An issue I see is people hoarding them at Tier 1. Maybe make them capped at, say, 5? 10? Also - When you progress past Tier 1 maybe offer them for weekly objectives?

@Zedoshi, I think Providence was saying that there was a balance of priorities on both sides to worry about. Your rebuttal was pretty good.

A friend of mine says that both types of players—the ones who pay for crystal energy, and the ones who buy it with crowns—are supporting the game. It's not a case of freeloading versus paying for everything. Of course, there is ridiculousness going down on both sides, and it's made worse by the way the issue is pretty much (a) polarizing and (b) complicated.

I still want it for higher levels >.>

But I can go with the two week thing. One week seems more than enough...but that's only if you know what you're doing. I had one week of beta and this first week post game to get my act together, I don't expect every player that comes through to be able to learn to handle themselves within the first week.

Of course, then you'll have the issues about people wanting this to become login days and not calendar days (which I'm not bashing, I'm just pointing it out).

To prevent character energy tank hoarding, make the objective tank provide 100 Crystal Energy, rather than Mist Energy. Extremely simple solution that also offers the reward of Crowns if you already have a lot of Crystal Energy, providing a service for both paid accounts and free ones.

buy I pay money for all the games I buy why should this be any different?

The energy market is a free and unregulated market. If someone wanted to spend $10,000 of real money, they could then use their crystal energy to bounce the market up or down at their whim and nobody could or would do anything about it. Not, mind you, that I think this is a like scenario, just sayin'. Smaller market manipulations will take place, of course, but market forces will keep that under control. Unregulated market though it is, the danger of cornering the market is essentially nonexistent, as more CE is generated whenever somebody spends RL currency. There will be no direct developer interference with the market, I'm sure. There never has been in other three rings games with similar payment models.

Now, awarding mist tanks, mist energy recharge rate, and other indirect effects on the market... -that- might happen. And mist energy tanks -should- be awarded for reaching the first tier as well as for entering tier2, but one really shouldn't be awarded for entering tier 3. I mean, I'll -take- it, absolutely! Just, mist tanks should be awarded earlier to 'hook' new players.

Also, I've spent no real money on the game, am enjoying T2 and getting close to entering T3 if only I can find a couple recipes I want (or else I may just buy some boring armor from the quartermaster soon.) There's -no- necessity for new players to spend RL money, they can do -anything-, saying otherwise is just silly.

Zedoshi, if they're not satisfied with an hour or less, OOO wants them to buy CE with money. That's the business model. It sucks, I know, but the devs have to feed their families somehow.

About rising energy prices: What I noticed in the preview event was when 100 CE cost 12000 crowns, people were buying CE to craft 4 and 5* equipment, not to do more floors. Again, T3 was designed to be punishing, it's for the die-hards who would play more and hopefully buy CE----making 4* equipment cost 200 energy was meant to separate the casuals from the more committed.

Now, there are more players, so more people might be buying energy and selling it. However, these CE prices are still very low compared to what they used to be. A lot of preview players were buying up massive amounts of CE recently, because they knew prices were going to rise. It'll be a while before the market settles and we find a real solution to the problem you've identified.

There are some people out there who have a lot of time on their hands as of late, whether it's because of work issues, or school, or what have you. I'm one of those people at the moment. Also, I've come from a long line of MMO playing, and all that jazz.. including 'free to play' ones, so I'm kind of used to this sort of business model.

That said.. I like to play a lot on any given days, especially when my friends are around. We'll pile into a group and do multiple dungeon runs, going all the way through T2 in one sitting. We're obviously not casual. An idea to have an 'objective tank' that gives ME on a daily basis would be *amazing* That lets the player save their crowns that they'd normally need to spend on energy, and instead go toward purchasing a recipe, or materials from other players.. whatever the case may be. You can do a lot more with 200 energy, obviously, than you can with the base 100 you earn after ~22 hours.

Heck, even if they didn't want to do an 'objective tank' idea.. I've seen thoughts of maybe increasing the rate in which energy recharges? Maybe stagger out.. energy 1-50 goes up faster, then slows down a little up to 75, then slows to it's slowest to 100? Though that may not work out well. Maybe have it recharge twice as fast on weekends? I don't know.

I do like the objective tank idea, though. Maybe 'run through and kill the Jelly King" for Tier 2 players.. or complete Tier 1 for T1 players.. that sort of thing. That'd give people the incentive to finish something all the way through if they are more 'hardcore' players, or if casuals get involved, since they don't play THAT much (being casual and all) they don't have to worry.

But yeah, just my two cents.