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Astral Diamond Changes
goatshark
Member Posts: 23 Arc User
Hey folks, Scott here again to give you an update on the state of the Neverwinter and the Astral Diamond economy. We’re going to be making a number of changes, all of which should increase the amount of AD most players earn in a given day. There's a lot here, so without further ado...
First and foremost, I want to make sure everyone knows the intent with Astral Diamonds, and why we’re making changes. AD is meant to be a currency rewarded by playing the game; Astral Diamonds are a representation of time. Zen is, well, money. At Cryptic, we feel it’s very important that players with time (but not money) can ultimately experience our games the same way as someone with money (but not time). This is why the Zen/AD Exchange exists: trade your time for money and vice versa. In order for us to maintain balance in this exchange, we need to make sure the general population can earn time currency (AD) in a predictable manner. Our goal: if you play Neverwinter, you earn AD. Before the upcoming changes, this wasn’t reliably the case, sometimes brokenly so. In order to correct this, we’re implementing the following adjustments.
Daily Quests & Hourly Events
Previously, there were separate daily quests that, if you remembered to take them, would reward bonus AD for completing Dungeons, Skirmishes, PvP, and Foundry. Unfortunately, based on our data, far too many people either didn’t know they needed to take these quests, didn't want to go through the effort, or they simply forgot. This lead to Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP not rewarding as much AD as was expected in our model. On top of that, though we were expecting players to use the Foundry daily to get AD, we found the vast majority weren't doing so at all.
We believe that simply playing content should get you your time currency, so we removed the daily quests and made things automatic. Now, simply play Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP, and you’ll receive significant bonus AD for completing the first 2 runs of each.
Along with the inconvenience of daily quests, we also previously scheduled events to run during fixed periods each day. So if you happened to be able to log in during very specific times, you would get bonus AD from the same sources as listed above. Only able to log in at hour X? Well, hope you wanted to play dungeons for your bonus AD. This meant only a few lucky people were able to bring in the quantity we want everyone to have from the content they wanted to play. To correct this, we are removing the hourly bonus AD events. And, like the adjustment to daily quests, we've put in tech that will automatically reward bonus AD for Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP at any time of the day. There are earn rate maximums per day (to make sure things stay balanced), but because you can now get bonus AD regardless of what time of day you're able to log in, we expect most players will significantly increase their earn rate.
Let’s look at some actual numbers:
Playing Dungeons
Old: If you picked up the daily quest, you got 3,000 AD for one dungeon. If you had your chest key, you got an additional 3,000 AD.
New: 1. Automatically get 3,000 AD for each of the first two dungeons. 2. In addition, get 150 to 750 AD for each dungeon played (up to a maximum 7,200 AD per day from dungeons). Amount varies by time.
Playing Skirmishes
Old: If you picked up the daily quest, you got 3,000 AD for three skirmishes.
New: 1. Automatically get 1,500 AD for each of the first two skirmishes. 2. In addition, get 50 to 500 AD for each skirmish played (up to a maximum 7,200 AD per day from skirmishes). Amount varies by time.
Playing PvP
Old: If you picked up the daily quest, you got 4,000 AD for two matches.
New: 1. Automatically get 2,000 AD for each of the first two matches. 2. In addition, get 200 to 300 AD per match played (up to a maximum 4,800 AD per day from PvP). Amount varies by time.
Across the board, these two changes are expected to put significantly more AD into the hands of anyone playing this queued content.
Leadership
As you may remember, we recently disabled the ability to use the Leadership profession on Gateway. This was due to an extreme number of bots generating far too much AD, and creating havoc with the AD economy. By disabling the profession on Gateway, we were able to reduce this artificially inflated number. Unfortunately, botters found a way around this fix. As we looked into the data, and as we analyzed what we could do to fix this exploit, we came to the conclusion that the way to stop the botters was to remove AD from the Leadership profession. There will still be a few sources in there, but nothing that botters can use to continue breaking the economy. In some cases, AD was replaced with extra XP, but by and large, AD was straight- up removed from the profession. We know this will be frustrating for those who were not exploiting, but the downside of leaving AD in the profession was too severe. Once this work is done, Leadership will be re-enabled on Gateway. Remember, we want players to receive Astral Diamonds for the time they spend actively playing the game, so (beyond the exploit) it didn't really make sense to have something that runs in the background as a major source of this currency.
Leadership, while no longer a major source of AD, is still a good source for XP, Gold, and loot items. All of these things are valuable to regular players, but less so to botters.
Invocation & Salvage
At this time there will be no changes made to Invocation and Salvage. We are, however, looking into some better messaging so players know when an item could be salvaged for Astral Diamonds OR used as Refinement Points.
VIP
VIP is changing slightly. Previously, you received +15% bonus AD at VIP Rank 1 for Daily Quests. At VIP Rank 2, you received +15% bonus AD on Hourly Events. Now, at Rank 1, you will get 15% bonus on all runs of Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP. For PvP in particular, this is a new source of Astral Diamonds.
Future Changes
Beyond addressing the group content listed above, and the botting issue of Leadership, we are also looking at ways for the solo player to earn this time currency. We are evaluating content like Heroic Encounters and Campaigns as likely places to make adjustments, while watching the above changes to make sure they're having the desired effect on group play.
We believe we can make the Astral Diamond economy much more stable and uniform for all players. Want to earn AD? Play Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP whenever you have time! Check back soon for more information on future additional AD sources.
Scott Shicoff
Lead Designer
First and foremost, I want to make sure everyone knows the intent with Astral Diamonds, and why we’re making changes. AD is meant to be a currency rewarded by playing the game; Astral Diamonds are a representation of time. Zen is, well, money. At Cryptic, we feel it’s very important that players with time (but not money) can ultimately experience our games the same way as someone with money (but not time). This is why the Zen/AD Exchange exists: trade your time for money and vice versa. In order for us to maintain balance in this exchange, we need to make sure the general population can earn time currency (AD) in a predictable manner. Our goal: if you play Neverwinter, you earn AD. Before the upcoming changes, this wasn’t reliably the case, sometimes brokenly so. In order to correct this, we’re implementing the following adjustments.
Daily Quests & Hourly Events
Previously, there were separate daily quests that, if you remembered to take them, would reward bonus AD for completing Dungeons, Skirmishes, PvP, and Foundry. Unfortunately, based on our data, far too many people either didn’t know they needed to take these quests, didn't want to go through the effort, or they simply forgot. This lead to Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP not rewarding as much AD as was expected in our model. On top of that, though we were expecting players to use the Foundry daily to get AD, we found the vast majority weren't doing so at all.
We believe that simply playing content should get you your time currency, so we removed the daily quests and made things automatic. Now, simply play Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP, and you’ll receive significant bonus AD for completing the first 2 runs of each.
Along with the inconvenience of daily quests, we also previously scheduled events to run during fixed periods each day. So if you happened to be able to log in during very specific times, you would get bonus AD from the same sources as listed above. Only able to log in at hour X? Well, hope you wanted to play dungeons for your bonus AD. This meant only a few lucky people were able to bring in the quantity we want everyone to have from the content they wanted to play. To correct this, we are removing the hourly bonus AD events. And, like the adjustment to daily quests, we've put in tech that will automatically reward bonus AD for Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP at any time of the day. There are earn rate maximums per day (to make sure things stay balanced), but because you can now get bonus AD regardless of what time of day you're able to log in, we expect most players will significantly increase their earn rate.
Let’s look at some actual numbers:
Playing Dungeons
Old: If you picked up the daily quest, you got 3,000 AD for one dungeon. If you had your chest key, you got an additional 3,000 AD.
New: 1. Automatically get 3,000 AD for each of the first two dungeons. 2. In addition, get 150 to 750 AD for each dungeon played (up to a maximum 7,200 AD per day from dungeons). Amount varies by time.
Playing Skirmishes
Old: If you picked up the daily quest, you got 3,000 AD for three skirmishes.
New: 1. Automatically get 1,500 AD for each of the first two skirmishes. 2. In addition, get 50 to 500 AD for each skirmish played (up to a maximum 7,200 AD per day from skirmishes). Amount varies by time.
Playing PvP
Old: If you picked up the daily quest, you got 4,000 AD for two matches.
New: 1. Automatically get 2,000 AD for each of the first two matches. 2. In addition, get 200 to 300 AD per match played (up to a maximum 4,800 AD per day from PvP). Amount varies by time.
Across the board, these two changes are expected to put significantly more AD into the hands of anyone playing this queued content.
Leadership
As you may remember, we recently disabled the ability to use the Leadership profession on Gateway. This was due to an extreme number of bots generating far too much AD, and creating havoc with the AD economy. By disabling the profession on Gateway, we were able to reduce this artificially inflated number. Unfortunately, botters found a way around this fix. As we looked into the data, and as we analyzed what we could do to fix this exploit, we came to the conclusion that the way to stop the botters was to remove AD from the Leadership profession. There will still be a few sources in there, but nothing that botters can use to continue breaking the economy. In some cases, AD was replaced with extra XP, but by and large, AD was straight- up removed from the profession. We know this will be frustrating for those who were not exploiting, but the downside of leaving AD in the profession was too severe. Once this work is done, Leadership will be re-enabled on Gateway. Remember, we want players to receive Astral Diamonds for the time they spend actively playing the game, so (beyond the exploit) it didn't really make sense to have something that runs in the background as a major source of this currency.
Leadership, while no longer a major source of AD, is still a good source for XP, Gold, and loot items. All of these things are valuable to regular players, but less so to botters.
Invocation & Salvage
At this time there will be no changes made to Invocation and Salvage. We are, however, looking into some better messaging so players know when an item could be salvaged for Astral Diamonds OR used as Refinement Points.
VIP
VIP is changing slightly. Previously, you received +15% bonus AD at VIP Rank 1 for Daily Quests. At VIP Rank 2, you received +15% bonus AD on Hourly Events. Now, at Rank 1, you will get 15% bonus on all runs of Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP. For PvP in particular, this is a new source of Astral Diamonds.
Future Changes
Beyond addressing the group content listed above, and the botting issue of Leadership, we are also looking at ways for the solo player to earn this time currency. We are evaluating content like Heroic Encounters and Campaigns as likely places to make adjustments, while watching the above changes to make sure they're having the desired effect on group play.
We believe we can make the Astral Diamond economy much more stable and uniform for all players. Want to earn AD? Play Dungeons, Skirmishes, and PvP whenever you have time! Check back soon for more information on future additional AD sources.
Scott Shicoff
Lead Designer
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When is this happening?Please reconsider putting this in next week BEFORE you have a solution for solo players, at least. Geez.GOOD:
Fixing the hourly system is good. So, yay there.
SOLO ISSUE:
Where are the AD for campaign tasks, daily task, SOLO TASKS????? Playing the game does not = Skirmishes, PVP and Dungeons for all your players. Those need to go in WITH this change not at some unspecified future date.
Promises of "we are looking into it" are probably not going to tide them over. Maybe some of them will come back... "news very soon" is also not good enough. We don't trust you. Fix that.
ECONOMY ISSUES:
How are we *ever* supposed to afford
GMOPSor STRONGHOLD upgrades (AD sink, surplus equipment- no one is going to want to donate their purples if that is a lone sorce of AD) in your new economy? How are new people or characters (since apparently we will now instead need to gear up a *DUNGEON* army instead of a leadership army)- supposed to afford rings from professions, black ice combines, cubes of augmentation, some of the boons, etc.Also please address the price of leveling up companions- it is stupidly high with this change.
Again, "we will be looking at this at some future date" is not good enough.
LEADERSHIP
When you take away with one hand you better give with the other. We are talking *massive* investment in this profession and removing AD without adding something else is stealing from us. Please figure something out. Perhaps some account bound ways to make GMOPS and/or Coal Wards? Remove the cap on doing each task only three times?
SUMMARY:
It's insane to announce this change without a tandem source for true solo players and addressing the current AD sinks in the game- especially the one that JUST launched in the last mod.
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The Holy Crusaders guild leader ♚ Mod 10 PVE Destroyer GWF guide ♚ Founding member of the Relentless Alliance
The people who are playing your content only have one way to get AD - and that was Leadership. You say that you want to reward people who give their time
If you haven't yet realised the backlash that is about to hit you, I'd suggest running. Pitchforks and torches are on their way.
I feel the pros definitely out-weight the cons and while yes there will be upset folks that can no longer rake in near endless AD (like me), what this does is turn the game economy back on track to what it should be. I feel too that these changes will allow far more people will be able to enjoy the game than those upset. Especially new and returning players. This sounds great to me. Looking forward to actually being able to play the game and not work it.
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You designed the AD sinks in the game around the AD generating systems in the game. If you plan on going ahead with this heavy-handed 'adjustment' you damn well better adjust those sinks as well!!
And not to grind the same content daily to acquire countless sets of currencies (which clogs up our inventories) and then to upgrade professions/ structures, which further requires more and different currencies to upgrade, before we can smell our BIS gears...
And by the time we manage to do all of the above, developers announce a new set of gears coming in the next MOD, making the gears we just farmed our minds off for, instantly obsolete.
This is disappointing.
The changes will have following effect (I think):
The players wont get new AD in those big amounts that some are used to. The amount of players that can afford to spend millions of AD on artifacts and mounts etc today will decrease very fast and in high numbers. At one point (soon enough), the demand will be extremely low at current prices.
That leads to players, bots and whatever gonna have stuff they cant sell, and what do you do when you cant sell your stuff? You lower the price so that the big mass can afford it.
Its gonna be hard for the players to adapt at first. I mean, nobody wants to sell a mount that with today cost 4m AD for 400k AD, so they will try to sell it for a high price at first and it will take much longer time to get it sold for that high price and the more time passes by, the more players will have the same items to sell so you get uncercutted.
The value of AD is gonna skyrocket.
Also: This will need major changes of all ZEN items an vendor prices. A huge portion of players will not farm and wait for weeks to buy one Gmark for 100k (or even 70k (something with VIP). This is just no realistic and I hope you guys understand this. Like farming 3 days for one transmute?
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Those prices will HAVE to come down, because they are based on a ****stic economy. Most people will not wait around for THAT fix, and will move on to another game. You need to keep your players enticed and encouraged to be able to progress in the game. That was currently leadership, one of the few ways to slowly build up enough AD for the things needed to progress. This change will not fix that, and you will alienate players who enjoy building their toons.
I'll leave it to others to sound off on the more obvious elephant in the room...
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I highly suggest you find another way to deal with bots, or a clever way to hide the leadership nerf.
As if we didn't farm the same dungeons and skirmishes over and over already, we have to do it even more to have any source of measly income in this game. Terrible move Cryptic. They should just counter bots instead than hurting the real player base. No wonder they had the double AD weekends, nothing comes without a cost.
Really took out all the excitement I had for double RP weekend.
I play solo. Solo does not mean dungeons, PVP or skirmishes to me. I thought this game was supposed to be "solo friendly," but it's not anymore.
Even for groupers and guild players, I don't see how advancement will NOT plummet if they have to rely strictly on the character that is currently logged on for all their Astral Diamonds. I overhear my spouse and her guild-mates saying this on TeamSpeak as I'm typing this.
Really happy about this. Of course more has to be done, Foundry and Heroic Encounters should give AD too, but at least the alt armies can go F emselves now and the playing field is a bit more leveled.