Cash shop? wait what?

General
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I almost quit Boundless this week. I was so angry initially. “I did not sign up for a micro-transaction game! This happens to games when they stop selling copies, at the end of their life cycle… before they die!”…I calmed down and took a rational look at it.

I have since thought about it and decided I can live with the Exchange cash shop in it’s current state. The ability to buy more plots with real money is absolutely an advantage in a sandbox building game, that has been established. But it is an advantage I can live with.

Some other things I could live with being able to purchase with real money:
-Cosmetic character model items
-XP boosts
-The ability to purchase a Guild or Tribe
-Pets
-Unique Mounts/Vehicles (as long as equal stat mounts and vehicles are available to earn)
-Gleam Club (Forever fueled beacons)
-Beacon cosmetics (on the beacon itself)
-Tax reduction
-Fireworks/emotes/dances

I’ll draw my line at these things that I would NOT be ok purchasing with real money:
-Coin
-Unique blocks (including colors, dyes, lights, effects)
-Planet access or Premium Planets
-Unique Tools (unless cosmetic only)
-Portals/Oortstone
-Skill/stat points
-Weapons/Tools/augments with better stats

-In detail, Coin, that’s an automatic eff you to the community.
-Unique blocks, If i have the ABILITY to build a big pokemon, i should be able to earn all the colors/blocks needed. Not; I need these blocks to finish my artwork… i have the skill and ability to farm them, i just cannot afford to pay for them, hence i cannot build that. In addition, things like only being able to buy red gleam, or flashing signs, or lighting… not ok. if its a building material, it should be able to be earned.
-Planet access, or premium planets… that would be another obvious eff you to the community
-Unique Tools, like a drill, or chainsaw with their own stats. Now if it just cosmetically turned all your axes into chainsaws, but they retained the same stats as the axes, that is whatever. Or turned your hammers into drills with same stats… that is a cosmetic.
-Portals/Oortstone Ya, this is a never Ever EVER. Keeping your portals alive is about the only thing that challenges players and large groups. Some ppl got too big for their britches and had to scale back portals. Also a dead portal showed who was and wasn’t active. Don’t do this… NEVER Ever ever
-Skill/Stat points… doesnt even need to be discussed…
-Weapons/Tools/Augments with increased stats. This would be like that Drill… but it actually is a drill that hits twice as fast as any hammer. Only way to get it is thru Cash

I like the game, and anything that comes from the top list or the like, I welcome it, and hope the devs make a lot of money from the game and those things.

Anything from the bottom list is where I’ll draw my line. If those things happen, then I’ll say farewell and still hope the devs make a lot of money, but i will be disappointed that they ruined a great game, and we’ll go our separate ways. It wont matter that much, I’m not a big member of the community. I build modestly. And noone would miss me. But if anything from that bottom list happens, I wont be the only one leaving

So what are some things you are ok with? and where do you draw your line?

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Although I’m very welcoming of your perspective, and glad that you’re sharing your ideas, I think we don’t need another thread for this topic.

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i like this thread it well organized and readable not a novel like the other one :joy: (ps simoyd make good point)

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Did my post just get buried?

Are you kidding me? I spent 4 friggin hours writing that in a way that wouldn’t offend anyone, including the devs. and genuinely wanted to know what other ppls answers were to my question. WHICH IS TOTALLY DIFFERENT FROM THIS THREADS QUESTION!!! It is a different topic… So if any threads mention or discuss the cash shop, they get buried here? Is that where we are at? I don’t think you even read the whole post. it was sent here to die within 4 minutes!!!

Wow… just wow…

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None of these will be exit in this game i believe.
They know 90 % of their player base hate this kind of cash shop.
So, they wont make this kind of decision.

Even me, the one complain the most about their current cash shop system, i don’t worry about those thing u list.

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Unfortunately, this topic has been asked and hashed out numerous times in the last few weeks, so everyone is very exhausted with it.

See the post I made: What should be sold for Cubits, and what shouldn't?

I, and many others in the last month, have raised identical concerns, and they all result in flame wars. Your post wasn’t buried, it’s just, everyone here has already said their piece on this exact subject, a thousand times, in threads I made (that were locked) and other peoples’ threads. In fact, this entire thread moved very far away from the original OP’s arguments, so though at first glance it appears this thread is different, the topic is fairly similar.

The answer to most of your questions are within this very thread. This thread covers pretty much everything you asked and talked about.

Most of the posts in this thread were from the original thread, not from things being merged. I’d also point out I don’t think the Devs moved your thread, so please don’t hold them responsible. This has just become the go-to place to make arguments, so we don’t flood the main forum with identical questions and complaints.

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That would have been an acceptable merge for my post… as it asks the same question. Unfortunately it is closed, and my post is buried in this totally unrelated topic. I worked so hard and delicately on that post… my blood is boiling and i think i need to step away for a moment…

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As I explained before, this topic is very related, many people have discussed some of the questions you posted to the community in this very thread, and many still follow this thread. This thread is simply where we go to discuss all things “Cash Shop” related.

Also, please don’t get too upset. In the grand scheme of things, writing your post won’t even rank in the top 10,000 of things that have gone wrong in your life by the time you’re old and withered.

Know that the devs read the feedback, and they read this thread. Your voice has been heard, if only because your questions had been asked before, and it resulted in quite a mess…

Thank you for sharing your thoughts though, and know that I mostly agree with you. However, where I may differ is that, so long as Cash Shop purchases can be bought with Cubits earned in game, and those cubits can be earned fairly, I’m finding myself more open to the idea of even things that used to bother me, but that being said, I’m still against Cash Shop upgrades that would boost productivity by completely removing crafting times and such, but then, I also recently learned those things are already in the game in the form of actual machines, so…

Yeah. I’d prefer plots were separate from the Cash Shop, and that there’s no pay to win items/weapons. I’d really rather it all be cosmetic.

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My apologies @Crete - my intention is certainly not to bury your post in the myriad of other posts here.

As @MinerDiggerMan has stated, as with your post, the posts here are all centered around the cash shop and what people find acceptable to pay real money for and what they do not. There have also been other posts started which, although done so with the intention of leading the conversation in a different direction, ultimately have just ended up rehashing the same exact conversations as have already arisen in this thread (or have started to spiral to such a degree that they likely would have been closed anyway).

As you are already aware, this is a very heated topic for discussion, which a great many of the members of this community have varied opinions on.

Please rest assured, that the devs are absolutely reading through all of these posts very carefully and will address the concerns raised in them in due course. Whether that means tomorrow or the end of the week (or even next week), I do not know for certain, but I have been reassured that they will be addressed.

On the topic of your post, I myself agree with all but one of the things in your list of things that you think are not ok to purchase with real money…

My reasoning behind this exclusion is that, I would like a safe environment that I can have some modicum of control over so that my daughter can also play Boundless with me (instead of her watching beside me and asking “can I play” 60 times an hour). I know there are parental control features in the game that will turn off chat, but she still wants to be able to type messages to me (even though we are in the same room).

My secondary reason, and certainly more selfish, is that I would like to both design and rent my own planet for my Guild to build more freely on, without running into another player that has plotted land that we may have wanted to use for our large scale build.

My intention is, if rented worlds do get released, is that I would only restrict plotting rights but not mining access, so that players are able to mine resources and whatever block colours the world may have - but, I would retain the right to deny access to any unsavoury players that threaten the safer, more controlled environment that my daughter would be playing in.

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Awesome response. Exactly the kind of response i was looking for. I didn’t even think about a “safe space” for children. I would think that after enough feedback, this might be included with the game. perhaps even an “offline planet” where she is still playing the game, but she wont run into any other players. But i could for sure see a parent willing to pay for such a feature/planet.

When i was thinking about Premium Planets, I was envisioning a nightmare scenario where there was a pay for access planet with increased gem spawns. or a planet made of Gleam. Or a planet with a block or resource that can only be gotten from that planet with paid access.

If it was a clone of an already available planet, then i would see no harm in it

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The developers have said if you rent a planet and it is connected to the rest of the boundless universe it has to follow the same rules. So no planets with diamonds on trees, no mobs and 18 different colors of gleam if you want to be connected to the regular universe.

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Reason this out for me.

  • The game has personal loot. There is no advantage to running exclusive runs. Invitations will likely go out via forum / discord to increase participation. The more on the run, the more loot, the more chances to trade for what you want.
  • The size of a build has no correlation to the organizational structure of the guild or it’s influence. Large builds do not inherently grant any bonuses to a guild since footfall from guildmembers is capped per a timeframe.
  • Large builds are difficult to make exclusive, so any no -guildy can hang around your plots if they like.
  • Guilds are groups of players and can already pool their plots for a build. A medium guild sharing their plots is going to have a larger build then one built by one player with $$, just from a resource standpoint.

A lot of plays is not going to give you a guild advantage. It hasn’t in the early release and it won’t in the 1.0 release.

With the ease of warping, a small cool build can be just as unifying as a large build.

Especially since both are unlikely to be stumbled across in the actual game…both are likely pointed to on the forum.

I honestly do not see plots as a significant game advantage with the ease of accessing everything they could provide you by just playing the game.

Just my two cents :slight_smile: not trying to silence any conversation, just sharing my opinion.

Tagris

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@Crete A lot of us have ranted and had our blood boiled, because a lot of us have emotional “damage” or “baggage” left over from other games we’ve dumped our lives into, and it gets ruined by poor decision from developers.

My advice that helped me recently. As much Time as I dedicate myself to writing a post, take the same time to at least research if I am correct or not. Don’t add the omg factor or the Worse case factors if it seems unlikely or in your case, where the devs explicitly told us it is NOT a p2w, and will be fair for all, and have explained what it will contain and not contain. (i did the same thing)

Otherwise we can get ourselves all worked up for nothing sometimes. These devs have earned our trust over the time we’ve been backing it and voicing concerns. Trust when I say there are so many of us, that it would be hard to not have come across similar feelings. I look forward to seeing you in the new universe.

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I would actually kinda like to see Guild and big cities have different bonuses for citizens, a friendly way to compete? Like a Hunter’s Guild, that gives some bonuses to damage, and a Miner’s guild, you know?

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I would be fine with that as long as it wasn’t linked with ranking with prestige type stuff…

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Why is that? Having two different Miner Guild’s compete might be fun?

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I’ll clarify… No issue with them competing against each other but don’t need it to be a city gem spam situation and especially not linked then to the normal city rankings, etc. That is more what I meant.

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Couldn’t they just make prestige linked to a new machine that specifically increases prestige?

The Machine could have 100 different recipes, all infusing a certain’ amount of prestige into a block, that way we could have a Copper City worth as much as a Diamond City?

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I like your idea, but i won’t support it.
Because you need to think about people who don’t like to join the guild.
This game is more about freedom.
These thing should not be push by the dev team.

If you want to create a guild with this kind of rule, i am 100% support.
But if you ask the dev team to create this kind of system, i won’t be a fan for that.

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If guilds want to compete then they have PvP coming. Be awesome a war of miners against each other. Maybe fought in caves trying to cause cave ins swallowing opponents or crushing them. lol

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