How much would you pay for Role-play?

This is a bit of a conclusion to the thoughts I had after an unusual encounter. I've posted a guild-advertisment on the Role-playing forum, and soon was whispered by a level-one alt of a guy from another server. He saw the advert and came to ask a few questions. Several hours later, he transfered his character to join the guild. I've experienced this as being put under a lot of pressure "Wait, people are actually paying real money to be in the guild?" Made me feel very uncomfortable, putting pressure to be a best possible guild-master. So, well, several skype-conversations later and so - here is my question!

People pay their monthly subscription, some pay for special items or those paid services. In the end, in-game gold takes time to amass and instead of spending it on best enchants/gems - we buy RP gear. So, take time to ponder and answer following questions.

1) A small guild is running a tavern every evening, 7 days a week. They provide good RPed out service and just make a tavern-experience as good as possible. But, to enter you have to pay an actual fee of, say, 50 gold (lower for those not lvl 80). Would you visit such a place?

2) Would you pay (gold or IRL money) to your Guild Leader/Officers if the guild they were running was qualitatively better than other guilds; professionally run, with events which provide great entertainment.

3) Would you pay (gold or IRL money) to a person/group of people who make huge and epically awesome large community events at regular basics.

4) Would youy pay IRL money to BLIZZARD if they had a special, more expensive, RPer's subscription that gives you access to heavily-moderated RP servers with additional features, GM involvement for events, and no OOCers?

5) Would you pay IRL money to BLIZZARD if they provided instanced player housing/player 'towns'/other RP features as a Paid Service?

Yes to the two last ones. Without a seconds doubt. Probably not so much on the three first ones though.

Julia wrote:Yes to the two last ones. Without a seconds doubt. Probably not so much on the three first ones though.

^ that.

Sometimes I re-customise or faction-change my chars for RP reason, if it counts as "paying for RP"

I wouldn't pay for any of those tbh

If options for the last two existed, I'm sure they'd be so lowly populated you might as well use those private rp servers I can't remember the name of

Personally, I would probably pay for special, better, RP servers provided they were properly populated. I would unlikely pay for Paid Character Housing unless it provided such epic customization and so on, that I could actually make it into something great. (Red Eclipse with cushions, couches, waterpipes and those elven drapes <3).

But I would pray in-game gold for very dedicated contributions to RP. Kick-ass tavern asking for fee

I wouldn't pay for any of those options.

On principal grounds, I believe that paying more than ten euro a month for a game is already grossly overpriced. Especially that the primary reason for this costly monthly fee was new content on a very regular basis (at the start of WoW vanilla you had patches much more frequent than we have now).

Now, Blizzard could've decided to lower the fee as the game got older, but they didn't. So as sure as hell I'm not paying another five bucks for some additional services that should've been included in the game in the first place (as was promised).

I'd not pay 50g to enter in a Tavern and I'd be strongly against that. I find this against democracy. I don't like how the system work in real life with money and how poepel can so easily turned into greedy beeings, or interested beeings. But i deal with it, because it's how the world is working.
I'd be ashamed to see role players working in that fashion.

Yes maybe the organiser of the tavern take time to organise their tavern. So do all other GM, event organiser, forum manager etc... if we start to ask fee for it, even in "in game money" we will enter in a system I'll despise. it's like turning dirty something wich was friendly and nice.

Do you imagine how it can turn ? How it will pervert the community ? If people start to think WoW as a job, it will change the spirit so deeply that you will not recognise anything. Do you imagine the drama we already have now? How they could be enhanced once there is money (godl or euro) involved.

I really do not want to see that world. The day it happen, I'm off.


The last two options : I'd personaly not pay for such a service, and I hope it would not happen. I like the fact that the community have to fight, create and imagine a world. We are doing all of this ourselves, we can congratulate ourself and be proud. If it was managed by a Blizzard team, it could be a nice experience, but it would lose its charm. A bit like to go in hollidays in a real medieval village, or to go in Disneyland. One is autenthique, the other well is shinny and certainly fun, but it's industrial.

In general I would not like to pay extra for any features that the game has promised already (RP-ruleset not being enforced etc.).

And paying gold to people for RP would be very controversial of some sorts.

Well blizzard state they work reactively i.e. you have to tell them about OOCers griefers etc, i think he means if GMs litterally did patrols for those people. One thing I would pay for would be a GM being able to use someone like Varian Wrynn on one of these "special extra feature servers". I think it would be cool.

On 1 I'm split. And it would depend on a lot of factors. But I belive that some people could create a social club/pub of some sort that yes, I would find worth paying an entrance fee too access. I doubt I would ever pay 50 gold for it even as level 80, but I can see the why in it. But then it would have to go with that drinks and food once inside would be free.

2 and 3 are both big no for me.

4 I am very split uppon, but if I had an income I would be willing to offer a small fee to get more GM support.

5, unless as someone stated, that it was -fantstic- custumistaion, no.

I don't think the current situation is broken to such end that it needs additional payment to fix.

I'm willing to support RP with in game gold. I try to tip the waiters (and waitresses, *wink wink*) in taverns for the brilliant RP they deliver, but really... I wouldn't "rate" their RP necessarily above or under that of other players. I see people play bodyguards.. and in that role their RP is severely dependent on that of the person they protect. They deliver a status of awesomeness no fancy in game armor suit can give. Is that worth gold? The same goes for guards around Cath who, in the end, add a little moderation to the roleplay in the city. All in good fun of course. Who can we give gold and who not?

As far as question 5 is concerned... if you have 4, why still bother with 5?

So.. am I willing to pay a little more to increase the quality of the roleplay or support good roleplay? Yes. Not necessarily in the shape as mentioned above, but yes, I would be willing to do that.
For now, I content to do that by supporting people with RP around their char, aiding them farm that item they want or being generous to my guild's bank.

1) If a small guild did indeed run a tavern 7 days a week, provided good rp and there was a fee, lets say it varied between (for 80's now) 20g - 50 g depending on wheter something extra happened that night I would not mind paying. And then to the why...

Leading a guild takes time, organizing events takes time, being addicted to rp also takes a lot of time... But still... The idea of "earning gold" on it I dont approve of, but.. I know one doesnt get much time to earn your own when you are occupied with ooc talks, solving drama/issues, planning, organizing so yes.. I would def... Pay ingame gold for this.

2) If the guild was spectacular, then I would maybe consider paying a small amount of game gold.. RL money = no.. Then again if it was for the agrument of it being realistic I would have to say: Well if I join that guild its more logical for the leader to pay the people below no? Then again it all amounts down to what kind of guild one is talking about rp wise. But RL gold for other than; transfer of faction/realm = nope.

Still a guild despite what kind or flavour should have members contributing, may that be grinding mats for rp cloth making, grinding for making of anything thats needed be it flasks, cloths, cash to buy more alcohol for the tavern? Yes. People should do more.

3) Now.. This depends on how much we are talking about... If I hire a party event planner IRL it does cost money.. If you rped being one, I would pay you... People however if I hired assassins inthe old days, felt OOC RL insulted due to the fact that I did pay the other rper without being asked ingame gold for the work he or she would try to do. Because I know how much time it takes and can take simply to find the specific person in question... So... I am thorn on this one.. As I have tried being nice and pay people, but that has gone nowhere but down the drain...

4) Blizz have earned enough RL money on me so far.. I dont really feel like they have kept their promises so no way.

5) And as said before; if the cutomization was marvelous then maybe

No I wouldn't pay for anything,
If those type of fee's were introduced now or in the next few weeks / months that would be just exploitation imo.

Gnash wrote:I wouldn't pay for any of those options.

On principal grounds, I believe that paying more than ten euro a month for a game is already grossly overpriced. Especially that the primary reason for this costly monthly fee was new content on a very regular basis (at the start of WoW vanilla you had patches much more frequent than we have now).

Now, Blizzard could've decided to lower the fee as the game got older, but they didn't. So as sure as hell I'm not paying another five bucks for some additional services that should've been included in the game in the first place (as was promised).

And that too.
Soz for double post.

Gnash wrote:I wouldn't pay for any of those options.

On principal grounds, I believe that paying more than ten euro a month for a game is already grossly overpriced. Especially that the primary reason for this costly monthly fee was new content on a very regular basis (at the start of WoW vanilla you had patches much more frequent than we have now).

Now, Blizzard could've decided to lower the fee as the game got older, but they didn't. So as sure as hell I'm not paying another five bucks for some additional services that should've been included in the game in the first place (as was promised).

Well an MMO has two ways to make money

a) A monthly fee is charged to all users to play the game, then everything in the game is decided by work in the game, not by IRL cash.

OR

b) Free to play MMO! BUT, to make money, the best gear/spells is offered through purchase with IRL money, which leads to serious imbalances, the rich kid becoming a god when he has no skill whatsoever, and people actually spending all their money trying to compete and ruining their lives. Japanese/Korean MMO's do this sometimes.

Which would you prefer:3

We discussed this already xD
Also, this MMO has already made enough money to create three other free MMO's to last them ten years a piece.
So I don't think introducing fees for RPing would exactly be "fair" on players, because yes they would want to get the best out of the game, but would they want to pay extra money for a game they already have a edit : Monthly Overpriced fee for?

IMO, no extra fees will keep me happy. I ain't paying not because I'm greedy, but because Blizzard will be the ones being greedy.
Meh, whoever has money feel free xD

It's not overpriced. Keeping as many US, Oceanic, all the EU servers running, paying their design team, people working on new content for 3 major games, GM's, making a movie, customer service in all the languages, running a blizzcon and all that isn't exactly cheap....

EDIT: I assume adding a fee for the special extra super monitered server with all the RP features would be to keep random OOCers coming on.

12,000,000 players x 13 euro ( on average) = 156,000,000 Million euro yearly.
Compared to the expenses, yes it is cheap.

Ephitos / Amarachus wrote:12,000,000 players x 13 euro ( on average) = 156,000,000 Million euro yearly.
Compared to the expenses, yes it is cheap.

I wouldn't go into such calculations, since you don't have the amount of Blizz's employers or their salaries or any other similar numbers that would reveal the company's expenses, such as the purchase and upkeep of all their technical equipment, the Blizzcon costs etc. You may make assumptions but they will be pretty baseless

But anyways, I wouldn't pay for RP really. RP is a give and take for me in terms of mutual fun. It stops being so when the currency of one side becomes gold or RL money.

Don't forget the daily sacrifices of of 75,000 Puppies that Bobby is required to make to Satan, that will run into their expenses a bit now that they're with Activision.

Mandui wrote:

Ephitos / Amarachus wrote:12,000,000 players x 13 euro ( on average) = 156,000,000 Million euro yearly.
Compared to the expenses, yes it is cheap.

I wouldn't go into such calculations, since you don't have the amount of Blizz's employers or their salaries or any other similar numbers that would reveal the company's expenses, such as the purchase and upkeep of all their technical equipment, the Blizzcon costs etc.

But anyways, I wouldn't pay for RP really. RP is a give and take for me in terms of mutual fun. It stops being so when the currency of one side becomes gold or RL money.

Ah yeah it's a super rough estimation , gross profit.
But to be fair, it is around 120Million + in gross profit.

Ephitos / Amarachus wrote:

Mandui wrote:

Ephitos / Amarachus wrote:12,000,000 players x 13 euro ( on average) = 156,000,000 Million euro yearly.
Compared to the expenses, yes it is cheap.

I wouldn't go into such calculations, since you don't have the amount of Blizz's employers or their salaries or any other similar numbers that would reveal the company's expenses, such as the purchase and upkeep of all their technical equipment, the Blizzcon costs etc.

But anyways, I wouldn't pay for RP really. RP is a give and take for me in terms of mutual fun. It stops being so when the currency of one side becomes gold or RL money.

Ah yeah it's a super rough estimation , gross profit.
But to be fair, it is around 120Million + in gross profit.

You realise more than half of that money alone, possibly more, would go on the film budget, yes? :p The price we pay to play this game isn't over what we should be paying if you ask me, the fact it hasn't changed since I started playing is good.

Anyway, paying for extra stuff? No, s'like buying pets and mounts from the blizzard store, can't get my head around why people do it. OOC'ers'll always be a problem, but stick to using your imagination for everything else, not your wallets.

If you had to guess, how much would you say Blizzard have in expenses and then in profit?
Also add the fact that 12 million or so bought Vanilla WoW, TBC, and Wotlk, at least once, and will happen again.
Cata will sell 12 million times on average, at 60 or so euro minimum. That's almost half a Billion.
I think they make more than enough

Ephitos / Amarachus wrote:If you had to guess, how much would you say Blizzard have in expenses and then in profit?
Also add the fact that 12 million or so bought Vanilla WoW, TBC, and Wotlk, at least once, and will happen again.
Cata will sell 12 million times on average, at 60 or so euro minimum. That's almost half a Billion.
I think they make more than enough

So why the hell would they lower prices when they're gunna make half a billion!

That's to conclude that they make more than enough and adding extra fee's would be just dickish and greedy >_>
Imagine they release new content you DON'T have to pay for.
Not with Blizzard.
<3