Consider this a step 1 in announcing changes to supporting the Empire, but not everything is fully decided yet! We have an overall plan to change our supporter packages up, where there is 1 rank of supporter and a seperate rank of "Cosmetics". Yes, this means the Iron/Gold/Diamond is going away. Iron is essentially going to be removed completely, and Gold will convert into 1 package and Diamond converts into having both packages. ===== UPDATE ===== New ideas came to be from this thread! The new idea will be that Utopia will be open to all, but low player cap. We will introduce a concept of a "Login Queue", so that when a server is full, free players have to wait in the queue to join a server (which is a better experience than simply being kicked like most servers do it and hope for lucky timing) and they will join in the order they joined the queue. Supporters will get a perk to skip the queue and always connect, and have a guaranteed login slot. The SMP's will also be reducing their max player counts as we will be condensing hardware to reduce cost. ================= Essentially, "Supporter" rank gives Guaranteed Login + some premium non gameplay altering perks, and Cosmetics rank is a pack of many cosmetic features. What each package entails is not 100% decided yet, but here are some Examples: Supporter/Utopia Access (unchanged = same as perks provided today): Guaranteed slot (unchanged) (incase server is hard-full) Skip the Login Queue if a server is soft-full. Supporter Chat (unchanged) Supporter + sign in chat to the right of name (Cosmetic detail but still associate it with supporting) Less ads on website (unchanged) Supporter Forums (unchanged) Immune from Derelict (unchanged) Discount on Sr Staff Services Customize Res Messages (unchanged) Automatic Login Bonus (unchanged) Ability to name vault pages (removing this from free, will be able to retain old names though) + more as we think of it/suggested Cosmetics Rank(must keep subscription active to keep perks): Ability to change your name color (to more colors than today, but still restricting some such as staff colors and black/darkgrey) (Supporters would not have this perk! Only receive the +) Ability to set italic/bold (not &k or underline) Non Combat Pets (Future) Zombie/Skeleton Horses /hat - places block in hand on your head as a hat. Particle Effects following your feet. Particle Effects on attacking enemies (bows/swords) Sound effects for the above actions too? Disguises in Town + more as we think of it/suggested Guaranteed Login Only - For those who want a cheaper price option, buy the single perk alone for 10$/mo. Feedback and ideas on these ideas are welcome! Optionally, we could go with a single rank, but this might restrict people who only want to pay 10$/month. A big fear everyone has is not bringing in enough money to pay the bills due to loss of supporters... so we are evaluating an overall price increase attempt to help compensate for losses. So our question, would you consider one of these costing 15$ and the other 10$ bringing cost to 25$/mo to have it all ok? Please only vote for a price if you are a supporter, was a supporter, or seriously considering becoming a supporter. If you are unable to ever support, please vote accordingly. We need the poll results to be based on who's actually able to pay and what they would be comfortable with paying. Please vote on what you would be comfortable with paying to help support the Empire. Thanks!
Q/A Q: What if I already have Iron? A: Iron will convert to a cosmetic pack, potentially with a form of a discount as long as the subscription is maintained Q: What if I have Gold? A: Gold will automatically convert to supporter rank, potentially with a 5$ discount as long as the subscription is maintained Q: What if I have Diamond? A: Diamond will receive both perks, potentially receiving a discount as long as the subscription is maintained Q: What about Supporter vouchers? A: All vouchers will be redeemable for the same package that the ranks convert to as described above Q: What about people who have more than 1 Residence? A: They will keep them. Previous perks can be retained as long as its possible for others to "earn" them the same, so we will say "Residences can be purchased for 9 billion tokens" and that meets the EULA requirements. Q: Utopia - What changes are coming? A: Utopia will no longer be a "Supporter Server", but instead a "Special Server". Special Servers on EMC will have a reduced max player cap. Free players will be able to play on this server, but they will have to enter a login queue if the server is full. They will always be guaranteed the ability to login, but if the server is full, it could take longer to connect. Supporters will receive a priority access to the queue and skip it, always being able to log in instantly. This method has been explicitly defined as allowed by Mojang. Vault, flying in town and claiming Residences will be open to all players. An extra login rupee bonus will be given for logging in to Utopia too. Q: EMC's Clean Appearance... Oh no (Cosmetic Names / Particles)! A: We will be adding a new player setting to ignore players Cosmetic Names and particles. Q: What about TNT? A: If we can not come up with a solution before Aug 1st, TNT will initially be disabled completely, temporarily. The idea is that we will block TNT in the wild, but enable it for all players in Town. A system will be put in place to ensure TNT is not abused in Town and does not cause lag, and then it will be open to all. .
Voted. I was a previous Diamond supporter that had it going for about a year. Which is a good amount of money.. I would agree with the 10 supporter | 15 Cosmetic Also 2nd
Just a suggestion here. One way that would certainly entice me to become a supporter with these changes is if senior staff services were discounted, which I don't think you could count as a gameplay feature. They're currently very expensive and even a fairly small discount would be quite useful. You could even consider increasing the current prices to attempt to entice more people into purchasing supporter. I think you'll need to rely on little tricks like this to get people to support now.
Renaming vault pages should always be free IMO. I can't imagine having to memorize every single number.
We have to comply with Mojangs rules, but I'm working on a legal way to potentially let free keep the same town access as today... Not everything is set in stone yet. This threads mainly about ideas on what you get for supporting and price your ok with paying for it, not about what is being removed.
Thanks for the update Aikar Mojang is making everything complicated now :/ So much for the community rounded company.
Just a question because I don't remember all the new rules, would you be allowed to give people who have purchased the cosmetics package Utopia access similar to that of the current free players, or is it even restricting to tiers of donator ranks?
I agree it should be free - but mojang is kind of forcing us to find ways to make supporting 'desirable'. Maybe we can drop "rename vouchers" too from mini bosses to allow free renaming, or sell renames for tokens. Yeah.. thats actually a good idea. Rename cost tokens, but Cosmetic gets it free.
Based on my poll choice, here is how I would like things to go down. Current Iron Supporters --> New Cosmetic Pack Current Gold Supporters --> New Supporter Rank Current Diamond Supporters --> Both Cosmetic and Supporter All at the equivalent saving of $5 per month, provided they keep their active subscription, as mentioned. Now, I feel this would do two things. Make all supporters feel like they're getting something out of the system, rather than just cancelling Iron (bad idea IMO) Encourage more people to start and then keep the relevant supporter rank to what they want.
I must protest in making Utopia only able to be accessed by supporting. The whole idea of my residence on Utopia was to have the largest and most extravagant shop to ever be designed and constructed. If only supporters could use it, then I lose A LOT of customers and I would lose money on the other things I was going to offer such as casinos and such. I can find ways around it, but I think Utopia needs to just stay as it is. People should be able to go, but unless they support, they cant do anything else. Maybe you could allow free members to visit for a short amount of time per day. Such as free members can only wander around Utopia for 20 minutes total before they are kicked off for the day. Just a suggestion. I would hate to see all the creations built on Utopia being restricted so that only supporters can see them.
If you purchase the cosmetic package you would. If you purchased the supporter package however, you would,get a + in front of your name. Sadly, this is just not going to be allowed by Mojang. I've spent a lot of time on a major project on Utopia as well, and I just hope something can be done in the future to move the residence or do something of the like.
How are you going to deal with multiple res'? Is everyone getting limited to 1 or is everyone getting 4? If the number changes, what's going to happen to folks who already have multiple because of supportership?
