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[Column] World of Warcraft: Play to Play for Free

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Comments

  • LordVeralLordVeral Member Posts: 2

    Some people have obviously read the article wrong...this is a quote from..the 4th(?) paragraph, second to last line: "Players do not set the buyout price" my guess is a few guys at blizzard are going to set an initial gold value for the $15 and as people buy/sell more of these tickets the price can go up or down.

     

    what blizzard needs to get right is obviously making sure that the players are unable to set the price because let's be real, on one server (I don't play wow so forgive me in case my "values" are what an average over-casual player can get in a few hours of not doing much or is impossible to get in 30 days) it could be 1k, on another server it could be 10k gold.

     

    now I a,so don't know how wildstar does it, since I don't play that either but as long as you're able to snag one of these with a bit of effort in 30 days (enough effort that said player needs to play for a majority of his/her 30 days at idk mid level? I have no idea how hard it is to lvl) this could also encourage new players to look for and make friends and for guilds to help out since for example if I decided to get it not long after this comes out or in a few months or w/e I'd have 30 days to level and farm for gold. Which seems like a pretty large task and what if I don't have time to play for 6 hours a day every day of the week? What if I really like the game? I would either have to resort to the forums or in game chat looking for guilds or people who wouldn't mind smashing faces with me every so often or giving tips to get from idk 1-50 in a day

     

    maybe I'm over exaggerating a little but the game is old, granted it has a new expansh and there are still a lot of people playing it (probably more than half the mmos I play) but if blizzard is making up a new way for people to be able to play, it seems to be in a bit of a decline

     

    but this also seems (maybe I'm overthinking shit) like a great way to bring some people a lil bit closer (of course ther will probably be an influx of people begging high level players for gold)

     

    TL;DR or I dont care about your opinion: "Players do not set the buyout price"

     

    oh and "Players do not set the buyout price" just in case you didn't see it "PLAYERS DO NOT SET THE BUYOUT PRICE"

     
  • tordurbartordurbar Member UncommonPosts: 421
    This is a very bad idea. I fail to see how Blizzard is going to make money on this. Retention? Stupid. The hard core players, who spend hours and hours in the game, are going to re-sub anyway. All this does is LOSE Blizzard money because the hard core players will be using their gold to buy time. Unless there is something that I am missing WOW is going to take a big profit hit in a few months after they start this. Once the profit falls you will see a lot less support, and fewer upgrades taking longer time. It has been said that only Blizzard will kill WOW and this is the first knife.
  • HorusraHorusra Member EpicPosts: 4,411
    Originally posted by tordurbar
    This is a very bad idea. I fail to see how Blizzard is going to make money on this. Retention? Stupid. The hard core players, who spend hours and hours in the game, are going to re-sub anyway. All this does is LOSE Blizzard money because the hard core players will be using their gold to buy time. Unless there is something that I am missing WOW is going to take a big profit hit in a few months after they start this. Once the profit falls you will see a lot less support, and fewer upgrades taking longer time. It has been said that only Blizzard will kill WOW and this is the first knife.

    Someone has to buy the token so no loss of money for Blizzard.

  • gervaise1gervaise1 Member EpicPosts: 6,919
    Originally posted by tordurbar
    This is a very bad idea. I fail to see how Blizzard is going to make money on this. Retention? Stupid. The hard core players, who spend hours and hours in the game, are going to re-sub anyway. All this does is LOSE Blizzard money because the hard core players will be using their gold to buy time. Unless there is something that I am missing WOW is going to take a big profit hit in a few months after they start this. Once the profit falls you will see a lot less support, and fewer upgrades taking longer time. It has been said that only Blizzard will kill WOW and this is the first knife.

    They won't and that is not their aim; think about what happens now:

    Consider 100 subscribers who pay Blizzard a $15 sub of whom a %, say 10, spend money, say $15, with a gold seller. 

    • Money to Blizzard $1500; money  to gold sellers $150; gold to players

    What Blizzard hopes is that in the future those 100 people will do the following: 90 buy a sub, 10 of whom want gold but instead of buying it from gold sellers they buy a token from Blizzard for $15 which is then sold on the AH for gold. The people who pay gold for the tokens don't need to sub.

    • Money to Blizzard $1350 + $150; money to gold sellers: $0; "value" to players: $150 (ten people save on a sub)

    So no loss of money to Blizzard; potentially a saving if the Customer Support hours spent chasing investigating bots and spam is reduced.

    Now that is the "all things being equal scenario": no impact on the game economy; 100% of people who buy gold buying it from Blizzard instead of gold sellers and ignores the fact that gold sellers are "sort of" players but that is the ideal. How it turns out in reality ... will probably be a few months before that is known.

  • gervaise1gervaise1 Member EpicPosts: 6,919
    Originally posted by Mothanos

    Gold seller website's have tremendous stockpiles of gold.

    If you think they wont inflate the prices of these tokens you are realy delusional.

    I expect high market manipulation

    Yes but - serious question - how and with what impact?

    As you say gold sellers could drive the "gold value" of tokens up so that no normal player could afford to buy them. And if they don't sell on the AH then people who want gold won't buy the tokens from Blizzard. They would do this by offering people more gold for their dollar but - assuming no change to the in-game economy - this should mean that they make less $$$.

    (Remember the tokens will be bound to the people who buy them so - once the gold sellers have paid their bot subs ! - the tokens they have will be useless.)

    Possible though. Steps Blizzard could take: provide some sort of guarantee to people who buy the tokens - if they don't sell then whatever (apologies if this is detailed somewhere). Offer tokens of less than 30 days. If gold sellers manage to double the gold value of a 30 day token introduce a 15 day token. And remember the gold seller has manipulated the gold price of the tokens by getting less $$$. 

     

    And the end game for gold sellers is not a good one. What if they do buy all the tokens that come on the AH? At the end of the day all that gives them is some soul bound game tokens; no real world money. 

  • HorusraHorusra Member EpicPosts: 4,411
    Originally posted by gervaise1
    Originally posted by Mothanos

    Gold seller website's have tremendous stockpiles of gold.

    If you think they wont inflate the prices of these tokens you are realy delusional.

    I expect high market manipulation

    Yes but - serious question - how and with what impact?

    As you say gold sellers could drive the "gold value" of tokens up so that no normal player could afford to buy them. And if they don't sell on the AH then people who want gold won't buy the tokens from Blizzard. They would do this by offering people more gold for their dollar but - assuming no change to the in-game economy - this should mean that they make less $$$.

    (Remember the tokens will be bound to the people who buy them so - once the gold sellers have paid their bot subs ! - the tokens they have will be useless.)

    Possible though. Steps Blizzard could take: provide some sort of guarantee to people who buy the tokens - if they don't sell then whatever (apologies if this is detailed somewhere). Offer tokens of less than 30 days. If gold sellers manage to double the gold value of a 30 day token introduce a 15 day token. And remember the gold seller has manipulated the gold price of the tokens by getting less $$$. 

     

    And the end game for gold sellers is not a good one. What if they do buy all the tokens that come on the AH? At the end of the day all that gives them is some soul bound game tokens; no real world money. 

    Blizzard is setting the prices to stop that kind of inflation.

  • ForgrimmForgrimm Member EpicPosts: 3,059
    Originally posted by Rhoklaw

    Obviously the person with the most gold in the game will attempt to corner the market. He will buy low and sell high until he's quadrupled his gold or token inventory. This style of subscription mechanic allows the rich to get richer and poor stay poor. Eve Online is proof of that.

    Or it could end up like ArcheAge with someone exploiting a dupe bug and completely screwing up the economy. I'm sure Blizzard won't let that ever happen though.

    Nope.

    Q: Can I resell a WoW Token after I’ve purchased it for gold?


    A: No, each WoW Token can only be sold once. After you purchase a Token for gold, it becomes Soulbound. At that point, it can only be redeemed for game time.

  • simmihisimmihi Member UncommonPosts: 709
    Originally posted by Horusra
    Originally posted by tordurbar
    This is a very bad idea. I fail to see how Blizzard is going to make money on this. Retention? Stupid. The hard core players, who spend hours and hours in the game, are going to re-sub anyway. All this does is LOSE Blizzard money because the hard core players will be using their gold to buy time. Unless there is something that I am missing WOW is going to take a big profit hit in a few months after they start this. Once the profit falls you will see a lot less support, and fewer upgrades taking longer time. It has been said that only Blizzard will kill WOW and this is the first knife.

    Someone has to buy the token so no loss of money for Blizzard.

    And it's also a hook for some people to re-sub: a friend who does not play WoW anymore told me that he's tempted by these tokens and that he thinks he'll be able to farm the sub every month. But first he has to re-sub - 15 bucks already gained by Blizzard here. If the price is too high, he will probably still stay subbed, one month with gold, the other with his real money - more money to Blizzard.

     

    This is definitely gonna bring more income to Blizzard, but gold has to have ingame value for the token sellers, so I'm expecting borderline pay-to-win stuff, like really really expensive heirloom-like items and who knows what.

  • HorusraHorusra Member EpicPosts: 4,411
    Originally posted by Forgrimm
    Originally posted by Rhoklaw

    Obviously the person with the most gold in the game will attempt to corner the market. He will buy low and sell high until he's quadrupled his gold or token inventory. This style of subscription mechanic allows the rich to get richer and poor stay poor. Eve Online is proof of that.

    Or it could end up like ArcheAge with someone exploiting a dupe bug and completely screwing up the economy. I'm sure Blizzard won't let that ever happen though.

    Nope.

    Q: Can I resell a WoW Token after I’ve purchased it for gold?


    A: No, each WoW Token can only be sold once. After you purchase a Token for gold, it becomes Soulbound. At that point, it can only be redeemed for game time.

    People need to read Blizzard's FAQ before posting here.  For better or worse Blizzard will be controlling this market by price and stopping resale.  You can not corner the market or inflate the price easily.  I am sure Blizzard will be able to monitor the purchase of the tokens and the buying of them in the AH to stop anyone gold farmers from trying to control he price of the token that Blizzard sets for the AH.

  • HorusraHorusra Member EpicPosts: 4,411
    Originally posted by simmihi
    Originally posted by Horusra
    Originally posted by tordurbar
    This is a very bad idea. I fail to see how Blizzard is going to make money on this. Retention? Stupid. The hard core players, who spend hours and hours in the game, are going to re-sub anyway. All this does is LOSE Blizzard money because the hard core players will be using their gold to buy time. Unless there is something that I am missing WOW is going to take a big profit hit in a few months after they start this. Once the profit falls you will see a lot less support, and fewer upgrades taking longer time. It has been said that only Blizzard will kill WOW and this is the first knife.

    Someone has to buy the token so no loss of money for Blizzard.

    And it's also a hook for some people to re-sub: a friend who does not play WoW anymore told me that he's tempted by these tokens and that he thinks he'll be able to farm the sub every month. But first he has to re-sub - 15 bucks already gained by Blizzard here. If the price is too high, he will probably still stay subbed, one month with gold, the other with his real money - more money to Blizzard.

     

    This is definitely gonna bring more income to Blizzard, but gold has to have ingame value for the token sellers, so I'm expecting borderline pay-to-win stuff, like really really expensive heirloom-like items and who knows what.

    They will do what they did in the past.  Mounts for gold.  pets...cosmetics...etc.

  • gervaise1gervaise1 Member EpicPosts: 6,919
    Originally posted by Voqar

    It's a dark day when Bliz abandons quality in favor of more profit when they're already drowning in cash from WoW.

    Blizzard sell tokens for $15 but these tokens - so Blizzard $15 up. Tokens are bought/sold on the AH. Person who buys the token uses the token instead of a sub - so Blizzard $15 down. Net gain / loss to Blizzard: zero.

    Now in the big scheme Blizzard may gain or lose some subs but at its core this is a "zero sum" scheme. A very public scheme targeted against gold sellers.

  • rodarinrodarin Member EpicPosts: 2,611

    And 4 million of those 5 million 'subs' are in Asia where people pay pennies to play the game.

     

    Regardless it will initially help them and it will be a huge boon to the game in regards to reactivating players who havent played in years. I suspect it will also sell a few Warlord of Draenor boxes and downloads as well. Last one I bought was Cata, but I logged in and I have Pandaria listed as where I am now, so I guess that one was free.

     

    I doubt it makes people stay any monger than they would if they were paying a sub, because as we all know free to play isnt the answer to player retention. If anything it makes it worse over the long haul.

     

    Looks to me like this is a quick cash grab by Blizzard to boost their earnings before they try and make some move somewhere.

  • gervaise1gervaise1 Member EpicPosts: 6,919
    Originally posted by Horusra

     

    Blizzard is setting the prices to stop that kind of inflation.

     

    Blizzard cannot dictate the price at which gold sellers charge on the internet however - so the comment about gold sellers trying to inflate the price was, imo, well made even if in the short term it could do them harm.

    If Blizzard "set the price" of a $15 token at 10k gold say and gold sellers offer 10k gold for $5; or 40k gold for $15 then the person buying the gold could use Blizzard but they may decide that the gold seller is "better value".

    My gut feel is that with this scheme Blizzard should be able to make things very hard for gold sellers - but its not as simple as "setting the price". 

     
     
  • HorusraHorusra Member EpicPosts: 4,411
    Originally posted by gervaise1
    Originally posted by Horusra

     

    Blizzard is setting the prices to stop that kind of inflation.

     

    Blizzard cannot dictate the price at which gold sellers charge on the internet however - so the comment about gold sellers trying to inflate the price was, imo, well made even if in the short term it could do them harm.

    If Blizzard "set the price" of a $15 token at 10k gold say and gold sellers offer 10k gold for $5; or 40k gold for $15 then the person buying the gold could use Blizzard but they may decide that the gold seller is "better value".

    My gut feel is that with this scheme Blizzard should be able to make things very hard for gold sellers - but its not as simple as "setting the price". 

     
     

    Illegal will always have better prices, but the fact I can buy a stolen car cheaper does not mean that many will flock to them instead of a legal dealer.

  • GeezerGamerGeezerGamer Member EpicPosts: 8,855

    It will be interesting to see what Blizz does with the game's economy going forward. I imagine gold itself will take a much more prominent role in WoW's economy now than it has in recent years. Blizz has spent years devaluating gold in the game favoring badges and tokens in an attempt to combat gold sellers. Now, they are going to want things to be worth gold. I'd also be willing to bet crafting is going to get a new lease on life soon.

  • HorusraHorusra Member EpicPosts: 4,411
    Garrisons take a pretty good amount of gold for casual players.  There is also the 100k gold mounts.  Heirlooms can be bought with gold for new players and alts.  If you like pet battle cash for bandages helps.  Other mount collecting from vendors.  There is stuff out there for casuals to need gold.
  • MerklynnMerklynn Member UncommonPosts: 100
    Wow is 10 years old so it's about time it stomps on some gold seller toes & make some very happy players even happier by putting their gold to good use. Of course spammers will go into overdrive trying to keep themselves going but I hope they all go belly up! Thanks Blizzard =)
  • daltaniousdaltanious Member UncommonPosts: 2,381
    Originally posted by Wighty
    So it Begins!

    ... destruction of Wow. :-(

  • ArthasmArthasm Member UncommonPosts: 785
    Thanks, Blizzard! I didn't know what to do with 4 million gold I got boosting people in CMs, now I just gonna buy subs for years! image
  • UhwopUhwop Member UncommonPosts: 1,791

     

    The most impressive part of the article is actually the comments, in particular the number of people who posted without even reading the article. 

     

    * Tokens are bound once purchased off the AH, no reselling.

    * The way it's written in the article it would seem players do not get a say in the price of the token on the AH, that will be set by blizzard. 

     

    When I first heard they would be doing this I wondered how in the world it would work in a 10 year old game that has experienced hyper inflation.  Players can purchase a ton of gold off of gold sellers for next to nothing, and those that don't buy gold have an enormous amount of gold reserves.  How exactly do they make it so that players who aren't sitting on 10 years, or hundreds of dollars worth of gold are able to purchase a token off the AH? 

     

    The players that would purchase the tokens for gold aren't clueless, they have a very good idea how much gold is circulating in WoW today, and they will expect to get a return equivalent to what they would get if buying from 3rd party sites.  AA is a great example of how gold sellers are able to impact sales of game time items; few people were buying APEX because you couldn't get near as much gold from them as you could the 3rd party sellers, and the players looking to buy APEX with gold couldn't afford them because the guys selling APEX for gold wanted an amount at least close to what they would get if they had spent the money at a 3rd party site.  Trion had to make it next to impossible for gold sellers to operate in AA to get APEX down to a reasonable price that people can afford, and drive of the value of gold so that the APEX sellers were getting their moneys worth. (Credit where credit is due, Trions efforts in fighting gold sellers is more noticeable in AA than any other MMO I've ever played.  Many of the gold selling sites regularly have no gold in stock, and they have to resort to convoluted methods of transferring the gold to the buyer.)

     

    A lot of words to say, if left to the players to decide how much gold a token is worth, tokens will be priced at a point that is not attainable without playing for a very long time for a lot of the WoW playerbase.  The game time tokens aren't worth much if you have to play for more than a month, or even near a month, just to be able to afford them. 

     

    If left to the players to set the prices, WoW will end up with a situation just like AA was experiencing about a month ago; it'll be cheaper to buy gold from a 3rd party site to buy a token than it is to pay a normal sub.  It'll result in tokens being purchased primarily by the guys who purchase gold, not guys that play for it. 

  • GravargGravarg Member UncommonPosts: 3,424
    The only problem I see is that Blizzard will be setting the in-game price. Haven't we learned by now that am economy where the governing body sets the price of goods never works...
  • UhwopUhwop Member UncommonPosts: 1,791
    Originally posted by Gravarg
    The only problem I see is that Blizzard will be setting the in-game price. Haven't we learned by now that am economy where the governing body sets the price of goods never works...

    10 year old game with an abundance of gold, gold that can be purchased in large quantities for cheap.  If left to the players to set the price, the tokens would end up selling for more than most people could afford within a few weeks, and become something that gold buyers purchase because it'll be cheaper than paying Blizzard a sub fee. 

     

    It's not a good system if you can buy gold for $11 and then use that gold to purchase a token that gives you 30 days of game time, or if only people who have been playing for several years can afford to buy the tokens with the gold they've amassed over time. 

     

    People having hundreds of thousands of gold isn't uncommon in WoW at this point, and they aren't the only people that Blizzard expects to buy tokens off the AH. 

  • UhwopUhwop Member UncommonPosts: 1,791
    Originally posted by MisterZebub
    Originally posted by Scot

    This hallmarks the way MMO's now think about the games economy. MMO designers are not thinking about how to have a better crafting system or better in game trading. All they think about is how the economy will relate to the cash shop. In WoW's case how it relates to its F2P element of Pay for Free.

    Agreed, but it also hallmarks how many players now also see the games economy. Some could say its conditioned response, or game companies banking on the excessive compulsive nature of some of the player base. Whatever the case the advent of cash shop items, even just vanity items, have given rise to a new type of player. You know the players who prefer to eschew crafting all together and just dump tons of money into lottery boxes and then make a huge pile of in game currency selling the rare shinnies they manage to get on the central auction house.

    As more MMOs move to this type of system the more game features like crafting become either something only done for your own character, or not bothered with at all.

    This has been a problem for near the entire life of the MMO genre, and has no correlation to the introduction of a cash shop.

     

    WoW crafting has never been central to the economy of the game, and has always been something you do more for yourself than to make money.  Alchemy in most MMO's is always the one form of crafting people will do for money, because it's usually the only craft where the item crafted doesn't exist for the life of an account. 

     

    Crafting systems are pointless in most MMO's for one reason, and one reason only, items exist for as long as the account those items are on exits.  It has nothing to do with cash shops, and everything to do with gamers being averse to the idea of losing an item. 

     

    In order for crafting to be meaningful, and important to a game economy, items need to have a life cycle.  There needs to be more than just a system of creation, you also need destruction to exist, and crafted items need to actually be as worthwhile to obtain as the things you farm in a dungeon. 

     

    Themeparks destroyed crafting in MMO's, not cash shops. 

  • Hashcow101Hashcow101 Member UncommonPosts: 105
    And the game is gooing to turn to shit blizzard is making a big mistake with this they have been on top for years now with current model why change now?

    "May Your Head Explode And Blood Swell From The Wound"
    - Hashcow

  • BladestromBladestrom Member UncommonPosts: 5,001
    They copied wildstar.

    rpg/mmorg history: Dun Darach>Bloodwych>Bards Tale 1-3>Eye of the beholder > Might and Magic 2,3,5 > FFVII> Baldur's Gate 1, 2 > Planescape Torment >Morrowind > WOW > oblivion > LOTR > Guild Wars (1900hrs elementalist) Vanguard. > GW2(1000 elementalist), Wildstar

    Now playing GW2, AOW 3, ESO, LOTR, Elite D

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