This week is the all mighty and powerful E3. And in good old E3 Fashion… they get to see the fun stuff first. PCGamer has done us a service by posting some great news on F2P Turbine Store Items! See their article which includes some (blurry) pictures of the store items!
These are just a few items in the store, and this should give you an idea of the types of things we’ll be seeing! For those of you actively invited to Free to Play Beta, you’re already seeing this, so you know more than we do!
Gift of Lesser Innocence
“Provides the user with a temporary +1 bonus to their Innocence Virtue Rank for one hour.”
Alternatively, players can purchase a permanent boost to virtue
Price: 35 Points – about $0.50
Greater Tome of Deed Acceleration
“Accelerates the rate at which you complete slayer deeds. Deeds for Skirmish lieutenants are not accelerated by this item.”
There will be different tomes for different level characters, but it should double the rate that you complete the slayer deeds
Price: 300 Points – about $4.50
Map to the Misty Mountains
”Using this map will transport you to the Misty Mountains, located in the Trollshaws. Maps may only be used once per hour.”
Not all maps will be reusable and you’ll need to visit each city once before you’re eligible to buy the map to teleport there.
Price: 100 Points – about $1.50
Analysis and Prediction
So with this release of information we find ourselves asking a few simple but important questions, as well as coming to some very positive conclusions!
First off, the presence of a "Deed" helper shows that Turbine is trying to help with the long grinds players face during achievement and trait building. This $4.50(ish) price point gives us a good idea of what types of "Grind Helpers" we are in for. The best part about this item is that in no way can it hurt either the economy or the player who uses it! It doesn’t break Lore or cause a conflict between Freep and Creep classes. In the simplest form, this is a great item to have on the market.
Second, we see the Gift of Lesser Innocence. This item is for those who just really, really don’t want to deal with grinding out a deed, and would rather just temporarily boost that up. We are unsure at this point whether this could be used to push a deed past its basic limit (10 being the current max). At $0.50, this little bonus would be great for those who are lacking a desired trait and just want a little "umpf" for a short time.
Finally, the Map to the Misty Mountains! It is unclear at this time whether all regions of the game will have maps available, but the presence of even a single location is hope enough for me. This item will help to take the edge off simple things like Daily IXP Rune Bounties or questing.
With the basic currency layout we have been shown here, you can calculate that every 100 Turbine Point is worth around $1.50. That means that VIP members are receiving $7.50 worth of Turbine points each month. If you figure in that you’re spending around $10 a month for a VIP Subscription, I can’t see how this is will work out to be a bad thing at all! In fact, if you figure in the amount of points players will receive as a bonus when F2P launches the average player will get more than 2 months worth of game time in Turbine Points!
From what DDO’s Store can tell us, combined with this new bit of information the overall outlook for myself and many other is that Turbine is taking the time to listen to player input on issues (Like needing a hunter to get around anywhere quickly!) and using these items to help fix the issue. For those of you saying "Well, they should just give us these things for free!" – Get over it. Life isn’t free, and the Turbine LOTRO Store isn’t going to be any different.
The F2P announcement may be the end of some player’s worlds, but this news has only helped to grow my faith that Turbine is looking out for players more than than a few coin in their pocket.
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June 16, 2010 at 8:59 am
Looks really nice. I especially like the boost to increase the rate of slayer deeds.
June 16, 2010 at 9:04 am
Just curious, is the Deed acceleration a permanent boost or temporary? If it’s only for a short while I don’t know if it’s really worth 300 points…
June 16, 2010 at 9:27 am
The increase in the rate of slayer deed completion bothers me the most. To me, the slayer deeds are part of the game design, that for some reason was designed to be annoying and tedious. Instead of coming up with a better game design, they’re letting people pay money to lessen the annoyance of part of the game.
June 16, 2010 at 9:35 am
This looks promising! I would definitely spend the points I’m getting monthly, as part of my subscription, on something like the slayer deed speeder-upper. Those deeds are a genuine pain in the butt so getting to burn through it faster for free (or at least, per the price of my sub) sounds great!
In response to what Poinky said, I think this is totally fair because it’s not one of those things where the “rich” get an advantage over the “poor” (or at least those who don’t want to spend extra money) because the F2P people have to pay ala cart anyway and subscribers are getting “free” points to purchase stuff like this as well.
I do agree that there could/should be a better system to advance traits than a meaningless grind, though. I just don’t know what that is.
June 16, 2010 at 10:03 am
I decided a long while ago not to sign up for F2P. If I earn points by doing nothing, than yay but I just couldn’t get around some of the stuff that was going to change.
After looking over some of the cash shop items my feelings have not changed. I don’t use the innocence virtue trait, I don’t mind grinding out slayer deeds (I work skill usage that way), as a hunter I have enough ports to anywhere I want to go, etc.
June 16, 2010 at 11:23 am
@Isilwren… reserve your judgement of the store and of Lotro F2P. These are 3 of 2500+ items that will be in the store, and these are likely from the beta (and may change) from now to then.
June 16, 2010 at 1:51 pm
@Korbinn
Well, as I see it, most of these incentives are aimed at getting new members interested in the game. I’m already interested. If I wasn’t I would have quit the game three months into it.
Personally, I don’t mind working for the stuff I want to get because that virture/trait or cosmetic item ends up meaning more to me in the end. Also, there are already so many wonderful cosmetic (and non-cosmetic) items in-game.
If I did change my mind it would have to be because of something really big – none of which I have seen so far from this deal. Personally, I wish they would have spent more time on expanding the game than going F2P.
June 16, 2010 at 11:05 am
These are right along the line of things that I was hoping to see in the store. Useful things that aren’t necessary to play, especially the slayer deed speed ‘em up.
In response to Poinky, it fits the definition of convince item. Yes it is a little annoying to see that what I did the long way someone else will have the chance to have an easier route to the same reward, but turbine is there to make money and this is an item that will sell. People can either do it the long annoying way or pay a bit and have a shorter less annoying route.
However you can be sure that if this option was available when I ground these deeds initially that I would have bought this. And I will buy this for all my alts to use depending on how long the boost lasts. It’s worth it IMO.
June 16, 2010 at 11:13 am
I do want to add, that I don’t like the idea of being able to purchase a permanent increase to a virtue. Thats not what falls into the convince item category in my mind. It’s paying to increase a stat. I NO LIKES THAT!
June 16, 2010 at 11:26 am
@Callist – As long as that in store item doesn’t allow you to go to a level 11 in a virtue stat (i.e. be better than someone else) then it is merely a convenience item. Some of those level 10 virtue traits are incredibly time consuming, and I welcome the ability to use points for them.
June 17, 2010 at 1:34 pm
@ Korbinn
I am going to reserve judgement, but I see only a shade of gray difference between purchasing a virtue and purchasing a level. Maybe, once per day I could spend $5 and jump up a level or two… Then I could buy the virtues I missed, because I was not actually doing anything to level.
I just see the whole store system as a slippery slope to places I don’t want to see the game go. I hope turbine is careful about it and does not let it get out of hand. We will see.
June 16, 2010 at 1:16 pm
I do think if there is anything in the store (and in the purchasable “unlocks” in general) that concerns me a little, it is the virtues and traits.
Obviously, I still need to see more information on how things are planned, but it does seem to be the one thing where you are directly buying stats. One of the cash shop fears I see mentioned often is the “someone with more money can just buy the best items and have a more powerful character”. I trust Turbine to keep the good armour and weapons out of the store, but I have a hard time wrapping my head around the purchase of trait slots or, in this case, direct upgrades to virtues.
For the most part I do agree that it is a convenience item in that it saves time for something I can do in the game without any store purchase, but once you look at things that way, will there also be purchases that will allow me to skip past some of the faction levels on the way to Kindred?
I am keeping an eye on things like this and hope to get into the beta at some point to see how the store evolves.
June 16, 2010 at 1:29 pm
I have zero interest in grinding most virtues so I would gladly pay to max certain ones out.
June 16, 2010 at 7:45 pm
I love the ports, but I have a feeling the permanent virtue buffs will create a lot of commotion on the forums. I think this links in well to my post on “power leveling” so for me I’m quite happy about it but I will admit I’m not sure it is the best thing for the game.