Mongolia already stated a pertinent fact- No matter how much EP someone has, someone else has more and you'll want it to be competitive.

ICE is a great idea, I fully support it.

In terms of EP- there's not going to be a way that everyone is happy with. Newer players want more, other players want it left as is, others will want some form of in-game method of obtaining it (missions/items)- there's not a single method that will please everyone.

You could implement a dozen different things- Double EP gain days, bonus events that can net you EP in some way that even new players can competitively play in, tokens or other methods- but one way or another it's going to be a headache- someone is always going to feel left out, cheated or otherwise unimpressed that their playing Perpetuum for X amount of time has amounted to little as a newer player can gain EP faster or someone is going to exploit it.

I wouldn't complain with anything, personally- it's just a game. But even so, the entertainment factor will suffer if, as a subscriber, I'm at a loss in a weeks time as someone has paid to get EP somehow. It's a mechanic that means there is a good progression level for players- a new player who forks out hard currency for effectively instant access to something player's have had to wait for isn't just unfair- it's impractical. Sure, plenty of PvP players will rejoice at having easy kills on inexperienced players- but that's besides the point.

The Kickstarter should be the only, I say -ONLY- way of "paying" for an EP boost. 20,000 EP is more than enough a boost for any new player. If there is some kind of "anniversary EP boost" on a particular day that nets everyone double-ep-gain, fine. That way it's at least "fair" in that everyone gets it and newer players aren't given an enormous head start or such.

On the count of the "Checking credit cards for if they're in the US, etc" type thing- This is true.

However: This isn't always so- it could be a few people were unlucky, or that they're all entirely right.

The only workaround that I'm aware of is to have someone in the US buy it for you, then have them link it to your account (with a new Amazon account so that you can take ownership of it or whatever).

This does, of course, rely on you trusting whoever you get to do it- I'd do it in a second, personally, provided I trusted someone enough and that it would work with subscribed accounts.

The Devs are going to sort this for subscribed account holders- It's just a ball in their court in terms of if they're going to talk to Gameconnect to sort out the whole only-available-in-the-US-thing.

We can but hope.

Can't remember where I read it, but it's up to Amazon when/if/how they distribute it to other Amazon sites such as the EU wing of Amazon- thus, out of the hands of the Devs. That is, unless they find another way of distributing it.

I mean hell, it's not like Amazon or the Devs will hear the end of it from disgruntled players until -everyone- is on an equal footing with the whole kickstarter thing.