Fearless, Virtual Goods, and Rage

This is my response to the leaked newsletter and the devblog response


Lets start with what I agree with. I agree with Zulu in that people dragging other people "through the mud" is overboard and should not have gone there. My concerns are with CCP's strategies going forward And as long as he is not covering for future plans by pointing to the fine print that the newsletter that it does 


"not reflect
general CCP company policies
or decisions and are strictly
individual opinions, written by
CCPers or about CCPers who
feel strongly about these issues."

then I also agree with him that the general reaction is a bit overboard.

However,
I do not agree with his point on pricing. The thing to remember is that these are virtual goods and will never be anything more. The pricing needs to be more reasonable. 60 USD for an eyepatch? Really? Has anyone at CCP actually done the math? I am all for selling vanity items for real money, I truly am, but they need to be at a cost that can actually be justified for something that will never leave your computer screen. As a note, even I as anti "extra money" as I am, would buy a pair of some really cool pants for 7$ and never more than 10$.

I do have a problem with allowing the purchasing of actual items/skill points/faction standing for real money. I know, I know, Plex already allows this blah, blah, blah (for the items anyway). But that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the rumors floating around about the ability to buy a "painted ship" call it a pink kestral from the Nex. Let me be clear, I have no problems with pink or even hello kitty kestrals, I would shoot them without a second tought, but I have no problem with them being possible. What I have a problem with is that CCP is considering the idea to let the player but that pink kestral straight from the NeX, the ship. If you are going to have a pink kestral, I think you should have to trade a regular kestral and pay extra for the paint. The problem with just giving you the ship, is that no a kestral manufacturer is out his money because someone didn't have to buy it from him, he got it from CCP directly.

Those are my thoughts.

Live long and die Laughing,
Max