My suggestion is: make non-subscribed accounts after the 8 hour trial period just like normal accounts except limit them to 1000 credits at any time and do not allow them any station storage. Any payments they receive that would raise their bank account to over 1000 credits just raise it to 1000 credits.

This would help solve two problems:
1. Fixes low game population.

Free attracts people. Not all of them will be the best people, but having more human brains in the game will make it more fun - even if a lot are 13 years old.

These players will disproportionately populate the border skirmishes, since the government pays to replace your ship. This will make the skirmishes look like real wars.

2. Fixes lack of social interaction

The credit limit will keep free players dependent on paying players or on one another. On their own, they will be limited to either an EC or a vanilla vulture and to lower level weapons.

Due to the inability to change ships in flight and that they cannot leave their ships in the station, their ship choice will always be as above.

This means that for doing anything more than popping collector bots, they will have to develop a lot of skill (a good thing) and they will need to team up. I bet 80 EC-89's can take down a hive queen. Maybe a few more for a Levi. Thus they will be forced to cultivate relationships among themselves or with the paying players.

To get better weapons they will have to ask a paying player to give it to them. This means they will need to cultivate good relationships with the paying players or turn pirate. Turning pirate is a good thing because more pirates make the game more interesting - escort missions will not just be fighting bots, but an armada of EC-89's or Vults.

I can even see the possibility of a shadow banking system emerging in which some paying players sit outside of certain stations and, in return for a fee, store free players' items. Or possibly some pirates, recruiting cannon fodder can offer to provide such a banking system in return for labor.

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The hassle involved in free play (replacing the ship means buying an EC, going out and getting some cargo, selling the cargo, buying a vult, getting more cargo, selling it, buying a non-free weapon, lather rinse repeat; you can't keep a good weapon you get from a drop or another player, etc) and the desire for better hardware will cause many free players to eventually convert to pay or drop out, depending on their level of personal perseverance.

However, these same hassles should help to forge a social network that will keep them playing and provide an excellent culture of cooperation within VO. And people will put up with the hassles because, it's a free game that rocks.

The population of free players could also be mined for money by using various in-game trinkets that require real-world money for free players. E.g. access to ship skins is 1 US$ for a month., but included in a subscription. Various animations could be also obtained for $ (e.g. a bind that temporarily makes a blue heart swirl around the ship or a access to a modified free plasma gun that shoots smiley faces or skulls). Station storage at their home station could also be available for real payments per cu. (Such an arrangement might encourage the creation of that shadow banking system.)

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I believe having a large number of free players limited in this way will make the game better for those who pay and more inviting for everyone.

I actually like this. It won't happen any time soon, but it's a pretty good balance.

i don't want a bunch of newb ass pirates in vanilla vultures getting popped all day long.

on second thought maybe i do

I am thinking of such a model for a quite long time. I think this would really bring a lot of advantages. More people in game, current subscribers more happy, more trial into subscriber conversions over time, the devs more happy, rinse, repeat.

The only statement I have seen from the devs was that they do not want to change the business/subscription model "now". Has the time come yet?

The suggested limitation needs polishing but, yeah, I am all for this. It would be some money and/or licenses limits, ...

I'd bump it to 10k cap... when someone finishes the 8 hour trial, all the money they made turns to zilch? Maybe just have whatever surplus credits they make inaccessible to them until they pay up?

Otherwise looks good to me (I have no clue what this would do to server load, however).

Maybe just have whatever surplus credits they make inaccessible to them until they pay up?

My thinking as well. No lifting the cap past what you need for SVG/IBG, though. Maybe lower prices on those at border stations.

I think the 1000cr limit is excessive. Perhaps 50,000 to 100,000cr as the limit so that they can purchase decent but not premium ships and weapons, but have to work harder to sustain their existance. Otherwise agreed.

I think if this was to be implemented, you would need not to restrict money, but rather ships, weapons and other stuff. They could get a million dollars, but still not buy anything above a certain level. Potentially have level caps, as well. It ^would^ bring in a much larger playerbase, however.

Hmm, Ok. I accept it may increase the number of folk who think " I'll watch this game until something I really like happens, then I will subscribe"

So , probably not a bad idea in the long run .

@skelbey08

Just restricting ships / weapons is inadequate imo because for a player with no interest in trading or mining, all they really need is the vult 3 or hog 2 to play effectively. If you restrict them access from the fcpc, I may relent on this though. However, Corvus would have to be reworked so that they can't benefit from its low standards for equipping items.

However, Corvus would have to be reworked so that they can't benefit from its low standards for equipping items.
Heh. I could imagine the incredible influx of newbs into greyspace if corvus weren't considered. While it'd be a horrible marketing tool, it would provide a bit of fun for our rat community.

But yah... I think monetary caps are the best idea, especially if the surplus money is inaccessible until they pay up, that way they get an immediate bonus when they sub (insta-gratification = revenue).

So, you are proposing a "FREE BASIC LEVEL" but pay for PREMIUM content? I've heard that before... same people that considered an absurd to pay real rental on a station or capships???

anyway, could bring more people in... with an decent limit, I feel closer to 100Kc, so he feels like having something and wishes more.

Maybe some roles specially crafted for them, as cargo pilot for convoys, gunners, support on hive combats, so on. << FOCUS ON TEAMWORK as participant <<

Hope it won't evolve to neut.mk4 at sale for US$5,00 and pay-for-content or microtransaction model.

For me that could complete what proposed at "brainstorming", but read Inc's reply... http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/1/22358#277168

How explain, RP'ing, the property cap? Like they're illegal aliens and cannot get a real job, since they do not pay taxes? And if one subscribe, becomes full citizen?

Surely, virtue is on middle path...

Rather than imposing a hard limit of 1k or 10k or 100k credits, I would suggest that these non-paying characters be limited to 5 or 10 M, with the addition of a 1k limit per transaction. This would prevent them from flying anything very expensive, but wouldn't be nearly as frustrating for them, and would allow them to feel like they're making economic progress.

Now, what happens if I let my subscription expire, with the intention of re-subscribing when I have more time to play? Do all of my credits evaporate? Because that would be a good incentive for me to not re-sub at a later time.

Alloh: There's a difference between pay-for premium content, micro-transaction, and pay-for with a free demo. Vendetta has always been a pay-for game with a free demo. This proposal extends the scope of the demo to allow cheapskates to stick around longer before (hopefully) deciding to pay.

Also, trying to explain a free demo of a game in the context of in-game roleplay is one stupidest ideas I've ever heard. I'm glad to see you still have the mental capacity of rubber duck.

Ladron has a good point, in an RPG, you need to feel like you are making economic progress. Otherwise it is less fun. Just limiting credits per transaction seems OK. This also gives some flexibility when you are paying players -- you can pay 30k in 1k chunks. Thus you can pay the pirates (peytros will be happy) or an EMS contract.

But I really like the idea of credits going into savings for when you finally do pay up. It is much closer to my original vision but it allows you to make economic progress. However, the devs will need to consider whether it is too frustrating, and whether having lots of credits entering the market all in one chunk will cause monetary balance problems.

Making the monetary limit 100k is definitely too high. We want to avoid making it possible for the free players to do too many things as individuals. I could see 2 or 3k. However, with 1k they can get access to: Revenant, Vanilla Vult and EC-89 & 101. Even the Rev is quite a lot of ship: 2S,1L with decent thrust and not a lot of weight. I, myself, am flying a Rev III for botting.

If you do per-transaction limits, 2 or 3k is too much, since you can buy the majority of weapons for that much and there is no need to go out and earn the money each time you make a purchase; you can buy using your savings. This would get rid of the incentive for players to have to ask for weapons from the other players.

I want decent weapons to have to get supplied by the paying players to help non-payers to forge relationships. But, I don't like level limits because I want them to be able to legally use any weapon in the game that fits on their ship. This gives them incentive to stay and grind their levels and get familiar with the game. I just want them to have to ask a paying player for the weapon. Not having level limits also avoids the problem with needing to rework Corvus. Finally, not having level limits lets the free players feel they are advancing and keeps the game fun.

Regarding subscriptions running out, my thought was one of two paths:
1) A Big Red Warning Box(tm) pops up when you try to log in as unsubscribed. "Do you really want to continue, your subscription has expired? Playing with an expired subscription will erase your current credits & station storage. Or you can click here to subscribe." If you don't play, everything is left as it was.

2) Your excess goes into storage and becomes inaccessible for the time you are playing as an unsubscribed player. This would be logically very compatible with the "in storage until you pay" model for dealing with profits from non-payers.

The second seems better.

Yeah, your second solution for a dead subscription would be acceptable, I think. The first would not be. It should not be possible for me to accidentally erase all of my savings in one go, no matter how drunk I am when I log in. ; )

This all sounds fairly reasonable to me. My prior thinking on this was mostly limited to level caps and the like. But money/storage caps (or accessibility caps, with earned money still being there but "unavailable") would be cool too.

There might also be some merit to limiting socialization features. There are some people who just go for the game as a "chat room" or some such. It might not be bad to prevent "demo" status players from being members of a guild, or even having global chat limits (like rating limiting them to a message per minute or something), and preventing use of Voice Chat (voice chat is also a big bandwidth hit for us, so that would be good to prevent).

Also, there would be a differentiation between "Trial" and "Demo". Any trial account would be the same as a paid account, for the period of the trial length. So people could see the game as it "is", and use everything. Then, when their basic hourly period or extended key-trial ended, it would lapse back to "demo" if unpaid. Much as accounts with a sub ending would lapse back to "demo". So.. demo would be less capable than a normal trial.

Unfortunately, I'm not comfortable with experimenting right now. I have a significant fear that enough of our existing paid players would go let their accounts lapse more easily, that we would vaporize in a couple of months. I don't have enough capital sitting around in a bank account to experiment without risking Doom. Hopefully at some point we'll have enough extra cash, or get another round of investment or something, to where we can try things like this.

In the meantime, I'll continue trying to make the game More Fun, which I think is probably the surest way to keep more paid players :).

Good idea

However Inc is probably right, especially some of those uber pirates who could probably kill 5 people at once when just flying a bus may lapse and just become freebie killers!

"Unfortunately, I'm not comfortable with experimenting right now."

So this idea ends ~exactly~ as I said. No arguing, I understand your concerns.
What if enough of us subscribe for a year or two in advance? Would it help?

"In the meantime, I'll continue trying to make the game More Fun"

The problem is that the most fun in this game comes from players. The more players the more fun.

Trust me, VO is actually pretty boring during these non-spike hours. I am usually escorting during low hours, flying through all the space, not meeting ANYONE. Right now, it is 16:45 UTC and I am actively flying for about 3:15 (3 hours and 15 minutes) and I have not met any single live player.

Two days ago, during the moderate/high hours I was sitting at Edras / Pelatus WH maybe for two hours. Then next two hours at the Edras station. I usually do not camp WHs but I had some work to do so I was half-AFK in VO. I did not meet ANYONE.

I still see the small player base as the #1 problem to fix. I simply do not believe cap ships or stations or whatever will help much with this. Someone should focus on "fixing small player base problem" directly.

What if enough of us subscribe for a year or two in advance? Would it help?

Mmmm, no, I don't think so, that would just create a different problem. Strictly speaking, we make more money from people being month-to-month. We either need more subbed players (duh), or acquire a buffer via some other method (outside investment, licensing the engine, the latter of which I've spent some time on recently).

The problem is that the most fun in this game comes from players. The more players the more fun.

I understand that, but there are certainly things we can do with game mechanics to help bring people together. Stuff like befriending convoy captains and having them report when they see people. Or sensor mines. Or whatever.

Plus, more scheduled and event-driven gameplay can help as well.

Based on the outstanding turnout for the Dark Convoy Event, I think that special dev events are the best method to bring lots of players out. A calendar of events that includes regular weekly events would be great. I think it would help to have a core of high profile guides who lead this effort, under Dev guidance.