Everybody knows,
that Blizzard is working on this… and microtransactions are part of the most Blizzard products, where will be their place? What should be avoided and what should be added? Are here some ideas? Dunno how you, but option without any payments sounds good for me… What you?
Make them free to use in world editor , paid to use on melee games and that should be fine , make skins for heroes and units and that’s kinda all
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I don’t mind microtransactions as long as they’re cosmetic only.
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Banners/crests on buildings and units would be neat. Like if I could throw a Warsong emblem on the shoulderpad for my grunts. Blackrock banner hanging from a Great Hall. Stromgarde fist on a footman shield. Kirin Tor banner on my barracks. Cute lore cosmetic stuff. I don’t know how I’d feel about stuff that changes basic units, but I think structures and heroes are fair game.
As long as heroes animate the exact same and the silhouette is roughly maintained. Shape altering’s fine because I mean we already see examples of that between the melee paladin, Uther, and Arthas in Reforged.
Portraits I think should just kind of stick around as incentives to dig into melee.
I’d also not turn my nose up at $10 or $15 for an official mission pack in the same vein as Starcraft 2. Nothing says they’d have to stick to the era either, so we could get backing up to before or after Warcraft 3.
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It’s pretty much impossible to avoid microtransactions in games these days, It’s a shame but that’s just how it is now…
As others said as long as the microtransactions are purely cosmetic I’ll be alright with it.
If they decide to add new content It should be free (like what Overwatch does).
Adding paid DLCs will put me off the game.
Here’s good options for Blizzard to monetize Reforged after release.
- Make expansion packs like TFT was with campaign, units, heroes and new races.
- DLC if you only want to add campaign exclusive content.
- Skins, potraits, customizing your account.
- Auto-host bots for your custom games costing a monthly subscription paid by the Editor, fan, clan or community.
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From what I’ve heard so far it seems like this might not be necessary since customs might wind up being like the SC2 system where you pick the map you want and fire up a lobby off Blizzard’s servers? Or something remarkably similar. So no forwarding ports, making exceptions in firewalls/security programs, hosting bots, etc.
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I’m not familiar with how SC2 manages its custom games.
If Reforged will continue to have clans then those clans will want to have their own personal hosting bots, there will be entire communities that would want this to keep things intact, personal and friendly.
Since auto-hosting bots won’t be allowed to be done by outside 3rd party providers it would be good if Blizzard took up the role of providing players with this kind of service for a monthly subscription.
That’s what lobbies are in SC2 for. The host just is there to manage the players and press the start button for the map they want to play once enough people have joined. I think this is the system they’re going to do or something similar. I’ll have to rewatch a bit of stuff to listen for what was officially said, but basically they intend to eliminate a lot of the hosting jank. Make it a ‘pick and play’ system.
This is actually very nice idea. How didn’t I come up with that 
I think the microtransaction should obviously be only cosmetic (like in all Blizz games, so not really worried about that). These should include the above-mentioned banners/crests, custom skins for units, heroes and buildings, player icons and really whatever they come up with. They should be obtained through achievement, completing campaigns and winning multiplayer games (ladder or melee) or you could directly buy the ones you want with real money.
Custom skins (and whatever other stuff they have for microtransaction) could then be used in campaigns, melee and ladder games (with obviously the option to not show them at all, if you don’t like them messing your game). Custom games should always have access to all skins, and custom maps shouldn’t be affected by what skins you happen to own (because it would change the looks and aesthetics the map maker had intended). Extra campaigns and mission should come in form of (paid) DLCs. Their assets should, however, be ready for use in custom maps right away.
I know this all might sound a bit favoring the custom games scene, but I just think that it would unpractical to put custom map assets behind a paywall, because firstly it would simply be quite hard to keep them there, since one could buy them, and them export the models and skins and others could simply import them to their game as “custom” skins. And the custom games are a huge part of the WC3 community, so holding it back wouldn’t really be a good idea. They could invent something else to monetize that part, if they need to.
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Aside from the more ‘oh no!’ type of microtransactions some may be thinking of, we are most likely going to see WC3R War Chests. Potentially co-op like in Sc2 since that’s an extremely popular game mode. New missions, I’m less certain about, although I would love to have new content. How that content will be handled by the World Editor, I would very much love to know. A new expansion will require you to have it to load the assets from, but I don’t know how something like a War Chest would work.
Most likely we’ll see premium maps in two forms: pay 5 USD for entire map access or it’s free to play with an in-map store. Examples of stuff in that store would be cosmetic stuff (new Skins, Mounts, Weapons, Spell Effects… WINGS) and unlockable Heroes and/or Game Modes. Premium Maps will likely be rare since for those to happen the map-maker will have to be working directly with Blizzard. Sc2 only has 2 premium maps so far so that should tell you how often these things will happen.
I bolded the above so people wouldn’t panic when reading this.
Stuff that is obtainable by winning multiplayer games or completing achievements should not be purchasable through microtransactions and vice versa.
It removes any sense of self accomplishment. You wouldn’t be able to differentiate between a good player and a rich player.
Having most cosmetic stuff obtainable through microtransactions is fine, but there should still be special skins or portraits that can only be acquired by completing certain achievements.
There needs to be an option to turn off seeing other people’s skins or else it will affect readability and give some gameplay advantage.
Well yeah, maybe there could be unique ones that can be gained only by achievements and such, but those that you could just grind for could also be bought.
My answer to this is simple: No. No, no, no.
Assuming these microtransactions will entail exclusively cosmetics, I would like to have the option to toggle them off. In my taste, it would be much preferable if all microtransactions, inclusing cosmetics, withered and died tenfold. Since that ain’t never gonna happen, I at least don’t to have to see them in the actual game. My disdain for them comes from the fact that I expect them to be advertised right in my face, as usual.
It’s vain, not stylish, and it’s beyond me why people indulge in this with intent rather than as a consequence of some faux pas.
I mean if you look at the industry, lots of multiplayer games have become platforms rather than ‘out of box never altered again’ to continue making a profit from more than just sales. You’re about several years late to the party. You could always not support microtransactions and not buy them, which is an option and a valid one.
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I’m not late, I remember times before microtransactions and paid DLC very well. Both of them bring inherent problems that are simply conflicting with the idea of quality product. Microtransactions are definitely more annoying, but paid DLC is just as detrimental to gameplay, or so I believe. My dream model would be free balance and bug fixing patches when necessary, and expansions every year, or every two years. When I say expansions, I mean Frozen Throne or Lord of Destruction. Not a couple of new buttons, but meta altering systems. Maybe I’m special in this regard, because D3 people seem to be complaining that there hasn’t been any new content in a year. Meanwhile, I still play Diablo 2 in single player, with no new content in a decade. But I also regularly play another game, which is getting three DLCs a year, not expansions, and that model is slowly murdering that game. It’s turned into a beast that not even it’s devs can control. They do, however, enjoy the steady income.
If they do it will be interesting to see how they do it. I mean with the map editor it will be hard as people will just port the art in.
Only way it could really work is by restricting it to ladder?
I am not really against micros provided they are not P2W or excessive.
You’re going to get those balance patches and bugfixes. Frozen Throne got two this year and Reforged has cross-play with Frozen Throne, so. Expansion might be more iffy since the Blizzard Classic team might not want to tread on the toes or take too many larger liberties with an expansion. I don’t see the issue.
Ohh regarding the dream model, I was speaking generally. For WCR, I absolutely expect those bug fixes and balance patches. Although I would like to see a proper expansion, I think DLC, such as a mini campaign, might be more realistic in this case, and I would endorse that. In fact, if they wish for the game to thrive, then they must inject it with new content.
What I see as potentially detrimental to my enjoyment of WCR is the implementation of cosmetic microtransactions. I want there to be an option to disable the display of all of these on my end. Likewise, I do not wish to be bothered by adverts pushing any microtransactions, not just cosmetic ones.