Free Trials (Sponsorship)

[BRP]

I would suppose this is the best place to post this. It has been on my mind lately, and I thought I would put it in text somewhere on the internet.


FFXI does not have any free trials. There is a very inexpensive trial, but it is not free(and therefor costs commitment). Many times potential long-term players are turned away by the lack of a truly free trial.

Now there are reasons against free trials. I am going to suggest a method of free trials which can work within the current system and also work around the reasons against free trials. Any hard numbers here are actually flexible depending on how strict or free it should be.

The system is based on sponsorship. A system where an active subscriber is the distributor of trials, not SE. The "sponsor" is given trial time he can give to his chosen sponsee. The amount of trials and length of those trials are based on how long the player has been playing FFXI. The trial time is broken down into units of weeks(a full 7-day week).

The trials can be one of three lengths: 1-week, 2-weeks, or 3-weeks. These take up units equal to the amount given. Meaning a Sponsor with 3 weeks in his pool of trial time can: 1) give three 1-week trials away, 2) one 1-week trial and one 2-week trial, or 3) one 3-week trial. When creating a trial(through POL), a code is generated and the sponsee uses it on his fresh POL account.

Before earning or giving away trials, the sponsor must fulfill three prerequisites:
-The oldest FFXI Content ID must be 6 months old. (The first time this condition is met on a POL account, 1 week of trial time is given). Deleting the oldest content IDs will have no effect on the trials, but sponsors will be unable to use them or gain more until their new oldest account is 6 months old.
-For each of those months to count, the character on that Content ID must have been logged at least once during that month.
-To create or distribute trials, the account must have been active the previous month.

Once 6 months of activity have passed, more trial time is earned at the rate of 1 week for every three months of activity.

Trial time earned is retroactive, including the first week after 6 months. In example, a Content ID which has been active for 3 years(36 months) has 11 weeks of trial time. If a system like this would ever to be implemented there would instantly be a very large amount of trials, this makes up for the fact players only earn 4 weeks a year.

Sponsees appear on the same server of their sponsor. The sponsor and sponsee are eligible for Gold Moogle Worldpass reward as soon as the sponsee's trial ends and the account becomes a regular FFXI account.

The final and most important part: During this trial, the sponsor will be held responsible for any RMT-related activities the sponsee takes part in. Even after the trial ends, if the former sponsee takes part in such activities, the sponsor will be investigated. Other offenses will not harm the sponsor unless there is a history of several sponsee breaking these rules.

There are a few more details to fill in any gaps or prevent abuse, but I won't bother with those unless someone wants to point those gaps out.


Looking at the system, the advantages seem obvious:
-Free marketing. Players can go where SE doesn't. Messageboards, anonymous posting, talk between friends, and other games. Trials on fileplanet or FFXI's main site are only visible to those to seek after them. But on a messageboard all it takes is a FFXI thread to get some new potential customers.

-Empowering the player. With this system, players are going to feel like they are in control. This is bound to give players a sense of pride in the months they spent playing. They have a gift they can give to a friend or a stranger.

-Not Alone. FFXI appearing dead is a big problem for some. While there are those who see the activity of the capitals, it wouldn't be a surprise there are those who might only see the emptiness due to current trends or playing time. With a sponsorship system a player is going into a game with a friend and maybe even a linkpearl waiting for them.

-Anti-RMT. Compared to the way things are now, this trial is even safer than the free month or starter pack despite being free. The strict requirements make it almost impossible for RMT to make good use of this. Consider that a RMT must have an active account which does not contribute to their business for 6 months. And that account at risk whenever the sponsee does anything. To gain a large amount of accounts, that useless account would have be around for years. It simply isn't worth the profit, more so when you consider just buying a new account or starter pack.

There is a vulnerability though. Bought accounts. Fortunately, in this system you only really create large nets of bans if that sponsee were to ever be caught.


And that's it.

[Hyan]

http://www.fileplanet.com/192215/190...Day-Free-Trial

[Buttons]

As of this week you even have an official trial for European Playonline:

https://secure.playonline.com/freetrialeu/

[Hyan]

http://www.ff11europe.com/index_en.html what the hell is wrong with the pic on the front page lol, that a galka right?

[BRP]

Wow I guess I am late. I had no idea about this.

[Gwynplaine]

Wow that illustration is like... what?

[Howard Roark]

not sure the difference of how these trials work but the WoW trials apparently you are unable to trade or post things on the auction house (or equivalent) and you can't even talk to other players or something?

perhaps my friend was exagerrating but it didn't sound too appealing when my friend was trying to get me to join (although he did say there was some join with a friend thing that was a pretty sweet deal)

anyway, hope it encourages getting involved etc as opposed to merely getting a taste of game mechanics like the WoW free trials would seem to

seems difficult to prevent RMT abuse without going isolationist

[Kiarax]

not sure the difference of how these trials work but the WoW trials apparently you are unable to trade or post things on the auction house (or equivalent) and you can't even talk to other players or something?

perhaps my friend was exagerrating but it didn't sound too appealing when my friend was trying to get me to join (although he did say there was some join with a friend thing that was a pretty sweet deal)

anyway, hope it encourages getting involved etc as opposed to merely getting a taste of game mechanics like the WoW free trials would seem to

seems difficult to prevent RMT abuse without going isolationist

No auction house, no mail box, couldn't create parties (but you could join them) and you can't /whisper people who don't have you on their friend list. It was fine for just playing with a friend, but it would suck if you weren't. If I didn't have to do a huge download and update I might have considered doing this to bug some old friends, but it's nice that SE are finally making something like this available.