One small correction. I overvalued the first 30 shared bank slots, I based it on the upgrade price instead of the 1495 point initial 30 slot bundle. Changes it to $8.92 from $17.82. So -$8.90 in total value. Also, as some other posters pointed out, gold rolls are 15 shards each so instead of $7.31 for the yearly value a more reasonable value could be $22.50 (15 shards per roll x $.03 per shard, x 50 weeks). So that would mean I undervalued the gold rolls by $15.19 ($22.50 - $7.31). So if I corrected both of these things VIP's yearly value would be $193.35 instead of $187.06.
VIP is worth it only if you value the stuff included. For example, “6 more character slots than premium”. Would you buy this on your own if it wasn’t included in VIP? What percentage of VIPs play that many characters? What about 33 extra crafting storage? It’s great that stuff is included, however if you include a bunch of stuff that people don’t really value, you’re asking people to pay for a bunch of fluff.
Right and that's a legit concern, but see the end of the video where I address this. Even if you assume everything is worthless but the XP boost, DDO points, weekly gold roll, saga skip and +20 heart you still get to $99 of value. Also I'm using the lowest possible dollar value for the DDO points and as other pointed out I could have easily valued the gold rolls higher if I based it on the 15 shard per roll value instead.
@@AxelAlexK It's the same with those for me. Tomes of Learning , Voice of the Master, guild bonus to XP, delving bonus are great, but I would never pay for 10% XP potions. One run of Dr. Rushmore's Mansion would give me 8 hours worth of 5% XP, but I don't even buy those. I'd never pay shards for skipping anything in a saga, when I can get something permant for them instead. Same with hearts, and never ever would I gamble away shards for a gold roll. Only the points are nice, but they're cheaper when you buy them directly and you get them all at once.
To make VIP worthwhile, they should add more unique and invaluable things. For instance, Strintom showcased the VIP benefits in LOTRO and other games, and in his video, it became evident how VIP advantages are truly unique and priceless. You can't put a price on quality of life (QOL) features.
Yep, someone else pointed this out too. I did not think of it or I would have calculated it this way instead. I agree this way is more accurate, so the way I did it in the video did actually undervalue the gold rolls quite a bit.
The final conclusion only represents yourself and is not suitable for "average players", because every player is not an average player, and each player's situation is different. Players who have money and time and are insensitive to price don't care, and and so do completely free players. Only old players who recharge VIP from time to time and some new players will care. In view of this, I imagine a method. If you like the new perk, one point, and then look at the expenses behind. If you can accept another point, you can divide the total score by the number of perks and multiply it by two. If it can pass 60%, maybe you can consider becoming an one year VIP. One more thing about the New Policy complaint is that while the prize pool changes after one year, new players and players who didn't pay for the VIP in the first year will have to pay 2-years-VIP if just wanna the 12 month perk and have to wait for two years, so the benefits of this New Policy decreases as time goes on.
I think VIP is worth it but just barely because I don't play DDO every week. So I prefer just buying only the stuff I really need for DDO points in sales. A few things to keep in mind are players earning a lot of DDO points from playing the game and getting them from VIP and not having much to spend them on. So the active player base having a lot of DDO points also devalues some things on the list. Cause you can easily get them already with those DDO points. An other note that I want to make is that the Adventure pack value is going to rise up again a lot when DDO adds new packs to VIP that weren't in the free coupon code.
Usually for the saga, we do all the quest for the xp anyway(since we have some in our group not VIP), So I would suggest that this is a nice to have (QoL) but a non VIP wouldn't spend shard on this etiher way. The race, class, pack, monster manual can also be unlock and bought in game with regular playing and the ddo points you get as f2p, it's a one time and not yearly value by itself like you said. This is the only thing I would suggest is missing from your video, the amount of points you can get just by playing a lot is not bad(not great either, but good enough). If you buy only the expansion and claimed the free coupon content there is not much to just by after so it's a reasonable time to get to the point where you can unlock the rest(and that's if you even want all class and races) But I agree it's hard to put price on Quality of Life stuff and that's the main reason i'm VIP. The real value of a VIP is from stuff that you can't just buy with points by plaing the game. I also agree it's worth it but a bit closer to the actual value of purchassing evrything indivually.
I think I play 10 hours a month. I stay VIP because it doesn't cost that much (just in my opinion) and its easier to log on, when I do play, and just have everything.
quite a lot of those things don't really have a real value...and some of them might have more of a value than you considered (based on convenience...or based on it stacking...like the xp), but an unstated value which is probably the top of my list, is supporting the company that makes the game I want to keep playing (with more new stuff over time) that supporting them increases the likelihood of that happening.
Not sure why you tried to take the value of the benefit of the gold roll as opposed to just the points for an astral shard purchase to do a gold roll. That seems like an easier and more accurate comparison.
Yeah I agree that way is better, other people have pointed this out and I added it to the pinned comment earlier today. It wasn't an intentional thing just something I didn't consider. If I did I would have valued it that way.
Elite open is in the store, 25 points per single elite open. IDK man, apart from Hardcore elite opening, VIP just really isn't worth it if a player claimed one of the quest codes & 99 point xpac offers. Anything more than 2nd TR & just running a few cannith challenges per life (for mats to buy 5% xp pots) negates most of what I think players would find most useful in VIP. Edit - the VIP benefits is a bit of a tough sell. EG - Sure the +20 HoW is 2495 points, but it also costs 8x months of VIP, so it's cheaper to just buy the points for the heart (and you don't have to wait for 8 months). If a player paid a single month of VIP & in that time got 2x TR's done, they probably don't need VIP any more.
Elite open is in the store? Didn't even realize that. I don't think I would have used that as a value anyways since you can get elite open through reincarnation.
The question is, is VIP worth it when the game is so often unplayable due to lag and server issues? They could include 1000 000 store currency a month and it would be worthless if i cannot log in to the game when i have time to play.
I mean it really comes down to your sensitivity to lag. Is DDO laggy? Yes. Is it unplayable? I would say that's rarely the case. But it comes down to each person's subjective sensitivity to lag. And I know I have been playing DDO for so long, on top of many other old so so performing games I grew up with, that it really does not bother me unless it's actually getting me killed in game and causing wipes. But that's just me. Other people play DDO alongside other lag free online games and understandably are really bothered by the lag. Either way it's not ever going to be fixed, I don't think they can because it's engrained in DDO's nearly 20 years of code, so it's something you just have to accept on some level if you want to play the game. I wish DDO didn't have the lag it does but it just is what it is at this point. It's understandable if it's a deal breaker for some.
Unfortunately i love the game but its a true dinosaur, even Cordovan said like 5 years ago on live he wished they could do DDO 2...is it time to launch the next expansion as ddo 2 w the new killer game engines? Players don't mind starting over look at hardcore
but I'm worried that if they do DDO2 they would streamline it with 5th edition crap. to get the dreaded wider audience which would make it more like a Neverwinter thing not the game I enjoy. Sure the graphics are ancient but who really cares about graphics in an MMO? WoW looks worse than DDO and yet is still doing well because of the gameplay (even if it's not my thing)
If they just did a graphics update, I think lots of people would continue to play and the audience would grow. I love the game and the quests, but just want the player base to be higher.
@@ConnorCoultrup thing is I doubt it is worth it for them to redo all the graphics of the game just to keep the current smallish player base around. They'd need to attract a lot more players and rightly or wrongly a company/investor is probably going to think they can do that by "modernizing" the game systems. I'd rather it stay a niche game and keep the uniqueness it has than become just another cookiecutter F2P MMO
@@Iridescence93 I don’t disagree with you, I just don’t want the game to die. They desperately need to do a server merge and just have one server, it would help the game feel so much better, so many more groups around. Having 5 servers just splinters the already tiny player base.
Your analysis actually shows that if you play the game for longer than a year you continuously lose more and more money remaining VIP. Conservatively speaking your gain/loss is extremely optimistic after one year because you are gaining DDO points while playing. Factoring the gain of DDO points for playing and the need to spend them continues to be reduced the longer you play makes for a dichotomy that SSG hasn't been able to solve. VIP's are losing money after a year of subscriptions. And the new loyalty program was just an insult as it is contingent on remaining VIP and logging in. Is VIP worth it? From your own "conservative" analysis you gain about ~$100 value during the first year but that value quickly deteriorates by the end of the 2nd year and becomes a liability. Leasing always cost more.
Gaining DDO points by playing doesn't make a difference, because of opportunity cost. If you don't spend those points on things covered in VIP you can instead spend them on other things in the store like XP pots, Otto's boxes, etc etc. Now if you personally don't value anything in the store other than what is covered in VIP then ok. But I don't think that is the case for very many players.
@@AxelAlexK It just devalues the point bundles. Premium and VIP earn points for playing. So there is a benefit which is why the first year is so beneficial being VIP. Full disclosure, I am VIP thanks to HC season. I'll probably remain VIP until I pick up the +20 heart of wood. Then I will drop to premium until the next HC season which I don't believe happens until 2025. Even then, depending on the rule set I may only lurk on HC server and not go VIP.
Great video bro, as always! I guess its worth prob for the majority of players who are on TR grind. Who got all PL`s done and RP, play the game to get better loot and have fun. idk, they can give more quality of life on those rewards too, like teleports,, a bag for cosmetics, chest rolls, a raid bypass every week. But lets see how it will roll, gj axel!
1) For the Gold role, couldn't you have used the cost of buying a gold roll which I believe is 3 Astral shards? Also, great information that I read as I couldn't keep listening with your repetitive "Conservative Assumption" dialogue. Please, there was no need for that as you had it written on your graph as well. Great video otherwise.
True, I could have also calculated the gold roll that way. I know I repeated that a lot but it was because it is important to point it out many times so the video doesn't get misinterpreted/taken out of context at any point.
@@AxelAlexK Re: repeating. I respectfully disagree. Perhaps just say it once or twice with emphasis and *trust in your audience to get that message?* There's a D&D (not DDO) UA-camr whose channel I don't frequent because they were really big about repeating themselves to make a point. Please don't. As in most TED Talks, please continue on with your otherwise solid message? If I want to hear it again... I know how to do that too! Heh! =)
@@PurrsPlaceUsually yes I could just not repeat and I don't do that normally (see any of my other videos) but not in this case since it's so easy for it to be misinterpreted or misunderstood due to the number crunchy nature.
@AxelAlexK Oh, I am a fan of your videos, Axel! It is folks like you and Strimtom who help keep me informed and excited for this game. Thank you for doing that! =)
"We DDO players" deal with stacking and not stacking Boni on various equipment, alchemy, insightful, quality, festive ....a nd so on Boni! I would like to believe that repeating something twice should suffice for such an intelligent audience 😅
A+ for your passion! Thats why those old games are still alive. There ist always a fanboy 🤣 But for Me ddo isnt worth that much money anymore when i have the option for that money to buy Baldurs Gate 3 or Elden Ring. Move on Äxel 🤣🙋🏻
The reason DDO is still alive is because no other game has what DDO has - there are a lot of unique mechanics / ideas that do not exist in any other MMO.
I would love to play Baldurs Gate 3 or Elden Ring. I already have a backlog though so I'm always hesitant to buy new games. I do play other games though btw! 😀But I'm mostly into old games. I just finished Assassin's Creed 3 last week for instance and have been playing Castlevania 2 and Ghosts and Goblins on my NES as well as Zombi U on my Wii U when I have had the time. This year I really have only been playing DDO 10 hours a week or so, almost all of that being on Saturdays when I do my long weekly stream.
THIS COMENT WAS WRITTEN DURING ME WATCHING THE VIDEO You start assuming we are all going to spend the most amount of money in the most beneficial time, i reject that, people dont spend more money than they have, they might wait for the double bonus points but is completely insane to think they are going to buy 200 dollars of points. Your bases for value of point makes no sense in the real world and not at all conservative. The gold rolls per week should not be calculated in base on the prices, you get the rolls, it should be calculated in base of the roll value, if you get trash or a mount, thats not what you bought, you bought the rolls. I dont get it, if you know most people buy the cheapest bundles why base it on the expensive ones? I think you asume the conclusión and work the logic around to get to that conclusión. We know the things we get have value, is not the value of a gold roll every day and is not good enough for many people to dont buy other games or points in other games and subscribe to DDO, thats the problem, the F°°°ING economy. My conclusión is i will keep buy 1 to 3 months a year and some day i will have a +20 heart... and thats it. So F no.
I think you're misunderstanding the math here. The reason I based it on the biggest point bundle is because it is the cheapest in terms of points you get per dollar spent. If I used the smaller, more commonly bought bundles as a basis then the value of VIP goes way up since the cheaper bundles cost more dollars per point. That's what I mean when I said I'm being conservative, it's the lowest value you could possibly assign to the points and to VIP benefits as a result. As for the gold rolls, if I based in on the 15 shards instead, the value of VIP again, goes up (see pinned comment).
@@AxelAlexK I see now why you choose the cheapest bundle. I think the problem is we are not separating value and worth. Like i say is not a matter of if we are getting more stuff or the same. I think people still think buying some astral shards when they "feel lucky" and want to make a gold roll is worth more than this month i get this, next month i get the useless item defense and at some point i will get the +20 heart. I dont say your opinion is invalid or even wrong, i say the survey you did was right, becoming VIP have not enough WORTH for most of us despite having monetary VALUE. One way the worth can be increased is giving every benefit to the player the moment he pay for the months, you buy a year, here is everything now not in 1 or 2...etc months.
while i agree monetarily its probably worth it, the new month rewards are a joke. even in this analysis you admit most of it is worthless. it comes across like they have no idea what is valuable. why on earth is omnispell dust even in the bag of many things? just to bait someone into picking something worthless? 1% named loot is also absurd youd need 100k+ chest pulls to notice any difference. unless it stacks with next years 1% bonus then it may aswell not even be there. i play r10s at endgame and item durability is never a problem. while something is in fact better than nothing it comes across like the devs dont play this game no cosmetics wardrobe no easy bank access no swapping base augments for free there are so many easy qol improvements just staring us in the face, things even implemented in other games like lotro that they just refuse to give us
Just for my circumstances, I get the 10% xp, weekly gold roll which average 1000xp a week (bad rng), 500 ddo points a month, I don't saga skip because it's inevitable that there will be a non vip in my pug plus you lose xp by skipping. I own all the content so extra classes, iconics, races, or packs so they are a moot point. Elite open is a moot point because anyone who has Tred at least twice can elite open. Movement speed, irrelevant, Again I own all content including MMs, character slots, crafting, banks ect. Spell swap is also irrelevant. The monthly thing for VIP only applies as long as you're VIP (mostly) and nothing in the monthly appeals to me. so for my value of things that matter (kind of) is $106.49 with a gain of $6.50. For those that don't think it's worth it are those that fall into similar categories that I'm in. For new players, or players that haven't bought everything, yeah it is worth it, but for players that already own everything it's not. I still pay VIP for one reason. With hopes to keep the game going. A free game with minimal revenue will eventually fail.
Wow. So much compassion! Thank you! And the amout of accounting is impressive, as well as the arguments for beeing a conservative guestimation (yes that's a word). So many things right and a lot of things wrong 😊 I think its wrong to assign value to things that you buy once and then keep "forever" like character slots, storage and so on ... on a yearly basis. In accounting you would need to spread that costs over the years of usage 🤷 I think the "only valid" argument for paying for VIP is to support the game. 👍 Any subscription like Patrion, UA-cam subscription, Fanclub membership, OF 😉 ... is not based on "value" but on showing (and paying) to support the "content creator". So VIP is for people who want (and can) support the game to be able to play it. Calculating the benefit of "that" is impossible. Thank you again for the video and the amout of thought that went into your calculations!
Glad you enjoyed. I did discuss instead spreading where applicable benefits over a number of years instead at 28:16 mark in the video, and that's fair, but it wouldn't have been applicable to most of the big hitter benefits anyways like points, +20 heart, XP bonus that are not one time purchases, and I already made so many overly conservative assumptions including assigning zero to so many benefits anyways so didn't seem worth the effort. I'd also would have to make an assumption on number of years to spread the value over. I instead chose to just summarize at the end by showing that even with just a handful of benefits, none of which are one time purchase unlocks, you still get more than the $99 of value.
The new VIP rewards are mostly empty calories. They want to make it look like they are giving VIP a lot of new stuff but they don't want to give VIPs any more real advantage then they already have over non-VIP players. So mostly flash with little bang.
I enjoyed this breakdown. I still don't think I would pay for VIP, as so much of the game is free, and VIP benefits feel so incredibly small. The extra XP is really the only appeal as a more casual fan, but for the price I'd rather just take a few extra sessions to level. I don't play enough for VIP to be a consideration at this point. To be transparent, I did do VIP for one year, and I don't regret it, as I used the points to buy nearly everything in the store at the time after waiting for sales. After that year though, I just don't get the same value a second time.
One small correction. I overvalued the first 30 shared bank slots, I based it on the upgrade price instead of the 1495 point initial 30 slot bundle. Changes it to $8.92 from $17.82. So -$8.90 in total value.
Also, as some other posters pointed out, gold rolls are 15 shards each so instead of $7.31 for the yearly value a more reasonable value could be $22.50 (15 shards per roll x $.03 per shard, x 50 weeks). So that would mean I undervalued the gold rolls by $15.19 ($22.50 - $7.31).
So if I corrected both of these things VIP's yearly value would be $193.35 instead of $187.06.
VIP is worth it only if you value the stuff included.
For example, “6 more character slots than premium”. Would you buy this on your own if it wasn’t included in VIP? What percentage of VIPs play that many characters? What about 33 extra crafting storage? It’s great that stuff is included, however if you include a bunch of stuff that people don’t really value, you’re asking people to pay for a bunch of fluff.
Right and that's a legit concern, but see the end of the video where I address this. Even if you assume everything is worthless but the XP boost, DDO points, weekly gold roll, saga skip and +20 heart you still get to $99 of value. Also I'm using the lowest possible dollar value for the DDO points and as other pointed out I could have easily valued the gold rolls higher if I based it on the 15 shard per roll value instead.
@@AxelAlexK It's the same with those for me. Tomes of Learning , Voice of the Master, guild bonus to XP, delving bonus are great, but I would never pay for 10% XP potions. One run of Dr. Rushmore's Mansion would give me 8 hours worth of 5% XP, but I don't even buy those.
I'd never pay shards for skipping anything in a saga, when I can get something permant for them instead. Same with hearts, and never ever would I gamble away shards for a gold roll.
Only the points are nice, but they're cheaper when you buy them directly and you get them all at once.
Well whether someone agrees with you or not, you did the math behind in a level I'm sure very few people match. So nice job Axle
To make VIP worthwhile, they should add more unique and invaluable things. For instance, Strintom showcased the VIP benefits in LOTRO and other games, and in his video, it became evident how VIP advantages are truly unique and priceless. You can't put a price on quality of life (QOL) features.
The accountant has spoken! Thanks mate fer the benefits vs cost analysis.
The shill*
Gold rolls are 15 shards each, 60 shards per month, at your ~$0.03/shard calculation they're worth $1.80/month or $21.60/yr.
Yep, someone else pointed this out too. I did not think of it or I would have calculated it this way instead. I agree this way is more accurate, so the way I did it in the video did actually undervalue the gold rolls quite a bit.
Happy to pay for VIP so DDO doesn't stop being a thing
The final conclusion only represents yourself and is not suitable for "average players", because every player is not an average player, and each player's situation is different. Players who have money and time and are insensitive to price don't care, and and so do completely free players.
Only old players who recharge VIP from time to time and some new players will care. In view of this, I imagine a method. If you like the new perk, one point, and then look at the expenses behind. If you can accept another point, you can divide the total score by the number of perks and multiply it by two. If it can pass 60%, maybe you can consider becoming an one year VIP.
One more thing about the New Policy complaint is that while the prize pool changes after one year, new players and players who didn't pay for the VIP in the first year will have to pay 2-years-VIP if just wanna the 12 month perk and have to wait for two years, so the benefits of this New Policy decreases as time goes on.
I think VIP is worth it but just barely because I don't play DDO every week. So I prefer just buying only the stuff I really need for DDO points in sales. A few things to keep in mind are players earning a lot of DDO points from playing the game and getting them from VIP and not having much to spend them on. So the active player base having a lot of DDO points also devalues some things on the list. Cause you can easily get them already with those DDO points. An other note that I want to make is that the Adventure pack value is going to rise up again a lot when DDO adds new packs to VIP that weren't in the free coupon code.
Axels accounting chops in action!
Usually for the saga, we do all the quest for the xp anyway(since we have some in our group not VIP), So I would suggest that this is a nice to have (QoL) but a non VIP wouldn't spend shard on this etiher way.
The race, class, pack, monster manual can also be unlock and bought in game with regular playing and the ddo points you get as f2p, it's a one time and not yearly value by itself like you said. This is the only thing I would suggest is missing from your video, the amount of points you can get just by playing a lot is not bad(not great either, but good enough). If you buy only the expansion and claimed the free coupon content there is not much to just by after so it's a reasonable time to get to the point where you can unlock the rest(and that's if you even want all class and races)
But I agree it's hard to put price on Quality of Life stuff and that's the main reason i'm VIP. The real value of a VIP is from stuff that you can't just buy with points by plaing the game. I also agree it's worth it but a bit closer to the actual value of purchassing evrything indivually.
I think I play 10 hours a month.
I stay VIP because it doesn't cost that much (just in my opinion) and its easier to log on, when I do play, and just have everything.
quite a lot of those things don't really have a real value...and some of them might have more of a value than you considered (based on convenience...or based on it stacking...like the xp), but an unstated value which is probably the top of my list, is supporting the company that makes the game I want to keep playing (with more new stuff over time) that supporting them increases the likelihood of that happening.
THIS!
Not sure why you tried to take the value of the benefit of the gold roll as opposed to just the points for an astral shard purchase to do a gold roll. That seems like an easier and more accurate comparison.
Yeah I agree that way is better, other people have pointed this out and I added it to the pinned comment earlier today. It wasn't an intentional thing just something I didn't consider. If I did I would have valued it that way.
@@AxelAlexK good analysis overall btw. :)
Elite open is in the store, 25 points per single elite open.
IDK man, apart from Hardcore elite opening, VIP just really isn't worth it if a player claimed one of the quest codes & 99 point xpac offers.
Anything more than 2nd TR & just running a few cannith challenges per life (for mats to buy 5% xp pots) negates most of what I think players would find most useful in VIP.
Edit - the VIP benefits is a bit of a tough sell. EG - Sure the +20 HoW is 2495 points, but it also costs 8x months of VIP, so it's cheaper to just buy the points for the heart (and you don't have to wait for 8 months).
If a player paid a single month of VIP & in that time got 2x TR's done, they probably don't need VIP any more.
Elite open is in the store? Didn't even realize that. I don't think I would have used that as a value anyways since you can get elite open through reincarnation.
The question is, is VIP worth it when the game is so often unplayable due to lag and server issues? They could include 1000 000 store currency a month and it would be worthless if i cannot log in to the game when i have time to play.
I mean it really comes down to your sensitivity to lag. Is DDO laggy? Yes. Is it unplayable? I would say that's rarely the case. But it comes down to each person's subjective sensitivity to lag. And I know I have been playing DDO for so long, on top of many other old so so performing games I grew up with, that it really does not bother me unless it's actually getting me killed in game and causing wipes. But that's just me. Other people play DDO alongside other lag free online games and understandably are really bothered by the lag. Either way it's not ever going to be fixed, I don't think they can because it's engrained in DDO's nearly 20 years of code, so it's something you just have to accept on some level if you want to play the game. I wish DDO didn't have the lag it does but it just is what it is at this point. It's understandable if it's a deal breaker for some.
For AS purchases, I think the most conservative choice would be a 20%+ Store discount (bought with Double Points). I never buy AS at full price.
Unfortunately i love the game but its a true dinosaur, even Cordovan said like 5 years ago on live he wished they could do DDO 2...is it time to launch the next expansion as ddo 2 w the new killer game engines? Players don't mind starting over look at hardcore
but I'm worried that if they do DDO2 they would streamline it with 5th edition crap.
to get the dreaded wider audience which would make it more like a Neverwinter thing not the game I enjoy.
Sure the graphics are ancient but who really cares about graphics in an MMO? WoW looks worse than DDO and yet is still doing well because of the gameplay (even if it's not my thing)
If they just did a graphics update, I think lots of people would continue to play and the audience would grow. I love the game and the quests, but just want the player base to be higher.
@@ConnorCoultrup thing is I doubt it is worth it for them to redo all the graphics of the game just to keep the current smallish player base around. They'd need to attract a lot more players and rightly or wrongly a company/investor is probably going to think they can do that by "modernizing" the game systems.
I'd rather it stay a niche game and keep the uniqueness it has than become just another cookiecutter F2P MMO
Interesting responses!
@@Iridescence93 I don’t disagree with you, I just don’t want the game to die. They desperately need to do a server merge and just have one server, it would help the game feel so much better, so many more groups around. Having 5 servers just splinters the already tiny player base.
Bravo! Still cheaper than an hour of therapy!! I’ll take it 😂
Your analysis actually shows that if you play the game for longer than a year you continuously lose more and more money remaining VIP. Conservatively speaking your gain/loss is extremely optimistic after one year because you are gaining DDO points while playing. Factoring the gain of DDO points for playing and the need to spend them continues to be reduced the longer you play makes for a dichotomy that SSG hasn't been able to solve.
VIP's are losing money after a year of subscriptions. And the new loyalty program was just an insult as it is contingent on remaining VIP and logging in.
Is VIP worth it? From your own "conservative" analysis you gain about ~$100 value during the first year but that value quickly deteriorates by the end of the 2nd year and becomes a liability. Leasing always cost more.
Gaining DDO points by playing doesn't make a difference, because of opportunity cost. If you don't spend those points on things covered in VIP you can instead spend them on other things in the store like XP pots, Otto's boxes, etc etc. Now if you personally don't value anything in the store other than what is covered in VIP then ok. But I don't think that is the case for very many players.
@@AxelAlexK
It just devalues the point bundles. Premium and VIP earn points for playing. So there is a benefit which is why the first year is so beneficial being VIP.
Full disclosure, I am VIP thanks to HC season. I'll probably remain VIP until I pick up the +20 heart of wood. Then I will drop to premium until the next HC season which I don't believe happens until 2025. Even then, depending on the rule set I may only lurk on HC server and not go VIP.
Just stop paying and alll that goes away!!!! So frustrating.
Great video bro, as always! I guess its worth prob for the majority of players who are on TR grind. Who got all PL`s done and RP, play the game to get better loot and have fun. idk, they can give more quality of life on those rewards too, like teleports,, a bag for cosmetics, chest rolls, a raid bypass every week.
But lets see how it will roll, gj axel!
This is the most conservative video I have seen. Jokes aside, thanks for making your videos.
1) For the Gold role, couldn't you have used the cost of buying a gold roll which I believe is 3 Astral shards? Also, great information that I read as I couldn't keep listening with your repetitive "Conservative Assumption" dialogue. Please, there was no need for that as you had it written on your graph as well. Great video otherwise.
True, I could have also calculated the gold roll that way. I know I repeated that a lot but it was because it is important to point it out many times so the video doesn't get misinterpreted/taken out of context at any point.
@@AxelAlexK Re: repeating. I respectfully disagree. Perhaps just say it once or twice with emphasis and *trust in your audience to get that message?*
There's a D&D (not DDO) UA-camr whose channel I don't frequent because they were really big about repeating themselves to make a point.
Please don't. As in most TED Talks, please continue on with your otherwise solid message? If I want to hear it again... I know how to do that too! Heh! =)
@@PurrsPlaceUsually yes I could just not repeat and I don't do that normally (see any of my other videos) but not in this case since it's so easy for it to be misinterpreted or misunderstood due to the number crunchy nature.
@AxelAlexK Oh, I am a fan of your videos, Axel! It is folks like you and Strimtom who help keep me informed and excited for this game. Thank you for doing that! =)
"We DDO players" deal with stacking and not stacking Boni on various equipment, alchemy, insightful, quality, festive ....a nd so on Boni!
I would like to believe that repeating something twice should suffice for such an intelligent audience 😅
A+ for your passion! Thats why those old games are still alive. There ist always a fanboy 🤣 But for Me ddo isnt worth that much money anymore when i have the option for that money to buy Baldurs Gate 3 or Elden Ring. Move on Äxel 🤣🙋🏻
Unfortunately you are right....im gonna comment above
The reason DDO is still alive is because no other game has what DDO has - there are a lot of unique mechanics / ideas that do not exist in any other MMO.
I would love to play Baldurs Gate 3 or Elden Ring. I already have a backlog though so I'm always hesitant to buy new games. I do play other games though btw! 😀But I'm mostly into old games. I just finished Assassin's Creed 3 last week for instance and have been playing Castlevania 2 and Ghosts and Goblins on my NES as well as Zombi U on my Wii U when I have had the time. This year I really have only been playing DDO 10 hours a week or so, almost all of that being on Saturdays when I do my long weekly stream.
THIS COMENT WAS WRITTEN DURING ME WATCHING THE VIDEO
You start assuming we are all going to spend the most amount of money in the most beneficial time, i reject that, people dont spend more money than they have, they might wait for the double bonus points but is completely insane to think they are going to buy 200 dollars of points. Your bases for value of point makes no sense in the real world and not at all conservative.
The gold rolls per week should not be calculated in base on the prices, you get the rolls, it should be calculated in base of the roll value, if you get trash or a mount, thats not what you bought, you bought the rolls.
I dont get it, if you know most people buy the cheapest bundles why base it on the expensive ones? I think you asume the conclusión and work the logic around to get to that conclusión.
We know the things we get have value, is not the value of a gold roll every day and is not good enough for many people to dont buy other games or points in other games and subscribe to DDO, thats the problem, the F°°°ING economy.
My conclusión is i will keep buy 1 to 3 months a year and some day i will have a +20 heart... and thats it. So F no.
I think you're misunderstanding the math here. The reason I based it on the biggest point bundle is because it is the cheapest in terms of points you get per dollar spent. If I used the smaller, more commonly bought bundles as a basis then the value of VIP goes way up since the cheaper bundles cost more dollars per point. That's what I mean when I said I'm being conservative, it's the lowest value you could possibly assign to the points and to VIP benefits as a result. As for the gold rolls, if I based in on the 15 shards instead, the value of VIP again, goes up (see pinned comment).
@@AxelAlexK I see now why you choose the cheapest bundle.
I think the problem is we are not separating value and worth. Like i say is not a matter of if we are getting more stuff or the same. I think people still think buying some astral shards when they "feel lucky" and want to make a gold roll is worth more than this month i get this, next month i get the useless item defense and at some point i will get the +20 heart.
I dont say your opinion is invalid or even wrong, i say the survey you did was right, becoming VIP have not enough WORTH for most of us despite having monetary VALUE.
One way the worth can be increased is giving every benefit to the player the moment he pay for the months, you buy a year, here is everything now not in 1 or 2...etc months.
while i agree monetarily its probably worth it, the new month rewards are a joke. even in this analysis you admit most of it is worthless. it comes across like they have no idea what is valuable. why on earth is omnispell dust even in the bag of many things? just to bait someone into picking something worthless? 1% named loot is also absurd youd need 100k+ chest pulls to notice any difference. unless it stacks with next years 1% bonus then it may aswell not even be there. i play r10s at endgame and item durability is never a problem.
while something is in fact better than nothing it comes across like the devs dont play this game
no cosmetics wardrobe
no easy bank access
no swapping base augments for free
there are so many easy qol improvements just staring us in the face, things even implemented in other games like lotro that they just refuse to give us
Just for my circumstances, I get the 10% xp, weekly gold roll which average 1000xp a week (bad rng), 500 ddo points a month, I don't saga skip because it's inevitable that there will be a non vip in my pug plus you lose xp by skipping. I own all the content so extra classes, iconics, races, or packs so they are a moot point. Elite open is a moot point because anyone who has Tred at least twice can elite open. Movement speed, irrelevant, Again I own all content including MMs, character slots, crafting, banks ect. Spell swap is also irrelevant. The monthly thing for VIP only applies as long as you're VIP (mostly) and nothing in the monthly appeals to me. so for my value of things that matter (kind of) is $106.49 with a gain of $6.50. For those that don't think it's worth it are those that fall into similar categories that I'm in. For new players, or players that haven't bought everything, yeah it is worth it, but for players that already own everything it's not. I still pay VIP for one reason. With hopes to keep the game going. A free game with minimal revenue will eventually fail.
I too am happy to pay VIP and special bundles, just to keep game funded, your brake down makes me aware of the greater value I'm actually getting.
Wow. So much compassion!
Thank you!
And the amout of accounting is impressive, as well as the arguments for beeing a conservative guestimation (yes that's a word).
So many things right and a lot of things wrong 😊
I think its wrong to assign value to things that you buy once and then keep "forever" like character slots, storage and so on ... on a yearly basis. In accounting you would need to spread that costs over the years of usage 🤷
I think the "only valid" argument for paying for VIP is to support the game. 👍
Any subscription like Patrion, UA-cam subscription, Fanclub membership, OF 😉 ... is not based on "value" but on showing (and paying) to support the "content creator".
So VIP is for people who want (and can) support the game to be able to play it. Calculating the benefit of "that" is impossible.
Thank you again for the video and the amout of thought that went into your calculations!
Glad you enjoyed. I did discuss instead spreading where applicable benefits over a number of years instead at 28:16 mark in the video, and that's fair, but it wouldn't have been applicable to most of the big hitter benefits anyways like points, +20 heart, XP bonus that are not one time purchases, and I already made so many overly conservative assumptions including assigning zero to so many benefits anyways so didn't seem worth the effort. I'd also would have to make an assumption on number of years to spread the value over. I instead chose to just summarize at the end by showing that even with just a handful of benefits, none of which are one time purchase unlocks, you still get more than the $99 of value.
I agree that VIP is a good deal but I dont like the new crappy rewards.
The new VIP rewards are mostly empty calories. They want to make it look like they are giving VIP a lot of new stuff but they don't want to give VIPs any more real advantage then they already have over non-VIP players. So mostly flash with little bang.
I enjoyed this breakdown. I still don't think I would pay for VIP, as so much of the game is free, and VIP benefits feel so incredibly small. The extra XP is really the only appeal as a more casual fan, but for the price I'd rather just take a few extra sessions to level. I don't play enough for VIP to be a consideration at this point.
To be transparent, I did do VIP for one year, and I don't regret it, as I used the points to buy nearly everything in the store at the time after waiting for sales. After that year though, I just don't get the same value a second time.
The Monster manuals offer a great deal of value too.