Honestly, let SE make as much money as they can.

[Razzle]

People would just buy the vanity item from other players for gil rather than waste their money on the one in the vanity shop.

Yeah, and even worse, from my experience, games that allow cash shop items to be sold in game are basically selling gil to players in the form of an item. Usuaully those items end up selling for a lot, so if you need easy cash just buy a popular custome and post it on the MB...

Again, it would be understable in an F2P but doesn't make much sense to me in a P2P game.

[Roris]

This retainer debacle wouldn't be an issue at all, at least for people with more than one character slot, if the rare items recovered by ventures are tradable and also if we could mail stuff between our alts but that can arguably be bypassed with a trusty FC bank. It'll be more of a hassle on top of the extra leveling and gearing but you can have all 4 retainer roles split between two characters that way. Venture items will most likely be tradable, or at least I really hope they will be because they could also just go and make them U/U because gotta make a profit. Anyway a lot of people are already mentally prepared either jokingly or seriously for, and some even willing to buy, stuff like Cloud's Magitek Bike or Yuna's Summoner Dress being eventually on the Mog Station for the cheap low price of $14.99 so I wouldn't be surprised at all if that happened one day.

[Ikeda]

Anyway a lot of people are already mentally prepared either jokingly or seriously for, and some even willing to buy, stuff like Cloud's Magitek Bike or Yuna's Summoner Dress being eventually on the Mog Station for the cheap low price of $14.99 so I wouldn't be surprised at all if that happened one day.

Why put that crap in a cash shop when they've already set the precedent for putting it as something to earn in a crossover event? The simple fact they ever had the lightning event completely destroys any excuse they could ever have for putting those in a cash shop.

[Roris]

Why put that crap in a cash shop when they've already set the precedent for putting it as something to earn in a crossover event? The simple fact they ever had the lightning event completely destroys any excuse they could ever have for putting those in a cash shop.

They could still do it if they keep following the WoW model, some people would even use an excuse like "well the Lightning event was a free one off thing, you should be grateful for that, stop being so entitled and just don't buy it if you don't like it"

[Ikeda]

They could still do it if they keep following the WoW model, some people would even use an excuse like "well the Lightning event was a free one off thing, you should be grateful for that, stop being so entitled and just don't buy it if you don't like it"

Won't work. Only a few idiots would make that excuse for them. Everyone else that doesn't enjoy being ripped off would see it for the cheap cash grab it is and promptly quit the game altogether. WoW is the only mmo that's gotten away with it and it only gets away with it because of the sheer amount of people that play it. A few hundred thousand or 1 million people quitting over the rip off cash shop in WoW barely makes a dent in WoW's playerbase. FFXIV on the other hand doesn't have the luxury. The mass of dropped subscriptions a cash shop would cause could cut its playerbase in half or cause it to lose more than half its playerbase.

[Roris]

Won't work. Only a few idiots would make that excuse for them. Everyone else that doesn't enjoy being ripped off would see it for the cheap cash grab it is and promptly quit the game altogether. WoW is the only mmo that's gotten away with it and it only gets away with it because of the sheer amount of people that play it. A few hundred thousand or 1 million people quitting over the rip off cash shop in WoW barely makes a dent in WoW's playerbase. FFXIV on the other hand doesn't have the luxury. The mass of dropped subscriptions a cash shop would cause could cut its playerbase in half or cause it to lose more than half its playerbase.

I agree, I'd probably quit for real if that happened too, even if I stuck around most others would probably leave too. Let's just hope that never happens but like I said it really wouldn't be a surprise at all if it did, fingers crossed it won't.

[Zwipe]

That example is pointless because Girl Scouts don't charge us monthly ( - . - ;

Isn't a subscription a thank you? And isn't keeping subscribed to the game is "showing support"? Why do you think that if we don't pay extra on top of a sub, that we won't see FFXIV around for a long term? I'm sure that when SE set the subscription price, they took into account that that price is what will keep FFXIV around for a long term...

If you want to "show your support" send your money to SE, I'm sure they will accept it, or buy 10 copies of FFXIV.

Regardless of my example, bottom line is people want extra retainers, but don't want to pay for it. The people complaining are bluntly wanting this but are too cheap. It's an optional service. If you want the benefits of a retainer, then pay. No conspiracy behind it like you make it out to be. My first paragraph says it all.

I mean, seriously, 2 measly dollars a month (24 dollars a year) a 'rip-off'?...a panhandler can afford that. If you have the time and energy to hoard THAT much mats, gear, etc. to need more space than the 2 retainers already provide, you sure as hell have the time and energy to get a part-time job to afford one.

[ReiszRie]

Again FFXI has gone for 10 years with no cash shop and has been SE's most profitable game. It's running on about 300k subscribers at most right now. Unless FFXIV some how manages to drop below 100k subscribers they have no business even thinking of a cash shop. Not even a vanity cash shop.

Most profitable game is merely semantics, the amount of resources poured into FFXIV correlates to the projected growth and ROI, as such you simply can't aim to be the most profitable game in a string of poor performing games.

What I feel is simply that players are against vanity shops simply out of principle, it barely affects the value the game and it feels as though all the doom and gloom views of the future of games are merely using the slippery slope fallacy.

[ReiszRie]

You know those outfits we get in seasonal events or the lightning event or the vanity item recipes you get from treasure hunting? Instead of getting things like that in updates LIKE WE'RE ALREADY GETTING RIGHT NOW they'd be in a cash shop for $5-10+ each. The reason a vanity market is a big deal is because there is no reason to have a vanity market. They already give us free vanity items in every freaking update and event. You're literally begging them to strip out content they were already planning to give us for free and slapping a price tag on it because you have this delusion that they'd give us more vanity content than they've already been giving us. How many freaking times do I have to say this until it sinks into your heads?

There are no guarantees that cash shop items would be implemented in the game if it doesn't have a cash shop.

It is a fallacy to think so

Its like saying BF4 was originally designed to have all its expansion map packs included in the base price but the proliferation of DLC made it that EA sells those map packs to you separately.

Cash shop and its potential revenues can simply be the sole reason said vanity items gets implemented into the game. It is prudent to view SE as a business that seeks to profit from its products.

[Kluya15]

Welcome to MMO forums lol.

I have no problems if they release stuff in a cash shop that doesn't affect in-game balance. The more money they can make, the less likely a f2p change could happen.

Exactly. Thank you for stating this. But let's face it, it's the ARR general forums. You could say 2+2=4 and people will rage, claim it's OP, swear to god they'll unsubscribe, ect.