10/28. **Update 1 went live onto servers today. Patch notes.
So, coming Wednesday (9/9/09), Dungeons and Dragons Online: Eberron Unlimited (formerly DDO: Stormreach) will be free-to-play and open to everyone. With it comes a few changes, and as I expect at least a few of you (including me, but I might go subscriber once more) to hop in on it to try it out, I thought I'd write up a guide on what is really free and what is not free.
(I have some of this info in an old post on Misc Games, but this is a better spot for it I'd say, without necroing a thread)
VIPs AND FREE PLAYERS
VIP status will cost you $15/month, just like most big-name MMOs out there. A comparison of what is available is demonstrated on a chart on the http://www.ddo.com/vip page.
Premium Status is for anyone who was once a VIP at any time or anyone who has purchased Turbine Points (will explain). This was originally designed to not only reward someone who has put forth a little bit ($6.25 minimum) of money with two extra character slots and higher priority in login queues, but also removes restrictions placed to stop goldspammers (such as only being able to put one item on the Auction House per server, limited chat that locked you out if you were talking too much). It is severely reccomended that if you plan on playing the game for a while, you at least pay $6.25 for some Turbine Points and remove those restrictions and double your available characters.
ADVENTURE PACKS
The most notable thing you'll find starting out as a F2P character in DDO is that there's a lot of content (but not all of it!) blocked out for you. This includes most major quest chains, raids, and hubs throughout the levels, which give slightly better rewards than your average quest. Does this mean you can't get to 20, the level cap? Of course not! (As I've been assured there's enough content to get you there by Turbine staff) This just means you're going to have to put in a lot more work and grind some of the same quests multiple times to level. There seems to be an alternative, however:
FAVOR
DDO has a very unique "favor" system that compliments its unique instancing style very well. For doing quests on normal, hard, or elite, you're awarded favor based on the highest level you've completed. (Example: I have completed the "Misery's Peak" quest on normal for the first time, awarding 4 favor. If I completed it on hard, I would get 8. On elite, 12.)
There is a limited amount of favor you can earn per character, capping at the point you've done every quest on elite, including all the raids and purchased content. While I'm not exactly sure what the cap is, "2000" is pretty close to the end and is the benchmark I will be basing the following ideas off of.
It is very important to realize that while you can buy Turbine Points (64 points per dollar ranging to 86 points per dollar depending on which bundle you buy), you also earn them as you gain favor as follows.
On the first character to reach this set amount of favor per server,
+50 pts. for 5 favor
+25 pts. for 25 favor
+25 pts. for 50 favor
+50 pts. for 500 favor
+100 pts. for 1000 favor
+100 pts. for 2000 favor
However, for every 100 favor you earn, you get 25 points.
This means, on your first character to reach 2000 favor on a particular server, you will earn:
(350 + 25(20)) = 850 points.
On subsequent characters to reach 2000 favor on that SAME server, you will earn:
(25(20)) = 500 points.
Note that you can, in fact, roll a character on all six servers and hit the favor cap for maximum points.
PURCHASED CONTENT
850 Turbine Points, fine. But what does that mean to me?
In order to buy the "low-level" (1-6) content: 1915 turbine points
In order to buy the "medium-level" (7-11) content: 3580 turbine points
In order to buy the "high-level" (12-20) content: 2395 turbine points
This tallies up to 7890 Turbine Points to purchase all the CURRENT, AS OF MY WRITING THIS content in the game.
At 86TP/$ with the large points bundle, not going too deep into the math, it would cost ~90-92 dollars to purchase all the CURRENT content in the game.
The common misconception is that, with current estimations and not taking into account favor gained by being a VIP, that if you are a VIP for six months you will have payed $90 but not actually get to keep any content you have when you go free-to-play. However, if you pay $90 (and have no problems paying 10 to 15 bucks for new content every two months or so) in lump for all the content, and play for more than six months, you are making a profit.
However, because (and this is the clincher) VIPs make 500 Turbine Points a month, it may be more profitable to play for six months and end up with 3000 TP. When your VIP subscription ends, you can buy a large chunk of the content (I.E., the ones you actually want. Like endgame raids and the good dungeons for leveling like Delera's) and continue as a free player with some restrictions and buy new content or additional content as you see fit. This will come out with the same cost, yes, but in that six months you are playing as a VIP and have access to all content and get to see what you want and what you don't want, as well as get favor from content you would have otherwise never played.
Now that I have compiled all this information, any person who truly enjoys DDO should be able to sit down and plan how they want to go about things.
Cupcake's example plan
My parents have always payed for my MMO subscriptions because I'm a pretty low-maintenance kid. My personal entertainment bill for a month can range from $15 to $35 depending on how many movies I want to see, and really that's it. So I'm going to be basing this on a current $15/month budget, ignoring spending extra for convieniences in the DDO store or buying additional content.*
We'll start with that traditional six-month VIP plan. I've played around in the beta up to level 6, and realized that leveling can be a bit of a pain without quests like Shan-to-kor and Tangleroot, but it's indeed fully possible. So I'm not going to worry heavily about buying that content. I have heard, though, that after level 12 you're going to have a hard time leveling without some other hardcore F2Pers. So, that's around where my content purchasing is going to start. I'm also figuring in here that within six months I will be able to get one character to 20 (Hopefully my ranger!) and hit 2000 favor. I may be able to get more characters up into that range, it's not really all that hard, so I might even have excess TP beyond this.
6 Months VIP = 3000
2000 Favor = 500
1st time 2000= 350
Beta = 500
= 4350 TP
Purchasing of engame raids (note that these often come in bundles, such as Menechtarun Desert, which are the best hubs for leveling in their range)
Vale of Twilight (Shroud) = 700
Devils of Shavarath = 650
Gianthold Tor = 995
Necropolis pt IV = 850
Restless Isles = 600
= 3795 TP
This will enable me to get into *everything* level 11 and up. I will miss out on Vault of Night (dragon) raids, yes, but the gear isn't worth it anymore since the game is very different than it was at launch. It is a very cool raid (knocks WoW's socks off) and I will miss it, but I might be able to purchase it later.
This will leave me with 555 TP. I will either use these to purchase Threnal (level 8-10, great for leveling) or Sorrowdusk Isle (level 6-10, great for leveling aswell).
------------------------
"BUT CUPCAKE?! WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH ME, A PLAYER WHO WANTS TO EXIST AS A FREE PLAYER AND/OR SUBSCRIBER TO DDO?!"
This compiled information will better help you decide how you want to spend your hard-earned money.
-Do you want access 24/7 to all content and want to play this game for years? $90 for all the content and then $15 every 2-3 months (as an estimate) would be the best bet for you. Of course, you will have to pay for additional character slots you want and won't get in-game GM support or a shared bank tab (unless you buy it), but you WILL have all the content and be eligible for every in-game item a VIP has.
-Do you want just the content you want? Best bet (if you're a new player) would be to go with my current plan. Play a character to cap, experience all the content you can, decide what is good and what's crap. You pay a bit more money but you won't buy something and realize it's not your thing, in addition to having VIP features for half a year.
*It's also important to note that when I turn 18 in ~12 months I will be able to supplement a bit of cash for additional content once I have a job.
So, coming Wednesday (9/9/09), Dungeons and Dragons Online: Eberron Unlimited (formerly DDO: Stormreach) will be free-to-play and open to everyone. With it comes a few changes, and as I expect at least a few of you (including me, but I might go subscriber once more) to hop in on it to try it out, I thought I'd write up a guide on what is really free and what is not free.
(I have some of this info in an old post on Misc Games, but this is a better spot for it I'd say, without necroing a thread)
VIPs AND FREE PLAYERS
VIP status will cost you $15/month, just like most big-name MMOs out there. A comparison of what is available is demonstrated on a chart on the http://www.ddo.com/vip page.
Premium Status is for anyone who was once a VIP at any time or anyone who has purchased Turbine Points (will explain). This was originally designed to not only reward someone who has put forth a little bit ($6.25 minimum) of money with two extra character slots and higher priority in login queues, but also removes restrictions placed to stop goldspammers (such as only being able to put one item on the Auction House per server, limited chat that locked you out if you were talking too much). It is severely reccomended that if you plan on playing the game for a while, you at least pay $6.25 for some Turbine Points and remove those restrictions and double your available characters.
ADVENTURE PACKS
The most notable thing you'll find starting out as a F2P character in DDO is that there's a lot of content (but not all of it!) blocked out for you. This includes most major quest chains, raids, and hubs throughout the levels, which give slightly better rewards than your average quest. Does this mean you can't get to 20, the level cap? Of course not! (As I've been assured there's enough content to get you there by Turbine staff) This just means you're going to have to put in a lot more work and grind some of the same quests multiple times to level. There seems to be an alternative, however:
FAVOR
DDO has a very unique "favor" system that compliments its unique instancing style very well. For doing quests on normal, hard, or elite, you're awarded favor based on the highest level you've completed. (Example: I have completed the "Misery's Peak" quest on normal for the first time, awarding 4 favor. If I completed it on hard, I would get 8. On elite, 12.)
There is a limited amount of favor you can earn per character, capping at the point you've done every quest on elite, including all the raids and purchased content. While I'm not exactly sure what the cap is, "2000" is pretty close to the end and is the benchmark I will be basing the following ideas off of.
It is very important to realize that while you can buy Turbine Points (64 points per dollar ranging to 86 points per dollar depending on which bundle you buy), you also earn them as you gain favor as follows.
On the first character to reach this set amount of favor per server,
+50 pts. for 5 favor
+25 pts. for 25 favor
+25 pts. for 50 favor
+50 pts. for 500 favor
+100 pts. for 1000 favor
+100 pts. for 2000 favor
However, for every 100 favor you earn, you get 25 points.
This means, on your first character to reach 2000 favor on a particular server, you will earn:
(350 + 25(20)) = 850 points.
On subsequent characters to reach 2000 favor on that SAME server, you will earn:
(25(20)) = 500 points.
Note that you can, in fact, roll a character on all six servers and hit the favor cap for maximum points.
PURCHASED CONTENT
850 Turbine Points, fine. But what does that mean to me?
In order to buy the "low-level" (1-6) content: 1915 turbine points
In order to buy the "medium-level" (7-11) content: 3580 turbine points
In order to buy the "high-level" (12-20) content: 2395 turbine points
This tallies up to 7890 Turbine Points to purchase all the CURRENT, AS OF MY WRITING THIS content in the game.
At 86TP/$ with the large points bundle, not going too deep into the math, it would cost ~90-92 dollars to purchase all the CURRENT content in the game.
The common misconception is that, with current estimations and not taking into account favor gained by being a VIP, that if you are a VIP for six months you will have payed $90 but not actually get to keep any content you have when you go free-to-play. However, if you pay $90 (and have no problems paying 10 to 15 bucks for new content every two months or so) in lump for all the content, and play for more than six months, you are making a profit.
However, because (and this is the clincher) VIPs make 500 Turbine Points a month, it may be more profitable to play for six months and end up with 3000 TP. When your VIP subscription ends, you can buy a large chunk of the content (I.E., the ones you actually want. Like endgame raids and the good dungeons for leveling like Delera's) and continue as a free player with some restrictions and buy new content or additional content as you see fit. This will come out with the same cost, yes, but in that six months you are playing as a VIP and have access to all content and get to see what you want and what you don't want, as well as get favor from content you would have otherwise never played.
Now that I have compiled all this information, any person who truly enjoys DDO should be able to sit down and plan how they want to go about things.
Cupcake's example plan
My parents have always payed for my MMO subscriptions because I'm a pretty low-maintenance kid. My personal entertainment bill for a month can range from $15 to $35 depending on how many movies I want to see, and really that's it. So I'm going to be basing this on a current $15/month budget, ignoring spending extra for convieniences in the DDO store or buying additional content.*
We'll start with that traditional six-month VIP plan. I've played around in the beta up to level 6, and realized that leveling can be a bit of a pain without quests like Shan-to-kor and Tangleroot, but it's indeed fully possible. So I'm not going to worry heavily about buying that content. I have heard, though, that after level 12 you're going to have a hard time leveling without some other hardcore F2Pers. So, that's around where my content purchasing is going to start. I'm also figuring in here that within six months I will be able to get one character to 20 (Hopefully my ranger!) and hit 2000 favor. I may be able to get more characters up into that range, it's not really all that hard, so I might even have excess TP beyond this.
6 Months VIP = 3000
2000 Favor = 500
1st time 2000= 350
Beta = 500
= 4350 TP
Purchasing of engame raids (note that these often come in bundles, such as Menechtarun Desert, which are the best hubs for leveling in their range)
Vale of Twilight (Shroud) = 700
Devils of Shavarath = 650
Gianthold Tor = 995
Necropolis pt IV = 850
Restless Isles = 600
= 3795 TP
This will enable me to get into *everything* level 11 and up. I will miss out on Vault of Night (dragon) raids, yes, but the gear isn't worth it anymore since the game is very different than it was at launch. It is a very cool raid (knocks WoW's socks off) and I will miss it, but I might be able to purchase it later.
This will leave me with 555 TP. I will either use these to purchase Threnal (level 8-10, great for leveling) or Sorrowdusk Isle (level 6-10, great for leveling aswell).
------------------------
"BUT CUPCAKE?! WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH ME, A PLAYER WHO WANTS TO EXIST AS A FREE PLAYER AND/OR SUBSCRIBER TO DDO?!"
This compiled information will better help you decide how you want to spend your hard-earned money.
-Do you want access 24/7 to all content and want to play this game for years? $90 for all the content and then $15 every 2-3 months (as an estimate) would be the best bet for you. Of course, you will have to pay for additional character slots you want and won't get in-game GM support or a shared bank tab (unless you buy it), but you WILL have all the content and be eligible for every in-game item a VIP has.
-Do you want just the content you want? Best bet (if you're a new player) would be to go with my current plan. Play a character to cap, experience all the content you can, decide what is good and what's crap. You pay a bit more money but you won't buy something and realize it's not your thing, in addition to having VIP features for half a year.
*It's also important to note that when I turn 18 in ~12 months I will be able to supplement a bit of cash for additional content once I have a job.
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