Peopel will always buy GTCs, there is a certain total demand for GTC.
By giving people an incentive to buy through SOMER they take away from other sites like dotlan who have an affiliate link but no incentive.

I would say that for the cost of a 30day GTC vs paying sub as normal there should be something for that extra $5/mo.
Using GTCs for 3 months I could have paid sub for 4 months. So I may be part of a small group that blatantly express that for my extra $5/mo I expect some sort of bonus or incentive.

And even for those times I want to pay for longer periods of subs at once, paying it directly is still cheaper than any bulk pack of GTCs could offer.

I would say that for the cost of a 30day GTC vs paying sub as normal there should be something for that extra $5/mo.
Using GTCs for 3 months I could have paid sub for 4 months. So I may be part of a small group that blatantly express that for my extra $5/mo I expect some sort of bonus or incentive.

And even for those times I want to pay for longer periods of subs at once, paying it directly is still cheaper than any bulk pack of GTCs could offer.

Peopel will always buy GTCs, there is a certain total demand for GTC.
By giving people an incentive to buy through SOMER they take away from other sites like dotlan who have an affiliate link but no incentive.

You are certainly correct about one portion of SOMER's sales... those that would have done the $>PLEX>ISK transactions with or without any gambling motivation.

Of the people who fit in that category that I know who ALSO play Blink.. I'd guess that the gambling motive had that small subset buy at least 50% more. That is a very small slice of the player base but not nearly as tiny a slice of the regular $>PLEX>ISK player-purchasers. My guess would be that the number would be 12% more plex>isk purchases.. maybe making up 1 or 2% more net income for CCP due to Blink gambling. That guess was built on guess's of ranges that might be seen from market sales etc...just a narrowing of errors but .... everyone would do that a bit differently. Only internal number crunching would give a truer number. It isn't a 0% increase. that I'm sure of.

It certainly isnt community supporting either.

[quote=Diomedes Calypso]
It certainly isnt community supporting either.

I agree. but.. guess I'm weird but I figure it's a good idea to recognize stuff that seems true to me even if it weakens my over all desire or position.

I do think that it risks more to game play than I first thought. there is a well written post above that I "liked" that makes a good case why the influence is bad.

Seems to me I should recognize a gambling short-term increase In GTC sales even if it could decrease sales long term by a far bigger number if it hurt the game.


(it could be my RL profession as a commercial real estate broker that try's to look for the real divide between two parties (ccp and players.. not somer and ccp ) and find adjustments to the terms that don't cost either side -- a landlord will pay for a different sort of Tenant Improvement if it had more general purpose use than the one the corporate planner proposed ...or a different date taking occupancy could let that last 10 cents per square foot divide be bridged...

... it's just an instinct that what is good for me (getting paid) means getting into the minutia dividing parties and finding what less obvious parts can give without either side compromising on what means most to them.. perhaps even giving an ability to sweeten what means most for both parties !)

My motivation as a broker type problem solver would be to find a way of keeping the gambling based sales without hurting the game at large. (ironically, after considering the dangers of "ship inflation" related to the gambling makes the much maligned vanity ship give away make more sense..... I don't advocate it but it's funny to notice)

I thought that SOMER just buys the ships they raffle off the market as everybody else does. At the first view the volume of ships blinked seems ridiculous but the actual number of ships payed out is much less as many chose to get the ISK value or blink credit as reward, not the ship/item itself. Means the number of ships in game doesnt actually increase.

Wrong attribution.

Somer doesn't sell 300K GTCs in a week ... the right term to use is captured. Put it this way, the demand for GTC is one whole pie ... they stole a significant portion of the pie.
If Somer didn't exist, that portion would have otherwise gone to other vendors/CCPdirectly.

Made wonder me if some fools at CCP thought the same way too, thinking Somer sold them a lot GTCs.

I would say that for the cost of a 30day GTC vs paying sub as normal there should be something for that extra $5/mo.
Using GTCs for 3 months I could have paid sub for 4 months. So I may be part of a small group that blatantly express that for my extra $5/mo I expect some sort of bonus or incentive.

And even for those times I want to pay for longer periods of subs at once, paying it directly is still cheaper than any bulk pack of GTCs could offer.

For those of us forced to pay the direct game time in local currency (Euro or Pound), it's often cheaper to buy a GTC with dollars. Buying directly on the EVE website only becomes cheaper with 6 month plans or more and not everyone is willing to buy that much gametime in one go all the time.

If I buy on a month to month basis directly from CCP I pay Gé¼15,- ($20,-) for one month. If I buy a 60 day GTC I pay $35,- (Gé¼25,-). So that comes down to Gé¼12,50 a month instead of Gé¼15,-. Even CCP's 3 month plan is slightly more expensive than that at Gé¼12,95 a month.

That makes no sense... at all. Please elaborate on the point you're trying to make?

Interesting. My posts were removed from this thread because i just wrote that it is very likely that SOMER and CCP are at one ship.

Interesting. My posts were removed from this thread because i just wrote that it is very likely that SOMER and CCP are at one ship. CCP probably gets a cut from somer casino, then he recieved special scorpions.. Hints are everywhere and censorship is on a roll. All im asking is if it is bad to RMT if CCP gets a cut from it.

This is another scenario, CCP is completely intertwined or simply is Somer Blink, which benefits CCP enormously. It creates a large sink of ISK stimulating the economy and leading people to purchase a large quantity of plexes. In the meetings about Somer blink whichever employees responsible simply say: "BUT LOOK AT ALL THE MONEY WE MADE".

Every scenario stinks - but let us be honest. Have you EVER seen any company be so tight lipped about something that could easily be cleared up? CCP has some sort of vested interest in this

[quote=AnUnskilled Pilot]


This wasn't an issue where CCP needed to write long apologies, it was an issue that needed action, and we got it. Sure, CCP could speak up a bit more on this issue, but it's likely whatever they say will just make people more mad and perhaps affect their relationship with their GTC affiliates. It's better that this is strictly business and has been dealt with as such.

This wasn't an issue where CCP needed to write long apologies, it was an issue that needed action, and we got it.

Action that gave SOMER 10 days to reap as much as they like before stopping so as not to get banned? Its like the Police sending drug dealers a mail telling them that in 10 days they are getting raided, its absolutely ludicrous.

As far as I am concerned, CCP have gone too far over this and in 3 days, this will be the first of my 3 accounts that expires and wont be resubbed. Some will say good riddance to yet another whiner, fine, you are entitled to your opinion, the same way I am and my opinion is that this stinks to high heaven and i want nothing to do with a game that is seriously unbalanced after this episode.

Action that gave SOMER 10 days to reap as much as they like before stopping so as not to get banned? Its like the Police sending drug dealers a mail telling them that in 10 days they are getting raided, its absolutely ludicrous.

As far as I am concerned, CCP have gone too far over this and in 3 days, this will be the first of my 3 accounts that expires and wont be resubbed. Some will say good riddance to yet another whiner, fine, you are entitled to your opinion, the same way I am and my opinion is that this stinks to high heaven and i want nothing to do with a game that is seriously unbalanced after this episode.

So no one has thought of the fact that PLEX are soaring up in price right now, maybe CCP and Blink are working together to introduce more PLEX into the economy to get the price down? Maybe Blink isn't actually getting the cut on sales and everything goes straight to CCP?

Of course, such a logical explanation must be heresy and the conspiracy theorists are obviously right.

And why would CCP tell them to stop it then?
Why would CCP stay silent about the matter for a whole week then?
Questions questions...

Empty words, why should your contribution depend on who else is contributing? That makes no sense.

So no one has thought of the fact that PLEX are soaring up in price right now, maybe CCP and Blink are working together to introduce more PLEX into the economy to get the price down? Maybe Blink isn't actually getting the cut on sales and everything goes straight to CCP?

Of course, such a logical explanation must be heresy and the conspiracy theorists are obviously right.