The philosophy of avoiding âpay to playâ is a good idea in my opinion. Why? Because you want a constant influx of new players to grow the player base and, in this case, also help you pay the bills (which I sympathize with). What keeps new players from sticking around, besides âthis just isnât for meâ? I would say frustration with a perceived learning curve is part of it, but mostly the perception that the elite players are just so far ahead of them they will never be able to catch up. This means never really getting to play with new garage ships, see the more interesting areas of the universe, or really being able to progress your avatar. You see that in the general chat at times, I know from experience (this is only my second seasonâŚyes, I am a noob, but perhaps that gives me some insight). Given all that, I look at your proposed plans with an eye towards limiting major frustration for the new players, moving dedicated new players towards experienced player status quicker (once they are experienced, I contend they are hooked), while alleviating some tedium for the experienced ones. Things I would suggest:
Forcing people to go to ECC and get out and about I think is important. Therefore, too much automation in OAM and OCD drives that down. I am not so hot on the refinery idea.
Along the same lines, while I very much would like personally to have portals, I think it would be a real bad idea. Large factions would just set them up and portal around (sounds like a song title) with little space traffic which gives the impression of an active universe. See Snowmanâs post which I agree with. Donât make life too cushy for the elite, it widens the gap between them and new users too much. If you really want portals I agree with Keiffo on just having them go to ECCâŚto work all that non-automated ore! Different approach: set up portals to be leased (RL money) monthly. That adds a twist people could play with, when to rent portals and to where, and gets you subscription income. Factions would use them one way, early players a different way. I would add that the portal should be limited to the lesseeâs use only. You would have to establish no build zones around the portals and other considerations if you really think this through on how people would use them.
I do not like the refinery idea for the same basic reasons: too much automation. Yes, you must shuttle around some, but I think that is part of the gaming experience. Next thing you know they will automate the fighting and people will just sit back and watch the game. 
I somewhat agree with DarthMyrten: your income stream should be partly one offâs, but I would argue mostly geared towards getting noobs into the mid-part of the game. The packages are OK where they are IMHO, I used them last season to jumpstart a bit, but perhaps adding just one or two higher level packages for early-to-mid game would help. The elite will not use them anyhow, so you have the right target audience. New experienced players then would consider subscription packages which is what you want.
You already keep persistent data on players to track permanent packages, so extending that model will be easy. How about allowing for a one-time career purchase (RL money) of one special resource package, perhaps including an NPC core and a fair amount of rare materials. Again, targeting getting noobs up the ladder quicker. Sure, some people might game this one with alt accounts and such, so make it available when they reach level 25. The elites (which you want everyone to become) will not bother leveling alts up. This flies in the face of the Ultra Patron Tier idea which I know you like because of the subscription model (perhaps they are compatible, different target audiences?). The cost/benefit analysis between a few elite subscriptions and more general purchases could be made on historical data you have.
There are a lot of good ideas in this thread, made by people who have lots of experience. My general theme is to craft things to move noobs to experienced where they will buy subscriptions, but donât make life too cushy after that.
2 cents.
