Is it true that F2P shifted resources away from end game permanently in DDO?

[Khafar]

The biggest question is when and how much the end-game community will get from this.

Well, it's going to start off with an entirely new level 62-65 region, which ought to qualify as "endgame". If you're talking specifically about raids... don't know (and speaking for myself only - don't care). LOTRO has never been some sort of endgame paradise, which is one of the reasons I'm playing it. Of the ~1600 hours I've spent playing the game since it launched, less than 100 hours have been spent playing at the level cap - across several different characters there. Endgame is usually going to be awfully repetitive, and often requires groups. Neither interest me all that much.

I think too many games spend far too much time catering to "endgamers", and even LOTRO has done too much of that in the past 2 years IMO. So if they hit a new balance point where they're delivering some new mid-level content, working on other game systems (crafting, housing, music, hobbies, etc)... that would rock.

Khafar

[Fudoshin]

Excellent thread, overall the way I see it is Lifetime accounts are value added, in a sense...even if you havn't got your 20-30 months yet, with the caveat that the game continues as it has (or hopefully with more content updates) BUT, that there, is the major point of uncertainty.

We can jump up and down and panic all we like and at the end of the day most of us won't know what it's going to do until it's done. As someone who really enjoys the raiding content I am suspicious that "fluff and quick play" type content will dominate the store because that's likely to be their biggest revenue earner. The solo only players who complained that raid content was too exclusive and a waste of Turbine resources may in fact end up being correct because the new "average player" doesn't want to commit "cash by pack" to more than they are certain of achieving on their own. If that becomes the case it's a sad day for raiding indeed. Then again, who knows?

I have a lifetime and have had for more than 3 years now, this game doesn't owe me a thing, and giving me $10-$15 worth of spending money a month..well, it remains to be seen if it's enough, it's a relative thing, but I expect if carefully managed it will be.

[Inkfinger]

looks like turbine is white washing any contrady evidence that goes against their previous statements and new business model, and likely hiding any evidence that proves ddo f2p fails. even my post got locked as soon as a dev replied to it. What have you got to hide Turbine?
This company acts so shady and secretive and then wonders that the player base doesnt trust anything they say or do. Remember how we were supposed to get regular updates for example? lotta ****.

[Khafar]

likely hiding any evidence that proves ddo f2p fails

What evidence would that be? DDO has doubled paid subscriptions, quintupled revenues, and will deliver twice as many content updates this year than they have in any previous year. Hardly a "fail", taking a game from death's door to that in a year -- in the middle of a bad recession. My worry (since I don't like F2P much) is that it's been so successful that it will be widely copied across this genre. If LOTRO is a wild success after making the switch, I'd pretty much count on it.

my post got locked as soon as a dev replied to it.

You got a reply, and it was bluntly honest: the reason they're getting more resources to work on this game right now is because of the transition to F2P (and the prospect that brings for improving their revenues).

Khafar

[Ruhrval]

According to Mersky's interview on massively.com, Turbine began moving LOTRO to a F2P model before the purchase by WB. So, if my memory is correct (and it might not be), we had blue names telling us that they "had no plans to switch LOTRO to F2P at this time" (or something like that) after development had already begun on that very thing. As Khafar said, the phraseology was couched in legalese terms, so technically what they said wasn't untrue.

Yup, they chose "weasel-words."

[bigsix66]

looks like turbine is white washing any contrady evidence that goes against their previous statements and new business model, and likely hiding any evidence that proves ddo f2p fails. even my post got locked as soon as a dev replied to it. What have you got to hide Turbine?
This company acts so shady and secretive and then wonders that the player base doesnt trust anything they say or do. Remember how we were supposed to get regular updates for example? lotta ****.

Please don't post statements for which you have no evidence, or attempt to speak for anyone other than yourself. All it will succeed in doing is getting the thread locked.

[Sapience]

I'd like to point out the "lack" of end-game content in DDO had nothing to do with F2P, and everything to do with the game already having hit it's maximum allowable level cap.

Granted, even after that, new end-game content came out, what with the re-opening of the harbor for the new epic versions of game quests, etc.

I just want to spotlight this post because it's a reply to the OP directly. Most of the other posts here aren't. Which means we're way off topic. Seeing as the OP has been asked and answered, we're done.