How microtransactions in MMOGs should work

[PleaseDeleteMe]

With the recent release of TF2F2P I think that I, a humble fourteen year old, should make my view on "Microtransactions" heard. I personally believe that a MMO with microtransactions should make them mostly, if not only, cosmetic. I am an avid gamer and in my time have played many an MMO, at the moment I play WoW, Champions Online and in light of it's release, TF2.(let it be known however that I did buy the retail version on steam). As it stands at time of writing, I belive that the best microtransaction game is Champions online, as the majority of purchases are cosmetic, with a few quest packs thrown in.
My reasoning for this is that simply put, purchasable upgrades are overpowered. Take Alliance of Valiant Arms, a game recently released on steam. I can either spend several hours racking up the points necessary to buy an AUG assault rifle, or input my debit card details and buy an AUG, grenade belt (+2 grenades) and other guns. Futhermore it is difficult for me to gain the many thousands of points needed to purchase this superior hardware as those who haven't the time for gaming and simply buy the guns have all the best gear, leaving it harder for me, the player with little spare time (given my piles of homework) to level up.

And so I pose it to you, the escapist's many forum readers, what is the way foreward for microtransaction based games?

Many Thanks,
Ben A.K.A Spiffyzzz

 

[Rad Party God]

Mostly, the F2P microtransactions of the games I've played, are mostly for vanity or for buying quest packs, mostly for Lotro & DDO and amazingly, TF2 is free as in free, free, except if you want some extra hats, wich are 100% vanity items. I like boost packs when they make sense and when they don't interfere with game balancing, especially if the game is PVP centered.

Even Guild Wars has vanity items in the form of the quite recent Mercenaries Pack, where you can "hire" the same characters you've created in your account and they can help you, instead of using the default heroes. This is almost purely cosmetic, as you can get a lot of different heroes throughout the game (assuming you have all the expansions) and customize them with whatever skill and weapon you want, even it's secondary class, making the Mercenary Pack quite unnecessary and, as I said, almost purely cosmetic.

In Lotro and DDO, the boost packs are mainly a little XP boost and a couple of health and mana boosts that are completely optional and are quite helpful, instead of hindering your progress.

But at the same time, there are a couple of games that mostly gets it wrong, mostly corean made games, like Combat Arms, wich has a quite similar system as you describe it in AVA (I can't play it due to region restriction, but it's no biggie).

 

[PleaseDeleteMe]

Mostly, the F2P microtransactions of the games I've played, are mostly for vanity or for buying quest packs, mostly for Lotro & DDO and amazingly, TF2 is free as in free, free, except if you want some extra hats, wich are 100% vanity items. I like boost packs when they make sense and when they don't interfere with game balancing, especially if the game is PVP centered.

Even Guild Wars has vanity items in the form of the quite recent Mercenaries Pack, where you can "hire" the same characters you've created in your account and they can help you, instead of using the default heroes. This is almost purely cosmetic, as you can get a lot of different heroes throughout the game (assuming you have all the expansions) and customize them with whatever skill and weapon you want, even it's secondary class, making the Mercenary Pack quite unnecessary and, as I said, almost purely cosmetic.

In Lotro and DDO, the boost packs are mainly a little XP boost and a couple of health and mana boosts that are completely optional and are quite helpful, instead of hindering your progress.

But at the same time, there are a couple of games that mostly gets it wrong, mostly corean made games, like Combat Arms, wich has a quite similar system as you describe it in AVA (I can't play it due to region restriction, but it's no biggie).

I've played combat arms and wanted to use that as a reference but thought that AVA would be more well known given the steam thing, and you my friend, are right.