Things that should be available for Platinum/Credits (and Equipment Overhaul Suggestion)

[MJ12]

Things you should be able to buy with Platinum/Credits but can't right now:

1. Drop Rate Enhancers (increase the chance dudes will drop resources and blueprints): Definitely a must for farmers who want to build their own Warframes. Probably a Platinum-only item.

2. Crafting Resources: I think you should be able to buy crafting resources on the market for credits. Common ones may cost like... 500 a unit, uncommon ones (like rubedo) 5000 a unit, and rare ones 50,000-100,000 a unit. This would be really convenient for the people who are awash in cash but are having bad drop luck.

3. Minor Edge Items. I posted in the "pay to win" thread a while back about what Battlefield: Heroes and its developers concluded about "pay to win" items and how they should work. The gist of it is, a pay to win item should never be so obviously powerful that people know they're being outclassed because of them. So here's some suggestions foritems which I think do fit that bill of providing bonuses but don't actually overshadow skill or ingame loot that you find/buy with credits:

-Ammunition Bandoliers (Extra weapon ammo)

-Ammunition Efficiency Enhancers (Extra ammo from pickups)

-Dexterity Augmentation (Faster weapon switching/recovery from melee attacks)

-Balance Augmentation (Recover faster from stagger/cannot be knocked down)

-Hostile Environment Hardening (Don't take damage from standing in fires, don't lose shields to cryo hazards, don't take damage from vacuum)

-Recoil Compensators (Reduced weapon kick)

And so on and so forth. All of these provide benefits but they're not terribly obvious (good) and they're not so good as to be must-haves (better).

Alternatively, one could overhaul the Equipment you can bring into a mission. Right now, you can bring in 8 items, which have to be consumables. I would suggest dropping that to 4 or even 2 slots, and having passive gear available as an alternative. Things like Heals would now stack up to 4x in one slot, and you could have things that give, say, +10% shields, +10% melee damage, +10% movement speed, +5% critical chance, +50% headshot damage, or whathaveyou in them.

[Nihiler]

I like this a lot. Im of the opinion that locking players out of basic functionality of characters is bad business. However, consmetic items, customization options, quality of life enhancements, and minor boosts to periferal functionality are all things that, in past games, have been monetized effectively without infringeing on the core gameplay of the user.

I've bee playing a lot of these freemium games lately, and i gotta say: the one thing that almost always gets me to break out the wallet, is the cosmetic items, and what ive come to call "Pay 2 Not Grind." League of legends, Planetside, and MWO all do a pretty good job in this respect (though i gotta say, the pricing in MWO is kinda crazy.) They dont lock the player out of any of the core functionality of the game. All the characters/classes/mechs all work just the same whether you buy them for soft currency, or hard premium currency, but having that extra skin, or a cool helmet, or a fancy paint sceme for you tools of destruction are almost always limited to those who want to pay real money for them. And people do pay for them.

I do find it hard to understand the logic behind the "Pro" version of a weapon, and the base version. Things like this shouldnt cost money, or should at least have a way of being unlocked through the core gameplay. Perhaps a blueprint for a pro upgrade that you need to farm materials for? Or maybe just by using it up to max level without pro unlocks those final little squares of power for us? How 'bout a log in reward that lets us upgrade one item to pro status? Im perfectly fine with all of these. I just dont think its right to section off our effectiveness behind a pay gate, even if we do get some starter currency.

Edited January 4, 2013 by Strik1101