Editing Warhammer 40,000: Eternal Crusade (section)

==Monetization==

===How it was===

During early stages of development, Eternal Crusade started out by offering a "Founders" program, in which future players could, through an important sum of money, basically "fund" the game and receive exclusive weapons, gear, updates and many other goodies with the hope of getting even more benefits as the game expanded, not unlike any pre-order or Patreon pledge. How many people bought these packs is anyone's guess, but the truth is that said sums were pretty high, and it was a risky investment since there was no clue how it was going to turn out.

During the Alpha stage, EC was known for its ridiculously high price, at a staggering $39.99 on Steam (more or less depending of the country.) While this scared off potential buyers right away, players who bought it were shocked as they got an incomplete, sluggish mess of a game, filled with bugs and completely unoptimized. Devs insisted again and again through weekly streams that they were working to improve everything, but time was running out and progress was minimal, even after a year.

A cash-shop was then introduced. Items sold are almost entirely cosmetic, and they can be bought through RTC (Rogue Trader Credits), an in-game currency you can get in exchange of real money. Prices range from 2,000 RTC for a helmet or chapter symbol, to 10,000 RTC for unique deluxe weapons, like a golden power fist. While devs repeatedly stated there wouldn't be pay-to-win in any form, there's a special subset of weapons that have minor buffs at the cost of taking up far more loadout space (such as the infamous Abaddon's Grace Autocannon, which deals minor soul blaze damage).

There's one huge problem with the shop: RTCs can only be obtained in packs of odd amounts (4000, 9000 and so on), while all prices in the shop are in even numbers. This means, if you want an item that costs 5,000 RTCs, you ''have'' to purchase the 9000 pack, which leaves you with 4000 unusable credits left unless you go for cheaper stuff. And to makes matters worse, the catalogue is relatively scarce, with no option for deeper customization. It's a scammy, unfair cash-grab, which has lead to much outrage from many players.

On the plus side, there was another currency introduced called "Requisition Points", which are basically skill points obtained through performing various actions in a match including kills, captures, executions, etc. These can be traded for "Supply Drops", which are mystery packs that contain weapons, upgrades and unique gear not available through the cash-shop. While opening all the boxes takes much time and effort, at the end the loot obtained isn't that great and once you've got everything, you can't do anything else. [[Games Workshop|Unless, of course, you want to give more money to The Man.]]

===How it actually turned out===

Originally, there were plans to have a free-to-play dynamic known as "Free To Waaaagh!", in which players could enter the game but limited to the Orks faction. The idea sounds brilliant and its quite fluffy, since Orks are literally a huge, green piledrivin' horde, and for that, you need players. However, concerns in game balance/population, and the fact that matches never went beyond 60 players crushed that possibility.

But eventually it happened. The game went into a freemium state, with a few restricts. You can't access the Assault class and progression is slowed to 1/3 normal state, but the other 2/3s will be given to you upon upgrading to premium or spending $20 in the cash shop. In other words: Without paying, players can access the game, but receive a third of their earned requisition and experience. Those who buy the game are given all of the currency and experience they were withheld from while free-to-play. 

This transition caused quite an outrage in the Steam community, specially those who ended up spending $40 or more during the early years. But at this point is obvious it was the Founders who got the short end of the stick.

To add insult to injury, the last noteworthy addition to the cash-shop were the "Heroes", which are unique characters with special abilities, but they come at the insulting price of 25,000 RTCs. Ouch.

Furthurmore, [[FAIL|they weren't even unique. Just either a veteran tactical equipped with flaming ammunition.]] [[Faptau|-or in the possessed marine's case, a goofy looking beatstick stuck with a single powerfist but no pistol or shield.]]