CONFIRMED: ZOS working on Trial accounts for ESO.

Neizir

There is obviously no time-table associated with any of this information and for that matter no definitive answer on exactly what a "Trial" account exactly means in ESO. Having said that, let us wildly speculate . . .

Thanks to Reddit user/AMGarkin the following lines were found in the EsoStrings table:
"[eng] Trial Account", -- SI_TRIAL_ACCOUNT_HELP_CATEGORY
"[eng] Disabled on trial accounts.", -- SI_TRIALACCOUNTRESTRICTIONTYPE1
"[eng] Whispering disabled on Trial accounts.", -- SI_TRIALACCOUNTRESTRICTIONTYPE2
"[eng] Trial accounts may only whisper to friends.", -- SI_TRIALACCOUNTRESTRICTIONTYPE3
"[eng] Guilds disabled on trial accounts.", -- SI_TRIALACCOUNTRESTRICTIONTYPE4

What can we safely assume? Well the fact that these exist in 1.5 and haven't appeared previously we know that ZOS is most likely going to add some form of Trial account in the future. I don't think this is a huge shocker. All subscription MMO's have some form of Trial accounts and some players have already been asking for them to try to entice their buddy who watched the Angry Joe review 6 months ago to give it a go. It can range from the constant trial of WOW to the trial weekends of GW2 or something in between.

From the strings we also know a few of the restrictions that trial accounts will have. Trial accounts will only be able to whisper people in their friends list and guild functionality will be disabled.

What are your thoughts on ESO Trial accounts? What TYPE of trial accounts do you think ESO should have? What additional restrictions do you think trial accounts should have?

My speculation:
I think trial accounts initially will be special event-type things - limited to weekends sprinkled throughout the year. I think the first one will be at Console launch. Which based upon the wording in their Update 5 API Patch Note Changes post leads me to believe is possibly still on track for this year.
"As gamepad support continues to accelerate, existing lua objects and control structures are being refactored at a faster rate."
Trial accounts have no clairvoyant power as to the state of the game or any impending doom - sorry haters. EVERY established sub-based MMO has some form of a trial account. Actually the fact that they are working on trial accounts means the sub is around to stay for the foreseeable future. There would be no need for trial accounts in a F2P system.
Trial accounts can only help make ESO stronger in the long run. Although I'm not looking forward to that first weekend . . .

Let the "ermagehrd F2P imminent" begin . . . 3 . . . 2 . . . 1 . . .

Sallington

If they give a free weekend trial I could probably convince a few of my friends to purchase the game and sub up.

ers101284b14_ESO

F2p coming!!!!!!

Seriously though its about time. There should always be a small trial. FF14 started opening on weekends after a patch an now has I think it's a week trial. I don't think trial people should be able to use zone chat as much either, maybe put a 30 second cool down on chat privilege or something. But I am happy they are finally doing this. Also hope the bots and gold spam don't come back.

BBSooner

Id be curious to know how long they have been in the code. They could be a relic and imply a future "TO-DO" or actively worked on.

DDuke

ers101284b14_ESO wrote: »

F2p coming!!!!!!

Seriously though its about time. There should always be a small trial. FF14 started opening on weekends after a patch an now has I think it's a week trial. I don't think trial people should be able to use zone chat as much either, maybe put a 30 second cool down on chat privilege or something. But I am happy they are finally doing this. Also hope the bots and gold spam don't come back.

Trial accounts shouldn't be able to use zone chat at all, since that leads to gold seller spam 100% guaranteed.

Bots might be a trickier problem... maybe trial accounts shouldn't be allowed to harvest materials either?

MorHawk

Interesting. I remember seeing some code in the beta client about gold purchases with real money, but that could be argued as an idea that was later rejected. If this has indeed just been introduced, it is very likely that this is coming soon.

Okay, I don't usually do this, but I think that official attention is actually warranted on this one:
@ZOS_GinaBruno‌

Nestor

Neizir wrote: »

There is obviously no time-table associated with any of this information and for that matter no definitive answer on exactly what a "Trial" account exactly means in ESO. Having said that, let us wildly speculate . . .

Thanks to Reddit user/AMGarkin the following lines were found in the EsoStrings table:
"[eng] Trial Account", -- SI_TRIAL_ACCOUNT_HELP_CATEGORY
"[eng] Disabled on trial accounts.", -- SI_TRIALACCOUNTRESTRICTIONTYPE1
"[eng] Whispering disabled on Trial accounts.", -- SI_TRIALACCOUNTRESTRICTIONTYPE2
"[eng] Trial accounts may only whisper to friends.", -- SI_TRIALACCOUNTRESTRICTIONTYPE3
"[eng] Guilds disabled on trial accounts.", -- SI_TRIALACCOUNTRESTRICTIONTYPE4

What can we safely assume?

There were Trial Accounts earlier in the game, back around the time of the public betas. Can't remember what restrictions, if any, were on those accounts.

I am all for giving people a chance to play the game, most who do like it. Unfortunately, there are enough griefers out there on the web to torpedo any game by blowing small issues all out of proportion, or continue to report issues that no longer exist in the game. I still see thread like this on these boards.

So, this could give people a way to see for themselves just what the game is like. I would prefer they be put on something like the PTS server, but that might have a limited population.

Gythral

As long as they are:
Time limited
Level limited
Broadcast chat restricted (once per 30 seconds or similar)
cannot initiate whispers (to non-friends) & friends requests

Then it's a good idea to have them on the live server at some point, no point in putting them on the PTS & not seeing the game with it's warts or having to play on a US based server if they are closer to the EU one etc.

AshySamurai

Finally! Hope this is true and ZOS really going to implement this feature. And hope I will be able to play with trial players too(trial and normal players have the same instance).

Voodoo

the only thing bad about a trial account is the spam/farmers it may produce. No doubt ZOS will have as much bases covered in that regard if this trial account goes ahead.
From a business stand point it is a good idea.

Nox_Aeterna

Dont care much about it , most MMOs have those in the end of the day so it seems logic that zen will implement them at some point.

I wouldnt have any use for it , already told my friends enough of zen "good" calls that i bet none of them would be interested in trying this game at all.

Gedalya

I'm not bothered at all; it will be a nice feature to enable players to try before they buy (ostensibly as we are presuming what the references are to).

However, as a paying customer, I am still interested in extra character slots. I would have preferred to see that implemented prior to adding options for people who haven't paid anything (again, speculation at what they are doing).

ers101284b14_ESO

DDuke wrote: »

ers101284b14_ESO wrote: »

F2p coming!!!!!!

Seriously though its about time. There should always be a small trial. FF14 started opening on weekends after a patch an now has I think it's a week trial. I don't think trial people should be able to use zone chat as much either, maybe put a 30 second cool down on chat privilege or something. But I am happy they are finally doing this. Also hope the bots and gold spam don't come back.

Trial accounts shouldn't be able to use zone chat at all, since that leads to gold seller spam 100% guaranteed.

Bots might be a trickier problem... maybe trial accounts shouldn't be allowed to harvest materials either?

Yeah but you don't want to lock them out of everything. If you don't let them talk, group, harvest, or anything then heck whats the point of the trial account. Just don't want them ruining my fun either though.

Neizir

@ZOS_TristanK @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_JasonLeavey @ZOS_MichelleA
Can we have some more clarification on the trial system e.g when we can expect to hear more about it?

MorHawk

Neizir wrote: »

@ZOS_TristanK @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_JasonLeavey @ZOS_MichelleA
Can we have some more clarification on the trial system e.g when we can expect to hear more about it?

Holy dev spam. Particularly unnecessary, since I'd already tagged Gina a few posts into the thread.

GoatKnuckle

As a subscriber, I couldn't care less.

AshySamurai

MorHawk wrote: »

Neizir wrote: »

@ZOS_TristanK @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_JasonLeavey @ZOS_MichelleA
Can we have some more clarification on the trial system e.g when we can expect to hear more about it?

Holy dev spam. Particularly unnecessary, since I'd already tagged Gina a few posts into the thread.

IMO they get tonns of notifications about dropped name, so it doesn't make any difference.
P.S. need to make holy dev spam template to paste it in every message.

Sotha_Sil

If such thing exists then it is definetely not our concern at all. So please let them work a bit and focus on the game out there. Thanks

Audigy

The issue with trial accounts will come over time. If people can claim names then the pool will get smaller and smaller.

At WOW this is a huge problem, to create a char without a special letter is almost impossible as these trial accounts are never deleted and therefore every person who made a char will have a name like forever, a name someone else might want.

ZO would need to make sure to delete these trial accounts after the trial weekend or just give the chars a number.

driosketch

You don't need to lock them out of harvesting, just turn of trading and mail, a limit on zone chat.

Nestor

Audigy wrote: »

The issue with trial accounts will come over time. If people can claim names then the pool will get smaller and smaller.

At WOW this is a huge problem, to create a char without a special letter is almost impossible as these trial accounts are never deleted and therefore every person who made a char will have a name like forever, a name someone else might want.

I am sure they would have in place a mechanism where a trial player could convert their account to a paying one, then want to keep the name. So, they would have to have some mechanism to delete names from the roles after the trial is over, like after two weeks or something.

Or, even better, a randomly assigned character name for the trial, then allow them to rename once they start paying. Which of course would mean we could rename our characters.....

Evergnar

Trial accounts would be good for ESO based on where the game is currently at. It got an overwhelmingly average rating out of the gate and it's a good time to let people in to decide what they think for themselves.

babylon

If they make trial accounts they need to give them their own instance (so we don't see the bots spell out their website names using bot bodies on the floor in the middle of our towns, and so randoms don't insist on farming every single node even if they can't use or sell the items anywhere, making raising a legit lowbie character on a paying account suck majorly), and either make the names temporary (like 1623543-Eso) or flush names regularly.

k9mouse

Let the people use the PTS server as a trail server. They can help test the new content and also it helps to keep the gold farmers away from the main "Live" server.

ZOS also make a "Live 2" server -- a copy of the live server for the same reasons.

I can see Gold farmers can be a BIG problem if they can get their dirty little hands on some "free" accounts.

This is how it might might work:
1) A few dozen trail accounts even if they are very limited
2) They harvest some nodes -- either by bots and or "Chinese players grind*"
3) Pass this loot off to a "real sub account" -- aka a pack mule or char bank / storage
4) Have yet a different real sub account for selling their wares

How does ZOS stop the gold farmers abuse and still keep the trail free enough for a trail account to be useful for some one who really want to try ESO out for the 1st time?

*This is the stereo type of a gold farmer worker.

KenThinks

Imagine how many of the trial users will be turned off at the long download just to get their hands on the client to play...unless they only get a small, self-contained client.

Nestor

KenThinks wrote: »

Imagine how many of the trial users will be turned off at the long download just to get their hands on the client to play...unless they only get a small, self-contained client.

Maybe. But all games seem like they are 20GB plus these days, so it would be expected.

Then again, ZOS could be mailing out game disks like AOL did back when.

kevlarto_ESO

OK like all MMOs do no biggie and expected

Volkodav

Hopefully not like WoW though. You can keep playing it till you reach level 20,with I dont remember how many alts. Then,just delete your account and do it again,over and over.Remove the client from your PC and re-download it.
Why pay when you can just keep it up. Personally,I paid eventually,to get the perks and up to level 85,..but for a long time,I didnt.
Make the trials only for like 14 days,and no keeping your chars once you sub.
Then those who already sub wont feel like the trials are give aways to those who dont want to pay.
Just my opinion though.

bosmern_ESO

PLEASE DON'T ALLOW THEM TO ZONE CHAT!!!!

I can already see how infested the starter zones will be infested with kids "twolling" which will ruin immersion and other peoples times that are trying to play.

Gillysan

driosketch wrote: »

You don't need to lock them out of harvesting, just turn of trading and mail, a limit on zone chat.

This would work. I would allow them to receive mail.

Take a lesson from another game where they have had to deal with the Goonwaffe for 10 years. Goons are beta testers. :P

https://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Trial_account_limitations

arena25

Just because there is a free trial, it doesn't signal free to play. Remember WoW? They offered a "free trial until level 20", but have they gone free to play? (Answer: A big giant red NO!)