The way the recon system was implemented is part of the reason why costs are "too high". If you could spec out powers don't want without also having to remove a bunch of things you do want, costs would be much cheaper. But it's not possible when you have a crude list.
Ok well the costs are not "too high". The list is crude and functionality could be improved. But the cost should not be lowered.
If it's going to cost you 400g total to replace your passive today...that should still cost 400g. Even if in the future functionality is improved in a way where you don't have to remove and re-add everything else.
The cheap and quick fix is to just make it WAY cheaper to do. Then a person struggling with the inherent errors in all this doesn't have to pay through the nose to navigate all the uncertainty.
The bottom line to me is that resources should be spent to make your character better, cooler and more effective, not to "fix" them.
Retcons are typically done to make your character better, cooler, and more effective.
I'm not here to get your agreement. Disagree all you want. The powerhouse could for sure use some changes to make it a better testing ground, but that's exactly the point that it serves......to allow people to figure out their build for free before stepping out. No better price than that.
Could it do a better job? For sure. That doesn't mean its existence should be invalidated by lowering retcon costs to the point of making the entire game the person's powerhouse.
I'm not here to get your agreement. Disagree all you want. The powerhouse could for sure use some changes to make it a better testing ground, but that's exactly the point that it serves......to allow people to figure out their build for free before stepping out. No better price than that.
Could it do a better job? For sure. That doesn't mean its existence should be invalidated by lowering retcon costs to the point of making the entire game the person's powerhouse.
First change I'd make to the Powerhouse would be to merge all versions of the Battle Station into one so that you can train against every group of enemies from any powerhouse instead of having to go to the different zones powerhouses for specific groups...
We are just sharing opinions. There is nothing wrong with that. I'm not sure how you construe lowering retcon costs as making the entire game the powerhouse replacement. It would still cost something.
I'm also not sure how you think leaving the price higher in the face of the bugs, imbalance and lack of information in any way makes the game better.
The price isn't the problem. The problem is the system and bugged/broken powers... Rather than wasting resorces adjusting the price they should fix the UI, create a more user friendly retcon system, and fix the bugged/broken powers.
You get a free retcon upon hitting level 40 and have lots of opportunities to learn what "works" and what doesn't between level 6 to 40. By the time the toon is level 40 the player should already be well-informed about power mechanics, synergies and how stats work with them. The powerhouse allows the player to spend all the time in the world to test out power / advantage / spec choices free of charge before they make the exit. The community both ingame and on the forums are pretty helpful with advice on builds if the player in doubt asks around. The "lack of information" excuse only goes so far.
The only thing with retcons I expect Cryptic to honor in practice is to provide free tokens each and every time they make a drastic change to any powers.
The only thing with retcons I expect Cryptic to honor in practice is to provide free tokens each and every time they make a drastic change to any powers.
Testing something in the powerhouse and using it in the game are worlds apart. Do you think they should charge to test builds in the powerhouse? Your pointing out that it's free seems to imply some form of generosity is being bestowed that makes up for the inherent struggle that bugged/broken/misinformed causes. How many "fun" hours in the powerhouse should somebody spend trying to ascertain how a power actually works in spite of the bugged/broken/misinformed?
You do realize that there are training dummies, damage simulators and the battle station in the powerhouse right? The tools are there for the player to figure out how their build would perform in a combat situation or in general.
Compared to some of the other MMOs I've played where a power / ability choice upon levelling up means a permanent one, and that the whole build has to be respec'ed even if its one power / ability choice to undo, yes, CO is pretty generous with how it allows players to playtest their power choices before confirming them.
And asking questions may or may not provide an accurate answer from the community, if an answer at all. Certainly answers from an official source are nearly non-existent (though they are putting out a good effort to fix the bugs in recent times.).
Well of course, let's immediately assume the worst case scenario. Let's also assume that the player is such a moron that they can't put two and two together when testing out new powers and power synergies while in the PH.
For my part they can keep the retcon price as is. I see newer players as being occasionally put off by the exorbitant cost of "fixing" their hero because of bugged/broken/misinformed. For somebody new that has just run up their first hero, coughing up 500+ globals to repair the toon is hard to come by.
If somebody has to "cough" up 500 globals to fix their toon, it means that:
1) They're already level 40.
2) They would already have gotten a retcon token.
Coughing up 500 globals is easy. Get 5 keys from the Z store and sell them off at the auction house for around the standard market price of 100g each. Spend a little money in the game, be a little wiser with the build this time around.
Caelach, you seem to really miss our point seriously... Changing the price solves nothing if the issue is because of bugged/broken powers... those powers will still be bugged and broken, people will still find themselves unable to complete a concept due to these bugged and broken powers. And another topic about it will surface yet again. We don't need yet another bandaid solution. What we need is actual development and real solutions. And now that we have the dev team back for a change we can actually get those fixes that we actually need instead of more bandaid solutions.
Spend 5 bucks because of bugged/broken/misinformed (and that's assuming one has the build perfected among the messed up selections and only one shot at this is needed)? Do you get that having to spend cash to fix something one would expect not to be fraught with bugged/broken/misinformed might turn some people away from the game? A sensible person might resent spending real money they could use toward costumes, vehicles or whatever to fix something because of a bug.
How much time not playing the game and crawling through the forums or a wiki should someone spend to become "wiser" (assuming the info they do scrape up is even accurate)?
Feel free to point out a MMO that is bug-free.
Existence of bugs is unavoidable in any MMO game. Some always get fixed and others don't due to whatever programming roadblocks. That doesn't mean that certain features shouldn't be monetized especially when its a F2P MMO. The high global cost is supposed to be the alternative to not paying for a retcon. Has always been from the start and is very unlikely to change.
I'm not sure how you construe lowering retcon costs as making the entire game the powerhouse replacement. It would still cost something.
Yeah and that something should be very significant.....like it already is. Retcons are not meant to be a light decision that you can easily undo anytime. If they become that then the powerhouse, and more importantly, being careful about what powers you choose for your character will be pointless.
These decisions are important and should carry a lot of weight.
I'm also not sure how you think leaving the price higher in the face of the bugs, imbalance and lack of information in any way makes the game better.
As others have pointed out: the bugs, imbalance, and lack of information should be resolved directly. Those are not reasons for doing anything other than fixing them. That's what's going to make the game better.
I mean, I've never had much issue with it. Then again, I always pick my powers before I make the character. Then I pick the ones I know I'll keep later first, same with advantage points. I always keep one travel power that is core for the character and pick the second travel power as close to last as I can. Same with powers that I'm -eh- on or know I'll switch out. I probably spent more on swapping out the last power of my main's loadout than 2 or more retcons.
So my advice is to save up the G while leveling and then do a full retcon and swap things around until you know you're satisfied. Best way to make money I found is to -not- just spam alerts, unless you feel like going insane. Sell mods, convert Q into Z and sell keys, run Andrith, and maybe do some costume piece farming.
In a free game, you gotta pay somehow. Time is money.
Did you even read my entire post? We have the dev teams attention on CO again for the first time in years. They ARE CURRENTLY fixing numerous bugs and addressing other issues as we speak. Will they all be fixed soon? Doubtful, but they are working on fixing them already.
What you're saying seems to be that retcons should cost real dollars, which is weird, and I have no interest at all in asking you why.
Certain features of a F2P MMO will bound to get monetized if they company decides that they qualify as something premium. The option to completely reroll a character into a new one without needing to level up another comes off as a premium service and therefore should cost real dollars. The only difference is that there's a 100% legit alternative to pay less money than what's normally expected to do it.
Obviously the concept will be "weird" to you if you feel you feel no obligation to pay real money for anything and act all entitled about it.
Throw money at the company for a game you're already paying for. That's the advice you're giving to gold subs, and that concept does seem really weird to me.
Many of us don't dump real money into keys, so we can't sell them for 100g a pop or don't have 300-500g items to put up on the auction house.
Actually considering that the AH is consistently stocked with cosmic keys, I'm lead to believe that real money is being dumped into keys a whole lot and by many players.
Throw money at the company for a game you're already paying for. That's the advice you're giving to gold subs, and that concept does seem really weird to me.
By that logic anyone who's gold expected to buy any Z-store stuff such as costume packs, auras, hideouts etc etc. is a "weird" concept. That's not how a F2P business model works.
Throw money at the company for a game you're already paying for. That's the advice you're giving to gold subs, and that concept does seem really weird to me.
You do realize that many of us gold and lifetime subscribers are more than willing to throw more money at Cryptic if it means we'll see more frequent updates and bug fixes.
Throw money at the company for a game you're already paying for. That's the advice you're giving to gold subs, and that concept does seem really weird to me.
You do realize that many of us gold and lifetime subscribers are more than willing to throw more money at Cryptic if it means we'll see more frequent updates and bug fixes.
That's a nice thing to hope for, however there is no guarantee and this game has seen long stretches of neglect before.
Many of us are not comfortable throwing money at the cash shop and hoping for the best. I pay for my gold subscription because I don't like the F2P model, and that's all I'm willing to give.
Many of us are not comfortable throwing money at the cash shop and hoping for the best. I pay for my gold subscription because I don't like the F2P model, and that's all I'm willing to give.
And yet you get the 500 ZEN monthly stipend. Pretty sure you're using all that stipend ZEN at the cash shop anyhow. If you're somehow not then you already got your 500 global retcon ticket(s).
That's a nice thing to hope for, however there is no guarantee and this game has seen long stretches of neglect before.
Many of us are not comfortable throwing money at the cash shop and hoping for the best. I pay for my gold subscription because I don't like the F2P model, and that's all I'm willing to give.
The long stretches of neglect are partially due to others with that very same attitude. If they don't get enough funds from the game, they are not able to make regular updates. We need more people actually spending money on CO. Luckily we do have the dev team working on things over here again though, so we WILL be seeing many things fixed and changed over the coming months.
Why are players allergic to the idea of saving up Gs for a retcon, rather than spending it on other things?
I remember I was initially very annoyed at the slow rate it takes to get Onslaught gear, but now, months later, I am glad I couldn't just scoop up everything I wanted in a week of play.
Saving up Gs is not tough in Champs, and you don't have to just spam Smash Alerts. Play the game, do missions and events, sell the occasional rare drop you get, etc. After a a week or two, you'll have the Gs. During that time, you got to play the game.
At this point I don't look to smash alerts to raise G's. For me it seems that farming for costume drops in VB to sell is far more time efficient. It's also possible to sell Questionite costume pieces for G's.
That's a nice thing to hope for, however there is no guarantee and this game has seen long stretches of neglect before.
Many of us are not comfortable throwing money at the cash shop and hoping for the best. I pay for my gold subscription because I don't like the F2P model, and that's all I'm willing to give.
The long stretches of neglect are partially due to others with that very same attitude. If they don't get enough funds from the game, they are not able to make regular updates. We need more people actually spending money on CO. Luckily we do have the dev team working on things over here again though, so we WILL be seeing many things fixed and changed over the coming months.
Is there proof of that? How do we know they didn't shelve and neglect CO because they had larger projects to work on? Or because they expected it to dwindle and die after DCUO was released, and they were cutting their loses (thankfully it didn't)?
Did an unexpected surge in cash shop sales inspire the Onslaught update? I find that unlikely. Many game companies use big updates to re-spark interest and create a resurgence of cash flow (from both subs and cash shop), not hold back updates until X amount of dollars are made in cash shop sales.
The main word in their sentence is PARTIALLY.
we have had Devs put onto STO and NW when they needed help, resulting in CO getting nothing. This results in players leaving and less money coming in.
Back when they did the Ask the Devs they told us that the number and frequency of updates is directly linked to income from the game. The more one of their titles makes, the more often that title gets updates. CO has unfortunately been at the bottom of the income for a long time (and most likely still is). The recent surge of updates appears to be more in line with "bringing more interest back" rather than "has sufficient income", most likely in hopes of bringing that income back up high enough to make continued updates worth the investment. Cryptic stated that they don't intend to cross-subsidise their games, so the income from one goes to maintaining only that game.
Of course CO is in that awkward spot of "updates are required to keep interest and bring better income" and "not enough income to maintain frequent and quality updates without cross-subsidization"... however CO is also deserved some cross-subsidization as it was income from CO that went to help fund development of NW and STO.
Throw money at the company for a game you're already paying for. That's the advice you're giving to gold subs, and that concept does seem really weird to me.
Not necessary for retcons. As a gold sub you not only get a free retcon at lvl 40 but you also get free retcons as vet rewards.
As a gold sub each of my new toons start with 6 free retcons (through vet rewards) and gain another at lvl 40.
Throw money at the company for a game you're already paying for. That's the advice you're giving to gold subs, and that concept does seem really weird to me.
Not necessary. As a gold sub you not only get a free retcon at lvl 40 but you also get free retcons as vet rewards.
As a gold sub each of my new toons start with 6 free retcons (through vet rewards) and gain another at lvl 40.
But the retcon still costs too much.
....
See nothing has changed, the price is still too high.
CHAMPIONS ONLINE:Join Date: Apr 2008
And playing by myself since Aug 2009 Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
Comments
If it's going to cost you 400g total to replace your passive today...that should still cost 400g. Even if in the future functionality is improved in a way where you don't have to remove and re-add everything else.
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Could it do a better job? For sure. That doesn't mean its existence should be invalidated by lowering retcon costs to the point of making the entire game the person's powerhouse.
PARSER USAGE GUIDE: click here for an easy how-to ٩(๑･ิᴗ･ิ)۶٩(･ิᴗ･ิ๑)۶
Spectre beats Eido in an SG run: VIDEO HERE
The price isn't the problem. The problem is the system and bugged/broken powers... Rather than wasting resorces adjusting the price they should fix the UI, create a more user friendly retcon system, and fix the bugged/broken powers.
The only thing with retcons I expect Cryptic to honor in practice is to provide free tokens each and every time they make a drastic change to any powers.
Compared to some of the other MMOs I've played where a power / ability choice upon levelling up means a permanent one, and that the whole build has to be respec'ed even if its one power / ability choice to undo, yes, CO is pretty generous with how it allows players to playtest their power choices before confirming them. Well of course, let's immediately assume the worst case scenario. Let's also assume that the player is such a moron that they can't put two and two together when testing out new powers and power synergies while in the PH. If somebody has to "cough" up 500 globals to fix their toon, it means that:
1) They're already level 40.
2) They would already have gotten a retcon token.
Coughing up 500 globals is easy. Get 5 keys from the Z store and sell them off at the auction house for around the standard market price of 100g each. Spend a little money in the game, be a little wiser with the build this time around.
Existence of bugs is unavoidable in any MMO game. Some always get fixed and others don't due to whatever programming roadblocks. That doesn't mean that certain features shouldn't be monetized especially when its a F2P MMO. The high global cost is supposed to be the alternative to not paying for a retcon. Has always been from the start and is very unlikely to change.
These decisions are important and should carry a lot of weight. As others have pointed out: the bugs, imbalance, and lack of information should be resolved directly. Those are not reasons for doing anything other than fixing them. That's what's going to make the game better.
PARSER USAGE GUIDE: click here for an easy how-to ٩(๑･ิᴗ･ิ)۶٩(･ิᴗ･ิ๑)۶
Spectre beats Eido in an SG run: VIDEO HERE
So my advice is to save up the G while leveling and then do a full retcon and swap things around until you know you're satisfied. Best way to make money I found is to -not- just spam alerts, unless you feel like going insane. Sell mods, convert Q into Z and sell keys, run Andrith, and maybe do some costume piece farming.
In a free game, you gotta pay somehow. Time is money.
Many of us don't dump real money into keys, so we can't sell them for 100g a pop or don't have 300-500g items to put up on the auction house. Throw money at the company for a game you're already paying for. That's the advice you're giving to gold subs, and that concept does seem really weird to me.
Many of us are not comfortable throwing money at the cash shop and hoping for the best. I pay for my gold subscription because I don't like the F2P model, and that's all I'm willing to give.
I remember I was initially very annoyed at the slow rate it takes to get Onslaught gear, but now, months later, I am glad I couldn't just scoop up everything I wanted in a week of play.
Saving up Gs is not tough in Champs, and you don't have to just spam Smash Alerts. Play the game, do missions and events, sell the occasional rare drop you get, etc. After a a week or two, you'll have the Gs. During that time, you got to play the game.
Whoever you are, be that person one hundred percent. Don't compromise on your identity.
Did an unexpected surge in cash shop sales inspire the Onslaught update? I find that unlikely. Many game companies use big updates to re-spark interest and create a resurgence of cash flow (from both subs and cash shop), not hold back updates until X amount of dollars are made in cash shop sales.
we have had Devs put onto STO and NW when they needed help, resulting in CO getting nothing. This results in players leaving and less money coming in.
http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/championsonline/#/discussion/253377/champions-online-returning-to-cryptic-studios-in-los-gatos-california/p1
this gives you an idea.
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Of course CO is in that awkward spot of "updates are required to keep interest and bring better income" and "not enough income to maintain frequent and quality updates without cross-subsidization"... however CO is also deserved some cross-subsidization as it was income from CO that went to help fund development of NW and STO.
As a gold sub each of my new toons start with 6 free retcons (through vet rewards) and gain another at lvl 40.
Click here to check out my costumes/milleniumguardian (MG) in-game/We need more tights, stances and moods
But the retcon still costs too much.
....
See nothing has changed, the price is still too high.
And playing by myself since Aug 2009
Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
Click here to check out my costumes/milleniumguardian (MG) in-game/We need more tights, stances and moods
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