WoW since WotLK have introduced 3/4 major content updates in every expansion for free, some really full of new stuff, other not really.

every 18 months of so they release a Expansion that you have to pay to get it, price varies but it was about ￡35 in the uk to buy the last Xpac when it was released.

I'm also prefering subscriptions.
If I play the game I want to have access to absolutely everything and don't want to buy the rest of the game in the cash shop.
Having a subscription doesn't feel like getting "milked" by the developers.

WoW had a ridiculus system, subscription, shop and the TCG, that's what milking the customers really is...

so lets see

WoW - P2P - will not change anytime soon as long as they maintain such high levels of subscriptions, that would be suicide financially, does the game deserved to be P2P is debatable, as the Major updates are very far stretched between.

Rift - P2P - this is the prime example as how a P2P model should be run, they have Major content patches every 4/6 weeks, justifying the money you pay monthly for it.

SWTOR - F2P conversion - Major fail while it was P2P and its still failing as F2P

TSW - B2P Conversion - Low numbers while P2P but had a CS since release, conversion to B2P was the right choice, cause now they can maintain reasonable amount of players and they seem to be sticking to a major content update per month

LOTRO - F2P conversion - dint do very well as P2P, converted to F2P with a CS and recently just released their 4th Xpac, it indicates they doing well.

GW2 - B2P - 3 millions copies sold and as CS that sells basically nothing that is any good, well the Halloween costumes were pretty awesome ^^, and so far have introduced a major content update every month.


For me i would go either the Rift way if no CS or GW2 with CS

I would be okay with P2P if the expansions are free, and its a lower price like $10 a month.

People are always going on about no micro transactions, but as far as im concerned there can be one as long as it only sells Armor dyes

I hope it will be P2P, there is no better model that than.

Yeah and usually you get way better support and patchrates in return along with unbiased content that is made to be fun for as long as possible.

While in F2P/Microtransaction games you start off with truely abysmal support (hence most people don't notice how bad support in those games truely is), next to no new content (at least it is VERY little compared to P2P games or you have in addition to the microtransactions to actually pay for new content which boils down to being P2P again), P2W Cashgrabs and a lot of stupid feature decisions that are purely made because you have to make your players want to pay for microtransactions.

That said, I guess any model that is not a pure Buy to Play is a cashgrab. Thus I prefer the cashgrab that gives me the best playing experience in return and that still is the subscription model period.

Because if you pay ￡50 for the game and then ￡10 a month in 5 months you have paid double under a subscription scheme (And because it is only a nominal monthly sub it doesn't really make any difference to anyone, especially if you could afford to ￡50 in the first place), so they can do more development because they have more money.

Microtransactions are seemingly the fashion but that is only because most MMO's are failing to hit their subscription targets and are taking emergency measures quickly.

I dislike having to pay for expansions in WoW (Even though they were huge), but City of Heroes was a subscription based game and introduced lots of new content that was free, only the truly major expansions were paid for, and they were entirely optional (IE: Not forced on you by raising the level cap or excluding you from endgame).

I can't help but feel that people who are unhappy with subscriptions just want something for nothing. I know GW2 is subscription free but they are doing that in order to grab a portion of the market that won't play other MMO's - that market is not big enough to be worth fighting over in all honesty. And cash shops always have side effects, even if everything on those shops is cosmetic and no pay-to-win will ever appear in order to make those cosmetic items attractive they will make the in game gear less attractive because they will be relying on those transactions to earn the money that the subscriptions would bring in.

Subscriptions mean everyone pays equally and gets the same, microtransactions rely on a smaller number of players paying more then most, but those who don't pay get less, and frankly I don't want to get less, nor do I want to be one of those who they rely on to pay more.

B2P is the best model. If they also introduced Steam Workshop, so that custom armor or homes players make can be used in the game. Kinda like TF2 with the requirement to buy the game.

I cannot see that every making it into an MMO as gear is usually the motivation to keep playing.

guess you havent seen wow, its still plagued with bots,spammers and the likes even with all the money blizzard gets

maybe it will be like WoW or maybe like Guild Wars

I always find it interesting how gamers like to speculate on this topic. Unfortunately the payment method has already been determined, though it has not been announced. Ponder for a minute, a company spending millions of dollars, but not having a business plan on how to make that money back. Simply, it wouldn't happen. The folks at Zenimax HQ aren't going to give millions of dollars to someone without a clear way to make the money back with a profit. In fact, I wouldn't at all be suprised if there are multiple layers to revenue generation. Games today are very rarely just one revenue model. They're a combination of big and small revenue streams which lead back to the folks whom gave out the money in the first place.

So regardless of what the model is, be comfortable that you'll be able to afford to play. That there will be multiple ways and opportunities for you to hand over your money. Keep calm and carry on.

I hope it's P2P. GW2 kept me for like a month and had no really big patches or expansions to be excited for, while P2P brings in more money = more availability for large expansions etc.

The problem with P2P is the time restriction - you HAVE to put in a certain number of hours in the period you have paid for to get value for money. What if there are unforseen circumstances in the near future after paying the monthly sub which means you can't put in that time? Some of us don't like that pressure.

At least with B2P there is no such restriction - play when you like and how often you like.

hope its free to play, look at DOTA 2 its doing great with micromoneyz and its totally free

thank you for being so specific XD

Umm not to be rude, but DOTA 2 is a MOBA, it's a completely different style of game with completely different development costs, employee numbers and goals and just, well it's completely different to put it simply. DOTA 2 also only has a playerbase of about 400,000 currently.

ESO will not in a million years ever be free to play and thank god for it.

Also, DOTA 2 isn't even F2P, you need to buy it first therefore it's actually called B2P. It's also not done either.

I used to be a P2P or nothing player, myself. What changed my mind was simply thinking logically about all of the arguments, and realizing that none of them held water. It doesn't "keep out the rif-raf". Just look at WoW's community. It doesn't guarantee fresh content, either. I've seen P2P games that were terrible at releasing content (or even fixing bugs), and F2P games that were great at it. I've also seen vice versa. Great new content has far more to do with the company running the game than it has to do with the payment model, period. If the sub fee is supposed to pay for new content, then shouldn't you be getting a whole new game's worth of content every 4 months? Because that's how much you're paying. With the typical $15 per month sub, you have spent $60 in 4 months- the same as the cost of a whole other game.

That isn't to say that F2P is necessarily the best way to go, either. There are several different models of F2P, and lumping them altogether is a mistake. Some of them- mostly games that start out P2P and later convert because they can't maintain enough subs (EQ, SWTOR, AoC, to name a few) end up with a hybrid system that worse than everything else. They have severe restrictions on what races and classes you can play, how many characters you can have, and what content you can access, unless you pay the premium service- essentially, pay a subscription fee. That's often called the "freemium" system, and I HATE it.

Here's my biggest issue with P2P: Games that run P2P generally have an INSANE profit margin. I read an article that said that Blizzard makes an 80% margin on World of Warcraft. In other words, only 20% of what they take in for sub fees is needed to pay for EVERYTHING related to running the game: servers, bandwidth, staff, development, executive salaries, everything. The other 80% basically goes into Kotick's pocket. Now, I'm a free market kind of guy, and have no problem at all with a company making as much profit as it can. However, what that means is that we as consumers are WAY over-paying for that product, and it's simply because not enough people realize they could and should be getting a better deal. I personally am not paying for it, but enough other people are, so that companies which produce MMOs have no incentive to drop their sub prices. Why is it $15? Because that's what people will pay. It's as simple as that. They could easily run them just as well with $5 per month (and NO cash shop), and still have a reasonable profit margin. The only reason they don't is because demand is still high enough to justify the over-pricing.

I would have NO problem paying say $5-8 per month for a sub fee. That would be plenty of money to keep the game running smoothly, with plenty of content update, and still a rather hefty profit margin for the company. It's win-win-win. I think Trion has made some good strides in this area. While their monthly sub fee is $15 just like everyone else, they have discounts for buying large chunks of time. IIRC, I payed what amounted to roughly $8 per month for the time I played that game. That's perfectly reasonable, in my opinion.

I also think GW2 has a winning payment system. It's not perfect (my opinion), but it's closer than the vast majority of games out there.

I think ZOS's best bet will be to go with one of those systems: either B2P like GW2, or a discounted P2P (less than $10 per month).

It seems the payment models being contested could very well mirror the two different kind of players TESO is trying to cater to.

• P2P = MMORPG fanbase
  
• B2P = TES fanbase

While I understand the upside to P2P models, I really do, I'm a bit biased because I have no source of income because I'm horrible at finding jobs. But if I ever did have a job, I would probably be in that P2P crowd just because the average $10-$15 a month really isn't bad at all (as long as there's enough content update; if there's no major update by the time I've paid a single game's worth [about $60] then well a lot of people would be incredibly disappointed at the $30 mark anyway).

But GW2 really did show that you could make heaps of money with a B2P model and include a cash shop that isn't pay-to-win. Seriously, a cash shop that sells just cosmetics can make so much money it's ridiculous. Just look at hats in Team Fortress 2. RIDICULOUS.

So yeah, I guess I wouldn't mind whichever payment model is picked because by the time this game releases I'll have a steady flow of income. P2P seems to give the game more opportunities for huge updates. B2P will reel in more players (whether that is a good or bad thing, I don't know). At the end of the day, however, ZOS will still be making lots of money. I'm sure of that.

This.
I would prefer to get b2p instead of p2p as 2-3hours a week as p2p doesn't really give me much for what i'm paying for, especially if you have to buy the disk then pay monthly.

An MMO is a game that REQUIRES time though, unless you plan on playing for years and years and years and never put a second into anything new, there's really no point playing an MMO if you don't have the time for it.

Just got an E-mail from TOR wanting me to pre-order their poorly done content patch.

If I buy I get a title, a pet and a statue.

Please don't let ESO end up like this, whatever the decision is.

Just got the same Email, lol.

This is correct now i think of it, but its depending on the payment model it will have different outcomes and pro's/con's to the model they choose.

such as p2p more consistent player base and monthly income guaranteed.
And b2p for a book at once and helping people who (thinking of least insulting way which meaning to) who live busy active social lives.

but on the other hand, p2p can be good as for example i bought gw2 played 10 hours and thought it svcked alot, if it was p2p it would of just been ￡8-10 wasted instead of ￡50 i guess its a win and loss for each person.

So anyone playing an MMO has to spend endless hours on it? I don't see why....


Nope, you would have had to pay for the box as well, meaning ￡50 + ￡8-10.