Terra Nova visited the issue of gaming as a social stigma today after an article on the subject in the UK Guardian.
Friday, 23 October 2009
Sunday, 11 October 2009
DDO: Paying for F2P: a cheapskate's perspective
I decided to pay some money for my free game.
I bought 5000 Turbine Points. They were at 10% off so I paid $49.99.
Now what's nice about this is
1) It's effectively a lifetime sub. I will earn more points by playing and I only buy adventure packs so any points I spend will be with me for good. $49.99 compares very favourably with the cost of a lifetime sub in Lotro or Champions Online, the two titles that offer that facility.
2) I double-dip the discount. 10% off my Turbine Points then I buy packs which are reduced. I just bought two packs at 35% off so the total discount is 41.5%
3) Spending money at the store upgrades me from F2P to Premium. This gives the following benefits:
Character slots: up to 4 per server from 2.
Queue: up to high priority from standard. I've never had to queue anyway.
Chat: up to unlimited from limited (although to be honest the limits were barely noticeable).
Auctions: up to 20 at a time from limited to one at a time (a very heavy restriction). (It says Unlimited in the chart here but Borror0 let me know it's 20 auctions for premium players. Thanks mate!).
Mail: up to unlimited from limited. Never did discover what the limits were, presumably you can't mass mail gold spam to strangers on free accounts)
Gold storage: up to unlimited from limited (although to be honest as a noob I was unlikely to hit the gold cap which is only in effect up to level 12 anyway).
Customer service: full for 45 days up from self-service online. (I've used the self-service once, when I couldn't log in to their forum and they fixed it pretty fast so can't say this is an issue)
Compendium: up to read/post from read only. (If I feel like helping them build their wiki).
Forums: up to read/post from read/limited posting. (It will be nice to be able to post outside of the F2P section. In particular the server forums are read only for F2P which is very restrictive).
So far I have the following balance sheet for Turbine Points:
Income:
Bought 5000
Earned through playing after a month: 996
Expenditure:
Tangleroot Gorge 358 (down from 550)
The Catacombs 200 (down from 250)
The Vale of Twilight 455 (down from 700)
Demon Sands 552 (down from 850)
Total 1565
Balance 4431
Between buying the packs when they are heavily discounted and earning more as I play I think I will have a very long way to go before I start getting low on points. I'll probably never get through them.
I bought 5000 Turbine Points. They were at 10% off so I paid $49.99.
Now what's nice about this is
1) It's effectively a lifetime sub. I will earn more points by playing and I only buy adventure packs so any points I spend will be with me for good. $49.99 compares very favourably with the cost of a lifetime sub in Lotro or Champions Online, the two titles that offer that facility.
2) I double-dip the discount. 10% off my Turbine Points then I buy packs which are reduced. I just bought two packs at 35% off so the total discount is 41.5%
3) Spending money at the store upgrades me from F2P to Premium. This gives the following benefits:
Character slots: up to 4 per server from 2.
Queue: up to high priority from standard. I've never had to queue anyway.
Chat: up to unlimited from limited (although to be honest the limits were barely noticeable).
Auctions: up to 20 at a time from limited to one at a time (a very heavy restriction). (It says Unlimited in the chart here but Borror0 let me know it's 20 auctions for premium players. Thanks mate!).
Mail: up to unlimited from limited. Never did discover what the limits were, presumably you can't mass mail gold spam to strangers on free accounts)
Gold storage: up to unlimited from limited (although to be honest as a noob I was unlikely to hit the gold cap which is only in effect up to level 12 anyway).
Customer service: full for 45 days up from self-service online. (I've used the self-service once, when I couldn't log in to their forum and they fixed it pretty fast so can't say this is an issue)
Compendium: up to read/post from read only. (If I feel like helping them build their wiki).
Forums: up to read/post from read/limited posting. (It will be nice to be able to post outside of the F2P section. In particular the server forums are read only for F2P which is very restrictive).
So far I have the following balance sheet for Turbine Points:
Income:
Bought 5000
Earned through playing after a month: 996
Expenditure:
Tangleroot Gorge 358 (down from 550)
The Catacombs 200 (down from 250)
The Vale of Twilight 455 (down from 700)
Demon Sands 552 (down from 850)
Total 1565
Balance 4431
Between buying the packs when they are heavily discounted and earning more as I play I think I will have a very long way to go before I start getting low on points. I'll probably never get through them.
Friday, 9 October 2009
DDO: The turbo favour Barb
Store points for the DDO item shop can be purchased or earned by favour.
There's a one off payout per server that roughly translates to get an alt to 50 favour on every server. (You can delete it afterwards if you like).
You also get a payment of 25 Turbine Points for every 100 favour earned.
You can earn this payment multiple times by zerging a new character to 100 favour then deleting it.
This is a look at a build designed to do that fast.
Race: Dwarf. Dwarves get enhancement bonuses to axe damage which is probably the most useful early game enhancement. Other useful enhancements include various saving throw bonuses, axe hit chance, Constitution and combat adjustments against certain creatures. It's a good collection.
Also starting with +2 Con and -2 Cha is useful.
Stats: 18 Strength, 18 Con, 10 Dex, rest leave at base. Hit stuff, don't die, nuff said.
Skills: Jump, Balance and Swim. All of these save time in the very early game. Later Swim becomes redundant when you get an item allowing underwater action but you'll be deleting the character before that and there's a lot of water on Korthos Island.
Feat: Toughness or Weapon Focus: Slashing. Toughness is nice because it allows you to pump the hit points with enhancements making a big difference in the early game.
So what are the strengths of the build?
1) Movement
Innate 10% move bonus, stacking +35% Sprint ability usable 5 times a rest and Expeditious Retreat from your Anger's Boots twice per day once you've done Redemption. This is a very very fast character.
2) Very high early game damage.
You're optimised for Great Axe and guess what the big weapon pushed at you in the early game is? That's right.
3) Burst damage
Many early instances only really have one nasty fight. Rage once per day is perfect for that.
Weaknesses
Worse saves and armour than some of the other options like Paladin. Tempting to play him like a zerging maniac in groups which might annoy others if you can't control yourself.
Strategy: skip The Grotto, then group if you can. If you can't find groups then zerg Korthos on normal, grabbing a cleric hireling as soon as you can.
You are looking for fast groups doing Elite instances where possible. Hard is ok. If they're doing Normal it won't be quicker to do it with them than it would solo.
You're zerging straight to the objective in your quest window. No point worrying about optionals, experience or chests. Just zerg straight there then finish out.
Keep an eye on your Favour count. It's quite easy with a character like this to lose track and grind to about 110 favour without noticing!
I can finish running one of these in an evening.
PS: take the Feather Fall cloak from the Redemption quest. Speeds up Misery's Peak quite a bit.
Update: you can now start at level 4 after you've ground out 1000 favour on a server (or buy this facility in the cash shop). It will be much quicker doing Turbo Favour Barbs if you start them at level 4.
There's a one off payout per server that roughly translates to get an alt to 50 favour on every server. (You can delete it afterwards if you like).
You also get a payment of 25 Turbine Points for every 100 favour earned.
You can earn this payment multiple times by zerging a new character to 100 favour then deleting it.
This is a look at a build designed to do that fast.
Race: Dwarf. Dwarves get enhancement bonuses to axe damage which is probably the most useful early game enhancement. Other useful enhancements include various saving throw bonuses, axe hit chance, Constitution and combat adjustments against certain creatures. It's a good collection.
Also starting with +2 Con and -2 Cha is useful.
Stats: 18 Strength, 18 Con, 10 Dex, rest leave at base. Hit stuff, don't die, nuff said.
Skills: Jump, Balance and Swim. All of these save time in the very early game. Later Swim becomes redundant when you get an item allowing underwater action but you'll be deleting the character before that and there's a lot of water on Korthos Island.
Feat: Toughness or Weapon Focus: Slashing. Toughness is nice because it allows you to pump the hit points with enhancements making a big difference in the early game.
So what are the strengths of the build?
1) Movement
Innate 10% move bonus, stacking +35% Sprint ability usable 5 times a rest and Expeditious Retreat from your Anger's Boots twice per day once you've done Redemption. This is a very very fast character.
2) Very high early game damage.
You're optimised for Great Axe and guess what the big weapon pushed at you in the early game is? That's right.
3) Burst damage
Many early instances only really have one nasty fight. Rage once per day is perfect for that.
Weaknesses
Worse saves and armour than some of the other options like Paladin. Tempting to play him like a zerging maniac in groups which might annoy others if you can't control yourself.
Strategy: skip The Grotto, then group if you can. If you can't find groups then zerg Korthos on normal, grabbing a cleric hireling as soon as you can.
You are looking for fast groups doing Elite instances where possible. Hard is ok. If they're doing Normal it won't be quicker to do it with them than it would solo.
You're zerging straight to the objective in your quest window. No point worrying about optionals, experience or chests. Just zerg straight there then finish out.
Keep an eye on your Favour count. It's quite easy with a character like this to lose track and grind to about 110 favour without noticing!
I can finish running one of these in an evening.
PS: take the Feather Fall cloak from the Redemption quest. Speeds up Misery's Peak quite a bit.
Update: you can now start at level 4 after you've ground out 1000 favour on a server (or buy this facility in the cash shop). It will be much quicker doing Turbo Favour Barbs if you start them at level 4.
Thursday, 8 October 2009
WoW: The economic game - a rant
I posted this on Klepsakovic's blog then I decided it might be of general interest. hadn't had a good rant for a while :-)
Ah but what's a "decent bit?"
Take Saronite. If it's over-farmed then the price drops to vendor price. Is the vendor price not a decent price? 25g for a stack of something you found for free while doing something else?
If you want to craft that Saronite into armour or whatever you need to follow market economics. Blacksmithing has always been a very badly designed profession from an economic point of view.
Apart from a few hot items like Truesteel everything on your recipe list is useless once you have skilled up. The value of things like Runed Copper Bracers is to skill up or to make one for yourself if you're a lowbie alt.
If people flood the market with the few good sellers (eg belt buckles) then it's bad for casually trading Blacksmiths but the casual guy didn't become a Blacksmith to make money. He picked it for the socket.
WoW has a terrible economy. It's always had a terrible economy. The only way it would not have a terrible economy is if people needed crafted gear for raids and top level pvp AND if gear gets destroyed. Those in turn are terrible choices to make when designing a game for raiding.
What interest there is to be had in WoW's economy is now being appropriated by hardcore players. Where once no one cared about gold now hitting the gold cap is a thing to brag about.
This really isn't any different from other areas of the game where hardcore players dominate. Hardcore pvpers win arena. Hardcore raiders dominate raiding.
The only reason this is a development is because it's a side of the game which was always trivial.
And you know what?
It still is trivial.
So if you're mainly a raider and you can no longer sell belt buckles just run a few dailies. Or grind some eternal fire in WG.
If you grind it you'll notice how little gold you actually need in the game - there's nothing to buy except fluff.
Ah but what's a "decent bit?"
Take Saronite. If it's over-farmed then the price drops to vendor price. Is the vendor price not a decent price? 25g for a stack of something you found for free while doing something else?
If you want to craft that Saronite into armour or whatever you need to follow market economics. Blacksmithing has always been a very badly designed profession from an economic point of view.
Apart from a few hot items like Truesteel everything on your recipe list is useless once you have skilled up. The value of things like Runed Copper Bracers is to skill up or to make one for yourself if you're a lowbie alt.
If people flood the market with the few good sellers (eg belt buckles) then it's bad for casually trading Blacksmiths but the casual guy didn't become a Blacksmith to make money. He picked it for the socket.
WoW has a terrible economy. It's always had a terrible economy. The only way it would not have a terrible economy is if people needed crafted gear for raids and top level pvp AND if gear gets destroyed. Those in turn are terrible choices to make when designing a game for raiding.
What interest there is to be had in WoW's economy is now being appropriated by hardcore players. Where once no one cared about gold now hitting the gold cap is a thing to brag about.
This really isn't any different from other areas of the game where hardcore players dominate. Hardcore pvpers win arena. Hardcore raiders dominate raiding.
The only reason this is a development is because it's a side of the game which was always trivial.
And you know what?
It still is trivial.
So if you're mainly a raider and you can no longer sell belt buckles just run a few dailies. Or grind some eternal fire in WG.
If you grind it you'll notice how little gold you actually need in the game - there's nothing to buy except fluff.
Eve Online: Margin trading - the basics
I'm heavily into the market in Eve (the auction house).
The way the market works there is by a kind of poll position system (to use a Formula One analogy).
Suppose I see that Shield Booster type Zs are being sold at 50k and bought for 10K. I put in a Sell Order for 49 999.99 and a Buy Order for 10 000.01.
I now have the dominant market position for this commodity.
It's perfectly possible and reasonable to take the dominant position in sales without worrying about purchases or vice versa.
Most people sort the listings by price. They will now find my order at the top if they want to sell and my other order at the top if they want to buy.
Until some other undercutter undercuts me all trade in Shield Booster Type Zs is mine and I make 40K per pair of buy and sell.
Eventually the margin will compress so that shields are being sold for 25k and bought for 24 900.
Before this happens I'll have jumped over to some other commodity with a nice wide margin and start trading in that.
I trade in a wide number of different commodities and don't always pair buy orders with sell orders on a given day. So one day I might be buying Shield Booster Type Z but I don't have any in stock to sell. Next day I'll be selling the ones that came in but may not necessarily buy them.
I also aim to review my orders daily. Twice daily would be more lucrative but that's increasing profit per month at the expense of profit per minute spent doing this. I don't want to spend a lot of time babysitting orders because I have better things to do with my life, both in Eve and out of it. Once a day is fine and it doesn't matter if you miss a day every now and then.
I generally undercut small. Deep undercutting is a strategy aimed at discouraging competitors by reducing or eliminating their profit (and my profit). It's always to some extent pyrrhic. In Eve you won't discourage anyone by trashing a market (unless they're idiots) since they can just hop over and trade in something else. The only people you may discourage are manufacturers and since I'm in the role of margin trading stuff that other players make or loot it's really not good policy to screw over my suppliers. I'd prefer they keep filling my orders with their hard work for me to make easy profits on!
Occasionally I'll vary my method from the small undercut.
If I see most people are selling at 50K but one guy is selling 1 of the item for 25k I'll assume it's exceptional and buy it, then list at 49 999.
If a market looks sold out I'll check the average price and if it normally sells for 50K but the only one listed is some outlier at 50 million I'll list my stuff based on some hefty proportion of the average. Say double or triple, so 100k-150k for something that normally sells at 50k but is currently sold out. There's no point undercutting the guy who has it up at a joke price, it's a listing that's only there to poison the data and won't sell.
I don't hold any sentimental attachments. If something has consistently been a good seller for me at 50K and I find lots of people listing it around 25k I'll get rid of my stock for 24 999 and find a new commodity to deal in. I don't think it's a good idea to hang on to stock because you hope it'll go up eventually unless you are very sure what you're doing (based on extensive data collection). So if you know there's a weekly cycle in missile prices maybe you buy in the week and sell at the weekend but that involves more work and more risk than just searching out things with huge margins.
I'm not worried about volumes. I'm quite happy to buy 200 of an obscure module because stuff at Jita always sells. I have never been stuck not even when I bought large quantities of items that seemed very obscure to me.
I think volumes will be more of an issue for traders who will use the upcoming iphone app. If you are checking your Eve sales from work twice an hour then you can trade in some huge volume commodity like Trit which will sell or get undercut within 15 minutes every time.
I don't think I'd ever want to go that route personally - I don't like playing games from work, puts me in the wrong headspace. I'm not really focussed on professional things if my mind is full of some game.
Still I think the app will encourage a lot of people to play while working and the only thing you can really do in Eve from your phone is day-trade or update skills.
The way the market works there is by a kind of poll position system (to use a Formula One analogy).
Suppose I see that Shield Booster type Zs are being sold at 50k and bought for 10K. I put in a Sell Order for 49 999.99 and a Buy Order for 10 000.01.
I now have the dominant market position for this commodity.
It's perfectly possible and reasonable to take the dominant position in sales without worrying about purchases or vice versa.
Most people sort the listings by price. They will now find my order at the top if they want to sell and my other order at the top if they want to buy.
Until some other undercutter undercuts me all trade in Shield Booster Type Zs is mine and I make 40K per pair of buy and sell.
Eventually the margin will compress so that shields are being sold for 25k and bought for 24 900.
Before this happens I'll have jumped over to some other commodity with a nice wide margin and start trading in that.
I trade in a wide number of different commodities and don't always pair buy orders with sell orders on a given day. So one day I might be buying Shield Booster Type Z but I don't have any in stock to sell. Next day I'll be selling the ones that came in but may not necessarily buy them.
I also aim to review my orders daily. Twice daily would be more lucrative but that's increasing profit per month at the expense of profit per minute spent doing this. I don't want to spend a lot of time babysitting orders because I have better things to do with my life, both in Eve and out of it. Once a day is fine and it doesn't matter if you miss a day every now and then.
I generally undercut small. Deep undercutting is a strategy aimed at discouraging competitors by reducing or eliminating their profit (and my profit). It's always to some extent pyrrhic. In Eve you won't discourage anyone by trashing a market (unless they're idiots) since they can just hop over and trade in something else. The only people you may discourage are manufacturers and since I'm in the role of margin trading stuff that other players make or loot it's really not good policy to screw over my suppliers. I'd prefer they keep filling my orders with their hard work for me to make easy profits on!
Occasionally I'll vary my method from the small undercut.
If I see most people are selling at 50K but one guy is selling 1 of the item for 25k I'll assume it's exceptional and buy it, then list at 49 999.
If a market looks sold out I'll check the average price and if it normally sells for 50K but the only one listed is some outlier at 50 million I'll list my stuff based on some hefty proportion of the average. Say double or triple, so 100k-150k for something that normally sells at 50k but is currently sold out. There's no point undercutting the guy who has it up at a joke price, it's a listing that's only there to poison the data and won't sell.
I don't hold any sentimental attachments. If something has consistently been a good seller for me at 50K and I find lots of people listing it around 25k I'll get rid of my stock for 24 999 and find a new commodity to deal in. I don't think it's a good idea to hang on to stock because you hope it'll go up eventually unless you are very sure what you're doing (based on extensive data collection). So if you know there's a weekly cycle in missile prices maybe you buy in the week and sell at the weekend but that involves more work and more risk than just searching out things with huge margins.
I'm not worried about volumes. I'm quite happy to buy 200 of an obscure module because stuff at Jita always sells. I have never been stuck not even when I bought large quantities of items that seemed very obscure to me.
I think volumes will be more of an issue for traders who will use the upcoming iphone app. If you are checking your Eve sales from work twice an hour then you can trade in some huge volume commodity like Trit which will sell or get undercut within 15 minutes every time.
I don't think I'd ever want to go that route personally - I don't like playing games from work, puts me in the wrong headspace. I'm not really focussed on professional things if my mind is full of some game.
Still I think the app will encourage a lot of people to play while working and the only thing you can really do in Eve from your phone is day-trade or update skills.
Friday, 2 October 2009
DDO: Codemasters fight back!
The launch of DDO: Eberron Unlimited has created a huge interest in DDO. However the European version of the game, run by Codemasters, decided to stay pay-to-play.
On the face of it it seems utterly unworkable to have two versions of the game, one which is free, one which requires a monthly sub.
Codemasters yesterday attempted to regain some of the lost ground:
- they are giving all former players a free week. Not current players it seems from the wording of the press release which is somewhat absurd.
- they are upping the exp gain by 25% across the board.
Now the free week is pretty standard across the industry now. It's pretty obvious that people who used to play who are casually wondering if they would have fun are considerably deterred from trying an old game they used to play by a sub requirement.
The exp boost is fascinating though.
You see I see playing the levelling side of the game as the main meat of the product. This is certainly what made WoW successful 5 years ago - an excellent levelling game. Eve quite deliberately drags it out infinitely - I don't think anyone has maxxed every skill. AoC's Tortage was miles better than the end-game raids when I played it. And in DDO the vast majority of content is not aimed at the level cap.
But for some players reaching max level is high priority. Exp potions are listed as one of the main Bestsellers in the DDO free version's item store. And that brings us round to the offer from Codemasters - you may be better off paying a monthly sub to always have +25% exp than playing a free-to-play game where you are spending a lot of real money on levelling boosting potions.
On the face of it it seems utterly unworkable to have two versions of the game, one which is free, one which requires a monthly sub.
Codemasters yesterday attempted to regain some of the lost ground:
- they are giving all former players a free week. Not current players it seems from the wording of the press release which is somewhat absurd.
- they are upping the exp gain by 25% across the board.
Now the free week is pretty standard across the industry now. It's pretty obvious that people who used to play who are casually wondering if they would have fun are considerably deterred from trying an old game they used to play by a sub requirement.
The exp boost is fascinating though.
You see I see playing the levelling side of the game as the main meat of the product. This is certainly what made WoW successful 5 years ago - an excellent levelling game. Eve quite deliberately drags it out infinitely - I don't think anyone has maxxed every skill. AoC's Tortage was miles better than the end-game raids when I played it. And in DDO the vast majority of content is not aimed at the level cap.
But for some players reaching max level is high priority. Exp potions are listed as one of the main Bestsellers in the DDO free version's item store. And that brings us round to the offer from Codemasters - you may be better off paying a monthly sub to always have +25% exp than playing a free-to-play game where you are spending a lot of real money on levelling boosting potions.
MMOs: Pacing
Psychochild opened a topic on Peaks and Troughs and the way modern MMO game design is aimed at making every moment exciting. He wonders if we've lost something.
The effect for me is that I'm tending to find the games more enjoyable but the people less enjoyable as things dumb down.
I miss most of the old school pacing mechanics because I think we've lost a lot of the social side of MMOs with the improved gameplay.
I was quite frustrated earlier this year how passive our guild members were in my WOW raid guild. No one would help recruit despite us repeatingly asking them to. It left me with the feeling people found it vaguely distasteful, as if the restaurant you eat a meal in asks you to wash up after.
Gameplay-wise things are getting better and better.
I can see it reaching the ultimate stage in SWTOR when I think I may simply turn off all chat channels and disable tells and just enjoy the storylines.
I do find myself however drawing away from that to more social games. Eve is social because it's scary to do anything alone outside of high sec although I'm in a solo cash-building phase for now. DDO is social because it's very old-school group-based play but I do find myself preferring characters that can solo on easier dungeon settings when I can't find or don't want a group.
The effect for me is that I'm tending to find the games more enjoyable but the people less enjoyable as things dumb down.
I miss most of the old school pacing mechanics because I think we've lost a lot of the social side of MMOs with the improved gameplay.
I was quite frustrated earlier this year how passive our guild members were in my WOW raid guild. No one would help recruit despite us repeatingly asking them to. It left me with the feeling people found it vaguely distasteful, as if the restaurant you eat a meal in asks you to wash up after.
Gameplay-wise things are getting better and better.
I can see it reaching the ultimate stage in SWTOR when I think I may simply turn off all chat channels and disable tells and just enjoy the storylines.
I do find myself however drawing away from that to more social games. Eve is social because it's scary to do anything alone outside of high sec although I'm in a solo cash-building phase for now. DDO is social because it's very old-school group-based play but I do find myself preferring characters that can solo on easier dungeon settings when I can't find or don't want a group.
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It's about sex.
When game designers (or even game academics) become the kind of superstars women want to date it won't be a stigma.
It's already happened to Football. When I grew up in the UK people who actually went to stand in the rain on a Saturday afternoon were called "anoraks" (a pejorative term akin to "nerd", also a kind of coat worn by sad nerds who stand in the rain on Saturday afternoon watching football or spotting trains) and mocked. Then once footballers started getting huge pay packets and appearing on random TV as celebrities they became sex symbols ultimately leading to the phenomenon known as David Beckham.
In thirty years time female fashion icons will be looking for game designers to marry. Non-gamers will be misusing gamer jargon at parties to get laid.
Don't believe me?
Compare and contrast these two images:
This is the image of a modern game designer:
http://www.ctrlaltdel-online.com/comic.php?d=20090916
This is the image of a successful woman
http://www.vogue.co.uk/blogs/the-vogue-blog/
Are they not two worlds on a collision course?