Make the game F2P

[Ocala-DN]

On 8/24/2022 at 1:21 PM, Conman said:

Are you talking about this? https://myaion.eu/Player/866977
Do you honestly consider that to be "geared" for today's standards? I don't. I have 2 pieces of 55e armor not enchanted and with white stones (one of which was given for free in a survey), lvl 30 abyss accs that I bought (cough cough) from the shop, and the Zapiel's Spear +10. BTW I got the enchants from the pass! I have 300k AP in relics that I got from the event pass  (cough cough) which I'm saving to get the 55e chest piece next.

But to answer your question: Absolutely yes. I'm FAR from a whale, but I do buy the pass + aura (and some event passes, not all though) every month. Thanks for asking! Unfortunately if you want any kind of meaningful progress you have to buy the pass, or farm every instance for enchantment stones or to sell LR that you can do daily, but I don't have the time for that (6h+ daily?).

About my Zapiel's Spear, I worked freaking hard for it. I have 6x SMs in a separate account to summon people that help me near the islands, and I have often dual boxed to help on DPS. I did not buy it, I farmed it.

I spend around $40 monthly since I came back 2 months ago to get some progress going... It may not seem much for you maybe, but it's a shitload of money for a old game. I only pay because I really, really like the game.

Not bad for being back only 2 months
I have been back for about a month, and still grinding....even with the pass sub as well. But I really like the game, only game that keeps my attention. Are there whales out there, of course, wish I was one, but I am not. Not going to cry about it as well though. Just play the game best I can and have fun. I don't let all the drama frustrate me. Just like real life, there is always someone with a bigger stick lol

[Conman]

18 hours ago, Ocala-DN said:

Not bad for being back only 2 months
I have been back for about a month, and still grinding....even with the pass sub as well. But I really like the game, only game that keeps my attention. Are there whales out there, of course, wish I was one, but I am not. Not going to cry about it as well though. Just play the game best I can and have fun. I don't let all the drama frustrate me. Just like real life, there is always someone with a bigger stick lol

It's "good enough" I guess. But nowere near geared. And that is paying! Can you imagine without buying the pass? No +10 Zapiel for sure.

People say there is enough content to make a lot of AP this patch, and I totally agree. The problem is when you lose 80% of your PvPvE encounters to geared players, getting 50% less AP as reward in the case of Dredgion or 90% less AP in the case of Tiak, it's going to take you 2 TIMES LONGER (please pay attention to this, it's important) to get to the same level of gear as they are now.

I blame thet in the lack of a proper matchmaking system (gearscore or ranking). It's all RNG, and RNG always beats the undergeared/new players.

No one here wants instant gratification as someone else said here or in another post, but if you start now you are already behind and only to think that it would take you at least 6 months to start catching up (And don't think for a second that you will have endgame gear in 6 months in the current state of the game lol. Maybe 9 months?)... Why would you bother with that in a dead game?

Again, think as a new player. If you are here for a while and have a geared static then getting more gear or more AP is not a problem for you.

Only the people that truly love the game are still around.

Edited August 26, 2022 by Conman

[Raycian]

On 8/24/2022 at 11:21 AM, Conman said:

Are you talking about this? https://myaion.eu/Player/866977
Do you honestly consider that to be "geared" for today's standards? I don't. I have 2 pieces of 55e armor not enchanted and with white stones (one of which was given for free in a survey), lvl 30 abyss accs that I bought (cough cough) from the shop, and the Zapiel's Spear +10. BTW I got the enchants from the pass! I have 300k AP in relics that I got from the event pass  (cough cough) which I'm saving to get the 55e chest piece next.

But to answer your question: Absolutely yes. I'm FAR from a whale, but I do buy the pass + aura (and some event passes, not all though) every month. Thanks for asking! Unfortunately if you want any kind of meaningful progress you have to buy the pass, or farm every instance for enchantment stones or to sell LR that you can do daily, but I don't have the time for that (6h+ daily?).

About my Zapiel's Spear, I worked freaking hard for it. I have 6x SMs in a separate account to summon people that help me near the islands, and I have often dual boxed to help on DPS. I did not buy it, I farmed it.

I spend around $40 monthly since I came back 2 months ago to get some progress going... It may not seem much for you maybe, but it's a shitload of money for a old game. I only pay because I really, really like the game.

Thank you. I was thinking about this all day at work. Ran Dredge on 3 chars yesterday and lost every one of them. Got 1500 AP on ONE run. Tiak wasn't much better. Would take forever to gear up any of my chars. To get an Elite PvP under and 55e gear would take a year if you got 12k AP a day, every day. 

[Raycian]

Quoted the wrong post and wont let me delete it but whatever. Add accessories and you are looking at over 15 months lol.

[Conman]

2 hours ago, Raycian said:

Thank you. I was thinking about this all day at work. Ran Dredge on 3 chars yesterday and lost every one of them. Got 1500 AP on ONE run. Tiak wasn't much better. Would take forever to gear up any of my chars. To get an Elite PvP under and 55e gear would take a year if you got 12k AP a day, every day. 

 

1 hour ago, Raycian said:

Quoted the wrong post and wont let me delete it but whatever. Add accessories and you are looking at over 15 months lol.

Yes, it's bad...

[Cyfur]

I think they need to take Aion Classic past 2.7 to either 3.x or even 4.x which in my opinion was the peak of Aion before gear complexity set in, and they started deleting maps like Sarpan.

 

[crithards]

Unfortunately at this stage i do not think even F2play would be enough to save the game,especially considering every decision must be approved by korea instead of allowing ncwest too fix the game for the region.

Quick search of players just now.

Theo 58 players most are 55s who are probaly using automation software too farm,with a few legit players.

Sanctum total 29 players.

Poeta 9 players.

Elthen 29 players,can discount the 46 plus players who are also farming in the leph bastion.

Veteron 7 players.

Heiron 20 players,also discount at least half farming outside jeip village.

Reshanta 3 players.

Iggison 67 players.

So we have a total of 222 players and we can easily discount at least 50+ players as automated people so maybe if lucky 170 real players not a healthy population.

We need players too solve issues such as stigmas,manastones and enchantment stones less people means these items arent cheaply available.

If we had Felic socketing then the manastone issue would be some what solved as it's 100% socketing.

Stigmas more players means more supply and we wouldnt be paying anywhere from 2-15 million kinah for basic stigmas.

A game cannot thrive when the region is so heavily micro managed by nc korea and every issue takes months too fix and the playerbase is bled dry.

As people have already stated to even catch up is months to a year since you arent geared and very unlikely to win dredges and tiaks with the remaining  population mostly in 50/55 elite already.And the AP gains from dredge and tiak are far too low given the gear costs.

Double Xp is all good and well,but when people hit the gearing wall and are just face rolled in instanced pvp and open world they are going too lose interest very fast and quit.

The costs for the pass and sub are fairly high on a 14 year old game and the shop has little of value too offer and things like emotes at 20 dollars is just a rip off.

No matter how much feedback is given people need too accept that the na market is largely overlooked by korea,despte the fact it could be thriving if they gave ncwest autonomy to run it for the regions needs.

Edited August 27, 2022 by crithards

[Cyfur]

F2play won't help, and is not the point of Aion Classic.

Aion is already F2play, and Aion Classic is a paid niche product to rewind back to different content.

That's why I pointed out above that Aion Classic should be extended to 3.x and 4.x they are both great maps and instances.

The subscription should be lower price too, $15/mth. is way to high, that's why poor people have flocked to other servers.

 

 

 

[Easycrow]

On 8/27/2022 at 7:26 AM, Conman said:

I blame thet in the lack of a proper matchmaking system (gearscore or ranking). It's all RNG, and RNG always beats the undergeared/new players.

Tbh matchmaking would be difficult to implement when the player population is so low. You will go from making half the AP to no AP at all because you won't get a match.

[Conman]

5 hours ago, Easycrow said:

Tbh matchmaking would be difficult to implement when the player population is so low. You will go from making half the AP to no AP at all because you won't get a match.

You may be right, but we will never know for sure. There are a lot of tryhards still around. I honestly think that it would work out just fine. I don't get a pop sometimes anyways, at least the ones I'd get would be a bit more fair.

[Attestant]

On 8/27/2022 at 8:25 PM, Cyfur said:

The subscription should be lower price too, $15/mth. is way to high, that's why poor people have flocked to other servers.

This is a myth. Even people with minimum wage can afford Aion Classic.

[Conman]

2 hours ago, Edict said:

This is a myth. Even people with minimum wage can afford Aion Classic.

The subject was never if people could afford it, it was if people would be willing to pay $15/mo for a 14yo game! It is expensive af. Plus all other things that you pretry much have to buy to get anywere in terms of gear lol.

[Nesuferit]

game's dead, why would someone need another update or make it free to play? that ain't gonna bring people back XD. The beginning of the end of classic server, great job NCsoft, you made me proud.

[Conman]

3 hours ago, Nesuferit said:

game's dead, why would someone need another update or make it free to play? that ain't gonna bring people back XD. The beginning of the end of classic server, great job NCsoft, you made me proud.

The only thing that can bring -some- life to the game at this point is F2P though.

Changes that could be done to Aura:
With Aura: 100% Exp, AP, Drops.
Without Aura: 50% Exp, AP, Drops.

It's better than now anyways... and the people who pay would most likely keep paying (I know I would).

[marikazan-KT]

3 hours ago, Conman said:

The only thing that can bring -some- life to the game at this point is F2P though.

Changes that could be done to Aura:
With Aura: 100% Exp, AP, Drops.
Without Aura: 50% Exp, AP, Drops.

It's better than now anyways... and the people who pay would most likely keep paying (I know I would).

The damage is done though.Korea doesnt listen they dont even read our forums they only care about that market.Look at time it took too fix droprates and still godstones are a joke to get manastones still expensive.This game is mostly those too invested too quit now.Only have to do a search of zones too see there's only a handful of legit players on.

And gearing lol catching up as new or return have fun with taking 6-12months with it.

They treated the market the same as Retail and learnt nothing i would love too meet those in charge and ask them how silly they can be tanking a game twice by same mistakes.

[Attestant]

9 hours ago, Conman said:

The subject was never if people could afford it, it was if people would be willing to pay $15/mo for a 14yo game! It is expensive af. Plus all other things that you pretry much have to buy to get anywere in terms of gear lol.

Aion Classic has had thousands of payers since it's opening and it was old not so long ago then and it remains about the same age now. It is a myth that $15 a month is expensive or unaffordable. It is a myth that even $35 a month is expensive or unaffordable.

 

The real problem is that they should add fines for breaking rules in the game. If anyone gets suspended, then a fine of $5 per full week of suspension should be required to get the suspended account back. Holding a position against this, would be siding with suspended players and rule breaking.

Edited August 31, 2022 by Edict

[Stormexia-KT]

The game is technically f2p but you all already know NCsoft/Ncwest "f2p" style

What aion needs is more content in classic and the live version is what always lacked... it makes me feel like Ncsoft does not play their own games or threat their own gm's like dummies that do not know what they are talking about and only the producers(that might not play the game) know better  or that Ncsoft just pay attention to the amount of money x or y game makes without realizing why there are games that are more alive and make more money than aion :v

Also aion needs a huge graphic update... like we are in 2022 already... I mean the game looks better than wow for sure but wow still has millions of players compared to the... 1k(+ -) players combining classic and retail server together?

[Piggie]

ye this game is pretty dead now - NC should consider making the game ftp at this point.

[marikazan-KT]

When classic was launched people were happy because they thought it would be a fresh start and negate the pay2win of retail.

This version became pay2win right away away with Candys and coins via daeva pass and crowns.RMT sellers obviously were being utilised by the price fluctuations.

So really people say they dont want pay2win but then happily engage in it,so for those people that honestly thought this would be different have left and all that remains is those hardcores who can devote 12 hours a day to a game and the people who have spent too much money too leave.

For a new player or even a return unless sink money and massive amounts of time into  it you are never going too catch up to those that remain.Player's want fun and while you expect too lose pvp encounters getting facerolled everyday in OW or instanced pvp gets old super fast.

When people see how little AP they are getting and the gear costs and medals needed of course they quit.Aion has zero gear catchups,AP quests are so low there are no gear quests for even 40 elite gear to get a very basic set.

And community how many 55s actually go and help anyone in lower zones,generally just get rude and sarcastic comments if ask for help not really going to encourage anyone to stay if cant spare 5 minutes from afking in iggy.

Content everything is Timegated and limited entrys i mean a pvp game and dredge,tiak and arenas all have entry and cd limits that is just simply stupid game design from day one.

Pve content lol Besh and udas such excitement running those all day.

The game needs more Content for a start and the AP from all instanced pvp should be permanently doubled and instance cooldowns increased.

Anyways talking into the wind years of feedback in Retail was ignored why would this version be any different.

[Easycrow]

15 minutes ago, marikazan-KT said:

And community how many 55s actually go and help anyone in lower zones,generally just get rude and sarcastic comments if ask for help not really going to encourage anyone to stay if cant spare 5 minutes from afking in iggy.

There's me and like one other guy on the Elyos side that have been carrying lowbies through campaign quests regularly. Sadly I have decided to take a break from the game but honestly helping low level players is way more fun and #feelgood than anything else going on. Perhaps if they introduced a mentoring system like days past it would help for people who need a monetary/item reward incentive.

Also - every so often I would get a message from some random annoyed that I'm helping noobs. Cant wrap my head around why anyone would be mad about it but welcome to Aion I guess. 

[Lieutenant]

On 8/16/2022 at 2:44 AM, Edict said:

Making the game F2P would make it unprofitable and the game would die almost instantly.

 People wait to come back dude  for F2P   and  spend the real money for the real deal in the shop, not for goat  position `subscription` :)) .

[Stormexia-KT]

 

what aion needs is... not being developed by ncsoft... Ncsoft is too busy hunting whales... and not actually developing their games