New Subscriptions

[Rufus]

Oh hell, I have just read on the startup news about the new subscription method, and I just flat out don't understand it. For those of you who haven't seen it yet:

We are introducing a new more flexible subscription system - you get a starter pack with your subscription, and you can pause your subscription:

Euro conversion
Right now we are losing an incredible amount of money each month just for currency conversion. That's why we have decided to switch the billing system completely to Euro. We know that odd Dollar numbers on the bill (like .37) might be confusing, but we hope that you understand this step. At the same time we lower the Euro prices so that the actual difference between old and new amount will not be too huge. So depending on where you come from and what you want to buy, some prices might be slightly higher or lower. On the subscription page you can easily convert the amount to your local currency.

New subscription system
We have changed the subscription system to be based on Gelats. That means you buy an amount of Gelats on the website, and then subscribe directly in the game using the Shop window. The subscription system has been simplified: we again only offer one Gold subscription which works for any current server (Zone, Kingdoms, Classic, under construction and hosted playerworlds). The price is in the middle of old single server subscription and gold bundle: you subscribe and then pay 300 Gelats each month.

Free starter pack
When you buy a subscription or gelat pack on the website then you get an additional starter pack for free. The starter pack includes items for Zone, Kingdoms, Unholy Nation, Zodiac and Era and makes the life for new players easier.

Flexible subscriptions
The subscription system is now much more flexible. First you don't need to subscribe for 12 months upfront: you can subscribe one month, then pause and continue later with your remaining Gelats. You will get an e-mail notification when your subscription is near the end and there are not enough Gelats on your account.

To start off, a new player is not going to understand what a Gelat is so I find it weird that everything is now gelat based. Gelats are very foreign, even to current Graal players and they're often confused with the local money system, it's a very confusing system in general so I personally don't think it should be mainstream. I didn't really understand the news post, so I checked out the subscriptions page which left me even more confused; this is not a simplification of subscriptions at all.

Here are my questions:

• What the heck is a bonus?
• Why do I need or want a starter pack? Especially since the items aren't even available on the server I play, and I'm not starting out.
• Are the forums going to be free now that the subscriptions are incredibly confusing and "flexible" to the point of it being abusable?
• Why change something that worked, was simple and obvious to the player, into something that is confusing to the point where I'm not even tempted to buy a subscription anymore?
• Why remove the Zone and Kingdoms subscriptions? Is it because nobody was paying for Gold anymore and just buying Zone?
• Are you aware that the 8 months package is the price of the previous 12 months?