Alt Avatars and the Community Store

Many people think that the goblin coin store is just S2s way of making additional money from people who have already paid for a full product.  If you visit the official S2 forums at all, or even some non-official Heroes of Newerth or even DOTA forums you'll see the 6800 signatures all over the place.  Obviously people are upset about things, and some even feel betrayed, but I think its important to think about some of the things S2 gaming is doing right here.

- Goblin Coins allow S2 games to give positive reinforcement for good behavior.  This is currently seen from the coins for wards stats, assists, kills (though I'm not sure anyone needs encouragement to get more kills).  S2 even put in coins for smack downs, which leads to funny situations of humiliation and triumph.  Something I think they could improve on this by gauging rewards to encourage behavior appropriately, as many people I know STILL don't care to buy and place wards when playing support or for buying a courier which you currently don't get anything for.

- Goblin Coins allow s2 to afford to continue pushing more interesting art oriented content. (artists aren't cheap... well not good ones anyway)  The new Slither Ms Ivy, unless this is an April fools joke; in which case i will punch someone, has me very excited.  Until such a time as these purchases offer real game balance effects, these coins are purely novelty items, and as such great rewards.

- Premium items allow s2 to afford to sometimes do expensive projects (like say... hiring someone with a famous voice).  As long as premium items are only those that cost quite a bit to finance, then they truly do fulfill the intent of which I think they were created, and enable the player base to get some really cool items!

- All this said, if s2 ever makes premium items that effect in game balance, we're going to enter a world of pay to play.

Overall I think the store is a great idea, that allows s2 to make money from those people who are impatient, and yet enrich the game with great, shiny, new, motivating, content.  Did I say shiny?