Locking the new awesome T3 dodec station behind 50k arx is sad :(

[acoustic mist]

Don't mind it being a purchase you can do to fast-track a bit, but locking the content down? That crosses a line i think is sad. Such a cool addition otherwise, at least make it unlockable with like 10B credits.

or hell make something even cooler out of it, make it a squadron-owned station!

on another note, i love the new ship! :)

[rose wyvern]

Squadron only may be a good idea. I just disagree with fast-tracking and arx-only; That's pretty plainly p2w

[vale rune]

Locking the Dodec behind a paywall is so scummy! They couldn't just stick to the tried and true early access ships. They had to show their greed.

If they don't walk this back, I'm never buying arx again.

[radiant citrus]

Just make it part of game ffs mediocum of new content behind paywall is just evil lmao

[kindred tundra]

Make it at least early access. This p2w is not what we wanted to see in our game. Community already forgave you with EA for ships, but making OP content pay-walled...

[vale rune]

Exactly! It's abhorrent!

[mortal geode]

Early access like the ships, yes. I agree. Otherwise who knows what other type of gameplay will be locked behind a pay wall in the future.

[rose wyvern]

I consider EA a compromise even. This, too circumvented a cricial part of gameplay for new players.

[stable crane]

I agree wholeheartedly. This is NOT what we want. We wanna be able to access all features completely free if we want, even if that means putting in extra effort like paying a large sum of credits. To do otherwise is ant-consumer

[lethal lark]

FDev to quote you yourselves from one of your official posts in 2019: " ARX can only be used to buy cosmetic Game Extras and will not be used to introduce and acquire pay-to-win purchases."

This is breaking that promise. Do right by the community and at the very least make it early access period. Otherwise you'll be doing nothing more than showing the community that nothing you say can be trusted.

[daring onyx]

While I don’t mind the whole early access mechanic where you pay real money for early access to new ships. The reason why is eventually the general player will have access to it once it comes out of early access.
Having this station as Arx or real world money unlock only has me worried that this will go down the road of spending real world money for access to certain game mechanics. Since it’s mentioned that the station will have the human tech broker.
Especially since this new station is a little under $40 usd.

[pallid hawk]

It's been pretty clear for a while now that we have to accept a changing definition of what arx can be used for in order for fdev to prioritize new features. In the range of Scam Citizen to NMS, Elite is in the middle still closer to NMS.

[radiant citrus]

' It's bad but it's not star citizen bad ' isn't really a good statement

[pallid hawk]

Lol, the point is development stagnated vs new features is directly related to monetization

[radiant citrus]

alas I'd like to spend more arx, but there isn't much for me to spend arx on - cosmetics, there's simply not enough

[lethal lark]

Early Access at least still fit within said promise though, although was getting close to the line. But since it wasn't permanent it meant ARX wasn't the only way, your options were ARX or wait 3 months.

This being not a cosmetic means it should not be permanently behind ARX. That's the issue.

Their financial releases show they are more than profitable with the early access model, it isn't like they need to go further because EA wasn't enough, EA is keeping it profitable.

[pallid hawk]

Tbh i think stuff like this should be packaged as a dlc and give it for free for the like, 5 backers that paid for permanent free dlcs that still play the game

[lethal lark]

Like I don't care if it's 3 or maybe even 6 months given it's a station. The point is it shouldn't be forever. I'm also worried that if they're going to drop the "early" for this, who's to say they won't start dropping that for new ships too?

They can keep the 2019 promise by at least having an option be "wait a bit"

[pallid hawk]

I think the big idea behind the logic is anyone can use the station freely for what the game actually is – a flying spaceship game. Elite players being elite players have created a whole metagame around colonization that's now being broken since you can't have 'the best system ever' without paying for a tech broker.

But the question is should fdev respect the p2w aspect for all metagames we have invented

[daring onyx]

Did they say the station has better stats than say, Orbis or ocellus?

[lethal lark]

Yeah, this one isn't super egregious in and of itself, the issue and concern is how big of a red flag it is.

Early access was already the first step down the slippery slope, this removing of "early" is another. And we have no indication they aren't going to keep walking.

[pallid hawk]

That's speculation, i think the only unique part is the tech broker and the shape

[daring onyx]

No, I heard in the video. It would have better development level population, etc.

[pallid hawk]

It will increase those stats but would it increase those stats more than the existing t3s isn't clear to me

[daring onyx]

They were pretty vague on it.

[modest elk]

#nodec

[ionic shore]

they outright said it has better stats plus the techbroker, to be fair they only mentioned 2 of the stats being better

[hazy scarab]

The game has thousands of useless systems and tens of thousands of useless stations. In which no one has been for years.
When you colonize, you increase the number of useless systems and useless stations.
Introduce a new station, what does it give you?
Useless technobroker? Slightly improved orbis? What's the problem. Where is the money win here?
What do you lose if you don't buy it? Who will win this new station? Technobroker?

Now look what a company that pleases us with its game, but which is based to make a profit, will win?
Maybe finally they will hire a normal screenwriter who will understand the game and will understand what immense opportunities can be achieved by mixing the PP and BGS scenarios, involving squadrons and game factions in the process...
Maybe

[rose wyvern]

this means of making profit does not lead to engaging new gameplay, just more ways to make this type of sale

its not about the effect of the station

[hazy scarab]

Thank the gods that they started making a profit and players are getting new content. He is controversial, but he is.
These stations are a great option for profit. They don't change ANYTHING about the gameplay.

[ionic shore]

Depends.

If you colonise a single system in the middle of nowhere, yes, its useless and it may never be used outside of yourself.

However if you grab a nebula, or go somewhere else thats nice and build multiples of nice systems, you may attract a small handful of CMDRs.

Or if its a large community project, a somewhat "large" community flying around.

[rose wyvern]

"this worked without negative backlash, how else can we implement it?"
its really as simple as this

[hazy scarab]

You're playing sandbox. You entertain yourself.
If you want to have fun with colonization, great.
Someone will fly to you in the nebula, great.

Someone will fly to you in the nebula to visit a technobroker or admire a new station? NO

[ionic shore]

See, this will get me flamed.

Why just the dodech? Let us buy insta claims on the other ports as well with more customizations and priced appropriately.

Is it more p2w? Yes.

Does it keep ED alive longer and fund more development? Yes.

If you where getting a ship thats fully G5 and 25% higher in all stats then a normal ship for arx thats when its absolutely and wholly unacceptable.

But a station? Seriously bro, theres better things to complain about especially since the dodech is likely not perma paylocked anyway

[ionic shore]

Yeah, no they arent going for the station lmao

[hazy scarab]

Sorry, I lost your train of thought, or the translator gives me the wrong meaning of what was said. I'm not complaining about the station.
I don't see P2W in the station.
And that's what I'm writing about

[rose wyvern]

it's pay to skip (and unlock)

like in clash of clans

[ionic shore]

That part wasnt aimed at you dont worry

[ionic shore]

Technically so are early access ships, you get them early, you skip the buy costs, you skip rebuy costs

[rose wyvern]

I agree

[ionic shore]

Personally i believe skins are only able to fund the game so much, so as long as its truly not pay exclusive i dont care too much as long as costs arent absurdly high

[rose wyvern]

There are a lot of gameplay implications for even stock-fitted EA ships

if the cost of keeping the game alive is turning it into a gacha game then theres no point

Optional subscription rewards were mentioned in the general chat earlier as an alternative, there are many other things they could try that wouldn't have negative long term prospects for gameplay or player retention

[ionic shore]

Well something was apparently hinted at a premium subscription and people were angry about that as well

Theres a smaller part of the community that will be angry no matter what it is if it involves using real money to buy it

[rose wyvern]

There are ways a subscription could be implemented that wouldn't make sense to me either, I'm sure

[ionic shore]

Yeah, all in all unless its something like those asian MMO's where you have a combat advantage or hard stat advantage by soending money only....

I dont care.

If they sold the clipper with 2100 T and you could only get it with arx id be very hateful of it.

[rose wyvern]

Change happens a step at a time.

[ionic shore]

Or a python MK II with pacifiers that permanently have premium ammo effect on (and stacks with premium synth) thatd also piss me off

[rose wyvern]

Or any stock ship that lets new players completely skip the journey from sidewinder medium/large ship

[ionic shore]

Isnt that all prebuilts

[rose wyvern]

not even the prebuilts, the stock ones have this effect

my friend played for a day, bought a pmk2 on day 2, quit on day 3

[ionic shore]

Huh

I started in a sidey, got a cobra mk III (i think) and pissed off to sothis/ceos until i had admiral rank and a krait mk ii

[rose wyvern]

I think that's an important part of playing the game personally

[ionic shore]

Yeah, but nowdays people get setup with wmm or exo bio, get hundreds of mil then buy good ships and dont understand they need engineers done and quit cause they get sniped by a pirate god npc

Or they join a low cz and get their conda destroyed by an eagle

[rose wyvern]

Right there are ways to minmax if you look for them but having something far more accessible like buying a big ship let alone a pre-fitted one is a step above imo

I would have liked to see something like a rank based access to ship sizes. Nothing crazy, just enough to take new players through that journey from sidewinder to a capable, resourced pilot

[ionic shore]

These are all seperate issues though, i feel like we are derailing the point of this thread

[rose wyvern]

youre right

[leaden merlin]

They should make this purchasable with credits! Seriously, I need something to spend my creds on!

[summer swan]

#nopay2d12

[sturdy drift]

Frontier Communist Party 客户满意度 50k arx for station 抢先体验 Censor customer complaint

[slow idol]

This sets a bad precedent for functionality locked behind a paywall. The best solution is to just make i early access

[ionic shore]

this, it would solve all the outrage (ok no it wont because people hate having anything be available for cash)

[slow idol]

Yes but at least the exclusivity arguments falls apart

Or even better: separate station from the instant token. Sell station for 35k arx early access and instant token for 20k or something

Usable for any structure

[ionic shore]

and the token can be bought multiple times

[slow idol]

yup

[kindred tundra]

At least early access. If not, I think I'll really delete my character profile. If game is setting course to locking OP content behind constant paywall. I don't want to play the game and accidentally become a victim of their agressive greedy marketing.

[ionic shore]

though the token should absolutely scale in price to what you wanna instantly build

an outpost aint worth 20k arx

[pallid hawk]

So.. the solution to 'excessive monetization' is a feature that lets you spend unlimited amounts of money to instabuild everything.. wow.. just wow

[slow idol]

The issue here is the type of monetization, which is locking functionality behind a paywall

Paying to skip a grind is not the same as having to pay to be able to get something at all

[kindred tundra]

P2S is also P2W, but we already accepted it with Python mk2, so we can't go back.

Only thing that we can do is to stop them with total pay-wall of the OP content.

How to stop? Just don't pay them even a cent.

[median bronze]

I don't think it's possible to get people to boycott it.

[low orbit]

pay2skip will inevitably lead to grindier gameplay, to incentivize paying

[median bronze]

anyway, there is time until the 11th, they read everything that is happening here and understand the excitement of the community. Maybe something will change in politics during this time.

[mortal geode]

Have you ever seen them change their money-based decisions though?

[kindred tundra]

It is. Just talk about it and explain it why we should stop them now. If people don't want to get their customer self-respect destroyed, if they want to continue to get content for free at least after few month, we must do it.

[median bronze]

Let's start with the fact that the elite has been working with a different leadership for 2 years, which one way or another may act differently.

Still, I don't think you can buy a station just for arcs. You can buy an instant building - yes, it is possible. But restricting people from building for Credits is a questionable decision. Maybe they didn't put it that way?

[mortal geode]

There were stages to this. First it was the Python Free Access, then it was the Panther Clipper with the community goal which was P2W for a limited time and now this is Pay for Content if not Pay to Win. It does look like they are slowly taking steps in the wrong direction. It could be worse but if they keep at it they might ultimately end up creating paywall-blocked more powerful suits and on-foot weapons and superior combat-focused ships that will be as close to P2W as possible in Elite.

[median bronze]

Introducing ships only for ARX is an extremely bad idea. Unless they have the same characteristics as regular ships.

People love with their eyes, FD understood that. Because we saw a similar ship from Star Trek. I'm not against early access. But if there are other beautiful ships only for ARX, then they should not be better than others.

[mortal geode]

It feels like Fdev want to see if they can get away with it. They make the announcement on the 4th, the next level P2W content arrives just a week later on the 11th before players can realise what it even means for the future of the game and have the time to complain. And if they get away with it now, if people start paying for this exclusive Arx-only content, FDev may get newer, worse ideas for the future. Its not a bad idea for people to boycott, or at least continuously express their opposition to this new trend. And if FDev have made this decision somehow because they don't consider the new station being Arx-exclusive P2W it would be nice if they communicate - if they say, this is where we draw the line although for many this situation is not okay obviously.

[lavish hull]

I just come here to say "BOOOOOOOO". P2W now ? Sadge...

[compact lion]

Could be worse

[summer swan]

or this

[kindred tundra]

Know what's the difference?

You can buy all ships from this pack with in-game currency.

[kindred tundra]

Potato tanks my beloved 🥰

[summer swan]

exactly. Paywalling powercreep fits the definition of p2w. And it only gets worse from there.

[median bronze]

probably no one from English speakers will understand why potatoes are xD

[compact lion]

Don’t get me wrong I think this is the wrong path fdev is going down with this

It’s going take me long time to get them arks for free

Going to take me a year and half

[median bronze]

But all the ships there will be available for free in the game) Except for the rare modifications that are given at the events

[fluid birch]

Yeah, please don't do this FDEV, show you respond to feedback and recalibrate as an early access item

[median bronze]

I would understand that access to the station was opened from a certain technological level of the system.

[compact lion]

This game will never be out lol

[clever niche]

This is a bad move. Cosmetics behind a paywall is acceptable because that was the promise.
But a station with boosted stats and an exclusive feature (Tech Broker) is not. It is the thin end of the wedge.
“If you tolerate this your children will be next”…

[median bronze]

Yes, it is)

[kindred tundra]

We'll have Operations soon, who needs Squadron 42 anymore XD?

[median bronze]

And only the first chapter of how many is there

[compact lion]

Its not out the solo mode has been delayed by 10 years and there only 1 system and they just released 2 one it in early alpha at best people still can not sit down on bench’s

[median bronze]

Hamsters are still waiting....I got tired of waiting 5 years ago.

[slow idol]

To keep the thread on point, we can all agree the implied permanent monetization of the Dodec is bad and something has to change

[compact lion]

Just think that game has earned $800 million and they are still no closer after 13 years of development

[median bronze]

there are visible changes, but whether it's worth that much money is an open question.

[compact lion]

I think they have seen this on every platform so

[kindred tundra]

Yeah, I think we should stop comparing. With this type of monetization, Elite is not better than SC (or even worse...).

[compact lion]

I am not comparing

[stable crane]

i find it funny how this got censored btw 💀

[ionic shore]

Did he get banned

💀

[stable crane]

timed out for 24 hours and then left on his own accord

[ionic shore]

[minor patrol]

well they could make it an unshockable with the new game feature like steal blueprints they could also introduce new builds that ties with operations like blueprints for new ports and weapons.

[hollow lichen]

you could just play the game to gain arx ohh wait there is the 400 arx limit looks like i only need to play 125 weeks to gather the needed amount kinda pointless to use weeks lets use year shall we. 2.4 years to unlock the station GG fdev well played

and the community thinks the gankers are the bad guys

[rose wyvern]

p2acces and p2skip is no better than p2w

[hollow lichen]

in this case its all three you pay2access the right to build it then you can place one for free thats one hell of a pay2skip and you will have a better station with a techbroker i would say thats p2w

did fdev hired someone from ea or ubisoft or whats going on

[kindred tundra]

There are only two type of baddies in ED.

Hamsters and FDev marketing department.

[waxen pagoda]

I hope FDev will not push this under the rug and pretend it doesn't happen, but locking behind a paywall a massive station that boosts more than the T3s you can obtain is clearly in the P2W realm.

If you can unlock the Dodec in a way others mentioned in this post that doesn't require players to use irl money, be it have a limit per squadron, have it take a lot more commodities to build than your typical Orbis or heck make it costs as much as a Squadron FC.

But rn it's just adding P2W in a game where ARXs are used to get mostly cosmetics and pay to skip grind / wait time

[timber moss]

Imagine some rich guy buying alot of these and just sniping areas cause

[rose wyvern]

Player groups pooling money to create instant bubbles of faction owned systems are a possibility

[timber moss]

I just think this whole dodec thing is a massive mistake at least the monetization of it or at some failsafes like cool downs or something I dunno

[rose wyvern]

The station itself isn't really much of an impact on the game aside from some edgecases like above, it's more that positive reception of it by the players will lead to more and more of it

[timber moss]

Ye I just don't like the politics behind it

[rose wyvern]

fair

[timber moss]

I feel like there needs to be some. Balance or regulation on these types of paid stations

[summer swan]

we won, see forums

[stable crane]

Excellent news. Glad to see them backpedalling

[compact lion]

Now everyone buy arks to support them for doing this

[timber moss]

They never should have attempted this bs

Like what possessed them to go ahh this is de way and thought it was a good idea

[mortal geode]

Agree 1000%. I think the community needs to show support for this correction.

[summer swan]

i plan to buy a 100k arx package today or tomorrow even though i won't use the arx rn

[mortal geode]

Same here, Im gonna decorate my fleet among other things

[dusty quiver]

Excellent decision. Thank you fdev for listening

[acoustic mist]

Glad they listened, this is much better! Thank you frontier

[kindred tundra]

I think it can be closed now.