New approach to trials

Twinny · #1 06-21-2007, 10:41 AM

I was thinking about trials and I came up with an idea to make a profit from trials, regardless if they pay or not, as well as provide incentives for gold/vip.

Basically, Graal should provide 1-3 flagship servers. On these servers, trials can play and save their account as they progress but are heavily capped. For example, on my current server they would not be able to access certain levels, be level capped and also have a capped amount of items/money. It varies from server to server but the idea is there.

Trials will be able to play more and get a better feel of the game. The cap should be extensive enough to allow trials to really start to love the game but capped enough to make them want gold/vip. The more they play: the more they may wish to purchase gold/vip so they can continue playing the server with no restrictions. This could be extended to p2p players with only no current gold/vip within these flagship servers. Also, the Graal client could add ads to the pm window (one above and one below the textbox) to help make up any losses but I think the incentive for gold/vip should cover it

Also, once trials get to know and love the flagship servers, they may be enticed to purchase gold/vip by the fact there are many more servers available for subscribers. These servers (such as current classic list) should have the current trial restrictions. Current gold servers should be totally inaccessible to trials: make them wonder just how good they are.

Just a concept/idea but it could work. An official comment *pokes Unixmad* would be appreciated but what are your thoughts?

XSeipheroth · #2 06-21-2007, 10:49 AM

Why not just add advertisements for trial accounts?

zokemon · #3 06-21-2007, 10:49 AM

All I can say is...
The Graal Reform.

Twinny · #4 06-21-2007, 10:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by zokemon

All I can say is...
The Graal Reform.

....Which is where? Information? ><

Quote:

Originally Posted by XSeipheroth

Why not just add advertisements for trial accounts?

This is a group package idea...any individual idea could be taken and used though.

Elk · #5 06-21-2007, 11:23 AM

you should be able to design your own homepage on graal!

MysticX2X · #6 06-21-2007, 11:26 AM

And this is supposed to help them upgrade faster how? You're just giving them a hell lot more than they already had.

I say to enable the guests accounts. Put an end to trials who refuse to pay.

XSeipheroth · #7 06-21-2007, 11:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MysticX2X

And this is supposed to help them upgrade faster how? You're just giving them a hell lot more than they already had.

I say to enable the guests accounts. Put an end to trials who refuse to pay.

Pester them into paying and if they don't pay make a small amount of money from advertisements.

MysticX2X · #8 06-21-2007, 11:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by XSeipheroth

Pester them into paying and if they don't pay make a small amount of money from advertisements.

wth? Give them saving abilities and restrictions to a few levels? "o noz, i cant enter the spar arena, whatever will i do".

Most trials are banned from alot of levels anyways.

Making them have a limited time might be good as that was the original intent of the guest account

Twinny · #9 06-21-2007, 11:34 AM

I was thinking more like "oh crud, i am restricted to this land mass when there are 9 others available if i were to upgrade!".

As I said before, the cap should be enough so that trials can play, enjoy and get hooked to the game but also annoying enough so players really want to upgrade.

This system should only be available on a limited amount of servers pushed forward by Unix/Stefan but I think the ads for trials should be global

MysticX2X · #10 06-21-2007, 11:38 AM

Its not really like anyone leaves the same 5 frickin levels anyways.

i.e UN:everyone stays in TC, classic: everyone stays by bank or at exodus spar.

Twinny · #11 06-21-2007, 11:42 AM

If they could go further with the possibility of a few saved things, they would. During this time, they may like the concept of graal and decide to pay vip/gold.

What you people must remember is the fact that alot of trials continually play anyway. Letting them save will have no real negative effect but will give them more of an enticement to what gold/vip status will offer. They may be able to do 12 fun quests but paying for an account opens up like 60+. Trials should also get alot of exposure to gold/vip who have the cool stuff so trials start thinking, "damn! I want that!".

It's just a concept but try and atleast think about it instead of shunning based on a narrow-minded approach

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elk

you should be able to design your own homepage on graal!

VIP gets webhosting....

XSeipheroth · #12 06-21-2007, 12:33 PM

Theirs a ton of things you can do to pester them into paying but you dont really know what their threshold is one evil idea I had was putting a limit to the % of trials on the server meaning their can only be 2-5trials for every 1classic member or something. If they go over this limit the trials will have to queue up and during the queue you could slam them with advertisements and possibly let them play a game of bomber man on flash or something, and even on the bomber man field on the main floor put an advertisement on their instead of the CJ logo. Thats alot of advertisement and also gives alot more advantage of even being classic. The only issue is, Is such a sinister idea going too far, or are we being too kind as it is. You can't really tell because we don't have a solid demographics of our trial user base.

Even the PWs could help with this advertising campaign for trials by adding ads to certain hot spots that only trial accounts can view.

But an effect of this could be that no one will go to that area or etc or even change servers, But if all servers adopt this strategy their will be no way to avoid the ads and also its not hard to move an npc on graal so even if they move away you can just move the ad. Maybe this idea is evil or maybe not as good as I think it is but I still think their could be some benefits of my idea even if it is not as extensive as the way I think it should be.

MysticX2X · #13 06-21-2007, 04:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Twinny

If they could go further with the possibility of a few saved things, they would. During this time, they may like the concept of graal and decide to pay vip/gold.

What you people must remember is the fact that alot of trials continually play anyway. Letting them save will have no real negative effect but will give them more of an enticement to what gold/vip status will offer. They may be able to do 12 fun quests but paying for an account opens up like 60+. Trials should also get alot of exposure to gold/vip who have the cool stuff so trials start thinking, "damn! I want that!".

It's just a concept but try and atleast think about it instead of shunning based on a narrow-minded approach

VIP gets webhosting....

Which is basically the same thing as the guest accounts but guest accounts are limited time usage. Why cant those be turned on now.

Tyhm · #14 06-21-2007, 04:57 PM

Guests should need to use passwords. Long, complicated passwords that only save the key points of their progress as of the last Password Point: not their appearance or bombcount, just what quests they've done and what key items they've bought. And every time they see the password screen - "Incidentally, registered users can save every detail, everywhere, without having to jot down their password and start all over if they lose it".

But Secret Soon is requiring that all such discussions be cut off immediately. There's a Secret project, coming out Soon, that will render it all meaningless, so trust the admins to have taken anything you could ever possibly think of into consideration and to do what's best for Graal. Your input is irrelevant. -_-

Crono · #15 06-21-2007, 04:57 PM

Trial accounts already have it bad. Leave them alone.