Alphas (even with just the current scanning skills and frigates) are already a big part of exploration. I don’t think they need any advancement in those areas… they can already access nearly everything in that part of the game.
It’s a damn good option for people getting into the game to RP, and offer some extremely viable alternatives to t2 ships in their weight class. You might not be able to fly an interceptor and enjoy bubble immunity, but you can fly a dramiel to a similar effect, and be quite a bit deadlier if you’re invested in being a pirate as an alpha clone. It’s the ability for alphas to embrace the game more wholly; this is a good balance for them to reach, since it’s genuine f2p for the game.
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Or Gamma clone, since calling people Betas could go pretty badly if you’re not careful. 
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I still hold the opinion that unlocking battleships is not necessary, and instead of unlocking t2 weapons i would have prefered to see t2 ammo being allowed in any meta > 0 turret or launcher.
Because every man and his dog would have a free mining alt, and probably hundreds of accounts would un sub an alt.
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ISK is not a currency, it is a fictional currency. ISK does not have an exchange rate to any real world currency, because that would be a violation of the EULA. (You can calculate a currency to ISK exchange rate, but not the other way around. You can also calculate a currency to loaf of bread exchange rate, but that doesn’t make bread a “currency”.) Being fictional isn’t helping your case.
There are not “2 types of accounts” there are two clone states, no one has argued that. But clone state does not equal customer status.
PLEXed Omegas are not paying customers, they are the product CCP is selling to paying customers who buy PLEX to “sell” in-game. Alphas are also not paying customers, they are potential customers and content CCP is selling to the paying customers of the game.
The rest about the SP, I have no idea what it has to do which our conversation regarding “payment” which is the transfer of real world currency.
The original point (that you interjected into) is that anyone who wants to can unlock and access 100% of Eve without spending any bit of real world currency.
I don’t know why the small Tech2 stuff should be available with an alpha status.
There’s already lot to do with the Tech1 ranked battleship. All skills unlocked to the battleship are going to improve all fregateers by a great lenght.
Since month I don’t understand the meaning of all this injectory stuff since we can’t steal them.
Sure, but someone is paying for that access, even if it isn’t you 
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No Sentry Drone skills? Awe… 
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The people asking for more, mining barges, T2 ammo, etc are basically asking that the game become fully free to play, at least to their playstyle.
I get it. I would love to play a game this nice for free, too.
Except . . . I have met devs. Had beers with them. Argued and talked and commiserated with them. They do deserve to make a living and Eve is their JOBS. But for some of them it is a lot more, look at all the volunteer time they put into things like the AT. The fun that is had with various meetups.
I like what they do, I am a customer and an unabashed fanboy. If you could prove to me that these nice folks would still keep their jobs, still be able to keep making and doing what they do after the conversion to a business model that does not look like it has a great income stream? maybe.
But there is supposed to be a difference between alpha and omega, there is supposed to be a reason to subscribe and pay money for value received. If you have decided that you are not getting said value then you unsub. simple as that. But to ask them to give you, for free, that which costs time and effort to make and is their livelihood? Take a breath, think about that. Turn it around. Ask yourself that, if a fast food burger joint handed out some free fires as part of a promotion would you demand all the other ‘food’ was free as well? After all, you been eating their stuff since 2003. They OWE you. /s
This week CCP laid off people I know. People I like.
Don’t encourage them to continue down this particular road when we already see this sort of thing happening. How many devs do you think it will take to make vanity items, loot boxes only openable by special space keys you can buy in groups of 1, 5 or 10? How long do you think the game will last?
Oh it will be free, until it isn’t there at all.
none of it
m
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Yes, but someone is also paying for Alpha access. So if PLEXed Omega is not f2p, neither is Alpha, because “someone is paying for it” in both cases. Of course it is nonsense to say Alpha isn’t f2p, and so the same must hold true for PLEXed Omega, since they are both the same “someone else is paying for it”.
Edit: removed the pyramid quoting, as it’s against forum rules - ISD Sakimura
No… I think you are missing it.
Plex are created when someone pays real world money. In the US, 500 PLEX (the cost to sub) cost 20 US dollars. Someone spends 20 dollars to create 500 Plex… so when someone uses Plex to sub their account… they’re effectively using up that product that cost 20 dollars.
So when you use PLEX to go Omega… you are effectively spending a 20 dollar bill. Now you may have gotten that 20 dollars by trading 1.5billion isk for it… but it’s still something that someone spent 20 dollars on to get in the game. They gave you 20 dollars for your isk… and you’re spending that 20 dollars on game time.
Alpha access is free. No real world currency needs to be spent by anyone to play an account as an alpha. YOu can log in and play without any real world money going to CCP. But as soon as you spend PLEX…you’re spending something that has a real world exchange rate (even if it only works in one direction). 500 Plex = 20 dollars.
Edit: removed the pyramid quoting, as it’s against forum rules - ISD Sakimura
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Hahahahahahaha. So it’s a currency then?
Ok good, cheers…
Good talk 
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“Welcome to Caracal Vexor Online”
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No… I think you are missing it.
We don’t live in a world where things run on hopes and dreams, no one can play any part of Eve without spending real world currency. I admit that the “transaction” is not as simple as it is for PLEXing, but that doesn’t make it any less real.
When CCP turns on their servers (writes code, and everything else required to make the game happen) they pay real world money to let everyone play the game. The only way they can pay those bills is by customers paying them real world money, this happens only in the selling of PLEX, subs, or account mods (MTC, transfer, etc.). This is the only buying and selling that happens, this is the only paying or not paying. Everything that happens in-game is not paying, in-game transactions don’t pay the devs or the power bills. If all the in-game PLEX disappeared at the next downtime, it wouldn’t affect CCP’s financial statements at all. (Except for people quitting the game.)
What the in-game transactions do do, is they create a demand for people to buy PLEX. They create content for the paying customers. Since I don’t assume that CCP is being nice and giving away money, I have to assume that Alpha is also contributing to CCP’s bottom line, and their ability to pay their devs and keep the servers running, therefore someone is paying for Alpha accounts.
The fact that something has a price/value doesn’t make it currency. Your whole thing about it’s like spending $20 doesn’t hold logically. If you go to a nice restaurant and you buy food worth $20, and then eat it, you haven’t eaten $20, you have eaten food. Even if you don’t eat it, it still cost you $20. (Almost) Everything in the world has a dollar value that doesn’t make it all currency, and it doesn’t make it “paying” when you use it.
I understand that Eve has a very complex and realistic in-game economy, so it’s understandable that people are confused by what is real and what is fictional. But Eve is a game, and if the game were to go off-line for good everything in it would disappear, but CCP would still have real world assets and liabilities. ISK and PLEX are not assets nor liabilities, if we looked at CCP’s balance sheet, they wouldn’t show up at all! They are fictional in-game entities that don’t pay any bills.
Once again, PLEXed Omegas are not paying customers, they are the product CCP is selling to paying customers who buy PLEX for in-game ISK. I don’t doubt that there is a $20 transaction going on when one PLEXes an account, but the PLEXer is not the buyer, nor the paying customer.
If you have 500 PLEX in your PLEX Vault and your account gets banned, CCP doesn’t owe you $20, because it isn’t currency, because it doesn’t have any real world value.
sounds about right, i havnt played in a few yrs now but recently downloaded it for the free play which was always my problem, im broke… just to be absolutely disappointed by where this game has gone, i started playing in late 2010, and whats happened to this game is just wreckless behavior
People who PLEX their account are paying customers. People who only ever play as Alpha are not paying customers, rather they are potential paying customers.
Yup, that’ll be the bit where the buyer pays for the account privileges / privilege time they would like to purchase. They can either use real world cash (currency) to buy the PLEX directly, or in game cash (currency) to pay some other guy to buy a PLEX directly.
ISK categorically is a currency in every definition of the word, and i’m not talking about Kroner. For something to be considered currency it just has to be the contextually given and understood system of payment exchange for the specific area or situation. Dollars are currency only where they are accepted, and to an isolated tribe in the Amazon who trade in nuts and honey dollars are garbage not a currency.
No, you are wrong in both cases. PLEXed Omegas have not paid anything by PLEXing, they may have paid otherwise, but not in the PLEXing to become Omega. Alphas may or may not be paying customers, their clone status says nothing about what they have or haven’t paid. An Alpha could have bought PLEX to sell for ISK or to buy a SKIN from the NES, in either case they are a paying customer and more so than someone who only spent in-game ISK to trade in-game for PLEX to PLEX their account.
Clone state does not equate to if a player is a paying customer or not. Giving real world money to CCP makes you a “paying customer”. That can happen for either clone state. Alphas and Omegas can both be paying customers (withing the last 30 days) and both Alphas and Omegas can not be paying customers.
Yes, but only the same way that the Amarr Empire is a government or CO2 is/was a corporation. They are all fictional!
If paying ISK to buy PLEX (which unlocks skills) makes a player p2p, then paying ISK to buy a skill book (which unlocks skills) also makes a player p2p. If we accept the argument that ISK is currency, and paying with ISK makes you p2p then everyone is p2p. (Unless they only play with free rookie ships.)
If you guys still had a Community team they could have told Team Size Matters we are capsuleers, not clone people.