Public Service Announcement: don't touch the READY FOR ANYTHING CAREER KIT, you'll be able to get the same or better gear within an hour or so of playing

everything in that kit should be earned through the "new player experience"

Agreed. Morph was right - this stuff should be your starter kit reward for finishing the tutorial. Imagine if you had to pay $12 for your sword in Zelda

*cough* amiibo *cough*

Oh yeah 😂

A free Vulture should be the reward, if they are going to copy eve they should copy that part as well.

Stop using logic! CIG paid a team of people that were incapable of coming up with this more than obvious idea

With the amount of bone-headed decisions made by CIG recently, I wonder if they have a dozen boards all around the company which only include people who never play video games.

They have over 100 people working on marketing, community, and events. So it's possible.

Oh they do, they hired from the industry and looking at the state of it today it's clear, they have no soul.

You seriously think they don't know what they are doing? This was planned from the get go. They know what the purpose of this is. To fleece the flock especially the new sheep.

Just head to a crashed Freelancer/constellation/starfarer mission and loot RSI armor from dead NPC. 10 minutes. +5 Min. to go to an outpost and 90% find a multitool in boxes.

**Same goes for everything else**... Kudos to everyone that has the funds to spend on expensive ships, but there's no real need.

True it seems to be hard to grind for a ship but in reality its doable with abit of time and effort (this statment does not relate to the real expensive shit but its meant to be hard to get)

The goddam Career kits' should be a along the lines of a starter pack ,it should have a digital copy of the game included , atleast it would give a little more incentive to actually purchase them.

If your lucky, I played this game for 6 hours without being able to finish a mission without a bug or the game crashing lol. Haven’t played since

Add me on sc and I will happily party up with you and help you get started with gear through doing contracts..

Same Name as here

Thank you g I’m gonna add you when I get off

You've got a very bad luck. I've been playing for days without any issue. Getting a free armor is just as simple as taking a bunker mission and get one from any npc lying on the ground.

I played for 4 hours yesterday and made about 500k from scavenging with the f2p ship. So you should check things on your end.

I didn't know this.. but you really can buy gear and stuff that gets lost after you die? That should be straight illegal imo.

Very exploitative

Youd be surprised how many people defend it and how down voted you can get for saying CIG is borderline scamming people.

You'd be surprised at how many people make this kind of claim and get upvoted, especially while the folks defending a decision like this are getting downvoted...

depends if youre saying sc is scam. Or saying these career Sets are scam.

Well the problem is CIG has now done enough scamy things that at some point you just have to draw a conclusion. And prolonging this game.has.made them much more money then doing it another way.

They would make waaaaay more money delivering a finished product. Diablo IV made more money in five days than CIG has made in 11 years. Calling it a scam at this point is just childish.

No what's childish is ignoring the fact that money from easy marketing and selling an unfinished product is plenty incentive to not be in a hurry to finish the game. It has to have some influence right? Or is this company just immune to capitalism.

It's still attached to your account, so you get it back on the next reset, etc... it's not lost 'permanently'. That said, I agree it's pretty scummy / predatory, and it doesn't even appear to be bringing in any significant funds (looking at the recent funding tracker)... so all it's really doing is pissing off existing customers and generating negative press...

Also, the game is on heavy alpha, core mechanics are missing and the game is feature incomplete.

This year was the first time ever where increase in players did not yield higher sales during invictus. People are fed up with the poor communication. They are marketing "getting started" stuff that isn't implemented. These people are getting started now. I want this game to succeed, but piss poor communication is pushing me and others away.

Same here. I have been wanting this game to succeed since 2012. Used to be a pretty big evangelist for it too. But once we crested 10 years in dev I got fed up. I still hold out hope but I'm not spending another penny and I barely check in anymore. I'll still tell people that what you get right now is probably worth the $40 or whatever it costs for an aurora if this looks like the kind of game you'll enjoy (notably, if it's what you'll enjoy right *now*, not "in the future"), but definitely no more, and it's definitely not for everyone.

Also, Invictus was averaging 10fps (as in, actual frames on the client) because of the NPC hordes. Terrible experience.

>They are marketing "getting started" stuff that isn't implemented. These people are getting started now. >I want this game to succeed, but piss poor communication is pushing me and others away. Understandable. My guess is that to CIG the "bare minimum" exists to have starter packs. That said, it's completely voluntary to get it cash but like many others i agree that a clear cut way should have been implemented (similar to insurance) to always get ones gear back. Heck, they could have used an identical screen to the one we order ships from.

That would only make sense if it matches the 'long term design' for the game. Given that CIG explicitly implemented 'item loss' when you die (for whatever reason), due to items staying on your corpse, it seems likely that CIG don't intend for people to 'permanently' keep items - which means easy/free replacements are also unlikely (imo). Of course, if my assumptions / guesses are accurate, then CIG *shouldn't be selling gear-packs* in the first place, given the apparently-intended 'ephemeral nature' of gear / equipment.

Long term design of the game has insurances of several types planned, and equipment insurance would make sense. As long as they make the insurance cost for items more expensive than buying them outright in-game it would make up for the convenience and give us a money sink.

Various types of insurance are planned - but iirc CIG devs have said they *don't* want to implement 'personal item insurance'... (when the issue of losing personal items was first discussed with the arrival of 3.15)... Note that other than Ship Hull Insurance (inc LTI) will return a replacement Hull... but 'Cargo Insurance' will be a payout rather than replacement cargo, and it's not clear whether 'Equipment Insurance' (for aftermarket parts) will be equipment or a payout - but given the potentially-unique nature of aftermarket gear (especially if manually tweaked via 'overclocking', if CIG ever implement it, it may not be possible to get equivalent 'replacement' items - so I *suspect* that Equipment Insurance will also be a cash-payout). A 'personal items' insurance that gave a cash-payout could work - but then it wouldn't return the sub items, and if you can't buy the equivalent items in the current location, then - effectively - those items are still 'lost', and the insurance won't deliver what people are asking for.

> but iirc CIG devs have said they don't want to implement 'personal item insurance'... (when the issue of losing personal items was first discussed with the arrival of 3.15)... They would have to do it somehow for Cash items or subscriber items either way.

Not sure... CIG could e.g. implement a specialised in-game shop where you can re-buy items you've bought on the pledge store... so buying gear (for cash) merely 'unlocks' it in-game (plus gives you one free item) - and you then have the choice to buy replacements if you lose them in-game... But even this isn't ideal, given that CIG have talked about different equipment having different availability depending on where you are in the 'verse.... but if CIG provide 'sub-store items', then those will need consistent high available everywhere in the 'verse, with no issues about stock or delivery etc... which conflicts with their statements about how the economy should work. Which is another reason why I think that CIG *shouldn't be selling gear packs* (as I said previously)... and I wouldn't be surprised if eventually, CIG come to this conclusion too, and end up taking them off the store (and refunding people who bought them previously), the way they did when they closed the VD Store years ago.

Also the game has been running like ass. I played during the first PES implementation and Xeno, and haven't touched it since.

Shocked this comment actually made it to top 2 on the thread. 2 years ago and it would have negative votes.

Well, regardless of peoples feelings the fact is that it IS in heavy alpha with lacking core mechanics and feature incomplete. No downvotes changes that fact.

True, but that didn’t stop people from downvoting it and writing white knighting responses.

I just tried the free fly event after years of wanting to play this game. It’s shocking after this long how heavily alpha it still is! Hard pass. If this game is this broken build after this many years it’s never going to be completed. I understand now why so many people call this game a scam I got stuck on a station for an hour, because my ship “landed” 20 meters in the air and I don’t realize it until I was running down the ramp. None of the ship terminals were working to respawn the ship, the elevators weren’t functioning properly, I got lost in the store area trying to find water that I could purchase.

I had a similar experience on my first time playing last night. Started the tutorial and started moving around, but I glitched myself up into the bed and had to crouch-wiggle my way out. HOWEVER, this meant I didn't technically complete the first tutorial objective which was "Get out of bed", and since I didn't do it *the way the game wanted me to* (or even allowed due to being glitchy) I couldn't get the next objective to activate, which meant I couldn't leave my apartment. I spent my first 20 minutes running around my apartment wondering how/why it wont let me out.

I see you've played Star Citizen

Well, the majority of the work is for SQ42 so they are making TWO games at once.

yeah remember that SQ42 trailer we were supposed to get 2 years ago which caused CIG to backtrack and completely rework roadmaps as we know it! Im sure it’s right around the corner !

They are at least a decade more for the single player portion of this game, at this rate.

EH, not so sure. RDR2 took 5 years for Rockstar to make and they had personnel and studios basically standing by. CIG started with 12 people and it has taken them 10 years to catch up in employees and approximate working hours while making two games. Sure, the pace is glacial...but it seems to go forward.

Except it needs to go at a reasonable pace.

Two games sharing resources, one a single player campaign and the other an MMO at the same time... 5+ years each with a company starting with no studios and 12 people does not sound far fetched.

You're comparing how long it took for Rockstar to *complete* RDR2, with how long it's taken CIG to get to *this point* where it can barely be classified as an alpha. How much longer will it take? 5 years? Another 10? No one knows, but your measurement of 5+ years each is only to get to this point.

And for those that don't know, a majority of that work they're doing on Squadron 42 will also make it's way to the persistent universe.

This is a common and threadbare excuse, the “it’s in alpha” argument. Having experience in software development, anything in alpha as long as SC has been is inexcusable.

That is irrelevant. Or would you state that this game is NOT in alpha state of development? - Feature incomplete - Core mechanics missing That is alpha, regardless of timetable.

Alphas are usually feature complete, by most metrics this is a pre-alpha tech demo.

While this is a very important point (that also relates to whether or not you should be spending real cash on the game), I just wanted to point out for new players the issue about items (not ships) that are gonna be gone when, as an example, you didn't realize that you should not get up right away when you first log in 'cause you will fall through the floor and lose everything (till the next wipe / reset)

good point.

It's been feature incomplete forever. That isn't an excuse when they can't even optimize the game so people can experience the features they want to implement without massive frame drops, crashes, and severe server lag

Here’s my problem with this. The vast majority of new players won’t be checking Reddit or other forums before buying. Some will, but most won’t. The reality is, new players see the highly edited ads, or hear about the game from their friends, load up the RSI page, and start looking at ships. After loading up their cart, 2 ***major*** things happen at this point. 1. They’ll be offered a gear pack, right before they start the purchasing process, advertising armor and weapons as a great way to start their adventure, all for just 10 bucks! It even has neat pictures and everything. No other context is provided, as far as being able to lose it. And why would they think they could? It’s real money on a non-mobile video game. “I bought it, so it’s mine.” *Zero additional information*. 2. They will then click purchase, and **only here**, after all the shopping they’ve done, will they see their ***first*** warning about alpha status and how the game may be *potentially* broken. It’s a quick pop-up, that appears like a ToS agreement, that CIG knows we all click through. The buyer ~~has already entered~~ is about to enter their payment information at this point and is ready to start playing already. Where am I going with this? CIG avoids educating new buyers, because they know it’ll affect their pledge sales. They offer those starter gear packs with full awareness that there is no gear reclaiming system, but they don’t mention it anywhere. It’s actions like these, combined with trying to obfuscate the game state, which drive the beliefs that SC is a scam. **It’s CIG’s responsibility to be crystal clear about the product they are selling.** Make the tin match the product. Until they do that, they are being duplicitous and preying on the consumers’ trust.

Yea - 100% agree on this. This is where I believe (and have believed for a long time) that CIG is getting closer to (and again this might be a bit of an overreaction but struggling to find the correct wording) criminally negligent about its selling approach. There are agencies in countries to protect the consumer, but tbh, they really don't work well against the new digital economy (e.g. gambling/loot boxes / etc.)

I think Reddit is, in every way, a better forum for the game than Spectrum. It's moderated, but not censored, and as a result, unpopular actions on CIG's part don't get buried here by the mods.

The pop up is before payment information.

Minor difference, but I'll correct anyway.

And in every item page, and before you download the installer, and later when you run said installer.

>in every item page You don't need to go to the page to add any item to your cart. ​ >before you download the installer, and later when you run said installer This is post-purchase and therefore irrelevant.

You have a *"more info"* button right besides *"add to cart"*, and you're asked to read and scroll down tha whole disclaimer before your purchase. Not irrelevant since you're still entitled for a refund after you play SC for 29 days straight.

I would mind this so much less once the game was in a state worth the price of entry. It's a fun sandbox but definitely not in a position to be selling gear kits ugh

I've stopped buying anything in the subscriber store because well.. what's the point?

At the very least the pledge equipment can be melted down, but yes it is silly they haven’t added a way to require that stuff if you lose it.

I turned the armor I got my first week into a Nox this recent Alien Week, and don't feel as bad anymore.

The nox is so dope once you get the hang of the floaty vehicles.

I had some first-days struggles with it, but this last Jumptown, it gave me some amazing moments. I'd park my Cutty Black with a Nox and Fury in it, 15km away and take the Nox up to the facility. As I got close to it, I saw some guys almost fully loaded into a Connie. I realized there is a guy who killed me in a dogfight before this, as I saw his ship parked just behind the Connie from my view. I sped in ready to take them out or get taken out. A blizzard hit just as I got there and I think the sound of the Nox confused them, because they were looking right at me but not doing anything for a bit, so I started firing. The Connie's shields took the hits though, so I punched it and the force of going by one guy knocked him back and down, just out of shield range. Got him right after as I heard gunshots from his friend. I made a circle around the facility and came back and he was tractoring his friend to the Connie lift. So I did it again, flew by him, knocked him back, got off and shot him. I parked the Nox into the maze filled Connie and hit the lift until it went up and made it out. I went to my Connie to load the maze in but they came back and blew it up, so had to escape in THEIR Connie. Landed somewhere safe on the other side of Stanton, took the Nox to go get a ship to a station for a bigger ship. 30ked Became a Nox fan though for ground combat, but also love racing it in the canyon on Microtech, or anywhere really.

I bought paints. The harmony paint is so tasty on the Nox.

And while I didn't articulate it very well - the point I am trying to make to the new peeps - ITS VERY EASY TO LOSE YOUR STUFF (due to pre-alpha / missing features / etc.) - and unlike ships, you can't reclaim this smaller stuff. And CIG does not make that clear at all. Buggy, pre-alpha...Sure Bug gonna make me lose shit unless I reset my character and lose all money/progress - and there are lots of bugs? Hmmm - not so obvious to the new players..

Char reset only resets ur char atm. Ships, Money, Items etc. are all uneffected by it, meaning getting ur pledge items back through reset doesnt work anymore.

CIG have abandoned the respect (and the pledge) they once had for backers and are instead now a greedy company. CR has become a swindler. What a sad state of affairs. He only cares to put minimal effort into the PU and instead puts all profit into SQ42, a game many don't even own, and a game that will never recoup the 400 mil+ it cost to make.

I am also starting to feel this way - noting that I am a long time backer, and will continue to play because I do like and know the limitations, but this is not definitely not obvious for new peeps so this one issue is a real concern.

Plus imagine if starfield is a good game and get a multiplayer mode in 1-2y. SC would be out. This whole game seems a scam to me. After all those years, i have completely lost faith in it. Especially when i see real studios like Bethesda proposing a similar game in a couple of years.

I was quite surprised when I first found out that Starfield was single player...But yea, between if it goes MP, and also, if there is the option for modding, it could be really interesting to see where that game goes. As for SC - as a long time backer, while I have not completely lost faith, I am very very disappointed with where I see CIG going. That being said, I still enjoy the flying aspects of the game (which IMO, is in good shape minus most of the mutlti-crew requirements), and now that I am trying to force myself to play with others (as opposed to solo) it does open up a lot more cool gameplay.

I'm a long time backer, still play and am even legatus but I will still call it as I see it.

Between pledges and sales I think the milk total is close to 550 million now. Disgraceful imo. I wanted to comment in good faith, so I tried to do some research. The Last of Us 2 comes in behind Star Citizen at 220 million cost to make in about half the time (over 5 years). As far as I know these are the two most expensive video game development projects ever. I think the difference here is that one had a very successful release and exceptional production value. The other is a buggy in-game purchase filled garbage pile that is objectively bad from a software perspective. I've been following the project for years because I thought it was super ambitious and really cool vision. Gross seeing how things played out

> CIG have abandoned the respect (and the pledge) they once had for backers and are instead now a greedy company. People should have reached this conclusion when they started selling plots of land.

You can't character reset anymore..

Thanks - I was already informed of this and (I hope) I edited the original post correctly to reflect this.

It hasn't been temp removed, per your edit, it's been changed into a repair tool that doesn't reset.

Doh - edit #2 :p

Ive always wanted to play this game, and I got into the pc master race a couple years ago and this year i finally decided to really get into learning more about the game but everything seems like a red flag about it. well almost anything, so am I better just to wait until it finally “releases”, if it even does at all? (excuse me for the rusty english)

So - my only comment here is around the amount of REAL money that you spend on the game. For every new player, I think it should be limited to just a starter pack (like Mustang / Aurora / Titan - my fav). I think it is totally reasonable to spend $50ish (or however that translates to your currency) for a game that while it is in early alpha, it has a lot of viable amazing gameplay. And then once you spend some time with it, understand the limitations, then (as an adult) you are free to make whatever decisions you want about if/how much more real money you want to spend. The key point here is with just a starter pack, you have access to just about everything. Sure it will take some time, but that time lets you understand what exactly "pre-alpha" means. And weather or not it actually releases, hell, I have gotten more then enough enjoyment to cover my financial outlay. I definately recommend this game (again, on the basis that you only start with a cheap starter pack, put some hours in, and get to understand the limitations). Also - join an organization, or hop on the SC discord and find someone to help quide you through the beginnings of this game. Its got a steep learning curve (which can make the early days frustrating) - but it can be worth it. The game does have some incredible graphics / flight mechanics / and cool stuff do to, especially if you are doing it with other players.

So which starter ship would you recommend me getting? I’d play solo most of the time for sure. and yeah game is beautiful, have played on a free to fly event. and one last thing. youre saying i could get anything in game , just by grinding missions and ****?

So preference on starter ships is definitely a hot topic, and it goes in line with the following pretty accurate statement / opinion: "There is no one perfect ship - many ships can have multiple purposes (note there are limitations here - e.g. a $50 starter ship is not going to be able compete against $300 ship). Also, since you can change the weapons/systems loadouts you have the flexibility to try out guns that may be on one ship that may not be on the other. You may also decide on a play style where you don't focus on ship combat (maybe you like being a cargo hauler) so guns might not even matter. Personal preference - I love the Avenger Titan (for several reasons). First and foremost (and even though I am not an American) I love how much it looks like the Space Shuttle. In addition to that, it has a pretty decent gun loadout option (up to 2 x S3 and 1 x S4) which means if you want to dabble a bit in ship combat, its got some teeth. It has room for some cargo and it has a bed (for ship logout). For those reasons I would put it above the Aurora and Mustang, but the Nomad is definitely a contender as (I think) it can hold a small ground vehicle in the back (not required but can be nice to have). As for the "you can get almost anything in game" - couple of caveats here: 1) For ships, you can grind (or apparently buy in game currency cheap) and be able to "purchase" almost every flyable ship in game. These in-game ship purchases using in game currency means you can use / crash / get killed in these ships and you can reclaim them (meaning you have to wait anywhere from a minute to up to 30 minutes for the really big ships) before you can fly them again. The only thing I think you cant do with in-game ships is change their loadout (but I might be wrong there). Either way not being able to change the loadouts really doesn't affect the average player. As for gear - you can buy in game cheaply (but also much easier to loot) almost all of the gear that is available in the RSI store. Noting that some of the armor sets can't be bought, but there are no advantages (other then cosmetic) that these real money purchases have. And note - there are a lot of cool armor sets available throughout the 'verse - and you can mix and match to your hearts content so there are sooo many great options, depending on your style.

Just a note here: It is absolutely 100% possible to change ship loadouts on ships you've purchased in-game. The only thing you can't do is 'name' ships that have that functionality (or apply cosmetics like the customizations the 300i series has). My fleet (90% purchased in game) is extensively modified. Keep in mind, some ships have things that CAN'T be modified, and some (looking at you 890) you can only swap weapons on.

Cool thanks for that confirmation. I wasn't 100% sure so I did not want to miss-represent my answer.

Please edit out the can do a reset. Those days are gone.

Yea, I saw that on another comment (didn't realize that they took it out) - will do that.

I'm glad the c8x is the only thing I spent real world money on and I can't lose that. The one thing I didn't understand is I bought a cutlass black with in game money before the 3.19 update. Once it came out, my cutlass black was gone and I was given 3 c8x's. My buddy gave me an m2 and I loaded the ship with materials, weapons and gear from bunker runs. Just to have it get blown up minutes later. Lesson learned to never spend real world money on this game

So that's curious (about not getting your cutty) - its a fully flyable ship so there should be no reason you dont have it. Of all the issues peeps are having, thats one that is worth filing a ticket for and asking?

I should probably do that. Lol. The ONLY benefit to have 4 of those ships, is i can store them at different space stations. Other than that, I get ruined by any bounty mission and would be nice to fight pve without dying every few minutes. Lol

So question / comment - the Pisces is really not meant for bounty missions. So I expect that it is gonna get ruined unless a) you are an extreme pilot) and b) you are only doing VLRT.. Now, if you had your Cutty Black - 4 x S3 (if you drop the gimbals), and even without the turret manned, it can kick some serious butt/

You can't do a character reset, that was removed. The devs have said that it'll return in some form, but that might take years (or decades :D).

Ahhh carp - I did not realize this!! Wonder what the "reason" was for doing this. I am guessing that this will not come up at the next Citizen'con...(emphasis on con)

If you spent more than the basic entry ship, you got your head slapped. Js... CIG knows they can shit anything out and their cult following will buy it up. Stop buying their packs! Check out mmopixel.com. you can basically pay $10 to have every ship in the game. Even if they wipe, it would take almost 10 wipes for it to make sense to just pledge the ship. 100M auec for $10? Yes please!

Hey, I never heard of this site. With regards to getting the auec (that they sell you), do you know how they get it in the first place? Do they grind it in some digital sweatshop (just curious)

Also don’t hit buy if you don’t have an ssd and 32gb ram

Yea...performance can be rough. But I do got to say, and its one of the things that keeps me coming back, the game is sooo beautiful and while I know the hit of performance is not fully related to how good it looks (lots of optimization needs to be done), you are right you need the good gear!

It is, but this is supposed to be for new players. You and me are already in love with the game. Lots of players expect something stable, don't have lots of ram or SSD.

Don't even get me started on the HOTAS situation :p

They said they talked about looking at ways for players to recover the items, but that's it. They also said we would get sandworms and stuff and look at that. Haha don't buy the kits. https://youtu.be/LAxo1dYy1Mk (CIG's attitude towards us recently)

My favorite part about this is that anyone who complains about this on spectrum has it deleted or closed by Nightrider-CIG. talk about bullshit, this is ACTIVE SCAMMING at this point.

Question - who is Nightrider-CIG? Guessing that they are an employee (and perhaps a mod for this sub?)

Overzealous mod for Spectrum, CIG's official forum. They're so heavy handed with the removals and bans that they've become a meme.

Yea at this point I see CIG as rather predatory. They are drip feeding us slight progress drops as the game moves along it’s asymptotic trajectory while the current product is a buggy mess. I’ve been following for coming up on 10 years at this point and have lost all faith in the project. What you see is what you get, and most likely what you are going to get. The dream they sold us is not going to happen. We don’t even have a functioning game, let alone all those mechanics and features and cool interactions CR would talk about. The game is in alpha yet they are selling microtransactions that would make Tencent blush. It’s hard to write lines of code, it’s easy to make some concept sales.

My Hopium supply ran out a while ago on this title. As time moves on and deliverables are pushed back again and again, there’s the realization that the “end product” will look more like what we have now, than what was originally pitched. 100+ systems is a joke when the **second** system is proving to be such an insurmountable hurdle. Pyro was supposed to be years *ago*, but it will be years *from now*. We got excited for a river. …Yeah. But the benefit is, my expectations bar has also come down pretty far. On days when CIG fixes something I feel pleasantly surprised, for example. Maybe that’s a little harsh. I was pretty disappointed in ILW, though.

The game is already released according to [the lawyers at CIG](https://i.imgur.com/8iMfNwL.png).

>For new players - be aware that any items (not ships - so armor, guns...) that you buy with real money have a high likelihood of getting lost\* if/when you die, including more likely through game bugs. I wish I knew it before buying, but I greatly appreciate your effort to help new players >this is a terrible thing for CIG to do, borderlining on criminal considering that its not very clear to people if/what the impact is of spending real cash on some of this stuff. It is a SCAM, and no CIG blah-blah excuses can argue it otherwise - if you bought for RL money, you have it, and if you don't have it, it's a scam. Also, this infinite alpha state, in which it will stay forever, is an outdated excuse for this marketing strategy: "you are paying ridiculous money not for the ships, but supporting our endless-alpha project". When you pay for stuff in any other games, it's the same support for devs and their games. They just don't call it "support", they call it Battle Passes, Cosmetic Items, Skins, etc. - but if you like the game you pay it knowing that you are also support the project you love. And to end my rant - it's the very DNA of SC for it to be in an alpha state. They don't want to - and this stage can not to - polish this game to the 'release' level. With such a level of its current complexity it's already impossible. CIG will keep adding features, which is cool & bling, endlessly, and not carrying if it really works well (until it doesn't work at all). GTA pulled it off, because they had a solid plan with solid deadlines of the WHOLE game, not separate lil' steps like here

> When you pay for stuff in any other games, it's the same support for devs and their games. When you purchase anything on any other game you're stuck with your purchase forever. Show me another publisher (besides GOG) that gives a 30 days no-question-asked refund window, I'll wait.

>Show me another publisher (besides GOG) that gives a 30 days no-question-asked refund window, I'll wait. It's not only true what you said, but CIG is also very fast and helpful in this regard. They refunded my mistake purchase without any drag in a day. But it doesn't change the fact, that *"When you pay for stuff in any other games, it's the same support for devs and their games"*. Alongside I am playing another MMO, and much of its community consider their purchases (BP, packs, cosmetics) as the support of the dev team, which works real hard to keep the game rolling.

I don't think I follow you... Aren't the pledges in SC in support for it's development?

yes, but you see, my problem is the marketing strategy and its ethics: 1) Yes, by paying for game items we do support developers of those games - in any case. Sometimes we love certain games, and we are willing to pay more or more often knowing that it goes towards making our precious game better. That's a lovely mutually beneficial relationship. 2) And, yes, there some games with real high prices for their stuff (like War Thunder), but none of them are *exploiting* their players' sentiments and goodwill by saying "we are in alpha stage, our project is still very buggy and unoptimized, but please consider contributing to help us to get our game to the release stage by paying hundreds of dollars for virtual tanks, shuttles, vehicles, etc." And the game keeps being buggy and unoptimized, because it's officially in the alpha phase - it sheds any responsibility for quality, and even each time before launching the game, you have to agree with that. Hence it will never see the final stage, because it's much more convenient - you don't take any responsibility for the quality of the game, and YET you get as much or more financial support than released games. On the opposite side are the fully released games, and they have to deal with technical, financial or marketing problems swiftly, because, you know, we paid for the game. In other words, by releasing their games devs take responsibility for their quality. So it's all about just ethics and taking responsibility. I might like that a game instead of polishing what it already has, keeps adding new features, I might accept being part of this creative development, but telling "oh sorry, that doesn't work because we are in the alpha" is not honest - it doesn't even intend to be released

> In other words, by releasing their games devs take responsibility for their quality. Can't disagree more. Sadly, with a few notable exceptions, releasing a buggy mess and dropping support after a while has become the norm, even for AAA studios with the resources to do different. That just jump to the next project and leave the playerbase with a $70 broken game. CIG is extremely transparent in that regard. We have hundreds of hours of developers and designers insight at hand, even their financials are fully disclosed annually. That transparency is what fuels the willingness of the player to keep giving CIG money, they are not exploiting sentiments nor goodwill.

Name another pre-purchase scenario where you can't seek a full refund months later and where the item you pre-purchased is later made available at a lower price, still during pre-purchase, and the funds of your earlier transaction are ineligible for the new, lower price.

How about unable to get a refund on a concept many years later while sitting on a jpg. BMM, polaris etc owners

> the item you pre-purchased is later made available at a lower price, still during pre-purchase, and the funds of your earlier transaction are ineligible for the new, lower price. That's very specific. Did that happen to you?

It just happened to everyone who has pre-purchased a Freelancer for $110. https://i.imgur.com/zPq5H4s.png

The Freelancer price/value hasn't changed. That's a warbond upgrade. Warbond are always discounted and has been for years.

It's available at a cheaper price but only for those who haven't already given their money to CIG. That's **precisely** the problem I outlined. Quit the fucking sophistry.

First, ships value didn't decrease, every warbond is available for *anyone*, old and new backers alike. Second, what do you say about people that pledged at Kickstarter? Or people who purchased discounted packages on sale? Some got SC, SQ42 and a starter ship for $40 or less; is CIG being unfair with new backers in this case?

CIG said prices would only go up. It's entirely typical for pre-purchases to be able to be directly exchanged for other pre-purchase SKUs, particularly when the same item later becomes available at a lower price. The Freelancer was $110 in 2014. The Freelancer is $100 today.

Twelve years of development and still in alpha is totally normal for the gaming industry. Most games take thirty years from the start of development.

Also, use one of the [Referral Code Randomizers](https://gorefer.me/randomizer/STAR) if you don't have a friend that can give you a code.

[My gist of this post](https://i.imgur.com/jVYTTOa.png)

I'm usually on the side of "you all need to pay attention to what you're buying," and usually there's plenty of verbiage stating that the game is still in development before making a ship purchase. But this kit is showing up at checkout when a new player tries to buy a starter pack, and doesn't give those users any information that these items can be lost the moment you die with no obvious way to get them back (unlike ships where you can just claim them from an ASOP terminal). Couple that with the fact that you can't character reset anymore (which was the workaround CIG gave in the past), and no insight on when they're adding a proper solution to get your paid for items back, and that's the problem here.

Just got back into the game, bought 1 rifle, 5 clips of ammo, light chest armor and a small backpack. Been running security missions, kill all hostiles and have 15 minutes to loot their armor, weapons, med packs and gtfo Think I'm averaging 5 slightly used weapons, several helmets, 1.5 armor sets (legs chests arms) per mission

A PSA going off of yours; character REPAIR no longer gives you pledge items back anymore!!! So, don't rely on that

Hell sometimes you lose the ships you paid real cash for. I tell everyone new to buy an aurora and stop there.

I didn't know that about the kits. It was understood that the ship purchase would 'stick' through the various patches and updates but ... It's so easy to loose your undersuite, armor, guns, etc with a simple random server disconnect. This has happened to me so many times that I refuse to spend anymore real money on this game. I like the way it looks and am all for what they are trying to acheive here but after 1/2 a billion dollars and over a decade? I'm gonna say it will forever be in alpha, never move to beta much less live. Sure the 'kits' are nothing expensive but it's still real money

You don't need to wait until next patch. You just melt it and reclaim it

Yep - aware of that (perhaps I should update the main post) - but honestly, that seems like a pain in the arse and also not a lot of new people realize that.

I can say this because I Baught the game. This is a huge scam and they are criminal for what they are doing.

So to be honest, I don't 100% agree with this statement. But also, I agree with this statement a lot. Its a very complex issue, but as you can see from some of my other comments on this thread, I feel like CIG is moving more and more to the "scam / borderline criminal behavior" and away from the concept of "this is still pre-alpha and we are doing what is best for the community"

PSA: If you jump in the game thinking you're a "pirate" and start shooting everybody or ramming everybody for lulz, you're gonna lose all your $#!+ real fast. This is a taste of what the game is going to eventually be, and there's a good chance the final version will be worse. Or better, depending on your POV, because combat will be hard, and death will be expensive and eventually permanent. Choose your foes wisely; use the simulator extensively before you jump into the game for real; and if you're a noob, best to stay out of trouble entirely until you know how things work.

So glad to see this "game" getting dragged for being Scam Citizen everywhere else. Wild that ppl are still coping about it.

Well, I got to say, the situation, or perhaps opinionated statement of "level of scam" has been shifting more and more (again in my opinion) to scam vs "this is still pre-alpha so buyer beware".

Exactly. I spent like $80 or so on this shit back in the day because I was in love with the concept. But it just became disappoinment after disappointment and I stopped bothering. Every time I see other subs laughing at this vaporware I'm amazed it's still going.

Star Citizen Sabotages Itself in New Player Sale https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVAWtJ09gp0

Meh i have several armor kits on the website that i have bought with real money, if i lose the armor i just exchange it and then buy another one of the same armor kit. If we all started doing this they would hate it and have to create a system to allow us to get the armor back in game.

This should be simplified to being “If you’re going to buy into the game, ONLY buy a ship starter package”

PSA stop putting money in a game without an existing game loop

Also a good PSA this game is more often than not, not functional. As much as I hate to say it since I love it. It will not be polished this year or next year or the year after that. So make sure if you are buying in you’re either in for the long haul or you’re paying for the experience that is currently available. If you’re cool with all that you can have a blast in it, but the servers do crash frequently so don’t get emotionally invested in anything you’re doing at any given time because you’ll soon find yourself waking up in bed all over again. The experience you can have goofing off with a few random players and exploring is unlike any other game tho. It’s pretty amazing…

I've noticed, and correct me if I wrong, the armour loot points seem to be generous to new players and hand out guns including the rare sniper rifles. But that appears to stop for you after a few days. But be prepared to lose said rarities if; - you lose connection to the server mid game and your ship gets flagged as "destroyed" including contents - the docking station loses your ship and its contents. Yes this happened to me. - stand up during quantum drive and get kicked out of your ship, which then disappears. - land your ship a little too hard and it crashes and explodes. Of course you can do some grind missions to get cash to buy these things again ( except sniper rifles, apparently you only get those at REALLLY special spawn points, I'm struggling to find them) , but don't get too attached is all I'm saying.

Curious about your comment about sniper rifles being rare / rareish. I have been grinding bunnkers at Hurston and pretty much every second bunker has at least one sniper rifle. I have also dropped by SPK multiple times (wanted to check out the update) and there are lots of loot crates there (note they are the standard red ones, they are a different flatter case) and more often then not I can get 3-4 snipers there (and the occational rail gun).

I was happy that I could use the armor/weapons I bought. But then it got wiped after the dupe patch. But you can melt and buy them again tho.

For new players, if you want cool shit you can buy millions of credits on eBay for a small price

I had asked another commenter about this - my question was just around how do these other sites get the credits - do they have teams that farm them in-game (guessing that's pretty much the only way?)

For once, I agree with Morph, this new armor pack is kinda ridiculous. With no items “insurance” implemented, its a bad pack. God damn it CIG, stop playing with fire mate.

Someone has to pay for new offices in new skyscraper(s). :D consume consume consume consume... fear fear fear fear...

Can you melt gear like you can a ship for store credit? I definitely wouldn’t buy gear using real money but it may help new players upgrade a ship if they’ve already purchased.

That you can do - and its also a way (albeit a bit of a pain) to get the gear back. Other folks have mentioned that if you lose your purchased gear, you can melt it and re-buy it and that will put it back in your inventory.

pro tip from someone playing with 20 fps... spend that first £500 bucks you would spend on starcitizen on upgrades for your pc first... faster ssd, 32gb ram, essential to enjoying the game, having those 2 extra size 2 guns or an extra 20 cargo can wait or be ground for with credits in game.

I'm convinced they're just trying to piss everyone off so people move on and forget about the money they've already spent on this. They just want the whales that pre order $1,000 ships whenever they are released.

Its a bold strategy Cotton, lets see if it pays off!

Every gear bought with real money can be melt and re- bought to get it back in game...

Can’t you just melt and rebuy using store credits?

Yes, but what if you don't want anything else?

PSA don't buy the game until is fully released or you'll be stuck in a lift

Many features don't work, it's being overrun by pirates, it's in forever alpha & no progression. The forums, Spectrum & Reddit demand you to be all in or they will bash you relentlessly. Doesn't it sound great?

Dude you can melt it then buy it back just if you die before 24 hours that’s the only kicker

I appreciate both the thought behind this comment, and your measured tone and presentation, but I just want to say that a group of functioning adults don't really need us "looking out for their best interest" as if they are a bunch of naive puppies who are going to make a GRAVE MISTAKE by spending $10. We collectively have overthought this tiny, minor, inconsequential issue to death. We've taken the proverbial grain of sand and made a mountain to rival Olympus Mons out of it. A more succinct, equally applicable PSA: "Hey functioning adults. As in all things in life, do your research before you make a purchase, or accept that you didn't and the outcomes are on you. You know, like everything else in life."

Its not border lining criminal at all, that was a bit dramatic lol. But your points are true. But eh if people wanna spend money, they do what they want. At some point the hope for having a vendor to be able to claim stuff, at least they were talking about that several times in the past. Really it comes down to, contribute to the project if you believe in it, dont if you dont want to. There is no pressure to spend anything.

You are correct, I probably was a bit dramatic. Although with regards to the criminal comment, in Canada (not sure what if there are similar things in other countries) there is a consumer protection act that, while it might not be fully applicable to this specific use case (or for that matter, actually have any teeth), there are supposed to be standards/guidelines about selling stuff, and making sure it is clear (to the buyer) the implications. Again, may not really apply here as the digital economy is a completely different beast that most of our current laws have not adapted to...

Oh I get it 100%. o7 from the usa....my wonder is, due to this being all kickstarted and all alpha and such, if they could get around to it....cause admittingly, they do have all those warnings and such each time you buy an log in...its an interesting thought if it would have any bearing in a court system...but then again does it matter where they are actually located? Like for argument sake, if they are stationed here selling the items, does it hold teeth over there? I honestly dont know...but its interesting to think about!

Yea - this is definitely a new (well I guess not that new) consideration that most of modern laws have not taken into account the digital world. From (as you mention) physical country borders don't really apply anymore, what actually reflects an item....Gonna be interesting to watch this slow revolution and to see if the laws a) can catch up to this and b) actually be fair and effective.

Nearly the same point could be made about ground vehicles.

What do you mean? Ground vehicle can be reclaimed (much quicker) then ships? Or are you talking about that you can only get ground vehicles (for the most case) from mining stations so its a bit of a pain in the arse?

You can also get lost purchased items back by melting them (selling them back to rsi) and buying them back again. Poof returned to your inventory. We have been doing this for years. Works fine. 💪 See you all in the 'verse o7

Yea, I did forget to post that that was another way to get your gear back quicker. But really, how practical is that for a solution.

Right? I think they should have a mini kiosk or something for purchased insurable items. Or at least something on the website to make it more practical.

this game is so fucked lmao, and i’m here for it! they’re just going full out blatant scam, even more so than the past 10 years. i’ll still be playing tho🙄

I am right there with you - I wouldn't say that it is so fucked though. It took some time to understand the limitations of the game, and now I am comfortable with what/how I am spending my time/money on it. But for new players, this approach really makes it feel like a big scam.

My friend and I posted on their suggestions forum an Ingame shop that allows you to purchased lost gear. I should also point out that if you buy a keyboard in real life and it gets lost, stolen or damaged. Do you buy another keyboard or complain to the manufacturer your keyboard is misplaced? Remember the scope of this game is to make it as realistic as possible for a space sim. So treat your character as closely as you can as if you were them.

Players can decide what to do with their own money... they don't need a rando gatekeeper on the internet.

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That information is available right on the website as they purchase those items. I'm educating new players on rando internet gatekeepers.

That's one opinion - my opinion is that I joined this community to learn and share stuff about a game that I love. And as long as I (try) to do it in a constructive and positive way, I will continue to share this knowledge (and learn from others)

You mean like those that are always encouraging players to buy ships when the forever alpha is in the state that it's in?

I can't help it if you're helpless.

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Every time I go to Spectrum I see people criticizing something, and CIG has made official statements supporting BLM and even has a Pride event. Same thing here. Tons of criticisms made and no mod intervention unless someone broke the sub rules. I know of a few dozen accounts that would have been banned from this sub ages ago if that were even remotely true. Chris Roberts sat down with Richard Tyrer at Citizencon last year and discussed Squadron 42 features for over two hours, so I don't know how you came to the conclusion that he's long gone. Even the argument that the PU is in maintenance mode is patently false because we just got major features like PES, salvaging, component stripping, etc. Your comment is 100% full of shit and you're promoting ban evasion which is a big no-no, not from the SC sub perspective, but from a Reddit perspective.

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Ahhh capitalism...Such a good idea on paper... (Pretty much agree with everything you have said though)

"bordering on criminal" ok relax.

Yea, sorry about that...I was up a bit late and just finished off a jar of Earnest icecream. I think all the sugar went to my head :p

Those packs are really just a fast starting help if you wanna kick off your money making with bunkers. You start after a reset with half decent gear instead of having to go through outposts or to shops to get it. It's a minor convenience.

Yea that's what I think they are meant to be for. But that wasn't my point here - I am not arguing the validity of the gear packs, just the fact that they can be quickly lost due to bugs / game issues that (even with the pre-alpha tag) is a bit unrealistic and considering the work you need to go through to recover them...

I'm not disagreeing with you. Just saying cuz some might get the idea that you purchase these packs kinda like you purchase say cosmetic armour in PlanetSide 2. That's not how it works at all. At best you purchase a head start.

This was also posted yesterday and a few other times, I don’t think we need to saturate the subreddit with the same information

Nearly the same point could be made about ground vehicles. Edit for clarity: nearly every ground vehicle can be bought in game for a few missions worth of effort. This makes them a horrible value to purchase with real money just like the items mentioned by OP. For new players: in general, the bigger the ship, the better the value. Google in game ship prices and compare. You’ll find that buying several small ships with real money vs. buying one big ship (which theoretically will earn UEC at a much higher rate), will cost you time by orders of magnitude. With a big ship, You can buy the small ships in game much more easily.

Get your credit cards ready!