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Pay to win

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Corina Jarr
en Welle Shipping Inc.
#941 - 2012-07-21 23:09:54 UTC
Mechael wrote:
Tippia wrote:
Mechael wrote:
Maybe I'm just dense, but I still don't see how it's a liability.
Liability.

Quote:
Once you've bought the PLEX, haven't the services been rendered whether or not the PLEX is ever actually activated?
No. The purchase has been completed, but the actual service that the PLEX represents (30d game time or 3,500 AUR) has not been delivered yet. If you buy directly, the store and the service provider are the same, so you're doing two separate deals with them: one where you get PLEX for cash, and another where they promise to trade in your PLEX for [whatever]. It's that second transaction that is the liability.

It's perhaps clearer if you look at it through the lens of buying ETCs. You pay BattleClinic or Shatter Crystal cash, they give you an ETC code. Deal done. You now take your ETC code and create a promise from CCP to give you game time/AUR at some point… that deal isn't completed until you've been given the game time/AUR. You can trade this promise like any other call option and have CCP owe someone else the same thing, but that's just it: the service is still owed.


Interesting. But isn't the only liability at this point that CCP could go belly up as a company and have to shut EVE down? In such a case, any PLEX that have not been fully spent (all 30 days) as well as any extra game time received from more traditional means would be unable to be payed by CCP. The thing is, at that point, CCP has already gone belly up and the person who purchased game time from them (again, whether through PLEX or, say, a year long sub) is just SoL. So it's really not much of a liability, is it? I could be wrong here, as I'm not familiar with the ins and outs of corporate law in Iceland, and whether or not someone in CCP would be held responsible for compensating these unfortunate players in the event of CCP dissolving (as would be the case, say, in the U.S. if the business were a sole-propriety, to the best of my knowledge.)

There is the potential for the player who bought the PLEX to be unable to use it for some reason (such as being banned for RMT or CCP getting rid of PLEX without telling us). In such cases it might be a legal liability. But, I'm not up to date on such cases, so can't comment further.
Ranger 1
Ranger Corp
Vae. Victis.
#942 - 2012-07-21 23:10:39 UTC  |  Edited by: Ranger 1
Mechael wrote:
Tippia wrote:
Mechael wrote:
Maybe I'm just dense, but I still don't see how it's a liability.
Liability.

Quote:
Once you've bought the PLEX, haven't the services been rendered whether or not the PLEX is ever actually activated?
No. The purchase has been completed, but the actual service that the PLEX represents (30d game time or 3,500 AUR) has not been delivered yet. If you buy directly, the store and the service provider are the same, so you're doing two separate deals with them: one where you get PLEX for cash, and another where they promise to trade in your PLEX for [whatever]. It's that second transaction that is the liability.

It's perhaps clearer if you look at it through the lens of buying ETCs. You pay BattleClinic or Shatter Crystal cash, they give you an ETC code. Deal done. You now take your ETC code and create a promise from CCP to give you game time/AUR at some point… that deal isn't completed until you've been given the game time/AUR. You can trade this promise like any other call option and have CCP owe someone else the same thing, but that's just it: the service is still owed.


Interesting. But isn't the only liability at this point that CCP could go belly up as a company and have to shut EVE down? In such a case, any PLEX that have not been fully spent (all 30 days) as well as any extra game time received from more traditional means would be unable to be payed by CCP. The thing is, at that point, CCP has already gone belly up and the person who purchased game time from them (again, whether through PLEX or, say, a year long sub) is just SoL. So it's really not much of a liability, is it? I could be wrong here, as I'm not familiar with the ins and outs of corporate law in Iceland, and whether or not someone in CCP would be held responsible for compensating these unfortunate players in the event of CCP dissolving (as would be the case, say, in the U.S. if the business were a sole-propriety, to the best of my knowledge.)


The important thing is that it is viewed as a financial liability to investors or other financial partners, and has a bearing on CCP's ability to fund projects.

It is important to be viewed as financially solvent, and liabilities on paper do that harm.

View the latest EVE Online developments and other game related news and gameplay by visiting Ranger 1 Presents: Virtual Realms.
Tippia
Sunshine and Lollipops
#943 - 2012-07-21 23:17:41 UTC  |  Edited by: Tippia
Mechael wrote:
Interesting. But isn't the only liability at this point that CCP could go belly up as a company and have to shut EVE down?
That's not really a liability (in the accounting sense), but rather a risk. CCP has to keep their books in order, and that means keeping track of their liabilities, or we risk having no game to play and have all our spent cash go kaplooie. Two different things and two different agents.

Quote:
So it's really not much of a liability, is it?
Yes it is. You're just thinking of it as a just a synonym for risk, rather than a very specific accounting item. Accounting liabilities affect a company's current assets and value and are important when you want to deal with financial institutions. It has very little to do with us players (other than out being the party that's owned future services), and a lot to do with CCP being able to get funding for new harebrained schemes.

The NeX is a fancy way of adjusting those liabilities by creating a way to provide the promised service and close the books on that outstanding debt. It has the added benefit (for CCP) that providing the service costs them pretty much nothing — no additional and unreliable running cost are created the way they are with game time.
Renan Ruivo
Forcas armadas
Brave Collective
#944 - 2012-07-21 23:34:45 UTC
Wow, you guys are really going at it. 2 pages per hour with 4 to 5 people debating the same points in a loop.

The world is a community of idiots doing a series of things until it explodes and we all die.
Corina Jarr
en Welle Shipping Inc.
#945 - 2012-07-22 00:09:19 UTC
Renan Ruivo wrote:
Wow, you guys are really going at it. 2 pages per hour with 4 to 5 people debating the same points in a loop.

Yep. All because of the addition of an any and the removal of an only.
Lady Spank
Get Out Nasty Face
#946 - 2012-07-22 00:27:13 UTC
Pay me and I will teach you how to win.

Grab a ticket below and mail me

L L L L L L L L L L L L
A A A A A A A A A A A A
D D D D D D D D D D
Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y

S S S S S S S S S S S
P P P P P P P P P P P
A A A A A A A A A A A A
N N N N N N N N N N
K K K K K K K K K K K

(ಠ_ృ) ~ It Takes a Million Years to Become Diamonds So Lets Just Burn Like Coal Until the Sky's Black ~ (ಠ_ృ)
Lady Spank
Get Out Nasty Face
#947 - 2012-07-22 00:27:46 UTC
Sorry; my contact tickets went wrong.

(ಠ_ృ) ~ It Takes a Million Years to Become Diamonds So Lets Just Burn Like Coal Until the Sky's Black ~ (ಠ_ృ)
Skex Relbore
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#948 - 2012-07-22 01:27:50 UTC
DrSmegma wrote:
Okay.

If Eve isn't pay-to-win because you can play for the same achievements, then it isn't play-to-win either because you can pay for the same achievements.

Unless you want to deny the existence of any achievements in Eve at all, I suggest the following:

EVE Online is hereby declared PayOrPlayToWin <- Your mind has been blown by DrSmegma again.

You can thank me via evemails, likes, or some ISK.


No EVE isn't pay to win because real life money can not be used to purchase advantages that aren't available through normal game play.

It's really that simple. You can still dislike the Plex system and argue against it on other grounds but you can't call it play to win because it fails to meet that primary criteria.
Mechael
Tribal Liberation Distribution and Retail
#949 - 2012-07-22 06:18:45 UTC
Skex Relbore wrote:
DrSmegma wrote:
Okay.

If Eve isn't pay-to-win because you can play for the same achievements, then it isn't play-to-win either because you can pay for the same achievements.

Unless you want to deny the existence of any achievements in Eve at all, I suggest the following:

EVE Online is hereby declared PayOrPlayToWin <- Your mind has been blown by DrSmegma again.

You can thank me via evemails, likes, or some ISK.


No EVE isn't pay to win because real life money can not be used to purchase advantages that aren't available through normal game play.

It's really that simple. You can still dislike the Plex system and argue against it on other grounds but you can't call it play to win because it fails to meet that primary criteria.


The "aren't available through normal game play" part is where we see things a little differently, as we've already covered.

We could really divide this up into two terms: "pay for a unique advantage" and "pay for any advantage." Advantage here being used in a strictly to-the-letter sense in that ... well, here, from dictionary.com:

Advantage :

1. any state, circumstance, opportunity, or means specially favorable to success, interest, or any desired end: the advantage of a good education.
2.
benefit; gain; profit: It will be to his advantage to learn Chinese before going to China.
3.
superiority or ascendancy (often followed by over or of ): His height gave him an advantage over his opponent.
4.
a position of superiority (often followed by over or of ): their advantage in experienced players.

Really, unless you say "advantage over those who do not have a unique thing that can be gotten only for real money" then anything that you get in-game that is useful is a more generic type of advantage. The type that isn't followed by "over [someone/thing else]." For example, an education is an advantage. ISK is an advantage. Having a ship, any kind of ship, is an advantage. However, having an inferior ship is not an advantage over someone who has a superior ship.

This really has boiled down to a question of semantics, because the entire concept of "pay to win" is new enough to not have a commonly accepted definition. I hold to the idea that "paying to win" is just shorthand for being able to pay real money for any advantage (read: anything that can be of any sort of use at all.) You hold to the idea that ... here, your words ...

"real life money can not be used to purchase advantages that aren't available through normal game play."

Who is right? Eh ... until there's a common definition of "pay to win" then nobody is really right or wrong here. And even if, once there is a more concrete definition, the definition favors one point of view and not the other, a new term can simply be coined for the one not favored.

Whether or not you win the game matters not.  It's if you bought it.
Mechael
Tribal Liberation Distribution and Retail
#950 - 2012-07-22 06:28:25 UTC
Something amusing ... I googled "define "pay to win"" and this thread was the 5th result. Cool

Whether or not you win the game matters not.  It's if you bought it.
malcovas Henderson
THoF
#951 - 2012-07-22 08:46:04 UTC  |  Edited by: malcovas Henderson
Mechael wrote:

The "aren't available through normal game play" part is where we see things a little differently, as we've already covered.

We could really divide this up into two terms: "pay for a unique advantage" and "pay for any advantage." Advantage here being used in a strictly to-the-letter sense in that ... well, here, from dictionary.com:

Advantage :

1. any state, circumstance, opportunity, or means specially favorable to success, interest, or any desired end: the advantage of a good education.
2.
benefit; gain; profit: It will be to his advantage to learn Chinese before going to China.
3.
superiority or ascendancy (often followed by over or of ): His height gave him an advantage over his opponent.
4.
a position of superiority (often followed by over or of ): their advantage in experienced players.

Really, unless you say "advantage over those who do not have a unique thing that can be gotten only for real money" then anything that you get in-game that is useful is a more generic type of advantage. The type that isn't followed by "over [someone/thing else]." For example, an education is an advantage. ISK is an advantage. Having a ship, any kind of ship, is an advantage. However, having an inferior ship is not an advantage over someone who has a superior ship.

This really has boiled down to a question of semantics, because the entire concept of "pay to win" is new enough to not have a commonly accepted definition. I hold to the idea that "paying to win" is just shorthand for being able to pay real money for any advantage (read: anything that can be of any sort of use at all.) You hold to the idea that ... here, your words ...

"real life money can not be used to purchase advantages that aren't available through normal game play."

Who is right? Eh ... until there's a common definition of "pay to win" then nobody is really right or wrong here. And even if, once there is a more concrete definition, the definition favors one point of view and not the other, a new term can simply be coined for the one not favored.


Your definition of P2W means ANY game MMO or otherwise, that has a payment involved is P2W. If you don't pay, you can't play, therefore you cannot "WIN". In this broad sense of the meaning, everything in RL that uses $$ is P2W. Using this kind of Free Fall meaning format. Buying food/electricity/water/ is P2W. The concept holds true with this only if you reach the final Factor in the meaning.

Using this form of Free Fall definition. It could be argued ALL sport is played by a team. The 100m sprinter is only a part of a Team. Although it is considered only the 100m sprinter that wins. Do you go through life with this Free Falling concept?.

Buying Plex to gain Isk can only be P2W, if, and only IF It gains an advantage over any other isk in the game. (IE buys double the amount), AND you manage to sell the Plex. In all its glory. The amount of ISK the Plex guarantees is ZERO.

Saying that because someone has bought the Plex, using it is a form of P2W. This is severely flawed. If I, me, myself buys a Plex with isk. I, me, myself has not parted with any real $$. The best it can be is PFO2AFMTL(Pay for others to win and for me to lose). In other words. Player A buys a Plex. Manages to sell it. Player B that purchased said Plex funds an Alt, or a Friends Account.. Player A and B meet on the field. Player A with his one Char. Player B with his 2 chars

P2W to have any meaning, must mean an advantage over EVERONE that does not Pay. Not just some, otherwise it is not "Win"

Your arguement on P2W is valid. But loses it's meaning, by being Free fall. It has no solid definition. By your reasoning, adding another level, makes you have to accept that level

Person A "I'm English."
Person B "no you are not, You're British"
Person A "Yeah but, I'm still English"
Person B "No, no. You're British"
Person A " So what your are saying is , I'm an earthling"
Person B "Don't be silly"
Person A" Why not. If I am British. Then I am European. If I am European, I'm an Earthling."
Person B" Well.... Yeah.... But."
Person C"We are all Milkywayians"

See how it goes? Once you start to argue against an accepted norm, you then have to accept all Possibilties no matter how silly they are, If they hold true.
Lady Spank
Get Out Nasty Face
#952 - 2012-07-22 08:57:41 UTC
Mechael wrote:
Something amusing ... I googled "define "pay to win"" and this thread was the 5th result. Cool

Google search results are profiled so Its not surprising.

(ಠ_ృ) ~ It Takes a Million Years to Become Diamonds So Lets Just Burn Like Coal Until the Sky's Black ~ (ಠ_ృ)
VegasMirage
Blank-Space
Northern Coalition.
#953 - 2012-07-22 12:16:47 UTC
this thread is full of tears and sadness

btw I LOVE pay to win games, it's just like real life... isn't this fun

Those of you who can't afford to "win" just develop your own measure for success and call all the guys paying to win losers. And when you lose ship after ship isk after isk and you're bled, then you can say you play eve for all the opposite reasons play to win players do... for the great community, for the spectacular local chat, I don't know but make something up and stick to it.

Sounds familiar?

no more games... it's real this time!!!
Doc Severide
Doomheim
#954 - 2012-07-22 14:41:25 UTC  |  Edited by: Doc Severide
Mechael wrote:
...the fact remains that you can still get an in-game thing with real money.

But so what? It doesn't give you an advantage over anyone else...

I buy 2-3 GTC's month for my ISK cause I refuse to grind and I'm not interested in mining or playing the market. I get ISK, someone else gets their game subscription paid for all sanctioned by CCP.

WIN-WIN

I don't give a rats arse if people don't like it...
Jerick Ludhowe
Internet Tuff Guys
#955 - 2012-07-22 15:22:53 UTC
The moment plex were introduced on the scene is the moment this game stopped being a sandbox.

As convenient as plex can be they sure as **** had a negative impact on game play as a whole.
baltec1
Bat Country
Pandemic Horde
#956 - 2012-07-22 15:30:10 UTC
Jerick Ludhowe wrote:
The moment plex were introduced on the scene is the moment this game stopped being a sandbox.

As convenient as plex can be they sure as **** had a negative impact on game play as a whole.


What evidence have you got to back that one up with?
Mag's
Azn Empire
#957 - 2012-07-22 15:37:41 UTC
baltec1 wrote:
Jerick Ludhowe wrote:
The moment plex were introduced on the scene is the moment this game stopped being a sandbox.

As convenient as plex can be they sure as **** had a negative impact on game play as a whole.


What evidence have you got to back that one up with?
I'd like to know this too.

Destination SkillQueue:- It's like assuming the Lions will ignore you in the Savannah, if you're small, fat and look helpless.
Mechael
Tribal Liberation Distribution and Retail
#958 - 2012-07-22 16:11:27 UTC
malcovas Henderson wrote:

Your definition of P2W means ANY game MMO or otherwise, that has a payment involved is P2W. If you don't pay, you can't play, therefore you cannot "WIN". In this broad sense of the meaning, everything in RL that uses $$ is P2W. Using this kind of Free Fall meaning format. Buying food/electricity/water/ is P2W. The concept holds true with this only if you reach the final Factor in the meaning.

Using this form of Free Fall definition. It could be argued ALL sport is played by a team. The 100m sprinter is only a part of a Team. Although it is considered only the 100m sprinter that wins. Do you go through life with this Free Falling concept?.

Buying Plex to gain Isk can only be P2W, if, and only IF It gains an advantage over any other isk in the game. (IE buys double the amount), AND you manage to sell the Plex. In all its glory. The amount of ISK the Plex guarantees is ZERO.

Saying that because someone has bought the Plex, using it is a form of P2W. This is severely flawed. If I, me, myself buys a Plex with isk. I, me, myself has not parted with any real $$. The best it can be is PFO2AFMTL(Pay for others to win and for me to lose). In other words. Player A buys a Plex. Manages to sell it. Player B that purchased said Plex funds an Alt, or a Friends Account.. Player A and B meet on the field. Player A with his one Char. Player B with his 2 chars

P2W to have any meaning, must mean an advantage over EVERONE that does not Pay. Not just some, otherwise it is not "Win"

Your arguement on P2W is valid. But loses it's meaning, by being Free fall. It has no solid definition. By your reasoning, adding another level, makes you have to accept that level

Person A "I'm English."
Person B "no you are not, You're British"
Person A "Yeah but, I'm still English"
Person B "No, no. You're British"
Person A " So what your are saying is , I'm an earthling"
Person B "Don't be silly"
Person A" Why not. If I am British. Then I am European. If I am European, I'm an Earthling."
Person B" Well.... Yeah.... But."
Person C"We are all Milkywayians"

See how it goes? Once you start to argue against an accepted norm, you then have to accept all Possibilties no matter how silly they are, If they hold true.


Yeah, we've been over this already. By my definition, most games do have some form of paying to win (you have to buy the game in order to play it.) The question is, where do we draw the line when it comes to spending money for advantages? I draw it a whole lot sooner than some of the other people in this thread seem to. That's the difference. Squares and rectangles. Or English and British. Blink

Paying for a unique advantage is still paying for an advantage, while paying for an advantage is not necessarily paying for a unique advantage. It's a matter of degrees. In my book, the only purely in-game advantage that it is acceptable to pay for is access to the game. That's where I've drawn my little line in the sand. You've drawn yours a bit further down that road.

I'm not going to bother explaining why I draw my line where I do, because if you don't already know then we are here for entirely different reasons anyway. Here's a hint, though ... it has nothing to do with "fairness."

Whether or not you win the game matters not.  It's if you bought it.
Jerick Ludhowe
Internet Tuff Guys
#959 - 2012-07-22 17:34:40 UTC
baltec1 wrote:
Jerick Ludhowe wrote:
The moment plex were introduced on the scene is the moment this game stopped being a sandbox.

As convenient as plex can be they sure as **** had a negative impact on game play as a whole.


What evidence have you got to back that one up with?


Wealth is no longer only acquired through in game means.... Instead you can drop your rl dollars for an item that is easily resellable for a rather high isk value... It is essentially rmt with one additional step.

I honestly am surprised i even had to explain this...
Corina Jarr
en Welle Shipping Inc.
#960 - 2012-07-22 17:41:12 UTC
Jerick Ludhowe wrote:
baltec1 wrote:
Jerick Ludhowe wrote:
The moment plex were introduced on the scene is the moment this game stopped being a sandbox.

As convenient as plex can be they sure as **** had a negative impact on game play as a whole.


What evidence have you got to back that one up with?


Wealth is no longer only acquired through in game means.... Instead you can drop your rl dollars for an item that is easily resellable for a rather high isk value... It is essentially rmt with one additional step.

I honestly am surprised i even had to explain this...

All that shows is that people are willing to pay in game isk for an item.

Doesn't show any negative effect.



And since no isk is added to the game in the process, its no more negative than people paying in game isk for ammo or ships.