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Dev blog: Introducing Open Buddy Invites

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rodyas
Tie Fighters Inc
#61 - 2012-10-30 06:05:42 UTC
Sorry Guard, no buddy invite for you. Just gonna have to stick it out in prison.

Signature removed for inappropriate language - CCP Eterne
brutman
Roid Ravagers
#62 - 2012-10-30 07:43:15 UTC
No longer do people get plexs if the there buddy pays with a plex but what they do get is only told to them after there buddy upgrades. Yeah I'm gonna spam the crap out of my link just so I can find out what trinket your gonna give cause ccp has always had the best gifts for players. You guys have got to be the most brilliant marketing experts in Iceland. Course what do you expect from a country that went bankrupt 2 years ago.
Val Killmers
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#63 - 2012-10-30 08:06:52 UTC  |  Edited by: Val Killmers
I have one pending buddy invite .When this Plex-Plex removal taking place ? And can I change my reward from Plex to 30 day game time ?
Abdiel Kavash
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#64 - 2012-10-30 11:48:01 UTC
If you are currently using PLEXes to pay for your gametime, you can still get "free" (as in no additional cost incurred) 51 day alts.

1) Create an alt.
2) Subscribe alt with PLEX.
3) Redeem gametime on your main.

Net result is one PLEX spent, one month of gametime gained on main, and 51 days gained on alt.


tl;dr: screwing people who pay CCP real money out of free alts.


(Just kidding actually - well, a little. I always thought that the idea of a free 51 day alt was a little silly. But as my post shows, if getting rid of it was your intention, it's not happening.)
Rob Crowley
State War Academy
#65 - 2012-10-30 12:08:57 UTC
Maybe it was obvious for everyone else, but the devblog could've mentioned that now you choose your reward after the condition has been met; until now you had to choose when you sent the invitation.

Another slightly buddy program related thing:
The community website (community.eveonline.com) doesn't have a proper link to Account Management anymore. AFAICS the only thing linking there is a litte picture that says "Upgrade trial to paid subscription". I'd like to have a link either in the support menu or get that dropdown menu on the top of the page back.
Goren Styne
Different Like You
#66 - 2012-10-30 12:26:27 UTC
Meh, wouldnt have all my accounts if it werent for the 51 day perk.

New program sounds neat, but plex-for-plex was neat too!

Goren Styne CEO Different Like You
Aineko Macx
#67 - 2012-10-30 12:28:31 UTC
I'm actually surprised PLEX-for-PLEX has been around for so long.

Also inb4 whines about killing off CSM vote stuffing Lol

iveeCore 3.0: The PHP engine for industrial activities and CREST library
Robbie Robot
Exiled Kings
Pain And Compliance
#68 - 2012-10-30 14:43:30 UTC
Abdiel Kavash wrote:
If you are currently using PLEXes to pay for your gametime, you can still get "free" (as in no additional cost incurred) 51 day alts.

1) Create an alt.
2) Subscribe alt with PLEX.
3) Redeem gametime on your main.

Net result is one PLEX spent, one month of gametime gained on main, and 51 days gained on alt.


tl;dr: screwing people who pay CCP real money out of free alts.


(Just kidding actually - well, a little. I always thought that the idea of a free 51 day alt was a little silly. But as my post shows, if getting rid of it was your intention, it's not happening.)

No, they are not trying to get rid of 51 day alts, or getting your real life friends 51 days. It seems to me that they are trying to reduce alt spam. There are so many ways to abuse the plex-plex system that I'm amazed they it took so long to take it out. With one plex, a person can create as many alts as they want, and play them for 51 days. I think they chose the best way to get rid of this possible type of abuse (not creating long term alts, but the disposable 51 day ones).
Rampage2010
State War Academy
Caldari State
#69 - 2012-10-30 15:41:42 UTC  |  Edited by: Rampage2010
Warr Akini wrote:
Steve Ronuken wrote:
That's not a bad thing. It's not like they're bringing any RL cash to the game. Or using up any plex


Not emptyquoting for emphasis. The URL seems to be a pretty good way for getting the name out, but using that as a guise to nuke the PLEX-for-PLEX under the banner of "we're sure you understand" is simply not putting out enough effort to ~really~ gain understanding.


Gonna have to agree with the legendary Warr Akini on this one. Funny how CCP try's to spin this as a good thing, you take away plex for plex and and give us some pics of ponies. F U CCP
CCP Alice
C C P
C C P Alliance
#70 - 2012-10-30 15:43:51 UTC
Rob Crowley wrote:

Another slightly buddy program related thing:
The community website (community.eveonline.com) doesn't have a proper link to Account Management anymore. AFAICS the only thing linking there is a litte picture that says "Upgrade trial to paid subscription". I'd like to have a link either in the support menu or get that dropdown menu on the top of the page back.


Getting that fixed ASAP!

"There is no knowledge without unity"
Reticle
Sight Picture
#71 - 2012-10-30 15:44:30 UTC
Robbie Robot wrote:
No, they are not trying to get rid of 51 day alts, or getting your real life friends 51 days. It seems to me that they are trying to reduce alt spam. There are so many ways to abuse the plex-plex system that I'm amazed they it took so long to take it out. With one plex, a person can create as many alts as they want, and play them for 51 days. I think they chose the best way to get rid of this possible type of abuse (not creating long term alts, but the disposable 51 day ones).

No one has yet explained what the abuse is. So what if there are tons of alts out there? It's not like it uses any real amount of resources, and in any event, if they were other humans, not alts, you'd still be using the same resources. So, again, what exactly is the abuse going on? I can build an alt army out of 21 day trials just as easily as 51 day ones. That simply can't be the issue. So what is the issue? What's the problem being solved?
Vincent Athena
Photosynth
#72 - 2012-10-30 16:00:08 UTC
This entire thing got me thinking.....

A typical reward you would get for a buddy upgrading via a PLEX you gave him is 30 days of game time. What is happening is you are converting a PLEX into an account upgrade and 30 days for the buddy and 30 days of time for yourself. So what if:

One of the options when you right click on a PLEX is "Sponsor a new account".
When its time to PLEX your account, you buy one, then fly to a new player system/
You type into local "Who wants to have their account upgraded?"
When some one answers "Me! Me! Me!" you right click on the PLEX (which I hope you left in station) select "Sponsor a new account" and enter in the name of the new pilot.
Assuming that pilot is in fact on a trial, the new pilot gets a popup that says "So and so wants to sponsor you to a full account, with 30 days time extension. Do you accept?"
If he clicks Yes, you both get 30 days time.

And a new in-game relationship is formed.

Know a Frozen fan? Check this out

Frozen fanfiction
Zeran Kariashi
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#73 - 2012-10-30 16:02:17 UTC  |  Edited by: Zeran Kariashi
I dislike the no plex-to-plex somewhat. I've gotten several new people into the game due in large part to them having effectively a 51 day, non-restricted trial to just get in, poke around and see what they want to do, instead of that race to try and squeeze out enough isk for a PLEX in 21 days (and lets face it, it takes at least 20 days to specialize once you know where you want to focus). Sure if they know to abuse FW, it's not that hard even with the current inflation, though if you're not interested in that sort of thing, and would prefer to be an industrialist or miner, those two areas are very difficult to make ISK at when you can't upgrade the skills for a hauler to jet-mine or move goods on a trial account.

The new mining frigate will help somewhat in that regard (assuming it's ore horde hasn't been nerf'd yet) since it can hold enough ore comparable to an industrial 3-ish hauler but without all the extraneous training and I'm assuming is usable by trial players, at least for mining, but an industrialist will still have issues in that regard.


A lot of people offer 100s of millions of isk to get buddy invites. But that's counter productive as they greatly holds back their ability to learn to make ISK.

My typical offer at the moment for buddies invites is I give them a full copy of the game and almost two months worth of time, FOR FREE (at no cost to me), and some advice to get them started on the area they're interested in. And get the PLEX back to either do it again or sell now that the price has climbed a little higher (I typically only buy extra PLEX when I find one extremely low priced). Which means more people in game (some of which feel somewhat indebted by my generosity that I can add either to my crew as miners or upcoming, guards for when someone in the group inevitably gets bountied for disliking PVP and preferring relatively safe, stable income.)
CCP Delegate Zero
C C P
C C P Alliance
#74 - 2012-10-30 19:15:06 UTC
I wanted to get back on some further points that people have raised and give a little insight into some of the changes that went live yesterday. There are a few issues to answer, so bear with me. Smile

Rewards Selection

It's been mentioned that the rewards available are not outlined on the invite page.

Currently the only rewards available through the program are 30 days of game time or a PLEX item. We are looking at how the rewards selection might be broadened as part of the ongoing development of the Buddy Program.

We have also changed the point at which a reward is chosen and claimed to when a buddy trial is upgraded. The main driver for this change was the open invite. It makes little sense to choose the reward in advance with a one-to-many invite as this locks the invite into only one type of reward. Instead we wanted let people choose their reward for each upgrade. This will become more important if and when the rewards selection is expanded.

The feedback on the information as currently presented is very useful and we will be looking to act on it in the next round of improvements to the pages and functionality of the program. The work on those improvements is already underway. Please continue to give us feedback and ideas for such improvements.


Listing Buddies for Open Invites

With Buddy Program open invites we wanted to make the functionality available as securely as possible. Because of the, well, open nature of the open invite we can't identify people who take up the invite automatically to the inviting player. There is an obvious case for enabling a connection between the two parties though and we are looking at ideas for how that can happen. If you have some ideas in that regard, again, do let us know.


The end of PLEX-for-PLEX

We understand the concerns of players who found the PLEX-for-PLEX option useful and convenient. We recognize that it had some positives and was legitimately used by many to enable buddies to enjoy their introduction to EVE.

Unfortunately the option had some negatives and over the time since its introduction has increasingly come to be abused for various purposes. As well as the chaining of zero cost alt accounts, the option also led to farming of gifts and other incentives, in addition to some RMT activity associated with PLEX-for-PLEX accounts.

These abuses and the fact that negatives of the option had come to outweigh the positives, particularly from a development point of view, resulted in the decision to close the PLEX-for-PLEX option. The decision was not taken lightly.

We know and in fact value the legitimate use cases for the option. We will look to see how those needs can better be answered in an improved Buddy Program. We believe that removing the PLEX-for-PLEX option allows us to positively explore better options and develop a better experience for all users of the program, experienced and new players alike.

Again, please do use this thread to make suggestions in that vein.

Thanks,
DZ

CCP Delegate Zero | Content Designer - Writer | @CCPDelegateZero
Abdiel Kavash
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#75 - 2012-10-30 19:18:49 UTC  |  Edited by: Abdiel Kavash
Reticle wrote:
Robbie Robot wrote:
No, they are not trying to get rid of 51 day alts, or getting your real life friends 51 days. It seems to me that they are trying to reduce alt spam. There are so many ways to abuse the plex-plex system that I'm amazed they it took so long to take it out. With one plex, a person can create as many alts as they want, and play them for 51 days. I think they chose the best way to get rid of this possible type of abuse (not creating long term alts, but the disposable 51 day ones).

No one has yet explained what the abuse is. So what if there are tons of alts out there? It's not like it uses any real amount of resources, and in any event, if they were other humans, not alts, you'd still be using the same resources. So, again, what exactly is the abuse going on? I can build an alt army out of 21 day trials just as easily as 51 day ones. That simply can't be the issue. So what is the issue? What's the problem being solved?


If these alts are logged in, they are using server system resources. If not they're still eating up DB space and taking up character names. Yes, it's not much - and I'm not entirely opposed to their removal. Only CCP knows the full scale this is abused on, and the potential impact on the economy. (Imagine somebody creating dozens of trial alts to run PI and flood the market.)

[ edit: CCP Delegate 0 covered this while I was writing this post. ]

The problem with 51 day alts versus 21 day is that if you PLEX the alt account it becomes a full account - thus no longer limited by trial skills, contract system, etc. Your 21 day alt will be locked out of pretty much anything you would want to use it for.
Rob Crowley
State War Academy
#76 - 2012-10-30 23:02:07 UTC
CCP Alice wrote:
Rob Crowley wrote:

The community website (community.eveonline.com) doesn't have a proper link to Account Management anymore.


Getting that fixed ASAP!

Thanks, much appreciated.
Therestina Kihara
Pator Tech School
Minmatar Republic
#77 - 2012-10-31 04:09:47 UTC  |  Edited by: Therestina Kihara
Oh you people.

While the 'plex rewarded for plexing a buddy invite' part seems true, remember, real money was paid to get that PLEX in the first place.

While it is arguable that the capability to have 51-day, free, fully upgraded, full-access alts have the possibility to be abused to some extent, there are also legitimate reasons for this, such as introducing a group of friends to EVE, or as an incentive to get then in a corporation that is actively bringing in new people (and removing trial limitations, thus allowing them to contribute effectively) , with each of them potentially becoming a subscriber - that and the trial account limitations are, at best, annoying for new players who want to pursue a specialization.

Also, sure, they get to play 51 days for free, but then what? They will have invested enough time and resources that they will subscribe in due time. For players with no access to real currency, be it dollars, euros or whatever, 51 days is more than enough time for them to earn ISK to PLEX their accounts - and of course, someone else has paid for that PLEX they are buying, which of course is money that already is in CCP's pocket.

The problem i see with most people approving the removal of inviters getting a PLEX when their invitee upgrades using a PLEX is that they dislike the idea that someone is playing the game for free - don't forget, every PLEX in the game is money already in CCP's pocket, whether it is some ISK - grinding player buying one off the in-game market and using it on his account, or someone who bought it and then used it to extend his own gametime - which is why it is a dismaying thing to see PLEXes lost and destroyed because idiots haul them in frigates and whatnot - it effectively becomes freebies for CCP anyway you look at it. (gametime extension for accounts is lost, so they don't need to put out server resources for those lost PLEXes anymore)

Last point is, once your free 51 days are up, every single option available to add gametime to said free 51-day account can never be 'free' since you now have to either shell out ISK for a PLEX or pay subscription - and this is revenue for CCP, albeit delayed. (in before multiple rewards from other upgraded buddy invites supplying that account with 'free' gametime, you still have to add time to your main anyway, negating that possibility.)

So, either way and all ways, "the house always wins" - but of course that is still supporting them one way or another. (Bar hacking/exploits to illegally generate PLEX, which obviously is wrong and definitely should be stopped if it ever happens)
Opaque Intent
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#78 - 2012-10-31 04:16:35 UTC
Quote:
Currently the only rewards available through the program are 30 days of game time or a PLEX item. We are looking at how the rewards selection might be broadened as part of the ongoing development of the Buddy Program.


I would like to see rewards that can be pre-chosen based on the buddy invite url (defaulting to 30 days if the reward is inapplicable)

e.g. /invite/341234134134/reward/PLEX

I would also like a new option that splits the reward between the participants.

Something like 'both buddies get 1750 AUR worth of Aurum Tokens' or something.
Abdiel Kavash
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#79 - 2012-10-31 08:33:26 UTC  |  Edited by: Abdiel Kavash
Therestina Kihara wrote:
Oh you people.

While the 'plex rewarded for plexing a buddy invite' part seems true, remember, real money was paid to get that PLEX in the first place.

[...]

Also, sure, they get to play 51 days for free, but then what? They will have invested enough time and resources that they will subscribe in due time. For players with no access to real currency, be it dollars, euros or whatever, 51 days is more than enough time for them to earn ISK to PLEX their accounts - and of course, someone else has paid for that PLEX they are buying, which of course is money that already is in CCP's pocket.

[...]

Last point is, once your free 51 days are up, every single option available to add gametime to said free 51-day account can never be 'free' since you now have to either shell out ISK for a PLEX or pay subscription - and this is revenue for CCP, albeit delayed.

[...]


The problem is, when you pay for a buddy account with a PLEX, you used to get a PLEX back. Thus nobody is getting paid anything, no money and no items leave your possession or the game itself. CCP gets nothing, real or virtual, for allowing you to play that character for the first 51 days. And although 51 days is the limit, there was nothing stopping you from simply getting another account for another 51 days at no cost. Yes, obviously you can't fully enjoy the game with 51 days worth of skill training, but as far as hauling, PI, cyno, scout, etc. alts go, it's plenty of time.

Since creating the account costs you nothing, any amount of ISK you can make during these 51 days is pure profit. Thus you can roll as many alts as you want, and collect the money at the end of two months - profit limited only by how many accounts you care to create. Taken to the extreme, a single person could theoretically keep a scout in every system in EVE 24/7 for absolutely free. (Free as in no RL or in-game payment.) It's up to CCP to determine to which extent this has actually been abused.
Matiel Shrike
University of Caille
Gallente Federation
#80 - 2012-10-31 09:17:51 UTC
> Dev Bronies

Knew there'd be some :3

Nice blog by the way, though being able to mass invite people like that may/probably will destabilise the PLEX market. Though it doesnt bother me personally, a lot of players'll be riled up about it. Perhaps something to counteract the inevitable mass increase in supply to the market may be in order?