Character Purchasing Scheme

(DB Genome editor) #1

Something Badman posted in the open forum got me wondering about how specific characters will be managed once the game goes live:

So far it was pretty clear that the following customizations would be purchase items:

[ul]
[li]
[/li][li]“Elite” skins which are effectively different models for existing characters (slightly different clothes and gear, like the Founders Mercs and the art concepts shown towards the end of the MS20 - General Art video)
[/li][li]
[/li][li]“Premium” skins which are re-color / re-texture on the original model meshes (as seen in several Character Art videos so far)
[/li][li]
[/li][li]“Gun” skins
[/li][/ul]
All of the above are cosmetic, so I don’t think anyone will have an issue with those coming with a price tag. But Badman’s post suggests that the characters themselves might be purchasable, which in turns implies that you won’t have access to all of them by default, and that’s where I’m a bit more concerned. Characters and their loadouts clearly affect gameplay and as such should ideally be kept outside of the monetization scheme lest we start going down the “pay-to-win” slope (unless we have extremely good balance between loadouts…).

So what is the plan for the various merc characters? Will all of them be available to everyone or be unlockable through in-game currency only (i.e. no real-life currency involved, play long enough and you’ll get them all) or will they need to be purchased? And in the latter case, will you at least get a complete set of the 5 classes right off the start? Will these be a predetermined fixed set (same for everyone) or will you get to pick one of each class from the available mercs?

So far we’ve seen very little concrete info on the monetization scheme, would be nice to start seeing part of that picture.

(Mustang) #2

Characters/mercs will be purchasable… you’ll just be able to unlock them through playing as well.

So pay for a fast unlock or play for a slow unlock.

Paying for convenience is not pay-to-win in my book, whereas if paying were the only option then it would be.

(INF3RN0) #3

I hope that they use a LoL style system with the load outs. Something I’d like to see is a grace period where all class load outs are available for play until around level 5-10, where in a player must choose which load out for each class they want. This way players can get a chance to test run all of the classes before choosing their initial favorites. After that some sort of in game currency can be earned and spent over time played to unlock the rest; or of course real money micro-transactions for loadout packs. Then I’d like to see a set of “free weekly loadouts” that rotates similar to LoL free week champs. At a certain point I expect DB will have a large number of load outs to choose from so this will help immensely to allow players to decide what new class they want to buy.

(Nail) #4

the founders mercs are exclusive remember

(Raviolay) #5

Considering the money most/some of us have put down just to test, I hope we the top tier paying founders get the mercs by default and only have to pay for cosmetic stuff. The money I have spent on this alpha is more than a year’s sub to WoW (not including cake:D), somehow I don’t think a hoodie, beanie, T-shirt & book cost that much to make. No doubt SD will make quite a large run of these items and give them away at trade shows near launch, although even in it’s current state it my most played game. Part of me thinks I should of waited for the open beta, I mean the game is F2P after all.

(tokamak) #6

Toka’s F2P Theory

(Mustang) #7

This or something similar has to happen, I think the try-before-you-buy mentality ties in very closely with the free-to-play one. Other games have done this as a training level/mission/area where you can test out everything, but then for the real games you’re limited to those that are unlocked.

Call me shallow but I actually enjoy the satisfaction that comes with achieving the unlocks through actually playing the game. Even starting with only 1 merc for 1 class would be fine for me, as long as the unlocks for the next few classes came fairly quickly, after than it could slow down, as long as it wasn’t a complete grind (for exampel c.100hrs for final merc vs c. 500hrs).

Again this is only me personally but I’m not a fan of unlocks that are only available by chance. I’d rather have a target to aim for (10,000xp, 50hrs, 3,000 headshots, whatever) rather than rely on chance alone. However if it were to unlock earlier by chance whilst I was working towards my target then I wouldn’t be butt hurt.

(tokamak) #8

Being butt hurt about it is part of the charm. It drives people to play more.

A good system has all possible combinations.

(Kl3ppy) #9

I like the unlock type of BF3. You need to reach a certain rank, kills with gun, xp of a class etc to unlock stuff.

As Mustang said, make the first merc unlock pretty fast but then raise the time/xp/whatever it needs to unlock them. Then you can decide wether you want to play to unlock them or if you want to pay for them. I think SD has some ideas already, maybe they can give a lil heads up about their plans.

(ailmanki) #10

[QUOTE=Shifty.;456948]I like the unlock type of BF3. You need to reach a certain rank, kills with gun, xp of a class etc to unlock stuff.

As Mustang said, make the first merc unlock pretty fast but then raise the time/xp/whatever it needs to unlock them. Then you can decide wether you want to play to unlock them or if you want to pay for them. I think SD has some ideas already, maybe they can give a lil heads up about their plans.[/QUOTE]

+1

I guess it would be better to limit the competition matches to certain loadouts - and then just have them all available - no matter if you unlocked it or not. And very cool would be to have team skins… like in sports.

(tokamak) #11

I’m still vehemently opposed to separating the competition from the rest of the game. It’s an admission of defeat, it’s conceding that there’s something wrong with the main game.

World of Tanks has a huge comp scene to the point of being an actual e-sport. Anything goes, premium tanks, promo tanks, limited-edition stuff etc. Anything. And that was BEFORE the devs decided to take exclusive financial advantages out of the game.

Here’s the thing. The exclusive financial content and the exclusive chance content doesn’t have to be an actual advantage. They can just be really exotic and wacky characters/gear, their value lies in novelty and entertainment rather than tactical validity.

A serious team wouldn’t like twice at actually using the content that you can’t obtain outside of the effort circle. But a team that may want to start incorporating fun bull**** into the games (koreans LOVE this) then they should be prepared to sift for the chance products or pay for the purchasable products.

Case in point: A Korean WoT team won an infamous match by holding their base with top tier tanks, undefeatable, they made the opposing team panic and leave their own base unguarded while a rare but extremely weak lower premium tank, easily crushed by anything bigger than itself, moved in and captured the base and won.

Totally unnecessary, highly prestigious and novel executed by a professional team that understands that you need more in an E-sport other than just winning.

(Kl3ppy) #12

I think what ailmanki menat was that the layouts should be the same to make sure that there is no op merc. As long as SD does really make DB a F2P and not a P2W game this concern shouldnt be a real issue. Also I think that we will play test all mercs. At the end, every merc should be balanced and you shouldnt get an advantage with buying a merc who is op.

(tokamak) #13

Of course! However, keeping this stuff separate means you’re admitting the main game is in some way or another P2W and therefore unfit for comp.

That doesn’t mean mercs can exist outside the sphere of effort. Mercs that can be purchased or won through luck are still easily possible. These mercs aren’t balanced, they’re just weird. They’re meant to clown and peacock around and to ridicule the other team.

WoT moved away from P2W, they admitted that it had P2W facets. Still they hold on to exclusive tanks. Tanks that are only available through payment or through (highly popular) special events. These tanks are historically valuable, collectors drool over them but gameplay wise sub-par.

(Kl3ppy) #14

Oh yes, I want DB to be a game without little to no differences between pub and comp dreams :smiley:

Of course rules should be different but the game itself should be the same, maybe take out some maps of the comp map pool but dont take out any guns/mercs

(OwNLY) #15

So i played this game called Firefall…
It´s still in beta, but you already have different “Mercs”.
Only the standart ones are available for Free, for the rest you have to play countless hours or - of course - pay.
Firefall is an FPS-MMO, so i doubt they will change much in the balance of the classes when it´s finished.
For the PvP everyone gets at least the free mercs fully leveled to be balanced.

There i see the problem for Dirty Bomb if it isnt perfectly balanced from the start.
Once it´s released and you have to pay for different soldiers,
you cannot change them anymore, or people who bought them will get really pissed of.
Also you cannot add more soldiers in the future, since this might throw the balance off.

And i don´t like the **** i see in modern military shooters like CoD or BF3,
where i have to pay full price for a game, then play it dozens of hours to unlock everything,
just to be able to play the game I ALREADY PAYED FULL PRICE FOR.
The worst thing is, even there you can pay for all the unlocks from the start.
I don´t like unlocking stuff. I bought it, i get everything from the start.

Seriously, who got this whole bull**** “unlocking in FPS games” idea?
I just want to pew pew, and not bother with the stupid ****ing rest!

(Kl3ppy) #16

Short reminder, db is Free to play :wink:

(MrFunkyFunk) #17

Yep, not a big fan of dragging unlocks but it’s a fact now: it keeps some playing a bit longer.
It just that sometimes you don’t want to spend countless times on unlocks to have your share of fun.
SD needs to earn money so I won’t hold a grudge against them because of time-consumming unlocks that can be bought asap, I just hope that in comp everything can automaticaly unlocked for diversity’s sake.
I’m fine with the skins market.

What I really can’t stand is the achievements craze we’ve been getting for less than a decade, like it’s something required for people to play, replay and enjoy the game (“ok so now I’ll focus on the “5000 nades suicide kills” one” ). It ends up, a lot, with players grinding them in public at the expense of others.

(OwNLY) #18

The term “play” is the problem here… i want pew pew, not neverending unlocks like a MMO.

(.FROST.) #19

I’m sure there’s still enough “pew, pew” for you between those unlocks :wink:

(spookify) #20

Founders skins/guns haha! Yeah!

Maybe continued cool stuff for founders also. Not just one and done…