Honestly BDO looks cool. The only thing stopping me from playing it is that it feels like there's no reason for me to get stronger as someone who likes pve content.
As basically a PvE player, yes I have been pked in game, but having played since march 16 2016, the number of those deaths can be counted on just fingers. Add deaths via guild declarations and toes come into the count. Most deaths have been in siege/guild wars and Arenas. (and going into areas too early.) With the New Region coming some day to BDO, that is basically questing and instanced Bosses. You need to do the quests to get crystals that aid in defeating the Bosses, which give other crystals you will need. Below Level 50, AKA up to Level 49 100%, you cannot be attacked by fellow players because you have to be L50. All bar one town/city is a PvP-free zone. The time to start the game is when a new Season Starts. Currently the Spring season has less than 3 weeks to go. It would be possible to level a new character via the Season Server and get started (if interested) in some lifeskilling even in that time what with combat Exp boost, skills boost and even lifeskill boosts. Plus as a new player, all the freebies Choice mentions. Oh and 3 of 4 Season servers are NON-PvP. At end of season, you should be able to go almost anywhere in the 'old world'/regions and do most life skills wherever you wish. Who knows, you may even get to equal Choice's GS LOL.
Smart man. There isn't any reason to get stronger besides open world pvp which is fighting the same players over and over. Every year or so u'll get a new meta circle to grind for silver. Thats it basically. Even the new content they keep releasing is targetted at mid geared players as well. Example new expansion's boss fights takes only 20% of your gear power into account. Also BDO may not be p2w but its kinda disgusting how much one can progress even selling costumes or buying them to cron tet distos for example. (Again, if you have money to spend and some view time as money)
I'm a similar type of player, never really done any PVP even though I've been playing for 2 years. BDO is definitely the type of game where you have to set your own goals. For me, that has been to increase my gear enough so that I can try out the most endgame monster zones. A lot of the coolest areas in the game are extremely deadly, but also drop rare loot and exclusive items that can make your character even stronger. But for a long while in the early days, I just wanted to make money just so I could have more fun while lifeskilling, and the game was plenty of fun just doing that. Some people just want to make enough money so they can buy new costumes from other players on the marketplace... and still others just want to decorate their Manor or other player homes to be as cool as possible. The main thing I will say, is that the action combat in this game is so fun that it's a blast just to try a new character out and practice combos - whether that means doing it against monsters, other players, or even training dummies is up to you.
The magnus change blew me away. I haven't played in a few years, but I remember rarely using most storage cuz it required me traveling to all these different towns and it was really annoying to keep track off. The magnus stuff was a complete surprise to me.
Bout the same here, played since release, EU server no 1 house owner for free xd, currently close to 300ap, spent 0 eur on game. It was always f2p you just had to wait it out! :D
I played BDO on and off since October 2016(now I’ve been playing more actively since 2021) and the amount of changes this game has gone through is crazy. I remember when silver had weight and pirate island was the meta grind spot and I literally had to max out my weight on warrior because of how annoying it used to be stopping every 30mins to empty out your inventory(using 3-4 fishing boats btw lol). So over they years a lot of items got their weight cut in half basically making it less mandatory to max out inventory weight(unless you want to of course). Another thing that was mandatory was getting t4 pets ASAP which I probably spent 200 bucks on. Today just by questing and logging in during events you get so many pets i had to start selling some cuz they were taking up so much space in my pearl inventory lol. I think the greatest thing that ever happen to this game is seasonal content which takes literally less than a week of play time to get full pen tuvala which is around 560gs? Even at this gear score you can make really good silver if you use agris at places like centaurs, hystria and aakman. The infinite hp pot grindspots also make decent silver now and before you know it, you’re 281 kutum and can hop into entry lvl endgame(orc camp or sycraia abyssal zone). In terms of swapping yes you can buy costumes but to get a large amount of costumes(yes costume purchases have a weekly limit) you have to raise your family fame which can take awhile. Even if you take said costumes to enhance yourself there’s no “guarantee” that you will get lucky even if you get more attempts than the other guy. I think if you have a lot of time to play then you’ll definitely get geared up to end game in a decent amount of time vs the people who play only an hr a day . The only thing I believe is mandatory now is the campsite because without it grinding becomes annoying lol. I’m on the fence with the fairy because you can reset your fairy and start over on a new one for the skills you need using silver(might cost a few billion silver if you’re lucky) but you can also swipe for the orbs to reroll skills. So from vet standpoint of BDO the game right now is more ftp friendly than it has ever been. Also the best bang for your buck isn’t costumes, its artisan memories.
I 100% agree I just wish they would do something with the 3 buffs if you want all of them make them all on one or sale them as a 30day and a cheaper price as they do have them as that’s what streamer get
@@cbates2410 p2w and now you need to become a streamer to get extra benefits, hahahaha! Yea bud, no it is not pay to win at all! *continues dying, laughing*
getting t5+4 t4 pets through events takes time. relying on maids to have a good amount takes time (unless its different for new accounts?). fairy rerolling has no safety net. playing without tent (you mention it in the video) is a horrible experience. there are many more purchases that affect the gameplay experience. and your 700 gs journey isnt relevant to a new players, or even the average players, journey in the game which is what will determine the general perspective of how p2w it is. is it much better than before? yes. but that doesnt exclude it being p2w; theres some cognitive dissonance going on here. an item not being locked exclusively behind a paywall doesnt exclude it from being p2w. "but if they do p2w, then that benefits you as a f2p player". i mean youre straight up admitting it here. and youre not taking into account all the silver that is facilitated by the myriad of items you can buy with pearl items other than straight up buying costumes. someone who beats you or has progressed further than you couldve swiped more and gotten advantages that way without necessarily doing it through costumes, even though they are probably the most direct method. again, the pearl shop is brimming with items that lead to more silver, and in general, a better gameplay experience. and lets not start talking about all the convenience/QoL locked behind paywalls for the sake of the video title. its easier for you to go through a 700 gs journey knowing everything beforehand (and only focusing on one goal) than it is for a new player to experience the game with a lot of the content incentivizing paying for a better experience. like the game having 3 different subscriptions.
People need to watch this, and not those dudes who have never played the game longer than a week but call it P2W. Nobody can give better information than Choice.
@@nickboyd6716 So you telling me what see with my own eyes is a lie? I watch people in discord spend thousands on outfits for crons just to make pen accessories
@@nickboyd6716 I wish it was a lie but the game is p2w dogg, sure BDO decrease the p2w to make it more new player friendly but other than that even the blind can see this is p2w
im old as you ! i completely agree ! as a veteran player i never needed to pay to progress or overcome a hard wall in the game ! 3 things that is the focus in this bdo :Your skill(pvp), grinding(pve) and exploring(energy). the bdo world so beautiful ! nowadays there are vendors on every grind spot, to repair and buy potions, you dont even need to buy campsite or whatever.i wish you done it without buying 60$ i think it's not needed on ur journey to 700gs. great video Choice ! been with you in node wars and it was fun in EU playing with you ! keep pushing on the ranks !
Thank you for putting in the time and effort to talk about this ancient issue. I have met a lot of friends that refused to invest time in BDO or even try it out due to it's longstanding reputation of being p2w. I completely agree with all the points you presented (and I loved the example of total pearl item sales on pearl trackers!) and I also do agree that it used to be p2w a long, long time ago. It will take time to turn things around but I'm sure it will happen given recent track records. Thanks PA & Choice :)
almost 99.99% game out there, new player simply cannot kill veteran player. At least in BDO they have catch up mechanic to close the gap between new and veteran player. Remember back then, everyone need to put PO on boss gear or simply hope for RNG boss box. Now is easy
Well even when I tried it years ago when it was pay to win, there’d always be a guy who argued $300 was just a convenience fee and it wasn’t p2w. I started playing again the other day as a seasonal character and it was information overload. But… I noticed some of the changes mentioned in the video and like what I see. Kind of wish that you didn’t have to do quests for them because, again, it’s information overload when you’ve come back after years.
I am a returning player. I have been playing since Early Release through the preorder packages. On my account, there are the neccessary items such as tent, a good fairy, some maids, some storage, costumes, pets, horse flutes. I havent had to spend a single buck so far in a month and ive had every buff you could have. This wouldve NOT been possible 3 years ago when i had quit. The game has improved a ton.
He's spitting fake news like people arn't going to fk around and find out 😂 I have 10k+ hours and I've spent lots of money on the game. It's pay to win end of story. The only reason people say it isn't P2W is their trying to bring new people into the dying game they have invested so heavily into.
@@locky7009nah. it's 100% not p2w no question. I've been playing for 5 months total now, since Drakanias release. I spent $150 cause I felt like it cause I knew I'll be playing the game for a long time. And for new players they double the number of pearls you get, so that $150 was $300 worth of pearls ($300 worth w/ no sale is 30,000 pearls). The deal they give newer players to double the number of pearls you get comes up very very often and the 3 extra times within these 5 months I've had the opportunity to get double pearls I didn't need to cause I had waaaaay more than enough pearls w/ how much I already $$ dropped. • I have a tier 5 5% loot speed pet, one tier 4 pet and three tier 3 pets, all given by the game for free within the first 4 months. • I have 17 total "maids", (each maid has a 20minute cooldown that allows you to use storage (bank)/market remotely) all given by the game for free within these 5 months • I have 9 Premium and 5 Classic Outfit Boxes in my storage right now left from the 25+ boxes I had, all given for free within the first 4 months • My main character has max inventory slots and 2 more characters having a lot of extra inventory slots unlocked on top of me having 28 Inventory Slot Unlock items in my storage right now, all free given by the game. • I have a solid t8 horse. ^^^ ALL FREE ^^^ • I now recently rolled a perfect, maxed out fairy. The game gave me, for free, 27 of the items needed to roll skills for the fairy. I could have waited longer for the game to continue giving me the items for free. Instead, I took advantage of the limited time 40% sale they had on the item, used a 30$ coupon they gave me (so 70% discount total), and spent 2500 pearls to roll my fairy early. • I have 2000LT weight on my main, which is a bit more than enough.. • I have the tent • I have 2 celestial horns ^^^ And these are **primarily** convenience **For PVP** BDO IS NOT p2w (I don't know about life skilling cause I don't give a fuck about it) Now, after these 5 months I'm down to 1200 pearls, which is $12 worth and it's cause I'm dumb and impatient as fk. I wasted 4700 pearls early on on costumes.. like an idiot because no exaggeration, I was given 15+ premium costumes and 10+ classic costumes by the game since then. I also wasted embarrassingly, about 6500 pearls in name change coupons because once again I'm impatient, I don't want to think of a name before I create a character, so eventually when a name comes to me that I want I drop pearls on a name change. I just started pvping this past month. There's low capped gear for Node War, Siege but I mainly was attracted to the game because of Arena of Solare, which has equalized gear that's given to you, which means you don't ever have to grind to participate. And I don't think choice mentioned this in the video but, if you're a newer player or even been playing for 6 years, if you make a seasonal character you can go on the seasonal character pvp server to play open world pvp w/ a ridiculously easy to achieve gear cap. On top of that you can create a Trial Character that's given max character level and skills w/ good gear at any time, going into the Battle Arena at any time, and PVP w/ the people who rat in there 24/7.
There would be so much to say about this video , but basicly if the point you are making is : " Is the game less P2W than before" , then yes it is , but as long as you can buy Cron , artisan memory , and some other convinience item such as weight that will give you a slight advantage over other playeurs then , the game remains a P2Fast at the very least. Then we could talk about how much "Fast" it is to see if it's a win. ( This is the part where people disagree ). But saying there's no P2W when the game has a predatory monnetisation , that forces your hand to buy , with shity "Daily Specials" , constant Pop-up to buy pearls item ,Fairy system (xD), indroducing more and more OP pearl shop item over time such as "Artic fox" , "Hedgog" , celestial Horn ( Like flute wasnt convenient enought ) . I would have liked a more nuanced opinion , cause Yes the game has gone better , But NO monetisation is still heavily problematic for most player (Especialy in EU ).
Watch some "ftp" vids. Make sure you take advantage of the free Season server path. Only make 1 pen season earring and ring as u get 1 each just for reaching lvl 60 on your season char. Enjoy!
play it small cups, dont rush it, be casual, you will be doing the same thing over and over again so better to take small breaks so you dont get burnt like i did
Can completely agree. This game is night and day compared to the old kakao days. PA really did a good job here while balancing the cash shop. The silver drip feed to credit card whales is also a good change, both for the economy and to help protect people with gambling issues/unhealthy buying habits.
if your gambling your progress then you are not very smart, most people would by their geard straight up if gambling scared them thhat much, and even then those that do gamble are not normally doing no their main gear but on a secondary piece
I want to say that they've also started to improve other regions as well aside from NA and EU, adding the mileage value pack (1 day pack for daily login points) to the JP shop just shows how they're committing to lowering the pressure of having to pay money in their game. So far so good!
Thanks bro. Just coming back to the game and 280 ap kutum feels like nothing, but this is cool. Gives me something to work towards and get the rust off in prep for new expansion.. Last time i played was after my guild died ( man up l) rip, the good ol days. Thanks bro.
If you watch his recent series 0-700gs there is a lot of amazing info on there, good way to get direction and ideas for how to progress your account without killing yourself.
Thank you. You completely convinced me to give the game another try. These are the things I was hoping to hear when I check up on the state of the game annually.
The game is better than it was but it can still be expensive the "choice" is still there to spend over 60 a month on value pack/Kama bless/old moon book + Tent + anything else you would want not to mention all of the "illegal" options that some streamers like to pretend they never did such as piloting etc. I think blaming Kakao is a bit unfair PA still does some shady tactics in the pearl shop but they do gotta make some money to keep the game going so i agree they have implemented some sort of f2p method for most of the issues people had with the game years ago but you still have to invest a lot into the game whether it is time or money.
ty for this very informative video, i play the game since relaese and agree with you 100%, one thing i would like is if the horse flute would work for all characters, but its not a big problem 🙂
• Added weight/inventory capacity so you need to do less offload trips, decreasing your downtime, increasing gains • Maids that let you open the warehouse and the market remotely, save you time • A tent to buy potions from anywhere in the world. It also lets you repair your gear. This doesn't only save you time, this also enables you to be more reckless when upgrading. Someone without a tent may not be able to grind too well with a 20 durability weapon while someone with the tent doesn't care because he repairs in the spot with three clicks. The tent also allows you to get villa buffs without going to the villas, which are in a very specific part of the map and if you're on the other side that might be a 25 minute round trip just to get a buff. • Pets that loot for you. You can get some for free, but ultimately you want a good list of T4 pets. This may seem like it's not a big deal but in many spots, your silver per hour is hard limited by your pets, since you kill way more that what they can loot, meaning they're the only thing that matters. • Kamasylve Blessing, which gives you more item drop rate as well as more energy recovery (for life skilling purposes, which translate into MORE silver) • Value pack, which gives you a fucking bonus on the money collected from the auction house. • Artisan memories, which cut down the durability increase cost by a fucking 80%. That durability increase is a key part of enhancing gear and it gets incredibly expensive on boss gear. This lets you pay money to cut it down by a fucking 80%. • Lifeskill outfits. They increase so much the silver you can earn doing lifeskilling that it doesn't even make sense to do those activities without one. They come with a $30 price tag! • You can literally sell items bought on the cash shop for ingame silver. "No but it's not worth it!!" is not a valid point against it, sorry. • You can buy outfits and melt them to get cron stones. Those stones give you free enhance attempts, which are the most frustrating thing in the whole game. Basically prevents you from losing billions altogether. Still p2w
"Someone without a tent may not be able to grind too well with a 20 durability weapon while someone with the tent doesn't care because he repairs in the spot with three clicks." LOL
im thinking about getting into this game again. i played for a bit on console but i wasnt really invested in the story so i stopped playing. is the story worth grinding through or should i just skip through it? (as in play it but not pay attention, skip cutscenes etc)
I'm f2p and have felt the game has made changes for me. There are still a few things behind a paywall, but if the game was completely f2p it would die a death. Appreciate you making a vid on what I've been feeling ,')
This game had so much potential yet so little was done in the first 5 years With no access to pet and weight/inv players were literally gated to play the game properly or catch up with other players gear wise without paying for pearls every single month I am still pissed that they did not address all these issues back when the game was just launched, I cant fathom how popular this game would be and how many ppl already missed out on the one of the greatest action combat design a mmorpg game could ever bring
i sill play but ya still need the val pak karmas blessing and the old moons blessing if you are min maxing.Otherwise market taxes . lifeskilling and grinding will have less returns.
I have the same sentiments and agree with all you have to say brother. These new players don't have any idea how awful they were to the original playerbase. Now they have made their money and getting old. They are giving away "freebies" which the original players would've been very happy even if a fraction was given back then.
@@blackwater7183 In addition to that enhancing was not difficult back then, it was IMPOSSIBLE because theres just no mats on the mp. You have to po hards/sharps for up to 5 times the max price in order to snipe some, and thats back when top players make 50 mil an hour
Thank you for the video, I'm literally trying BDO for the first time tonight. and I remember the P2W of the past which is why i stayed away for a long time, but i'm looking for a new and exciting MMO and thought I should give this a shot. Glad to see that there's not much that's going to hinder me in game due to monetization.
I played Black Desert for 2 months in march and april 2016. Was going at it for over 10 hours a day, forsaking life, until I decided to just suddenly stop because I was incapable of properly managing my time. Now in 2023 I'm set up much better in life and hopefully more mature, so I'm thinking about getting back to it. Hardly remember anything about the game other than that the combat system was amazing. I want to play it, but It scares me. MMOs are dangerous. I'm afraid I will once again lose interest in anything else and move my entire life into the fantasy world. Should I do it? :|
@@sedraniM I agree. There are so many other options out there to entertain, you don't need to play BDO or any other MMO for that matter. Just avoid the risk, you aren't really missing anything by not playing this one particular game, most people don't play any particular game and are perfectly fine.
Thank you for creating this video choice. I started playing BDO 4 years ago, and the P2W really soured this game for me, I loved it, but i was so dissapointed with how much money i would have to spend to enjoy it. After returning at the start of 2023 i can happily say its hard to find negative things about this game anymore, and its easily the best timesink i have ever played. Never spent a single cent, and the only thing i feel like im missing out on is the guardian underwear.
It didn't take me long to realise that if I was going to spend nothing or the bare minimum on the game then I would not realistically be able to compare myself with the top tier players. So I just stopped using that comparison to set my goals. I can enjoy the game now even without all of those pay for convenience items, I just accept that I won't be doing everything as optimally or efficiently or whatever as other players. The game isn't perfect and has some issues with the cash shop but you can definitely enjoy it without spending anything.
Just because you can buy literally everything in the game for a ridiculous amount of IRL money doesnt make the game p2w!!! Well just because you can painstakingly slog your way through the game without spending money doesnt make it NOT p2w either... I hate this argument. The second you can buy any sort of power or progression, you know the entire end game goal of playing an rpg in the first place, the game becomes p2w.
As someone who has started playing in 2020 I have only gotten my final T4 pet last month. And that's with picking a pet from every single season and not even rolling for better talents.
The thing is u dont really need a t4 pets this days xD if u have 4 t3 and 1 t5 u will be good, and the t5 is f2p, btw they gave like 2 or 3 T4 pets from 2020 to 2022 if i remember correctly so u should check the events/daily gifts and codes more often. :)
@@EverLastingTR That's still P2W tho. The item still has to come into existence from spending real money, you just do some currency exchange with the person who bought it first.
I bought the game pre launch back in the day but I have misplaced my log in info even if I did find it would I be able to recover my original character / account? I played it for a bit I just don't recall what I had.
So can I get a bit more info on the PvP side of the game, would you still consider the gear grind of this game still pay to play-ish as I remember the gear in this game being an issue to maintain (as they degrade) and are really painful to enhance.
I would like to say this is a great mindset to have going into BDO as a f2p player or someone with limited spending. Unfortunately because it is less prevalent doesn't mean it doesn't exist. The options are still on the cash shop and until they are completely removed people can still abuse it. For me personally the problem isn't so much about the p2w rather it being more of a predatory cash shop system centralized around gambling which I personally believe just doesn't belong in gaming. I have played BDO since 2018 and love where the game is going in terms of content changes. On the flip side I won't recommend it to friends because of their monetization schemes.
It took YEARS for Pearl Abyss to reach some sort of "decent" paywall threshold, but now comes the time of new promising MMOs threatening the future of BDO, notably its community renewal capacity. Objectively, players will always choose fresh and new IPs rather than the old game with a long-lasting P2W reputation. Whatever the efforts in sensitizing awareness toward "positive" changes in an inglorious game; what PA have done IS done and nobody can erase such scars.
Yes! I said the same thing. Lol! I was there day 1 launch with so many broken promises. Now this vid is telling us it was Kakao's fault and Pearl Abyss the hero saved the it's players from that bad bad company. I've heard publishers don't really get a say much with game changes, it was Pearly Abyss all along behind Kakao.
Is it worth it for me to play if I can only play 8 hours a week and from 2am or 3am to 5am or 6am?? I stopped playing because of that reason, I couldn't do nodes and random fights around the world just don't happen at that time on my server, is there something else worth it for me to do now?
Well, skill exists for sure, but gear is huge. Good luck killing 740gs valks/drakanias/warriors/zerkers ... especially when they are not only high gear but high skill.
Dude. I've been watching you since I saw 1 of your guides and I have been playing since day 1 of NA BDO release. I quit around 2020 during the pandemic and contemplating on returning now. Is it really the good time to be back? What should I do as I still have my old account (transferred), should i just create a new toon or start new with a fresh account? TIA!
There are still issues like Fairy system, getting T4 pets which make a big difference in a lot of spots. Gear tagging is only cheap if you have low gear score, if you have 3 x PEN BS then it is quite expensive. Also having no extra weight is very inconvenient in a lot of the grinding spots where weight of trash is 0.30LT. Having a lot of maids make a huge difference. Having 3 different value packs is a joke as well, all should be in just one. The game has made a huge progress, it is much better then ever for sure. If you know the game well then yes you can have a lot of fun for not much money as you clearly showed with your EU account, but new players do not have this type of knowledge and are likely to make wrong decisions and wrong purchases from cash shop.
He adressed newbies who might give the game a chance, none of them have 3 Blackstars. And even then with that you grind Hexe, thats one saturday grind. 3 packs sounds dumb but actually better split as to pay more for all with things you maybe do not want.
okay, i have a question, what makes fairy system p2w? i'm quite new to the game. i got almost perfect T4 fairy with all V skills except fairy steps IV without spending any money only spent 500m silver to enhance my T3 fairy to T4 fairy. i don't really have any problem with weight at all while grinding i just put my horse close to my grind spot. but i agree 100% with you about 3 different value packs.
Love how you said you said you got a 700 gs but not how. Its still p2w, because you can pay to get stronger faster, making the pvpers still have an edge over you
@@ImChoice Lmao.. u just burned him with facts. BDO gained bad reputation of being p2w over the years... but if u actually played u'll know that it's not what people say it is.. at least for me who played it during these changes and got the game for free XD. Like wat u said p2w is kinda pointless if u want to dominate both pvp/pve... unless if u hab a lot of disposable money like Elon Musk lmao.
What about that item that allow you the repair gear that you fail to upgrade? (can't remember the name).. but that was the reason why i stopped plaiyng few years ago.. is it still in the cash shop? Second question: do you think that ONLY paying the monthly sub (without buying anything else) is a viable option or still hinder you a lot?
I lauhed when you said the game gives you 8 pets for finishing season and quests... you only need 47 more... The game is not pay-to-win, but they are experts at creating problems that can only be solved with items from the cash shop. Let's start with pets: having all pets maxed out is a massive upgrade, especially in lower tier zones where you can quickly kill mobs. Waiting for low level pets to gather items is not fun. There are three types of premium items in the game: the Value Pack, Kamasylvia Tree, and Book of the Old Moon. It's nice to have them all, but they can be expensive. Owning a Fairy is a quality of life change - not having to use potions all the time is very convenient and can also help in PvP. Having enough inventory and weight capacity is important - it's annoying to play the game without at least 100 slots and about 1000-1200LT. If you have starting capacity of 500LT or something, you'll have to run to your horse a couple of times per hour. The Tent is another important item - imagine paying around $50 for the ability to grind on the spot forever. You can buy potions and repair equipment without having to run to town every 40 minutes. Finally, if you're into enchanting, buying slots to save fail stacks is a must-have, otherwise you'll spend all day switching characters. While the game is not strictly pay-to-win, owning these items can significantly improve your gameplay experience. The cash shop doesn't just sell cosmetic items - they also sell must-have items that can make a big difference in the game experience.
You know there's a free tent in game right? You can buy a camp for 10m and use it to buy potions and drop rate buff you can also buy anvil in cm or make it your self so you can repair without going in town. Been playing for 3 years now and I don't have any reason to buy the p2w tent because of this
I started BDO again 3 month ago and did this zero to hero and followed you you where 3 weeks into it when I started and I got 700gs on my valk in two and a half months myself.
7 year veteran here and i completely agree with this ! Old scholl mediah phase bdo was insanely P2W due to weight & energy, and in the last year its just SOOOO much better and completely avoidable
I tried, the early game is just too boring and stale, and I'm not going to invest both time and money in order to eventually have fun. I guess I won't get to the point where the sunk cost fallacy kicks in, shame.
this is true, i am a newer player like i started from the moment sage was announced, saw the game looks cool, the game is cheap even on non sale season, like 5$ , and boy I didn't believe that the PV for the gameplay is totally true and not bullshit like the action is very actiony and with the heckton of class you can choose easily worth 5$ ++ worth of game hours you'll spend just trying each class until you get bored of it also I spend some cash too, but lately with the amount of gifts they give each month if you really don't want to spend but don't want the hassle during grinding you can just login daily for some time and when you accumulate enough freebies you can make at least one char to be your main with probably max inventor, weight is hard but you go get like 1/2 maid ticket each month so it's totally gonna go away as time pass by , unlike other game where if you play as f2p you gonna feel paywalled more and more as you play, in BDO it's totally the reverse
I played back when it first came out and eventually left due to the constant PK'ing. Is it still PVE to 50 then PVP there after or for those that don't enjoy PVP is it worth coming back as the graphics and gameplay were glorious?
I respect your dedication to BDO, how skilled you would be now and can get to 700GS in 55 days without P2W. Let's say the essential items (60 dollars) is a must buy for everyone. People still buy for enhancements(where most people spent their money) and for gears(whales). And about pets...there are free pets.. I don't know if its enough or not Even with all the fixes and updates, how much easier it is to get gears now, You still need skills, knowledge about the game. Not many people have the time, so they just quit the game after excessive grinding or they just spent their money. Just because you can get to where P2W people can get and beat them, it doesn't mean it's not P2W. In fact, that's how the game monetization works, A bit by bit advantage, to progress faster. If you think P2W means Being The Best, you're not wrong but for most if not all, P2W means buying advantage, gears, energy, more fail stacks.. anything. They say PvP is the end game but what do people with the best gears really do? Fight to be the best? Yes but P2W players. Whales... they just start getting Life skill gears, they don't want to grind more :) so they just buy them. So you know why it is still PAY TO WIN? TIME is the reason why people still spent their money. The GAME want us to put too much of our time in the game. Let's be real, after LvL 61, there's not much things to do. Only grinding and repetitive life skilling to progress for better gears. If they have skills and knowledge like you, they could just do it like you but you spent 6 years playing this game right. If there are legit F2P players who can compete in PvP, they must be the best of the best through experience and skills, but just how many F2P players even have the gears to compete?
"If there are legit F2P players who can compete in PvP, they must be the best of the best through experience and skills, but just how many F2P players even have the gears to compete? " All top pvers just played a lot for a long time. Some P2W a bit during big sales but are still 95% F2P grinders, most are 100% F2P. Choice explained it well. There are very very few whales and they are irrelevant. Boosting and botting are a taboo subject but they are much more prevalent than whaling among top PvP guilds.
You didn't talk about the Fairy system but I absolutely agree with everything you said. I've been playing the game since Steam release aswell (early 2017) and it is so much better nowadays.
because its biased. lots of people are leaving bdo because it is p2w. he needs to make people believe the game is not p2w because he makes money off it. you need value pack minimum and fairy system is designed to waste a lot of money, also t4 pets or you wait months to get enough pets from market. you have to realise why he posted this video and the context.
@@RR-fk7xc i agree with some of the things u said but your not waiting months for pets at all, along w free pets they often sell on the market and even more so with events? you can get full t4s within 2 weeks or less
@@RR-fk7xc Your entire argument is untrue. 1) Value packs are not a concern: You receive so much for free (at least three months as a new player) in addition to benefits from the events, etc. If you really want to save money, you may also use loyalty tokens to purchase a 1-day value pack every two weeks. Also, paying $60 for a subscription for six months is nothing. It's actually common: almost all mmos have a more pricey subscription system. By the way, you get 360 hours of play time for 60 dollars if you play for 2 hours every day for 6 months (which is below average). You can barely play 40 hours for an $80 console game. 2) Having a decent fairy is ridiculously simple. If you play pvp, all you really need is miraculous cheer V. You'll have a lot of chances to get it for incredibly cheap by using a T3 fairy to upgrade it to T4 with sweet honey wine and repeating the process until you get miraculous cheer V. The worst-case scenario would likely see you spend 10B, which is nothing. Moreover, you receive numerous Theiah's orbs from all the coupons codes given. 3) Getting T5 and T4 pets is easy as hell: Simply place orders on griffins: I was able to complete 1 order every 48 hours (actually less than that). Griffins have a correct skill and cost 200M (lol, 1/4 hour) (durability reduction resistance). In addition, I quickly received an order for an Arctic Fox (for the same amount), which I upgraded to T5 using all of the free pets that I received.
@@RR-fk7xc wrong. I've been playing the game since Drakanias release (5 months). I have been playing w/o a value pack even though I have 3 months' worth of value pack in my storage that was given by the game. I have a tier5 5% loot speed pet, a tier4 pet, and six tier3 pets given by the game. And I recently rolled a maxed out perfect fairy w/ the 27 free Theiah's Orb the game gave me for free, + 2500 pearls I spent getting a bit more that I didn't need to spend, I could have waited for the game to give me the 15 more Orbs I needed to max out my fairy.
Speaking from experience, the Pearl Abyss era has been much more wallet-friendly in terms of freebies, discounts, and convenience. It's still on the pricey side for monetization in online games imo, but overall happy with the direction.
I want to add that you can play the game for free and never be missing out on the value pack (subscription) buffs. You get lots of free value packs from login rewards and events. And not just that, you get value packs from both the new player and the returning player bonus, which triggers after being away from the game for a month. So if you just dont play the game for a month and then come back, you have get at least 1 valuepack, which lets you sell all your marketplace items without losing out on money even as a free to play player.
I have 1300 hours, most of which where active pvp or gear score farming. Issues I believe this game still has, that I can remember Cron Stones, Max Tier Pets, Tents, FailStack books, costume selling, artisan memories Pay 2 skip IS pay 2 win when you're endgame is pvp. Almost got my hopes up on coming back to this game, but instead you sound exactly like I did in 2018 shilling this game to my friends
Are grind spots still hard to come by in SEA without running into nolifers? I was thinking of coming back but the one thing that turned me off so hard is you can't really play the game if you're getting bullied out of your spot, and even the lesser spots are all taken in SEA.
Always will be. Gotta love fake news like this video. Wish false information like this got policed and taken down for being untrue. Everyone knows this game is P2W af.
So how does it feel playing without this value pack? Say id be willing to spend 60$ for once, but not 10-15$ afterwards every month.. is it still enjoyable without this value pack?
The player who can afford to leave his PC running 24/7 365 days makes this game P2W. But then again you dont win anything only Pearl Abyss wins. PVP - dead, Dungeons - dead, Content - dead. Literally the only thing you do here is grind in a circle on the best spot fighting the same mobs every single day for months and chopping trees or mining rocks for hours. The best feature of this game is the AFK fishing mechanic where it allows you to minimize the game so you could actually play something fun for once.
The issue I have as a brand new player is the fairy. Not having auto pots is such a huge disadvantage. I think a lot of BDOs monetization is pretty scummy though.
For the fairy is just grind/gather, and get a lot of Laila's Petal, when u got a lot go exchange then, once u have a t3 u can upgrade it to t4, it cost silver, like 600-1b depending on honey price, but if u just want the auto potion that should be easy, the problems start if u want a perfect fairy, with 5 usefull skills and max level xD thats p2w or a long way or just luck, it took me 4 years of playing have a perfect fairy without pay for it xDD. so yeah gl with that, but the autopotion is the only important thing and u will get it eventually and "easy".
As the other guy said, to get the T5 Auto pot you just have to keep getting a new fairy until it learns it on the first skill. I just turned in extra petals I had last night and I got 26 Brilliant (t3) fairies, all of those could be leveled to attempt for the skill and then upgraded to a Radiant fairy with sweet honey wine off the market
As a returning player please allow me to answer your title as a question. YES, BDO is 100% P2W! I play NW, LA, L2 and countless other MMOS; FPS and many other styles. BDO is the worst p2w game; im disgusted. I love playing but there are pay walks that just fucking destroy the complete enjoyment you may get from this game. A quick and easy answer WEIGHT! Bro I need 2-3k weight, you need to spent 100$+ just for this if you want to have such an essential and necessary game feature which is (again) ESSENTIAL for grinders. And they say oh you can do other stuff to get around it but that’s bullshit, cuz the things that you have to do to get around these pay walls are so tedious and time consuming and horrible as a game experience to do is just not worth it. And this is one example from hundreds. Shame, thinking to leave now again cuz I am not willing to pay for weight and I can’t play the game because of it…
What exactly do you need 3k weight for? I'm a returning player who's got 1k+ weight for free & through loyalty points. I've not felt the need to buy weight since like 2017 playing Musa and juggling pots.
I've been playing BDO since around late 2018, so roughly 4 years or so (got it when it was free for a week when the other company owned it). I don't spend money on value packs or anything, but I'll occasionally spend money for new underpants for a character since the base ones are hideous/don't work with the outfits. I am a hyper casual, playing/grinding mobs for 1hr a day, maybe spending 30min or so decorating my home and stuff. Occasionally I'll do some main quests I need to do. I'm at about 600+ gear score, and most of that progress was made within the last 1-2 years. At the beginning, it seemed kind of grindy but fun enough. Progression was slow af and I just upgraded when I could. In recent years, I have made a huge jump from 240 to 280 ap. The changes to mob zones giving more silver was massive imo. The jetina quest for the pen accessorie was massive too, and I managed to upgrade my tet jordun blackstar to pen on christmas (I was so happy). I'm pretty happy with my progression rn and I'm currently working towards that guaranteed garmoth heart quest, just need those scales and those turos hearts and I'm set. Also, the amount of free pearl shop items I've gotten is unreal, I literally have a storage dedicated to just pearl shop items that were handed out through dailies. Those also really help.
I'm glad to hear its no longer p2w, ive played it a while when it was still new and got really turned off on it. Even though it was the most beautiful and feature rich mmo in my opinion. I came here because im watching reviews as im downloading the game right now but im stikll really apprehensive and have my expectations set low because of it. I'll just hop on when the dl is done and experience it for myself.
Dont be to disappointed there are still a lot of p2w systems in place that havent been touched or made worse passivly over the years, especially if you are an endgame pvp player there are system where you will be tempted to spend just to save 24 hours of your time. But for the most part the p2w factor has been reduced but not fully eliminated. You still can and will spend a fortune if you want to make progress quickly.
so i do agree with you mostly, but i was looking in the pearlshop just yesturday, and the event stuff on sale is just outrageous. you can literally buy 300 artisans for 60 dollars. that is the value of about 4.5bil silver. pen weapons are so painfully cheap at less than 6bil, you can also buy the outfit bundles for about 130 dollars, which would give enough silver to outright buy a pen weapon. basically i feel like it is pay2win more now than it used to be in some ways, but for general convienience it has below a TON better making it alot nicer for new players
@@FrexieFrex you would though and you get money from other sources than grinding too. Having to grind 2 more hours because you grind at the wrong spots still doesn't warrant spending money to get the most basic gear
That exstra time u get to play the class ur playing, learning. The most valuable thing there is in BDO right now. Knowledge will carry u 90% of the time in BDO not ur not ur gear, gear takes some of the 10%. If u pay 2 win when u start playing it can only help u to kill Timmys faster, but u aint tuching those with knowledge over how the pvp works.
Yes, the game is so much better than it was on release it is night and day. However, it is still pay to win in some aspects. Like horse breeding, worker promotion, the book of old moon and kamasylvia buffs which are nice to have if you're life skilling on top of a value pack and of course a cooking outfit. Also, a whale could just buy outfits for himself to get crons instead of selling which I assume is the expected behavior of a whale which means there is no 35 outfits limit per week. It is expensive but it exist.
@@TheBoneCharmer93 You're saying that there's still some nice to have things in it, that's why i said that. The problem with westerners like you is that you're almost expecting companies to run on donations, that's why there's almost no new MMO developed in the west in the last decade.
@@zupremo9141 That's the definition of pay to win. NICE TO HAVE THINGS. Dude just stop commenting you are beyond clueless. Value pack is nice to have but you can still play the game without it at a much slower pace. #entitled_westerners. What a moron.
Sorry Choice (big fan of your twitch btw), but there are still some hard P2W mechanics in the game like the fairy and its skills. Some might say - its not that important, but any veteran player will tell you otherwise. Also if you're unlucky with upgrading the few pets that they give you at the start you're basically forced to either handicap yourself with your grinding or buy pearls and fall down the rabbit hole. Also I know you don't do lifeskilling, but in bartering/sailing buying skin/sailor slots/parrots gives you an advantage. I love BDO and I have played it for so many years now, but lets be real - its still p2w in a lot of aspects. They could fix it by giving us the option to buy everything with loyalties or heck - make everything that can be bought with pearls sellable on the market place with silver, but they won't do that.
but the game is way different from before and the P2W elements are mostly explained and matter in PVP only. most of what you type there can be done solo without being bothered. come on now, Fairies and pet are abundant if you play the game regularly, you forgot how PearlAbyss take care of the game, the events (might be lazy sometimes but its w w because of the rewards), the balancing (not the best but its frequent), the free expansion, the new class, QOL and you forgot again that all of those are free.
I've just reached 700gs last month after a year, might not be much but it was a big deal for me and til now i've spent zero on pets & fairies. Fairies don't have to be maxed-out to be useful and lv3 pets work just fine at end game spots like gyfin & hexe. I honestly have no idea why people keep mentioning these 2 since fairy is very easy to work on so does lv3 pet. Does it give you advantages by spending? Yes. Can you play without those spending? Definitely & comfortably. To be honest, there're no F2P games anymore and if you have played a game that long i think it deserves some money from you.
Honestly BDO looks cool. The only thing stopping me from playing it is that it feels like there's no reason for me to get stronger as someone who likes pve content.
As basically a PvE player, yes I have been pked in game, but having played since march 16 2016, the number of those deaths can be counted on just fingers. Add deaths via guild declarations and toes come into the count. Most deaths have been in siege/guild wars and Arenas. (and going into areas too early.)
With the New Region coming some day to BDO, that is basically questing and instanced Bosses. You need to do the quests to get crystals that aid in defeating the Bosses, which give other crystals you will need.
Below Level 50, AKA up to Level 49 100%, you cannot be attacked by fellow players because you have to be L50. All bar one town/city is a PvP-free zone.
The time to start the game is when a new Season Starts. Currently the Spring season has less than 3 weeks to go. It would be possible to level a new character via the Season Server and get started (if interested) in some lifeskilling even in that time what with combat Exp boost, skills boost and even lifeskill boosts. Plus as a new player, all the freebies Choice mentions. Oh and 3 of 4 Season servers are NON-PvP.
At end of season, you should be able to go almost anywhere in the 'old world'/regions and do most life skills wherever you wish.
Who knows, you may even get to equal Choice's GS LOL.
Smart man. There isn't any reason to get stronger besides open world pvp which is fighting the same players over and over. Every year or so u'll get a new meta circle to grind for silver. Thats it basically.
Even the new content they keep releasing is targetted at mid geared players as well. Example new expansion's boss fights takes only 20% of your gear power into account.
Also BDO may not be p2w but its kinda disgusting how much one can progress even selling costumes or buying them to cron tet distos for example. (Again, if you have money to spend and some view time as money)
I'm a similar type of player, never really done any PVP even though I've been playing for 2 years. BDO is definitely the type of game where you have to set your own goals. For me, that has been to increase my gear enough so that I can try out the most endgame monster zones. A lot of the coolest areas in the game are extremely deadly, but also drop rare loot and exclusive items that can make your character even stronger. But for a long while in the early days, I just wanted to make money just so I could have more fun while lifeskilling, and the game was plenty of fun just doing that. Some people just want to make enough money so they can buy new costumes from other players on the marketplace... and still others just want to decorate their Manor or other player homes to be as cool as possible. The main thing I will say, is that the action combat in this game is so fun that it's a blast just to try a new character out and practice combos - whether that means doing it against monsters, other players, or even training dummies is up to you.
That's the point of the game. You look for your goals since de game is a sand box.
they are adding ranked PvE in the newest expansion coming in a month or two
Thank you for taking the time to put this together Choice. Excellent video.
The magnus change blew me away. I haven't played in a few years, but I remember rarely using most storage cuz it required me traveling to all these different towns and it was really annoying to keep track off. The magnus stuff was a complete surprise to me.
Makes storage not even a big deal anymore which is pretty crazy considering it’s BDO. PA deserve all the credit in the world for the improvements
console players right now : it should of been meeeeeeeeeee😭😭😭😭😭😭
As a hardcap player that’s been playing almost since release, I couldn’t agree more.
OMFG ITS REAL PALKER BIG FAN
Bout the same here, played since release, EU server no 1 house owner for free xd, currently close to 300ap, spent 0 eur on game. It was always f2p you just had to wait it out! :D
XP gain and the fun is another topic rn, but I liked it back then, with the basic mechanics more, when 57 to 58 took 30 hours ca
I played BDO on and off since October 2016(now I’ve been playing more actively since 2021) and the amount of changes this game has gone through is crazy. I remember when silver had weight and pirate island was the meta grind spot and I literally had to max out my weight on warrior because of how annoying it used to be stopping every 30mins to empty out your inventory(using 3-4 fishing boats btw lol). So over they years a lot of items got their weight cut in half basically making it less mandatory to max out inventory weight(unless you want to of course). Another thing that was mandatory was getting t4 pets ASAP which I probably spent 200 bucks on. Today just by questing and logging in during events you get so many pets i had to start selling some cuz they were taking up so much space in my pearl inventory lol. I think the greatest thing that ever happen to this game is seasonal content which takes literally less than a week of play time to get full pen tuvala which is around 560gs? Even at this gear score you can make really good silver if you use agris at places like centaurs, hystria and aakman. The infinite hp pot grindspots also make decent silver now and before you know it, you’re 281 kutum and can hop into entry lvl endgame(orc camp or sycraia abyssal zone). In terms of swapping yes you can buy costumes but to get a large amount of costumes(yes costume purchases have a weekly limit) you have to raise your family fame which can take awhile. Even if you take said costumes to enhance yourself there’s no “guarantee” that you will get lucky even if you get more attempts than the other guy. I think if you have a lot of time to play then you’ll definitely get geared up to end game in a decent amount of time vs the people who play only an hr a day . The only thing I believe is mandatory now is the campsite because without it grinding becomes annoying lol. I’m on the fence with the fairy because you can reset your fairy and start over on a new one for the skills you need using silver(might cost a few billion silver if you’re lucky) but you can also swipe for the orbs to reroll skills.
So from vet standpoint of BDO the game right now is more ftp friendly than it has ever been.
Also the best bang for your buck isn’t costumes, its artisan memories.
Damn, those were exactly the days I played too. I'll give it a fair shot again
I remember meta players at sausans😢
I 100% agree I just wish they would do something with the 3 buffs if you want all of them make them all on one or sale them as a 30day and a cheaper price as they do have them as that’s what streamer get
Even Lost Ark has it's all in one benefit (Crystalline Aura), BDO needs a system like that too
Streamers get it for free??
@@Moose0fNorway yea thats there insetive to be a content creater
@@cbates2410 p2w and now you need to become a streamer to get extra benefits, hahahaha!
Yea bud, no it is not pay to win at all! *continues dying, laughing*
@@Desperado070 well it's not extra that what they get paid form the dev we just have to pay for it
getting t5+4 t4 pets through events takes time. relying on maids to have a good amount takes time (unless its different for new accounts?). fairy rerolling has no safety net. playing without tent (you mention it in the video) is a horrible experience. there are many more purchases that affect the gameplay experience. and your 700 gs journey isnt relevant to a new players, or even the average players, journey in the game which is what will determine the general perspective of how p2w it is.
is it much better than before? yes. but that doesnt exclude it being p2w; theres some cognitive dissonance going on here. an item not being locked exclusively behind a paywall doesnt exclude it from being p2w. "but if they do p2w, then that benefits you as a f2p player". i mean youre straight up admitting it here. and youre not taking into account all the silver that is facilitated by the myriad of items you can buy with pearl items other than straight up buying costumes. someone who beats you or has progressed further than you couldve swiped more and gotten advantages that way without necessarily doing it through costumes, even though they are probably the most direct method. again, the pearl shop is brimming with items that lead to more silver, and in general, a better gameplay experience.
and lets not start talking about all the convenience/QoL locked behind paywalls for the sake of the video title. its easier for you to go through a 700 gs journey knowing everything beforehand (and only focusing on one goal) than it is for a new player to experience the game with a lot of the content incentivizing paying for a better experience. like the game having 3 different subscriptions.
ah a thinker...... well in!
People need to watch this, and not those dudes who have never played the game longer than a week but call it P2W. Nobody can give better information than Choice.
You wrong on all levels it's p2w short term or long
@@rocko1017 it’s literally not
@@nickboyd6716 So you telling me what see with my own eyes is a lie? I watch people in discord spend thousands on outfits for crons just to make pen accessories
@@rocko1017 that is just a lie lol. Maybe 1 in every 10000 people actually can afford to do that buddy.
@@nickboyd6716 I wish it was a lie but the game is p2w dogg, sure BDO decrease the p2w to make it more new player friendly but other than that even the blind can see this is p2w
im old as you ! i completely agree ! as a veteran player i never needed to pay to progress or overcome a hard wall in the game ! 3 things that is the focus in this bdo :Your skill(pvp), grinding(pve) and exploring(energy). the bdo world so beautiful !
nowadays there are vendors on every grind spot, to repair and buy potions, you dont even need to buy campsite or whatever.i wish you done it without buying 60$ i think it's not needed on ur journey to 700gs.
great video Choice ! been with you in node wars and it was fun in EU playing with you ! keep pushing on the ranks !
this is funny, how much does the tent cost?
I was going into this totally not expecting to be traumatised by a beardless clip of myself in it HAHAHAHAH this video is fantastic!
Thank you for putting in the time and effort to talk about this ancient issue. I have met a lot of friends that refused to invest time in BDO or even try it out due to it's longstanding reputation of being p2w. I completely agree with all the points you presented (and I loved the example of total pearl item sales on pearl trackers!) and I also do agree that it used to be p2w a long, long time ago.
It will take time to turn things around but I'm sure it will happen given recent track records. Thanks PA & Choice :)
almost 99.99% game out there, new player simply cannot kill veteran player. At least in BDO they have catch up mechanic to close the gap between new and veteran player. Remember back then, everyone need to put PO on boss gear or simply hope for RNG boss box. Now is easy
Tell your friends to watch a review of Neverwinter by Josh Strife Hayes. THAT game defines PtW.
BDO Does not even come close.
Well even when I tried it years ago when it was pay to win, there’d always be a guy who argued $300 was just a convenience fee and it wasn’t p2w.
I started playing again the other day as a seasonal character and it was information overload. But… I noticed some of the changes mentioned in the video and like what I see. Kind of wish that you didn’t have to do quests for them because, again, it’s information overload when you’ve come back after years.
I am a returning player. I have been playing since Early Release through the preorder packages. On my account, there are the neccessary items such as tent, a good fairy, some maids, some storage, costumes, pets, horse flutes.
I havent had to spend a single buck so far in a month and ive had every buff you could have.
This wouldve NOT been possible 3 years ago when i had quit.
The game has improved a ton.
He's spitting fake news like people arn't going to fk around and find out 😂
I have 10k+ hours and I've spent lots of money on the game. It's pay to win end of story.
The only reason people say it isn't P2W is their trying to bring new people into the dying game they have invested so heavily into.
@@locky7009 Someone mad coz bad.
@@cryze0965 And you know what I find really funny? He probably has no idea who the hell Hadum is.... cause HE is Endgame, period
@@locky7009nah. it's 100% not p2w no question. I've been playing for 5 months total now, since Drakanias release. I spent $150 cause I felt like it cause I knew I'll be playing the game for a long time. And for new players they double the number of pearls you get, so that $150 was $300 worth of pearls ($300 worth w/ no sale is 30,000 pearls). The deal they give newer players to double the number of pearls you get comes up very very often and the 3 extra times within these 5 months I've had the opportunity to get double pearls I didn't need to cause I had waaaaay more than enough pearls w/ how much I already $$ dropped.
• I have a tier 5 5% loot speed pet, one tier 4 pet and three tier 3 pets, all given by the game for free within the first 4 months.
• I have 17 total "maids", (each maid has a 20minute cooldown that allows you to use storage (bank)/market remotely) all given by the game for free within these 5 months
• I have 9 Premium and 5 Classic Outfit Boxes in my storage right now left from the 25+ boxes I had, all given for free within the first 4 months
• My main character has max inventory slots and 2 more characters having a lot of extra inventory slots unlocked on top of me having 28 Inventory Slot Unlock items in my storage right now, all free given by the game.
• I have a solid t8 horse.
^^^ ALL FREE ^^^
• I now recently rolled a perfect, maxed out fairy. The game gave me, for free, 27 of the items needed to roll skills for the fairy. I could have waited longer for the game to continue giving me the items for free. Instead, I took advantage of the limited time 40% sale they had on the item, used a 30$ coupon they gave me (so 70% discount total), and spent 2500 pearls to roll my fairy early.
• I have 2000LT weight on my main, which is a bit more than enough..
• I have the tent
• I have 2 celestial horns
^^^ And these are **primarily** convenience
**For PVP** BDO IS NOT p2w
(I don't know about life skilling cause I don't give a fuck about it)
Now, after these 5 months I'm down to 1200 pearls, which is $12 worth and it's cause I'm dumb and impatient as fk. I wasted 4700 pearls early on on costumes.. like an idiot because no exaggeration, I was given 15+ premium costumes and 10+ classic costumes by the game since then. I also wasted embarrassingly, about 6500 pearls in name change coupons because once again I'm impatient, I don't want to think of a name before I create a character, so eventually when a name comes to me that I want I drop pearls on a name change.
I just started pvping this past month. There's low capped gear for Node War, Siege but I mainly was attracted to the game because of Arena of Solare, which has equalized gear that's given to you, which means you don't ever have to grind to participate. And I don't think choice mentioned this in the video but, if you're a newer player or even been playing for 6 years, if you make a seasonal character you can go on the seasonal character pvp server to play open world pvp w/ a ridiculously easy to achieve gear cap. On top of that you can create a Trial Character that's given max character level and skills w/ good gear at any time, going into the Battle Arena at any time, and PVP w/ the people who rat in there 24/7.
There would be so much to say about this video , but basicly if the point you are making is : " Is the game less P2W than before" , then yes it is , but as long as you can buy Cron , artisan memory , and some other convinience item such as weight that will give you a slight advantage over other playeurs then , the game remains a P2Fast at the very least.
Then we could talk about how much "Fast" it is to see if it's a win. ( This is the part where people disagree ).
But saying there's no P2W when the game has a predatory monnetisation , that forces your hand to buy , with shity "Daily Specials" , constant Pop-up to buy pearls item ,Fairy system (xD), indroducing more and more OP pearl shop item over time such as "Artic fox" , "Hedgog" , celestial Horn ( Like flute wasnt convenient enought ) .
I would have liked a more nuanced opinion , cause Yes the game has gone better , But NO monetisation is still heavily problematic for most player (Especialy in EU ).
One celestial Horn was given out for free
Totally agree
@@Fireballun True , but you get my point !
How is celestial horn p2w
Agree, time is equal to money. Instead of spending 5000+ hr to get very hard cap gear, P2W whale can get that hard cap within 1-1500+ hr
I agree. It has improved greatly! Nice job showing this!
Gonna download and give it a whirl now. Thanks Choice for covering the current state of the game otherwise I probably wouldn't have given it a chance.
Watch some "ftp" vids. Make sure you take advantage of the free Season server path. Only make 1 pen season earring and ring as u get 1 each just for reaching lvl 60 on your season char. Enjoy!
play it small cups, dont rush it, be casual, you will be doing the same thing over and over again so better to take small breaks so you dont get burnt like i did
Finally someone made THIS video!
Thank you Choice!
Can completely agree. This game is night and day compared to the old kakao days. PA really did a good job here while balancing the cash shop. The silver drip feed to credit card whales is also a good change, both for the economy and to help protect people with gambling issues/unhealthy buying habits.
"help protect people with gambling issues/unhealthy buying habits" this has to be a joke.
Thank you for all the time and effort you put in to this.
Great video Choice. You are getting good at this
the heavy rng is only exciting because of the bad game design with gambling with your progress in the first place
if your gambling your progress then you are not very smart, most people would by their geard straight up if gambling scared them thhat much, and even then those that do gamble are not normally doing no their main gear but on a secondary piece
your problem if you want to gamble and then lose. you don't have to gamble, period.
I want to say that they've also started to improve other regions as well aside from NA and EU, adding the mileage value pack (1 day pack for daily login points) to the JP shop just shows how they're committing to lowering the pressure of having to pay money in their game. So far so good!
Thanks bro. Just coming back to the game and 280 ap kutum feels like nothing, but this is cool. Gives me something to work towards and get the rust off in prep for new expansion.. Last time i played was after my guild died ( man up l) rip, the good ol days. Thanks bro.
If you watch his recent series 0-700gs there is a lot of amazing info on there, good way to get direction and ideas for how to progress your account without killing yourself.
Thank you for the video. This really clears thing up a lot.
Thank you. You completely convinced me to give the game another try. These are the things I was hoping to hear when I check up on the state of the game annually.
how is the game? 3months after you tried it
The game is better than it was but it can still be expensive the "choice" is still there to spend over 60 a month on value pack/Kama bless/old moon book + Tent + anything else you would want not to mention all of the "illegal" options that some streamers like to pretend they never did such as piloting etc. I think blaming Kakao is a bit unfair PA still does some shady tactics in the pearl shop but they do gotta make some money to keep the game going so i agree they have implemented some sort of f2p method for most of the issues people had with the game years ago but you still have to invest a lot into the game whether it is time or money.
convinient little video for the non wise isnt it ? It is still money centric .The end
Great video. And grats on the 20k subs!
20K subs already congratulation Choice lets go!
ty for this very informative video, i play the game since relaese and agree with you 100%, one thing i would like is if the horse flute would work for all characters, but its not a big problem 🙂
I agree, I would like to add though they have been giving out horse flutes quick frequently from the season pass.
• Added weight/inventory capacity so you need to do less offload trips, decreasing your downtime, increasing gains
• Maids that let you open the warehouse and the market remotely, save you time
• A tent to buy potions from anywhere in the world. It also lets you repair your gear. This doesn't only save you time, this also enables you to be more reckless when upgrading. Someone without a tent may not be able to grind too well with a 20 durability weapon while someone with the tent doesn't care because he repairs in the spot with three clicks. The tent also allows you to get villa buffs without going to the villas, which are in a very specific part of the map and if you're on the other side that might be a 25 minute round trip just to get a buff.
• Pets that loot for you. You can get some for free, but ultimately you want a good list of T4 pets. This may seem like it's not a big deal but in many spots, your silver per hour is hard limited by your pets, since you kill way more that what they can loot, meaning they're the only thing that matters.
• Kamasylve Blessing, which gives you more item drop rate as well as more energy recovery (for life skilling purposes, which translate into MORE silver) • Value pack, which gives you a fucking bonus on the money collected from the auction house.
• Artisan memories, which cut down the durability increase cost by a fucking 80%. That durability increase is a key part of enhancing gear and it gets incredibly expensive on boss gear. This lets you pay money to cut it down by a fucking 80%.
• Lifeskill outfits. They increase so much the silver you can earn doing lifeskilling that it doesn't even make sense to do those activities without one. They come with a $30 price tag!
• You can literally sell items bought on the cash shop for ingame silver. "No but it's not worth it!!" is not a valid point against it, sorry.
• You can buy outfits and melt them to get cron stones. Those stones give you free enhance attempts, which are the most frustrating thing in the whole game. Basically prevents you from losing billions altogether.
Still p2w
"Someone without a tent may not be able to grind too well with a 20 durability weapon while someone with the tent doesn't care because he repairs in the spot with three clicks." LOL
im thinking about getting into this game again. i played for a bit on console but i wasnt really invested in the story so i stopped playing. is the story worth grinding through or should i just skip through it? (as in play it but not pay attention, skip cutscenes etc)
Thanks for the video! I was tired of ppl making reviews on the game playing up to level 30.
I'm f2p and have felt the game has made changes for me. There are still a few things behind a paywall, but if the game was completely f2p it would die a death. Appreciate you making a vid on what I've been feeling ,')
well Warframe is completely f2p and u can pretty much grind everything wihout spending money and still not death
@@nicolasbram165 Interesting. Wonder how they pay their developers and how long that model will last. Ty 4 info
@@EZnevets well they last for like 10years now iirc and still going strong .. a lot of ppl i know when i play is just buy thing to support dev
This game had so much potential yet so little was done in the first 5 years
With no access to pet and weight/inv players were literally gated to play the game properly or catch up with other players gear wise without paying for pearls every single month
I am still pissed that they did not address all these issues back when the game was just launched, I cant fathom how popular this game would be and how many ppl already missed out on the one of the greatest action combat design a mmorpg game could ever bring
i sill play but ya still need the val pak karmas blessing and the old moons blessing if you are min maxing.Otherwise market taxes . lifeskilling and grinding will have less returns.
I have the same sentiments and agree with all you have to say brother. These new players don't have any idea how awful they were to the original playerbase. Now they have made their money and getting old. They are giving away "freebies" which the original players would've been very happy even if a fraction was given back then.
@@blackwater7183 In addition to that enhancing was not difficult back then, it was IMPOSSIBLE because theres just no mats on the mp. You have to po hards/sharps for up to 5 times the max price in order to snipe some, and thats back when top players make 50 mil an hour
Can someone answer this question: What is the skin that the Maegu is wearing? @3:10 and onwards? Thank you.
Thank you for the video, I'm literally trying BDO for the first time tonight. and I remember the P2W of the past which is why i stayed away for a long time, but i'm looking for a new and exciting MMO and thought I should give this a shot. Glad to see that there's not much that's going to hinder me in game due to monetization.
Fire Up Chips!
I played Black Desert for 2 months in march and april 2016. Was going at it for over 10 hours a day, forsaking life, until I decided to just suddenly stop because I was incapable of properly managing my time.
Now in 2023 I'm set up much better in life and hopefully more mature, so I'm thinking about getting back to it. Hardly remember anything about the game other than that the combat system was amazing. I want to play it, but It scares me. MMOs are dangerous. I'm afraid I will once again lose interest in anything else and move my entire life into the fantasy world.
Should I do it? :|
Don't. It's like a a junkie asking, if he should get back to heroin because he is "more mature now".
@@sedraniM
I agree. There are so many other options out there to entertain, you don't need to play BDO or any other MMO for that matter. Just avoid the risk, you aren't really missing anything by not playing this one particular game, most people don't play any particular game and are perfectly fine.
If you can't limit yourself ofcourse don't lol
Thank you for creating this video choice. I started playing BDO 4 years ago, and the P2W really soured this game for me, I loved it, but i was so dissapointed with how much money i would have to spend to enjoy it. After returning at the start of 2023 i can happily say its hard to find negative things about this game anymore, and its easily the best timesink i have ever played. Never spent a single cent, and the only thing i feel like im missing out on is the guardian underwear.
They also occasionally giving out underwear for free, twice a year iirc as i got a few stored up on my calpheon's storage from last year's event
Underwear is free if you're patient.
It didn't take me long to realise that if I was going to spend nothing or the bare minimum on the game then I would not realistically be able to compare myself with the top tier players. So I just stopped using that comparison to set my goals. I can enjoy the game now even without all of those pay for convenience items, I just accept that I won't be doing everything as optimally or efficiently or whatever as other players.
The game isn't perfect and has some issues with the cash shop but you can definitely enjoy it without spending anything.
Hell yeah, thanks for this video! The game has come an enormous way from where it started 7 years ago.
great video Choice!
Just because you can buy literally everything in the game for a ridiculous amount of IRL money doesnt make the game p2w!!!
Well just because you can painstakingly slog your way through the game without spending money doesnt make it NOT p2w either... I hate this argument.
The second you can buy any sort of power or progression, you know the entire end game goal of playing an rpg in the first place, the game becomes p2w.
As someone who has started playing in 2020 I have only gotten my final T4 pet last month. And that's with picking a pet from every single season and not even rolling for better talents.
The thing is u dont really need a t4 pets this days xD if u have 4 t3 and 1 t5 u will be good, and the t5 is f2p, btw they gave like 2 or 3 T4 pets from 2020 to 2022 if i remember correctly so u should check the events/daily gifts and codes more often. :)
you could just order pets from central market. i've never spent money on pets but i have 23 t4 pets for specific lifeskills almost all from cm
@@EverLastingTR That's still P2W tho. The item still has to come into existence from spending real money, you just do some currency exchange with the person who bought it first.
I bought the game pre launch back in the day but I have misplaced my log in info even if I did find it would I be able to recover my original character / account?
I played it for a bit I just don't recall what I had.
So can I get a bit more info on the PvP side of the game, would you still consider the gear grind of this game still pay to play-ish as I remember the gear in this game being an issue to maintain (as they degrade) and are really painful to enhance.
I would like to say this is a great mindset to have going into BDO as a f2p player or someone with limited spending. Unfortunately because it is less prevalent doesn't mean it doesn't exist. The options are still on the cash shop and until they are completely removed people can still abuse it. For me personally the problem isn't so much about the p2w rather it being more of a predatory cash shop system centralized around gambling which I personally believe just doesn't belong in gaming. I have played BDO since 2018 and love where the game is going in terms of content changes. On the flip side I won't recommend it to friends because of their monetization schemes.
game set match ............. agreed
It took YEARS for Pearl Abyss to reach some sort of "decent" paywall threshold, but now comes the time of new promising MMOs threatening the future of BDO, notably its community renewal capacity. Objectively, players will always choose fresh and new IPs rather than the old game with a long-lasting P2W reputation. Whatever the efforts in sensitizing awareness toward "positive" changes in an inglorious game; what PA have done IS done and nobody can erase such scars.
Yes! I said the same thing. Lol! I was there day 1 launch with so many broken promises. Now this vid is telling us it was Kakao's fault and Pearl Abyss the hero saved the it's players from that bad bad company. I've heard publishers don't really get a say much with game changes, it was Pearly Abyss all along behind Kakao.
thank you for this video, I will be checking it out for sure after this
Is it worth it for me to play if I can only play 8 hours a week and from 2am or 3am to 5am or 6am?? I stopped playing because of that reason, I couldn't do nodes and random fights around the world just don't happen at that time on my server, is there something else worth it for me to do now?
It does not matter how many or how few players can spend thousands of dollars per month the game is still pay to win because it is possible to do it.
You the man choice. Another banger. Very true facts laid out. Skill>gear.
Well, skill exists for sure, but gear is huge. Good luck killing 740gs valks/drakanias/warriors/zerkers ... especially when they are not only high gear but high skill.
Dude. I've been watching you since I saw 1 of your guides and I have been playing since day 1 of NA BDO release. I quit around 2020 during the pandemic and contemplating on returning now.
Is it really the good time to be back? What should I do as I still have my old account (transferred), should i just create a new toon or start new with a fresh account? TIA!
what do u buy for the 60 bucks kind of confused on that part?
There are still issues like Fairy system, getting T4 pets which make a big difference in a lot of spots. Gear tagging is only cheap if you have low gear score, if you have 3 x PEN BS then it is quite expensive. Also having no extra weight is very inconvenient in a lot of the grinding spots where weight of trash is 0.30LT. Having a lot of maids make a huge difference. Having 3 different value packs is a joke as well, all should be in just one. The game has made a huge progress, it is much better then ever for sure. If you know the game well then yes you can have a lot of fun for not much money as you clearly showed with your EU account, but new players do not have this type of knowledge and are likely to make wrong decisions and wrong purchases from cash shop.
He adressed newbies who might give the game a chance, none of them have 3 Blackstars. And even then with that you grind Hexe, thats one saturday grind. 3 packs sounds dumb but actually better split as to pay more for all with things you maybe do not want.
okay, i have a question, what makes fairy system p2w? i'm quite new to the game.
i got almost perfect T4 fairy with all V skills except fairy steps IV without spending any money only spent 500m silver to enhance my T3 fairy to T4 fairy.
i don't really have any problem with weight at all while grinding i just put my horse close to my grind spot.
but i agree 100% with you about 3 different value packs.
Agree. They have made good steps forward. But things like the fairy need to be more focused on. In game systems not only the cash shop.
Love how you said you said you got a 700 gs but not how. Its still p2w, because you can pay to get stronger faster, making the pvpers still have an edge over you
Well the how is just by playing the game, I have a 9 part video series on my CZcams channel of you'd like to check it out
@@ImChoice Lmao.. u just burned him with facts. BDO gained bad reputation of being p2w over the years...
but if u actually played u'll know that it's not what people say it is.. at least for me who played it during these changes and got the game for free XD.
Like wat u said p2w is kinda pointless if u want to dominate both pvp/pve... unless if u hab a lot of disposable money like Elon Musk lmao.
What about that item that allow you the repair gear that you fail to upgrade? (can't remember the name).. but that was the reason why i stopped plaiyng few years ago..
is it still in the cash shop?
Second question: do you think that ONLY paying the monthly sub (without buying anything else) is a viable option or still hinder you a lot?
Do you mean artisan memory? If yea, i found it kinda dishonest for him to not mention it since thats a common way for people to p2w
thank you for this !! i ve been waiting for this since u re playing on EU server
I lauhed when you said the game gives you 8 pets for finishing season and quests... you only need 47 more...
The game is not pay-to-win, but they are experts at creating problems that can only be solved with items from the cash shop. Let's start with pets: having all pets maxed out is a massive upgrade, especially in lower tier zones where you can quickly kill mobs. Waiting for low level pets to gather items is not fun. There are three types of premium items in the game: the Value Pack, Kamasylvia Tree, and Book of the Old Moon. It's nice to have them all, but they can be expensive. Owning a Fairy is a quality of life change - not having to use potions all the time is very convenient and can also help in PvP. Having enough inventory and weight capacity is important - it's annoying to play the game without at least 100 slots and about 1000-1200LT. If you have starting capacity of 500LT or something, you'll have to run to your horse a couple of times per hour. The Tent is another important item - imagine paying around $50 for the ability to grind on the spot forever. You can buy potions and repair equipment without having to run to town every 40 minutes. Finally, if you're into enchanting, buying slots to save fail stacks is a must-have, otherwise you'll spend all day switching characters. While the game is not strictly pay-to-win, owning these items can significantly improve your gameplay experience. The cash shop doesn't just sell cosmetic items - they also sell must-have items that can make a big difference in the game experience.
newbies wont know better
@@THANE_MITHRA Newbies are their target demographics. They are experts on implementing the "sunk cost fallacy".
You know there's a free tent in game right? You can buy a camp for 10m and use it to buy potions and drop rate buff you can also buy anvil in cm or make it your self so you can repair without going in town. Been playing for 3 years now and I don't have any reason to buy the p2w tent because of this
sadly..the one thing you forgot to mention..MOUNT TOKENS...they will get you every time - any horse trainer will tell you the struggles of S:Sideways
Buy from breeders. They've either gotten lucky or know how to to use the tokens effectively. A courser costs just over a billion
@@Versailles28 I am a breeder, that's how i know the struggles, i have 2 t10's and i've made 7 t9's
Awesome Video ~ always with the quality content
I really agree with this video, and I think you did a good job with the editing!
I started BDO again 3 month ago and did this zero to hero and followed you you where 3 weeks into it when I started and I got 700gs on my valk in two and a half months myself.
7 year veteran here and i completely agree with this ! Old scholl mediah phase bdo was insanely P2W due to weight & energy, and in the last year its just SOOOO much better and completely avoidable
Had no idea things had changed, thanks for the video, downloading now 👍
Thanks for the videos like always man
I tried, the early game is just too boring and stale, and I'm not going to invest both time and money in order to eventually have fun. I guess I won't get to the point where the sunk cost fallacy kicks in, shame.
this is true, i am a newer player like i started from the moment sage was announced, saw the game looks cool, the game is cheap even on non sale season, like 5$ , and boy I didn't believe that the PV for the gameplay is totally true and not bullshit
like the action is very actiony and with the heckton of class you can choose easily worth 5$ ++ worth of game hours you'll spend just trying each class until you get bored of it
also I spend some cash too, but lately with the amount of gifts they give each month if you really don't want to spend but don't want the hassle during grinding you can just login daily for some time and when you accumulate enough freebies you can make at least one char to be your main with probably max inventor, weight is hard but you go get like 1/2 maid ticket each month so it's totally gonna go away as time pass by , unlike other game where if you play as f2p you gonna feel paywalled more and more as you play, in BDO it's totally the reverse
I played back when it first came out and eventually left due to the constant PK'ing. Is it still PVE to 50 then PVP there after or for those that don't enjoy PVP is it worth coming back as the graphics and gameplay were glorious?
Thank you, great video!
I respect your dedication to BDO, how skilled you would be now and can get to 700GS in 55 days without P2W.
Let's say the essential items (60 dollars) is a must buy for everyone. People still buy for enhancements(where most people spent their money) and for gears(whales). And about pets...there are free pets.. I don't know if its enough or not
Even with all the fixes and updates, how much easier it is to get gears now, You still need skills, knowledge about the game. Not many people have the time, so they just quit the game after excessive grinding or they just spent their money.
Just because you can get to where P2W people can get and beat them, it doesn't mean it's not P2W. In fact, that's how the game monetization works, A bit by bit advantage, to progress faster. If you think P2W means Being The Best, you're not wrong but for most if not all, P2W means buying advantage, gears, energy, more fail stacks.. anything.
They say PvP is the end game but what do people with the best gears really do? Fight to be the best? Yes but P2W players. Whales... they just start getting Life skill gears, they don't want to grind more :) so they just buy them.
So you know why it is still PAY TO WIN? TIME is the reason why people still spent their money. The GAME want us to put too much of our time in the game. Let's be real, after LvL 61, there's not much things to do. Only grinding and repetitive life skilling to progress for better gears. If they have skills and knowledge like you, they could just do it like you but you spent 6 years playing this game right.
If there are legit F2P players who can compete in PvP, they must be the best of the best through experience and skills, but just how many F2P players even have the gears to compete?
"If there are legit F2P players who can compete in PvP, they must be the best of the best through experience and skills, but just how many F2P players even have the gears to compete? "
All top pvers just played a lot for a long time. Some P2W a bit during big sales but are still 95% F2P grinders, most are 100% F2P.
Choice explained it well. There are very very few whales and they are irrelevant.
Boosting and botting are a taboo subject but they are much more prevalent than whaling among top PvP guilds.
You didn't talk about the Fairy system but I absolutely agree with everything you said. I've been playing the game since Steam release aswell (early 2017) and it is so much better nowadays.
because its biased. lots of people are leaving bdo because it is p2w. he needs to make people believe the game is not p2w because he makes money off it. you need value pack minimum and fairy system is designed to waste a lot of money, also t4 pets or you wait months to get enough pets from market. you have to realise why he posted this video and the context.
@@RR-fk7xc i agree with some of the things u said but your not waiting months for pets at all, along w free pets they often sell on the market and even more so with events? you can get full t4s within 2 weeks or less
@@RR-fk7xc
Your entire argument is untrue.
1) Value packs are not a concern:
You receive so much for free (at least three months as a new player) in addition to benefits from the events, etc.
If you really want to save money, you may also use loyalty tokens to purchase a 1-day value pack every two weeks.
Also, paying $60 for a subscription for six months is nothing.
It's actually common: almost all mmos have a more pricey subscription system.
By the way, you get 360 hours of play time for 60 dollars if you play for 2 hours every day for 6 months (which is below average).
You can barely play 40 hours for an $80 console game.
2) Having a decent fairy is ridiculously simple. If you play pvp, all you really need is miraculous cheer V.
You'll have a lot of chances to get it for incredibly cheap by using a T3 fairy to upgrade it to T4 with sweet honey wine and repeating the process until you get miraculous cheer V.
The worst-case scenario would likely see you spend 10B, which is nothing.
Moreover, you receive numerous Theiah's orbs from all the coupons codes given.
3) Getting T5 and T4 pets is easy as hell:
Simply place orders on griffins: I was able to complete 1 order every 48 hours (actually less than that).
Griffins have a correct skill and cost 200M (lol, 1/4 hour) (durability reduction resistance).
In addition, I quickly received an order for an Arctic Fox (for the same amount), which I upgraded to T5 using all of the free pets that I received.
@@RR-fk7xc wrong. I've been playing the game since Drakanias release (5 months). I have been playing w/o a value pack even though I have 3 months' worth of value pack in my storage that was given by the game. I have a tier5 5% loot speed pet, a tier4 pet, and six tier3 pets given by the game. And I recently rolled a maxed out perfect fairy w/ the 27 free Theiah's Orb the game gave me for free, + 2500 pearls I spent getting a bit more that I didn't need to spend, I could have waited for the game to give me the 15 more Orbs I needed to max out my fairy.
@@RR-fk7xc Weird, I've never met anyone in the game across several years that wanted to leave the game because it's p2w.
Banger video, Choice. He did it again
in 2018 bdo had fps affects animations in pvp is that still the case? like with s and faster attack animations
27 maid? where did he get all those?
I'd like to know as well, I'm playing since the end of last season and I have 13 total.
Speaking from experience, the Pearl Abyss era has been much more wallet-friendly in terms of freebies, discounts, and convenience. It's still on the pricey side for monetization in online games imo, but overall happy with the direction.
I want to add that you can play the game for free and never be missing out on the value pack (subscription) buffs. You get lots of free value packs from login rewards and events. And not just that, you get value packs from both the new player and the returning player bonus, which triggers after being away from the game for a month. So if you just dont play the game for a month and then come back, you have get at least 1 valuepack, which lets you sell all your marketplace items without losing out on money even as a free to play player.
the biggest problem rn is, if you fail a 30% chance enchant 20 times in a row and someone else gets it every single time
BDO is more of a time sink than it is Pay 2 Win at this point.
I have 1300 hours, most of which where active pvp or gear score farming.
Issues I believe this game still has, that I can remember
Cron Stones,
Max Tier Pets,
Tents,
FailStack books,
costume selling,
artisan memories
Pay 2 skip IS pay 2 win when you're endgame is pvp.
Almost got my hopes up on coming back to this game, but instead you sound exactly like I did in 2018 shilling this game to my friends
Well said, completely agree! The time you put in > Simply swiping. Effort means more in the long run.
Are grind spots still hard to come by in SEA without running into nolifers? I was thinking of coming back but the one thing that turned me off so hard is you can't really play the game if you're getting bullied out of your spot, and even the lesser spots are all taken in SEA.
Tl;dr: Game is still p2w.
Always will be. Gotta love fake news like this video. Wish false information like this got policed and taken down for being untrue. Everyone knows this game is P2W af.
BDO ISNT PAY TO WIN! Proceeds to tell me how I can spend money to pay to win...
So how does it feel playing without this value pack? Say id be willing to spend 60$ for once, but not 10-15$ afterwards every month.. is it still enjoyable without this value pack?
The player who can afford to leave his PC running 24/7 365 days makes this game P2W. But then again you dont win anything only Pearl Abyss wins. PVP - dead, Dungeons - dead, Content - dead. Literally the only thing you do here is grind in a circle on the best spot fighting the same mobs every single day for months and chopping trees or mining rocks for hours. The best feature of this game is the AFK fishing mechanic where it allows you to minimize the game so you could actually play something fun for once.
The issue I have as a brand new player is the fairy. Not having auto pots is such a huge disadvantage. I think a lot of BDOs monetization is pretty scummy though.
For the fairy is just grind/gather, and get a lot of Laila's Petal, when u got a lot go exchange then, once u have a t3 u can upgrade it to t4, it cost silver, like 600-1b depending on honey price, but if u just want the auto potion that should be easy, the problems start if u want a perfect fairy, with 5 usefull skills and max level xD thats p2w or a long way or just luck, it took me 4 years of playing have a perfect fairy without pay for it xDD. so yeah gl with that, but the autopotion is the only important thing and u will get it eventually and "easy".
As the other guy said, to get the T5 Auto pot you just have to keep getting a new fairy until it learns it on the first skill. I just turned in extra petals I had last night and I got 26 Brilliant (t3) fairies, all of those could be leveled to attempt for the skill and then upgraded to a Radiant fairy with sweet honey wine off the market
It takes 500m to roll a lvl40 T4 fairy, with 15% chance to get rank V autopotion. That's 3.5b average aka 5-7h of centaurs grind with tuvala gear.
As a returning player please allow me to answer your title as a question.
YES, BDO is 100% P2W!
I play NW, LA, L2 and countless other MMOS; FPS and many other styles.
BDO is the worst p2w game; im disgusted. I love playing but there are pay walks that just fucking destroy the complete enjoyment you may get from this game.
A quick and easy answer WEIGHT! Bro I need 2-3k weight, you need to spent 100$+ just for this if you want to have such an essential and necessary game feature which is (again) ESSENTIAL for grinders.
And they say oh you can do other stuff to get around it but that’s bullshit, cuz the things that you have to do to get around these pay walls are so tedious and time consuming and horrible as a game experience to do is just not worth it.
And this is one example from hundreds.
Shame, thinking to leave now again cuz I am not willing to pay for weight and I can’t play the game because of it…
What exactly do you need 3k weight for? I'm a returning player who's got 1k+ weight for free & through loyalty points. I've not felt the need to buy weight since like 2017 playing Musa and juggling pots.
@@ribthiefz8283 simple answer.. "privilege player"
Probably playing without a horse....
For South East Asia region should pay to download this game ?
I've been playing BDO since around late 2018, so roughly 4 years or so (got it when it was free for a week when the other company owned it). I don't spend money on value packs or anything, but I'll occasionally spend money for new underpants for a character since the base ones are hideous/don't work with the outfits. I am a hyper casual, playing/grinding mobs for 1hr a day, maybe spending 30min or so decorating my home and stuff. Occasionally I'll do some main quests I need to do. I'm at about 600+ gear score, and most of that progress was made within the last 1-2 years. At the beginning, it seemed kind of grindy but fun enough. Progression was slow af and I just upgraded when I could. In recent years, I have made a huge jump from 240 to 280 ap. The changes to mob zones giving more silver was massive imo. The jetina quest for the pen accessorie was massive too, and I managed to upgrade my tet jordun blackstar to pen on christmas (I was so happy). I'm pretty happy with my progression rn and I'm currently working towards that guaranteed garmoth heart quest, just need those scales and those turos hearts and I'm set. Also, the amount of free pearl shop items I've gotten is unreal, I literally have a storage dedicated to just pearl shop items that were handed out through dailies. Those also really help.
I'm glad to hear its no longer p2w, ive played it a while when it was still new and got really turned off on it. Even though it was the most beautiful and feature rich mmo in my opinion.
I came here because im watching reviews as im downloading the game right now but im stikll really apprehensive and have my expectations set low because of it. I'll just hop on when the dl is done and experience it for myself.
Dont be to disappointed there are still a lot of p2w systems in place that havent been touched or made worse passivly over the years, especially if you are an endgame pvp player there are system where you will be tempted to spend just to save 24 hours of your time. But for the most part the p2w factor has been reduced but not fully eliminated. You still can and will spend a fortune if you want to make progress quickly.
so i do agree with you mostly, but i was looking in the pearlshop just yesturday, and the event stuff on sale is just outrageous. you can literally buy 300 artisans for 60 dollars. that is the value of about 4.5bil silver. pen weapons are so painfully cheap at less than 6bil, you can also buy the outfit bundles for about 130 dollars, which would give enough silver to outright buy a pen weapon. basically i feel like it is pay2win more now than it used to be in some ways, but for general convienience it has below a TON better making it alot nicer for new players
130 dollars for a pen weapon is meaningless progress for how much money that is. I'd rather grind 8 hours than spend 130 dollars to get the same gear
@@hamingway you wouldnt grind 800mil/hr if you dont even have a pen weapon.
@@FrexieFrex Full pen tuvala at centaurs can net you 700m+ an hour.
@@FrexieFrex you would though and you get money from other sources than grinding too. Having to grind 2 more hours because you grind at the wrong spots still doesn't warrant spending money to get the most basic gear
That exstra time u get to play the class ur playing, learning. The most valuable thing there is in BDO right now. Knowledge will carry u 90% of the time in BDO not ur not ur gear, gear takes some of the 10%. If u pay 2 win when u start playing it can only help u to kill Timmys faster, but u aint tuching those with knowledge over how the pvp works.
is this game free-to-play or you have to pay after a certain time period?
I'm gonna try to redownload the game again. With so many class changes, any ideas which are easy to play and strong in pvp?
so much respect to Choice ! you truly represented us here on covering the real reality of Black desert online !
real reality
Yes, the game is so much better than it was on release it is night and day.
However, it is still pay to win in some aspects. Like horse breeding, worker promotion, the book of old moon and kamasylvia buffs which are nice to have if you're life skilling on top of a value pack and of course a cooking outfit. Also, a whale could just buy outfits for himself to get crons instead of selling which I assume is the expected behavior of a whale which means there is no 35 outfits limit per week. It is expensive but it exist.
The point of the video is that there's really no power gap between F2P and P2W player anymore. It's a business not a charity.
@@zupremo9141 It wasn't business before the changes? Dumbest thing I have ever heard.
@@TheBoneCharmer93 You're saying that there's still some nice to have things in it, that's why i said that. The problem with westerners like you is that you're almost expecting companies to run on donations, that's why there's almost no new MMO developed in the west in the last decade.
@@zupremo9141 That's the definition of pay to win. NICE TO HAVE THINGS. Dude just stop commenting you are beyond clueless.
Value pack is nice to have but you can still play the game without it at a much slower pace. #entitled_westerners. What a moron.
What is the 60 dollars you spent on? Conquerors pack?
the main issue is the game creating problems and selling the solutions, instead of just removing the problem.
Sorry Choice (big fan of your twitch btw), but there are still some hard P2W mechanics in the game like the fairy and its skills. Some might say - its not that important, but any veteran player will tell you otherwise. Also if you're unlucky with upgrading the few pets that they give you at the start you're basically forced to either handicap yourself with your grinding or buy pearls and fall down the rabbit hole. Also I know you don't do lifeskilling, but in bartering/sailing buying skin/sailor slots/parrots gives you an advantage. I love BDO and I have played it for so many years now, but lets be real - its still p2w in a lot of aspects. They could fix it by giving us the option to buy everything with loyalties or heck - make everything that can be bought with pearls sellable on the market place with silver, but they won't do that.
Choice failed the mention the boundless kuku pets or wizard gyphry from events and seasonal rewards.
but the game is way different from before and the P2W elements are mostly explained and matter in PVP only. most of what you type there can be done solo without being bothered. come on now, Fairies and pet are abundant if you play the game regularly, you forgot how PearlAbyss take care of the game, the events (might be lazy sometimes but its w w because of the rewards), the balancing (not the best but its frequent), the free expansion, the new class, QOL and you forgot again that all of those are free.
I've just reached 700gs last month after a year, might not be much but it was a big deal for me and til now i've spent zero on pets & fairies. Fairies don't have to be maxed-out to be useful and lv3 pets work just fine at end game spots like gyfin & hexe. I honestly have no idea why people keep mentioning these 2 since fairy is very easy to work on so does lv3 pet. Does it give you advantages by spending? Yes. Can you play without those spending? Definitely & comfortably. To be honest, there're no F2P games anymore and if you have played a game that long i think it deserves some money from you.
Is their a pvp option like Arena of Solare where I can fight my friends. To be honest I find my self spending money for outfit only.
All hail Choice!! Great video.
You can still pay to win. But it's kinda meaningless. Unless you have too much money and you don't know where to spend it.