Cartel Coins In-Game And The Subscriber Discount: Of Course There’s A Catch

Hey look, the in-game cartel coin purchasing thing is live! I’m ready to get my big cartel coin pack at 50% off, yo.

Starting today, you can purchase Cartel Coins from inside the game!

No need to log out. Now you can purchase Cartel Coins directly from the Cartel Market.

To celebrate this launch, Subscribers save 50% on their first in-game purchase of Cartel Coins through November 30th! …

PLEASE NOTE: To get started, you must opt-in for in-game purchases of Cartel Coins by visiting your Cartel Coins Ledger and have made at least one purchase of Cartel Coins through the SWTOR.com web site using a Credit Card:

From the SWTOR.com home page, click “MY SWTOR” → “My Account” → “Cartel Coins”

If you’ve never made a purchase of Cartel Coins through the web site, you will first need to do so by clicking “Buy Cartel Coins.” You will then be able to opt-in for in-game purchases of Cartel Coins by clicking “Enable.”

If you’ve made at least one purchase of Cartel Coins through the web site, you will be able to opt-in for in-game purchases of Cartel Coins using your existing Credit Cards by clicking “Enable.”

Paypal and Boku payment methods are not supported for in-game purchases of Cartel Coins. If you’ve purchased Cartel Coins through the web site using only one of these payment methods, you will need to make another purchase using an accepted form of payment to opt-in for in-game purchases of Cartel Coins.

. . .

What the fuckcrap? First, I’d better get my shit together in the next 25 days, or I’m out of luck on the discount.

But the part that super-sucks is that I have to first buy cartel coins at full price to access my discount at all. I call bullshit. There is no earthly reason why I can’t input my credit card number on a website WITHOUT making a purchase – well there are two reasons that I can think of. One: shoddy programming (haha, that has happened). Two: greed. I’m going to say it’s likely number two.

My plan: buy the tiny cc pack of 450 for $5 to get my credit card in the system (even though it has a crappy cash-to-cc ratio). Then use my discount in-game to buy 5500cc for $20 ($40 half price). That leaves me with 5950cc at a price of $25. Not terrible, but NOT the 5500 for $20 that I was expecting.

Edit: A twitterati pointed out that if you’ve bought cartel coins before as a paypal customer, you will still have to buy yet another full-price pack to get access to your discount. That’s even worse, because you’ve already done a purchase and you’re getting screwed because of your method of payment.

Comments

Cartel Coins In-Game And The Subscriber Discount: Of Course There’s A Catch — 9 Comments

Cyare on November 5, 2013 at 11:40 am said:

If this is not changed, EA will not be getting a thin dime from me. I’ve already made a purchase, but since it’s PayPal-based it doesn’t count. Good going EA, way to screw yourself out of an easy $20.

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Shintar on November 5, 2013 at 11:43 am said:

That stinks, now I’m not sure if I’m going to bother with that offer. Especially since I recently bought some Cartel Coins in a retail store to get one of those store-exclusive pets (and haven’t felt the need to spend them on anything yet).

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Teo on November 5, 2013 at 12:31 pm said:

Your response and strategy mirrors mine. I’ve never bought CC, so will have to use a credit card. I’ll do a quick spreadsheet to confirm the $5 pack plus $40 in-game with discount gives the best CC/$, but likely you’re right, the minimum $5 seems the obvious overall best value to hook into this kinda awkward system.

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- Njessi on November 5, 2013 at 12:46 pm said:
  
  Well the strategy of the $5 pack assumes that I won’t be needing any further cartel coins in the foreseeable future. Since I don’t buy cartel packs and I have no expensive plans (like multiple species changes), I don’t foresee myself needing to buy cartel coins pretty much ever again after this initial influx.
  
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  - Teo on November 5, 2013 at 12:50 pm said:
    
    Me either! In fact, got 9135 CC right now from stipend and whatever other freebies we got. Seems like a waste not to use the discount while it’s available… Guess I could spend OotiniCast cash and buy Cartel Packs as prizes. Umm.
    
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    - Njessi on November 5, 2013 at 12:55 pm said:
      
      I already have plans for my cc. There’s always something I want and don’t have the credits for, mostly legacy unlocks.
      
      – I don’t have HK on any of my imperial toons. I should probably see the story on that side.
      – I don’t have a gbank on my ship yet
      – Every time an alt gets to 30 or so, I unlock field respec for that toon.
      – I have almost no priority transports
      – I only have a lowest-level repair bot on my raiding toon and on no other toons
      
      Even with that list, I can’t imagine it will cost me so much that I will need to buy more cc. I have been living on my stipend until now, and done just fine on that allowance.
      
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Green Armadillo on November 5, 2013 at 10:30 pm said:

I’m going to wait and see how this plays out given that we have through the end of the month. The big thing that has me considering this bundle is the chance to transfer three characters. (That is paid with CC from your balance, correct?) That said, it’s more of a want than a need, and if it’s too much of a pain in the rear then I might not bother.

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- Teo on November 5, 2013 at 11:02 pm said:
  
  Character transfers are indeed paid for out of your available, already-acquired CC.
  
  As to why you need that initial purchase, it seems unnecessary. Having used a credit card for something else isn’t enough; you must have purchased Cartel Coins with a credit card (not even the one you necessarily want to use for subsequent in-game purchases). Maybe they need at least one authorisation where you’ve exchanged real money for fake before they’re able to make it an ongoing thing?
  
  Speaking of which, I suspect we can’t use PayPal because it’s not possible to give BioWare permission to charge you arbitrary amounts at any time (though you can set up a recurring payment of a fixed amount on a fixed schedule, as we do for subscriptions). This would only work for in-game purchasing if they got you to enter your PayPal password, and I’m guesing merchants aren’t allowed to do that; when buying anything with PayPal on the web, you’re redirected to PayPal’s site to enter your password.
  
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- Njessi on November 6, 2013 at 9:12 am said:
  
  It might well be worth it, for character transfers. I’m still bristling at the *principle* of it all, but will probably buy the coins at discount anyway, just in case I ever want to buy a big ticket item like a name change, species change, or server change.
  
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