Yes before all the flame starts, I am proposing a change to the Free 2 Play possibility within Star Sonata. Feel free to comment or point out mistakes in my suggestion, as long as it is constructive towards the thread.

First of all, I believe that the free 2 players have been given way to much possibilities within this game. They can pretty much do roughly 75% of the games content, and are only withhold from the endgame content.

Being skill capped at 18? alone is not enough, This means that the only difference between a F2P and a P2P skill wise is would be a grand total of 3 skill levels. The maximum should be around 10, which is roughly half of the available skill levels. This would allow them to try out the game to a certain extend, and yet be limited to a lot of the content.

Also another troubling fact is that F2P cannot PVP, Yet they are able to build fully functional bases in EF space. I believe that this is quite stupid to be frank.

As you can see this all is quite a lot for something that is not limited by a time trail.


TL;DR

These free 2 players take up server bandwidth and cost money, instead of producing it. While i agree that they should have the ability to enjoy and try out the game. Right now its similar to them eating in an all you can eat buffet. Where you only have to pay for the deserts. Yet those free 2 players walk out, leave a big mess, and never eat the bloody deserts!

To ensure readability i have decided to post in white.

Going from T18 to T21 takes significantly more time than going from T0 to T18.

/signed

Also, F2P cannot do anything in Wild/Perilous Space, and they cannot build bases.

Saying that F2P experience 75% of the game is inaccurate. It's a lot less than that.

Yes they still can.

Ah, my mistake then.

Im a bit outdated about this but as far as I remember the idea was to not allow them to build bases and not to use slaves.

Celestial garden should be the only place where they can build bases unless something has changed since I left.

That they can reach high levels and get skills up to 18 is ok with me since they are limited in where they can go etc.

change em back to c1 -.-
maybe raise lvl cap to 50 orso, but not too high. f2p was good as it was. now they have too much freedom.

Something like this has to be grounded in hard data. How many F2P are out there over level 100? How many actually own bases and how many trade slaves?
The impression I've been given is that most of the server load that is affected at all by the playerbase is due to bases and trade slaves. While trade slaves are theoretically unlimited, the crappiness and small size of celestial gardens strictly limits the number of player bases F2Ps can build to a number well below 10% of what the P2P population does build.

tl;dr: My understanding is that F2P's represent a minor fraction of the server load, even with their expanded abilities.

Many different games have been moving to F2P. Before, Star sonata's F2P was a joke. Mostly intended for advertising purposes I think. Furthering these limitations with as much competition as there is I dont think would be a very good idea. The Levels seem fair, they allow the player to experience enough to allow them to love it... while maintaining many reasons why they would want to p2p. All in all I would have to say it was one of the wisest choices I have seen in terms of advertising but im no omnipotent being.

Im very updated on F2P seeing how i am one, curent limitations:
Skills, all that exist whitin Wild,Cele,EF space
Combat: PvAI Cele, EF space
PvP: DG, Special gals, Colo
Defenceless traveling: Wildspace
Base building: Cele garden only, witch has no ruin and no high tier shiz
Ask if you have questions, i can find out easy

Some benefit of having these F2P,
Mid tech gear becomes both easyer to find and worth something
You have ppl to pirate who cant defend themself
You can produce item and sell at higher price then previosly
You can now easyer find assistance for lvling

Classic old-timer mindset, but you are missing the point of the current f2p system. The goal is not to badger players into going p2p by withholding content from them. Instead, the goal is to give free players access to pretty much everything the game has to offer, with a few big caveats.

1. Do not disrupt the p2p experience (including economy)
2. Do not allow f2p to stress the server

The only things that significantly stress the server are user bases and slaves. By limiting f2p building to celestial garden, they can get some experience with this very important mechanic (enough that they can start to imagine what things are like when you can build in Wild Space), but they they can't go absolutely crazy in the limited amount of space they have.

This is a longer term strategy that will hopefully accrue long-term subs from dedicated players who have gotten thoroughly immersed in the f2p game and eventually decide to step up to the big leagues. It is a fallacy to suppose that badgering players into subscribing was an effective means of growing the subscription pool; what we did get was people who paid maybe on month's sub and then moved on to another game.

Ultimately, we will have to wait things out and see whether the new model is more effective in the long run. The one count I do agree with you on is that there should be more PvP opportunities for f2p. However, it would take some careful thought since we will inevitably have p2p griefing f2p if they can.

Ive got 4 bases, 1 shop and 3 defending stations in case of termites how ever i would blow the 3 defenders if it would make u all p2p stop picking on F2Ps xD
For slave, Dont have any active right now