You didn't lobby for anything, your concerns just happened to be addressed when somebody else thought it might have been a good idea. Nobody is reading this, nobody 'cares'.
This game is so far on the back burner for PW, I'm surprised they honestly thought they could go to it to suck up a few extra bucks.
If we can't actually talk about these things, or be heard by people who can actually influence things, then yes, we may as well get mad. And that is the problem here. They should know we're mad, and they ought to be concerned. But this is a dying game. They know it, and we know it. And even taking pity into consideration, it's not worth it's price.
If I want to own the "best" costume sets on the market I'd have to forwards enough money to be able to buy myself [Sword] for god's sake, add in the bundles and that's enough for two [Sword]'s.
The price for "basic" costume sets has needlessly gone up from 475 to 600, probably to make it so that subscribers can't buy them with their monthly stipends alone unless they accrue it for more than a month, this making their more inclined to spend extra money on the game to get the Zen needed before the extra month's passed.
Sets that have low quality parts, a low number of parts, or only gender specific parts are "full price" 600 Zen instead of being 375 Zen with the rest of the (I quote) "older sets, usually less polished and with a relatively small list of pieces."
This is clearly devised to make people invest more money either because PWE is demanding higher profits from a game that isn't doing as well as they want it to or because they're trying to milk a game they predict doesn't have much longer to live.
Either way they're not doing the smart thing of asking you to either keep making new storylines*, add new powers**, or listen to the community begging you to unlock the costume creator limits***, all of which would make the players love you more and thus make them want to invest more money in the game naturally instead of artificially.
* Preferably like the old comic series or adventure packs in length/structure, not the Mechanon storyline which was way too short despite all the really nice costume pieces we got out of it. ** Actual new power sets, not just 1-2 recycled NPC powers. Although NPC powers would be good if they were actually packaged in a healthy number, such as a "Voodoo Sorcery" set based on the Sovereign Sons powers, a "Twisted Celestial" set based on the Nephilim powers, or power armor powers bundled together as an expansion of the Power Armor set. *** The skeleton category clearly shows that this is possible and that clipping isn't an issue either, so far your reason for not doing this boils down to "because I said so".
PS: In reference to my point about powers above, making FULL lists alternate powers for more sets the way you have for Telepathy would probably be a good idea and the people would probably like it. (See ** for examples)
I still feel like we're not getting enough, if any, active development on this game. Not enough to justify any of these prices. Can we honestly ask how much we're getting for our money here? Considering Cryptic North was supposed to be our dedicated dev team, we really don't have as much to show for it after this many months. I can see the most expensive sets being no more than 750z, but 1000z is ridiculous. Yes, they are nicer sets, but this is how sets should have been from the get go. Full set of costume pieces, most materials availible, variant pieces. That's how a costume set should be, so raising the price is like gouging us with a pointy stick.
While this game isn't nearly as broken and bugged as sto is, it's still lacking any real development since a lot of what we've had was already at "work in progress" status before CN came in. Most of the last Archetype was powers already in game, two unusable yet ingame powers, and maybe one new one?
We all know that Cryptic has dropped this game in development terms, it really doesn't make sense to raise the prices on anything. I said it before, nothing in this game is worth the $10, so why are they raising the prices of anything? If anything, they should be dropping all of the prices on everything, to at least sell more of it before the nextgen Superhero mmos release.
As much as we love and enjoy the devs who do give us the time of day *stands like buddychrist* "I'm lookin' at you TT", I just think this is a big mistake to ask for more money when we're not getting anything out of it.
Thank you TT for posting this list. I must admit, I do not like how the costume sets are spread out among the tier prices. There are more than 20 costume sets within the 375, 600 and 750 zen tiers; this will give the devs a good reason to make only 1000z costume sets. I can hear it now, "Well, since there are a variety of costume sets at the lower tiers, we feel it's time to give you guys the quality costumes you deserve, and unfortunately they will cost 1000z."
It seems that most, if not all, of the costume sets that are free to gold/lifetime members are within the 375z tier. Lifetime members should at least have the choice of recieving one 1000z costume set for free and gold members should have the choice of recieving one 750z costume set for free. Why? Because in my opinion, the value of the gold and lifetime memerships are going down; without new content to present to the players and the recent price increase having a membership is not as enticing as it once was. The emblems should be free perks just for signing up and playing the game; they are not worth one red zen! (pun intended)
Please consider raising the stipend to 750z; that way, the player can decide to either use it for a "decent" costume purchase now or wait 2 months to get the "premium" costume set. Since there is always the possibility of other store items to fall into this "tier" price system, the stipend may as well be raised now instead of later.
Let us now recount the number of times calm deliberation has made any sort of impact in this game with reversing any number of previous poor decisions.
And now visit the frothy forums of your choice (I recommend STO for this exercise), and tell me how many times childish tantrums have made and sort of impact with that game with reversing any number of "poor" decisions.
In most forums, every change of any sort, without exception, is greeted with wailing and gnashing of teeth, fervent declarations that this change is the one that will End It All, and over-the-top proclamations that this or that user is Leaving Forever and everyone else is supposed to be utterly devastated by this news. (In my experience, these same people quietly creep back in after a few days.) And none of this makes the least damned bit of difference - the change becomes the new norm, people either settle down or continue crying at every opportunity, and when the next change comes those same folks are at it again, screaming about how this new change is The Worst Thing Ever, even if it's in fact changing back the thing they didn't like the first time.
I'll take calm, adult deliberation, thanks.
"Science teaches us to expect -- demand -- more than just eerie mysteries. What use is a puzzle that can't be solved? Patience is fine, but I'm not going to stop asking the universe to make sense!"
It must be nice to get to remain so very passive in all of this. Though not everyone is in a position to as easily shrug it off. Now, it's good this doesn't seem to concern you much, but the last thing this needs is more PW cheer leading thrown about.
Happy with the changes? Good, you needn't bother any longer. You can go be jolly about any an all other upcoming things the company might have in the works. You can leave us to our boiling out the pot.
It must be nice to get to remain so very passive in all of this. Though not everyone is in a position to as easily shrug it off. Now, it's good this doesn't seem to concern you much, but the last thing this needs is more PW cheer leading thrown about.
Happy with the changes? Good, you needn't bother any longer. You can go be jolly about any an all other upcoming things the company might have in the works. You can leave us to our boiling out the pot.
Honest question:
Are you actually saying that those happy with, or at least not unhappy with, a change should be silent on the matter so that only those who are unhappy will be heard ?
You're going to leave because something you don't need to buy is too expensive? I usually just don't buy it. When I played WoW, I didn't buy the $25 sparkle pony; while I do play STO, I didn't buy the $125 Delta Rising ship-and-race-and-trait pack. And if I think any of the costume sets here are more than they're worth, I just won't buy them. But I'm not going to quit over it.
Because the filter is there to catch the nimrods who can't be bothered to read the ToS when they sign it (which you have to do before you can finish even creating an account). It doesn't relieve the players of the responsibility for obeying the rules, any more than the balcony placed just below the top floor of a county office building near here means it's okay to jump off the roof.
So basically, doing some math and taking into account that some costumes are lowered in price, we get an increase in costume Prices at over 20%, with nothing in return.
- Better new Costumes? Hmm well no, all the wording gives us is to keep the actual level (wich can be pretty bad, for example the missing textures on the scoundrel jacket on every material that isnt cloth), not increasing.
- Bug-Fixing? Not tied to this Price-Increase, it will happen "as usual", wich usually means that one or two minor fixes a year will be the best we can expect. Clipping Errors? If any of those were ever fixed it must have been before I started playing.
- Enabling new Material-Options or lifting some costume creator restrictions? Not tied to this Price-increase, they "may" happen though. Well it "may" happen that a meteor of pure gold hits my lawn tomorrow too.
- looking at that Price-List its damn obvious that quality is a very minor factor in the decision in wich price-tier a costume ends up. The ones they can hope to get the most sales out of go in the upper tier, the older ones (already sold so often), the gold-free ones (big part of the player base has no need buying them anyway) and those that are just undesireable end up in the bottom tier. So the real price increase (especially for new gold-members) might be a lot steeper than those 20%.
So thanks for the heads-up and not outright lying (at least I hope so) in the meaningless lip-service about caring for the games development. Who ever believes a second that this will actually benefit the players might need to check in with reality.
And yea I second what a lot of people here already voiced, the change irks me for its obvious CO-squeezing (my hope that this will in any way increase COs funding is... non existant) but overall, why should I really care for a game whos Managers and Devs obviously see as a dying cash-cow that has to be squeezed for the last drops before feeding it to the dogs.
*Slowly raises hand*
Uh guys, I wasn't reading the forums then, and I have no idea where to find them in the mass of old "Archived Posts", but I belive c-store costume prices were changed when Questionite was added to the game, and other C-store items prices adjusted as well. This sort of thing has happened before, perhaps not to such a tiered extreme, but it has happened.
Can we please not panic, start a riot or shoot the messenger?
I'm silver, and nearly all of my Q and C-points goes to character slots, costume slots or costume sets. I dont buy them often, and I would like to have more of them, but if this set price increase allows the devs more funding to work on other parts of the game [like, y'know, more content?] then I'm cool with it. I just have to stock up more Q and buying my To-have list will simply take a little longer. A bit annoying, sure... But I can deal with it.
Why can't you?
*Slowly raises hand*
Uh guys, I wasn't reading the forums then, and I have no idea where to find them in the mass of old "Archived Posts", but I belive c-store costume prices were changed when Questionite was added to the game, and other C-store items prices adjusted as well. This sort of thing has happened before, perhaps not to such a tiered extreme, but it has happened.
Can we please not panic, start a riot or shoot the messenger?
I'm silver, and nearly all of my Q and C-points goes to character slots, costume slots or costume sets. I dont buy them often, and I would like to have more of them, but if this set price increase allows the devs more funding to work on other parts of the game [like, y'know, more content?] then I'm cool with it. I just have to stock up more Q and buying my To-have list will simply take a little longer. A bit annoying, sure... But I can deal with it.
Why can't you?
^____^
Pshaw, No one remembers things from that far back :P
Looking at the pricing, it seems like thing are shaking out about as expected. Prices in general are going up, but with putting the top tier at 1000, hopefully we'll be seeing costume sets in that vein more often. I'd love to see the Cadillac costume sets dominating in the future.
*Slowly raises hand*
Uh guys, I wasn't reading the forums then, and I have no idea where to find them in the mass of old "Archived Posts", but I belive c-store costume prices were changed when Questionite was added to the game, and other C-store items prices adjusted as well. This sort of thing has happened before, perhaps not to such a tiered extreme, but it has happened.
Can we please not panic, start a riot or shoot the messenger?
I'm silver, and nearly all of my Q and C-points goes to character slots, costume slots or costume sets. I dont buy them often, and I would like to have more of them, but if this set price increase allows the devs more funding to work on other parts of the game [like, y'know, more content?] then I'm cool with it. I just have to stock up more Q and buying my To-have list will simply take a little longer. A bit annoying, sure... But I can deal with it.
Why can't you?
Because there are lot of "IF's".
And the Costume pricing itself didn't change, just the C to to the Z.
And they did kill the messenger in the ancient Greece, if he bought Bad News(or No News At All...)
CHAMPIONS ONLINE:Join Date: Apr 2008
And playing by myself since Aug 2009 Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
This is one of the WORST, most lazy and less detailed Costume Parts the Z store ever got
The Science VESTs are freaking RAW, they don't even have details or textures, they are made of Plastic! You are able to make a BETTER Scitentist costume with the already available costumes (HECK even the Firefighter's Jacket makes a BETTER scientist costume because it actually has DETAILS)
So you are gonna make this Pathetic set EVEN more expensive
It DOESN'T Deserve the 600 Zen Price
Neither Urban Anime Costume deserve the 750 Zen price at the current state, Buggy, the Vests' Pockets cannot be coloured as Advertised and have NO Textures
Those two costumes set DON'T Deserve those Prices! UNLESS they get redone, get additional textures and materials
At least the Animal Heads & Masks got the Price it worth
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergiesPlaying since 1 February 2011 98+ Characters (7 ATs, 91 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
-yes, hello? We're fixing prices atm, we're raising the price of everything by 100% and reducing the price of the useless stuff by 20%. Thank you for making sure Neverwinter Online will get another expansion CO players.
So thanks for the heads-up and not outright lying (at least I hope so) in the meaningless lip-service about caring for the games development. Who ever believes a second that this will actually benefit the players might need to check in with reality.
And yea I second what a lot of people here already voiced, the change irks me for its obvious CO-squeezing (my hope that this will in any way increase COs funding is... non existant) but overall, why should I really care for a game whos Managers and Devs obviously see as a dying cash-cow that has to be squeezed for the last drops before feeding it to the dogs.
Just like the Government, they don't do anything that doesn't serve their self interest.
I take this quote from a review that I agree with.
"customisation is so linear; everyone is after the optimal dps:survivability ratio with 0 reliance on other players = autonomous gameplay... Players don't need each other anymore... which in my opinion is a bad thing."
The lists at the link should be alphabetized so it's easier to find what you are looking for by name. Less than 15 minutes work for someone.
My bad. Actually took about 3 minutes to put them in a more useful order. Feel free to copy and paste to the other page.
1000 ZEN
Cosmic Knight Costume Set
Costume Variety Pack Bundle
Halloween All in One Bundle
Holoforce Costume Set
Power Armor Bundle
Psionic Dragon Costume Set
Robotic Samurai Costume Set
750 ZEN
Arabian Nights Costume Set
City Street Defender Costume Set
Cyborg Beast costume set
Dark Ages Fantasy costume set
Golden Age Costume Set
Harajuku Girl Costume Set
Heroic Formal costume set
Iron Age Costume Set
Legacy Power Armor costume set
Power Armor Costume Set
Pulp Costume Set
Retro Sci-Fi Costume Set
Roinesh Costume Set
Sakura Mecha Armor costume set
Sci-Fi Soldier costume set
Steelhawk Costume Set
Tactical Armor Costume Set
The Nighthawk Costume Set
Urban Anime Costume
Victorian Costume Set
Wizard and Witch Set
600 ZEN
Ancient Rune Armor Set
Beast Heads Costume Set
Bone Armor Costume Set
Cape Collection costume set
Dark Fantasy Armor Costume Set
Dryad costume set
Feather Armor Costume Set
Geo Armor Set
Halloween Creature costume set
Halloween Mask Pack
Hi-tech costume set
Jet Pack Costume Set
Luchador Costume Set
Magical Girl costume set
Melee Weapon Pack
Ranged Weapons Pack Modern
Scientist Costume Set
Stars Tights set
Steampunk Cyborg Costume Set
Tesla Coil costume set
The Armory Collection: Patterned Armor
375 ZEN
Animal Heads & Masks
Cardboard Armor Costume Set
Classic Heroic Tights Costume Set
Dark Demon Costume Set
Demon Knight Costume Set
Elemental A-Symmetry Tights
Epic Samurai Costume Set
Halloween Hats Costume Set
Halloween Skeleton Costume Set
Halloween Webs Costume Set
Hats and Heads Costume Set
High Plains Drifter Costume Set
Martial Arts Master Costume Set
New Millennium Tights Costume Set
Ninja Warrior Costume Set
Pharaonic Master Costume Set
Redeemed Villain Costume Set
Serpent Armor Costume Set
Shining Knight Costume Set
Soldier of Fortune Costume Set
Spartan Armor Costume Set
Swamp King Costume Set
Tech Tights Costume Set
Viking Warrior Costume Set
Wild Things Costume Set
Wild Things Costume Set
Wired Cyborg Costume Set
Zombie Costume Set
I guess I have a rather neutral outlook on this whole thing. Even in semi-maintenance mode they have to cover costs, and inflation (even during the recession) is a fact of life. So, something in the game is going to have to cost more over time. I'm guessing there would be even more howling if they raised subscription prices, so this route was deemed less objectionable to the most people. Would I like all prices for everything I have to buy to remain frozen? Sure, but it just won't happen.
Well, the Delta Rising pack was $125 on introduction, but I believe it's gone up to around $150 - that was preannounced, by the way.
As for ship prices, I don't know if they've gone up previously, because honestly I didn't pay that much attention, but currently they start at 500 Zen for the Tier 1 ships (which you'll outlevel after a few hours of gameplay at most), and range up to, IIRC, around 3000 Zen for Tier 6. (I'll go check out the store in STO later and refine these figures; they're down for maintenance now, of course.)
OTOH, in STO, pay attention during the seasonal events (mostly Summer and Anniversary) and you can pick up some of those ships for free; I recently equipped most of my toons with the Tier 6 Kobali Samsar cruiser, at the expense of having to play the game for 25 days straight. (Such a sacrifice, I know, but there were still people complaining about the "grind".)
"Science teaches us to expect -- demand -- more than just eerie mysteries. What use is a puzzle that can't be solved? Patience is fine, but I'm not going to stop asking the universe to make sense!"
You didn't lobby for anything, your concerns just happened to be addressed when somebody else thought it might have been a good idea. Nobody is reading this, nobody 'cares'.
This game is so far on the back burner for PW, I'm surprised they honestly thought they could go to it to suck up a few extra bucks.
If we can't actually talk about these things, or be heard by people who can actually influence things, then yes, we may as well get mad. And that is the problem here. They should know we're mad, and they ought to be concerned. But this is a dying game. They know it, and we know it. And even taking pity into consideration, it's not worth it's price.
Choose your enemies carefully, because they will define you / Make them interesting, because in some ways they will mind you
They're not there in the beginning, but when your story ends / Gonna last with you longer than your friends
I guess I have a rather neutral outlook on this whole thing. Even in semi-maintenance mode they have to cover costs, and inflation (even during the recession) is a fact of life. So, something in the game is going to have to cost more over time.
I was partly thinking along the same lines, lower server populations and higer wages and more man hours spent means somethigns gotta move. By the looks of the list 600z is the new average costume price to be unless they do a good job or great job.
How much the Ship prices went up in STO
And Companions in NW?
[\QUOTE]
As mentioned STO recently introduced new $30 ships, and $5 partial upgrade tokens for old ships. Think the new tier of ship here.
NW is barly 2 years old, some prices actually went down after beta cause they were (and still are) stupid high. Over the 2 years they've introduced pricier mounts, and 2 separate sets of "artifact items" (each with multiple items allowed to hold) that use cash shop consumables at certain points (or alot of luck/grinding to find the rare items in game). The new update allows you to carry another one of these items and more/upgraded selection.
So while not price hikes on standard stuff, more expensive stuff, and just allowing more stuff to eat consumables
Hmmm, since I don't play CO as often as most of the folks here, I've kinda held off commenting on this.
However, I have to say that I always thought that the CURRENT costume prices were too high, which would explain why I've never bought them. Granted, I've never dug around to actually look at how the full sets look in-game, but have just gone by the promo pix that have been shown from time to time. None of them have made me say "I need that".
And now it seems that the sets generally considered to be 'bad' are going to be cheaper. The ones that may rate a 'so-so' are getting a slight bump and the ones considered good or better are going to be increased significantly.
If I wouldn't pay for the good or better ones as they are priced currently, I sure as heck won't purchase them after the price increase. My guess would be that this is an attempt to get new players to shell out more money for the 'good stuff', since they wouldn't know that these things used to be cheaper.
Oh well, I get that Cryptic needs to make money but this move just leaves me scratching my head.
"We can't get things to sell at their current prices, so let's raise the prices!"
Next thing you know they'll be raising the price on the Freeform slot for Silvers so that they can make more money off that. :rolleyes:
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
"We can't get things to sell at their current prices, so let's raise the prices!"
You proceed from a faulty assumption. Glance around at some of the other toons running around; you'll see that there's no problem "getting things to sell" at their current prices. Well, aside from the emblem packs, of course, because frankly the Bestial and Sci-Fi Emblems are kind of useless. (Heck, there's only one in the Weapon Emblems I'm even tempted by, because it might be cool to have a toon who's such a huge Avenged Sevenfold fan that he wears the bat-winged sword as an emblem - even more so if they get those working on the Headphones.)
On the other tentacle, now I'm glad I grabbed Holoforce and Psionic Dragon when they were still cheap...
"Science teaches us to expect -- demand -- more than just eerie mysteries. What use is a puzzle that can't be solved? Patience is fine, but I'm not going to stop asking the universe to make sense!"
Glance around at some of the other toons running around; you'll see that there's no problem "getting things to sell" at their current prices.
I see other characters all the time, I have no idea what pieces are base stuff or things that can be earned in-game and what ones are C-Store items. Okay, some are easier to spot than others, but not all. And just because items were selling before, doesn't mean they will now with higher prices.
Would you buy any current sets you may have at the higher price point?
How about if they lowered the price on everything, are there things you were on the fence about but may decide to buy since they would be cheaper?
None of the pieces/sets I've seen advertised over the years look good enough to *me* to spend the money they wanted for them. Even when they run sales it's still too much for *me*.
Now, I'm not averse to purchasing costume sets as I bought pretty much every costume set that was released in CoH. It's just the sets here do not appeal.
I'm not saying everyone should have the same sense of style I do, heaven forbid. This is all personal preference and opinion.
Perhaps I did exaggerate that the items weren't selling, since I know people who have bought them. It just doesn't make sense to me that if you want something to sell better, raising the price seems like the opposite of a good way to do that.
This is why I'm not in business though. As much grief as I give Cryptic sometimes, someone there or at PW at the very least, must have a clue or they'd be out of business.
I get that fancier sets take more time to create and that the price should reflect that.
On future sets.
Raising the price on already released sets, where they've likely made their money back, just seems odd.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I'm willing to pay 1000 Zen for the lockbox only costume sets (each, and they would be auto-consumed so you can't put them onto the AH). Can you make that happen?
No plans for that. While I know not everyone likes the lockbox model of monetization, it has its place in our business strategy. While we aren't going to cut other methods (like direct C-Store releases), we aren't going to cut lockboxes out either, and that change would drastically drop sales of keys.
Though I would like to add that charging TT with any of this nonsense is ridiculous, and I hope it hasn't been going on. The man is just the messenger, the go between for us seething masses, and a brick wall.
Thanks, but that's not quite true. While my title still says Community Manager, my actual position is Assistant Product Manager. I'm basically the ranking stakeholder for CO on the PWE side, and I help with publicity, monetization, community work, etc. (I just keep the CM tag because that's what I do on the forums.)
We may not be seen a lot in-game, but we do lurk in chat, and we do skim the forums.
But you still don't care, TT
frankly 600 Zens for the scientist costume is an outrage : it totally doesn't fit in your description of raising prices, beside the glasses it has no new material like glass, holoforce or psi, it is amateurishly designed and has an amazing number of clipping bugs like the skirt, not per say an abysmal lack of textures on the blouse which looks like cardboard and the number of pieces is scarce to say the least
Same with the feathered armor which has a ridiculous amount of pieces and is quite an old costume
Same with magical girl and harajuku which should be half listed price since they can be worn only by half of our characters
Why do you want we believe you since you do not even obey your own rules?
And if i buy the weapon packs can i equip them on my nemesis ? Since those specific costume sets cannot be used on nemeses they should as well have a significant price decrease since i cannot use on this particular purpose unlike the other costume sets....unless you are announcing that you finally fixed the weapon nemesis bug which lasts since the creation of the nemesis system?
So while not price hikes on standard stuff, more expensive stuff, and just allowing more stuff to eat consumables
Pretty much off topic, but I really hate cash shop crafting items. Oddly I have no problem with boosts, even drop rate boosters.
Likewise way off topic, NW's astral gems ruined the game for me. I went in thinking 'yeah, AD&D semi-gritty fantasy!' and something about the shop keepers babbling about astral gems just felt way too FFVII/anime to me.
CO had simply its shop prices adjusted to fall in line with other PWE titles. Including two other Cryptic games.
This was to be expected at a some point in future.
Maybe it's a sign that CO is to get some more attention. Or maybe not. But we had it coming since a very long time.
Now, that some of costume sets are bugged and need attention, is a rather unrelated issue.
Though, with costumes being more expensive, people will pay more attention to bugged releases, so overall quality standards needs to be raised.
I've got to say I'm curious what they will do if they don't make more revenue with this price increase. If they end up making less money will they revert to the more profitable original rates?
Highly unlikely, Jaz, i have never heard any company said " we did a terrible mistake, we apologize, we should have listened to you", someone said here that he will never report bug again on costumes on pts because obviously whatever he says, devs don't take in consideration what he says, yes they can fix minor bugs ONCE the product is released, but they never RETHINK the whole concept when it has been approved internally
People suggested great ideas on king sekhen and scientist costumes on pts forums, have they been listened to? no. Same with vehicles, same with aura unlock account wide, same with nemesis bug, same with more contents, same with queen of the pale demonflame bug, same with an extended zone city map, same with the present thread.
If they gain less money with the present +85% price increase they will likely increase something else to compensate
Expect some well-thought speech about how underpriced the auras are and how since now on you will pay your energy aura pack 1000 zens
*Slowly raises hand*
Uh guys, I wasn't reading the forums then, and I have no idea where to find them in the mass of old "Archived Posts", but I belive c-store costume prices were changed when Questionite was added to the game, and other C-store items prices adjusted as well. This sort of thing has happened before, perhaps not to such a tiered extreme, but it has happened.
Can we please not panic, start a riot or shoot the messenger?
I'm silver, and nearly all of my Q and C-points goes to character slots, costume slots or costume sets. I dont buy them often, and I would like to have more of them, but if this set price increase allows the devs more funding to work on other parts of the game [like, y'know, more content?] then I'm cool with it. I just have to stock up more Q and buying my To-have list will simply take a little longer. A bit annoying, sure... But I can deal with it.
Why can't you?
^____^
The only ones I've really seen panicking are people I've never, ever seen on here or in game. For all I know, some of the heavy duty ranters are plants from still-in-development superhero games, or still-bitter CoH trolls, not actual, regular players.
That being said, to the two main points in your post:
1) As Finn indicated, prices weren't increased, the number attached to the price just got higher when C changed to Z. That was a great change, since it now reflects a simple 1Z to $.01 conversion. It also came with a corresponding increase to the number next to the stipend.
2) I would love to believe that money made from increased sales will be reinvested in CO to create meaningful improvements. I just haven't seen any evidence that it has been the case in the past, or even any evidence that it has ever been the plan to do so. Actually, it seems that each (trying to avoid buzzwords like "corporate greed" or "cash grab") optimistic monetization has led to less and less development, and more and more bugs that go completely untouched. Five years of experience has left me doubting.
This isn't the worst thing that could happen, obviously. The lights are still on, and if I don't want to buy something, nobody will ever make me. I'll still be playing CO till it shuts down, we will still get some costume sets that are great, and I made my peace with never getting new powers or zones years ago.
Mainly, this irks because it is a change with no positive outcome that any of us will ever see, and it has been marketed in terms that are at best disingenuous. I will gladly eat my words if these changes lead to even a quarter of the annoyances, bugs, and broken features that have been untouched for years getting some attention, or if we got even one of the new power sets people have been wanting for years, or if it freed up enough time and resources to simply re-open old leveling paths, put old costumes back in, etc., you get the idea.
I just won't hold my breath while I wait to be proven wrong. I'll be punching bad guys, wearing everything other than a $6 Scientist set.
The only ones I've really seen panicking are people I've never, ever seen on here or in game. For all I know, some of the heavy duty ranters are plants from still-in-development superhero games, or still-bitter CoH trolls, not actual, regular players.
Nah. I'm fine with it. But if you WANT to have that conversation, we can certainly do so. Personally, as was said earlier, I've been rather fond of the fact that the CO forums are relatively mature and calm.
For me it's not an issue of listening to customers (who may or may not do what they say on a forum) but what the actual cash flow tells them. E.g. if they were selling 20 of something at $5 before the change, but were only selling 6 at $10 afterwards, and their stated goal is to make more money than they were before, it would seem logical that they then adjust the price to maximize their income. I'll be curious to see if they adjust prices at all somewhere down the line once the new prices have been around awhile. E.g. I can't imagine that they'll make a lot of money on the poorly done scientist set at the 600Z. Will they drop it to 375Z in the future?
Highly unlikely, Jaz, i have never heard any company said " we did a terrible mistake, we apologize, we should have listened to you", someone said here that he will never report bug again on costumes on pts because obviously whatever he says, devs don't take in consideration what he says, yes they can fix minor bugs ONCE the product is released, but they never RETHINK the whole concept when it has been approved internally
People suggested great ideas on king sekhen and scientist costumes on pts forums, have they been listened to? no. Same with vehicles, same with aura unlock account wide, same with nemesis bug, same with more contents, same with queen of the pale demonflame bug, same with an extended zone city map, same with the present thread.
If they gain less money with the present +85% price increase they will likely increase something else to compensate
Expect some well-thought speech about how underpriced the auras are and how since now on you will pay your energy aura pack 1000 zens
Nah. I'm fine with it. But if you WANT to have that conversation, we can certainly do so. Personally, as was said earlier, I've been rather fond of the fact that the CO forums are relatively mature and calm.
If you're fine with things, and are relatively calm and mature, then you're obviously not one of the trolls I was talking about.
As for ship prices, I don't know if they've gone up previously, because honestly I didn't pay that much attention, but currently they start at 500 Zen for the Tier 1 ships (which you'll outlevel after a few hours of gameplay at most), and range up to, IIRC, around 3000 Zen for Tier 6. (I'll go check out the store in STO later and refine these figures; they're down for maintenance now, of course.)
That was a couple of hours (and a couple of pages) ago, but I have the figures now, excepting the big LOR and DR bundle packs (because I flat forgot to look those up).
Bridge Packs, to change the appearance of your ship's bridge for those rare occasions you venture into it - 400 Zen. Most packs range from 2 to 4 bridges for that price, although the Klingon Bird of Prey pack includes six variants.
Shuttles and Fighters go for 500Z each, as do the Tier 1 ships, the ones you'll fly as a fresh Lieutenant. You'll outlevel those quickly, as I noted above.
Tier 2 ships go for 750Z, Tier 3 for 1000Z, Tier 4 (the ones you'll fly as a Captain, or a Commander if you're Romulan) 1500Z, and Tier 5, the Rear Admiral ships, 2500Z, although there are 3-ship bundles for the Odyssey-class, Bortasq'-class, and one big ol' Rom ship class I forget the name of, for 4000Z.
The newest tier, Tier 6, which can also be flown by Rear Admirals and above but which are "balanced" for Vice Admiral and above, run 3000Z each, with 3-ship bundles of the new Command Cruisers for 6000Z. Also, you can purchase an Upgrade Token, to upgrade a Tier 5 ship to Tier 5-U (gaining a few hull points and one bridge seat) for 700Z.
There are also Fleet Ships, slightly-upgraded versions of the existing ships, which require the purchase of Fleet Modules. The number of Modules needed varies according to what you're upgrading and what you already have unlocked; each Module costs 500Z.
Uniform packs, which can have as few as one piece, cost 550Z.
Oh, and Master Keys, the STO equivalent of Cosmic Keys of Power? Those run 125Z each.
"Science teaches us to expect -- demand -- more than just eerie mysteries. What use is a puzzle that can't be solved? Patience is fine, but I'm not going to stop asking the universe to make sense!"
I get the feeling I've been too longwinded here so...let's try this from a shorter angle.
-CO was/is in the black.
-CO wants to be more in the black.
-CO wants more profits because it's a business.
-A Tailor Pass is not part of the deal with this price adjustment.
-Content is not part of the deal with this price adjustment.
-Improvements/Additions/Repairs to Costume Sets is not part of the deal with this price adjustment.
-There are currently no announced plans for the future...other than this.
-There has not been a State of The Game in ages.
-Aside from this thread, communication is low to non-existent.
-Some positive QoL Changes have occurred this year.
-Some of them are mostly froob-centric...but still, IMO, long overdue and positive.
-This amount of focus on customization in the face of the state of the tailor and the "polish" with Space Scoundrel and, especially, Mad Scientist appears to be, at the very best, very very poorly timed and perhaps should have been postponed until improvements/repairs could be in the works.
-The current state of the PTS Process is, IMO, only a smidge above that of the Old Cryptic Days presently. This should be addressed.
Not that opinions matter at this point (either TT's or anyone else's). It's clear Cryptic has finally thrown in the towel with this game, so now they'll bleed players with low self-esteem for as much as they can before everyone leaves for Valiance.
If they actually cared for not alienating the player base, they'd just announce new costumes will cost 1000zen BUT put all older costumes under some "legacy category" and keep them at their current price (while still unacceptable, that would at least be less alienating, consumers hate retro-active price changes)... but then, to do that they'd need to care.
Even in semi-maintenance mode they have to cover costs, and inflation (even during the recession) is a fact of life.
And yet it doesn't have to be like this, if you're unaware the why to what is, go research about the Elites and their System causing despair, using the working man as slaves to pay their banksters & Corpses their fraudulent legal tender to keep us in debt, Humanity can do better but we need to wake up and do something about it, otherwise, New World Order anyone?
I take this quote from a review that I agree with.
"customisation is so linear; everyone is after the optimal dps:survivability ratio with 0 reliance on other players = autonomous gameplay... Players don't need each other anymore... which in my opinion is a bad thing."
Just because they don't make themselves known doesn't mean it isn't their, take a good look around and see how people are manipulated, lied, controlled and bought, how do you explain the way things are? all this greed and corruption in the world and most people only see it at a certain level, so where is the root of the proverbial evil? why do these things perpetuate? prey on human nature to profit, you think they're here for our benefit? nope.
I take this quote from a review that I agree with.
"customisation is so linear; everyone is after the optimal dps:survivability ratio with 0 reliance on other players = autonomous gameplay... Players don't need each other anymore... which in my opinion is a bad thing."
How does any of that have anything to do with the subject at hand? Surely you're not trying to compare Cryptic to the likes of the Koch Brothers? You've wandered a bit far afield here.
Comments
This game is so far on the back burner for PW, I'm surprised they honestly thought they could go to it to suck up a few extra bucks.
If we can't actually talk about these things, or be heard by people who can actually influence things, then yes, we may as well get mad. And that is the problem here. They should know we're mad, and they ought to be concerned. But this is a dying game. They know it, and we know it. And even taking pity into consideration, it's not worth it's price.
If I want to own the "best" costume sets on the market I'd have to forwards enough money to be able to buy myself [Sword] for god's sake, add in the bundles and that's enough for two [Sword]'s.
The price for "basic" costume sets has needlessly gone up from 475 to 600, probably to make it so that subscribers can't buy them with their monthly stipends alone unless they accrue it for more than a month, this making their more inclined to spend extra money on the game to get the Zen needed before the extra month's passed.
Sets that have low quality parts, a low number of parts, or only gender specific parts are "full price" 600 Zen instead of being 375 Zen with the rest of the (I quote) "older sets, usually less polished and with a relatively small list of pieces."
This is clearly devised to make people invest more money either because PWE is demanding higher profits from a game that isn't doing as well as they want it to or because they're trying to milk a game they predict doesn't have much longer to live.
Either way they're not doing the smart thing of asking you to either keep making new storylines*, add new powers**, or listen to the community begging you to unlock the costume creator limits***, all of which would make the players love you more and thus make them want to invest more money in the game naturally instead of artificially.
* Preferably like the old comic series or adventure packs in length/structure, not the Mechanon storyline which was way too short despite all the really nice costume pieces we got out of it.
** Actual new power sets, not just 1-2 recycled NPC powers. Although NPC powers would be good if they were actually packaged in a healthy number, such as a "Voodoo Sorcery" set based on the Sovereign Sons powers, a "Twisted Celestial" set based on the Nephilim powers, or power armor powers bundled together as an expansion of the Power Armor set.
*** The skeleton category clearly shows that this is possible and that clipping isn't an issue either, so far your reason for not doing this boils down to "because I said so".
PS: In reference to my point about powers above, making FULL lists alternate powers for more sets the way you have for Telepathy would probably be a good idea and the people would probably like it. (See ** for examples)
@IonutRO
While this game isn't nearly as broken and bugged as sto is, it's still lacking any real development since a lot of what we've had was already at "work in progress" status before CN came in. Most of the last Archetype was powers already in game, two unusable yet ingame powers, and maybe one new one?
We all know that Cryptic has dropped this game in development terms, it really doesn't make sense to raise the prices on anything. I said it before, nothing in this game is worth the $10, so why are they raising the prices of anything? If anything, they should be dropping all of the prices on everything, to at least sell more of it before the nextgen Superhero mmos release.
As much as we love and enjoy the devs who do give us the time of day *stands like buddychrist* "I'm lookin' at you TT", I just think this is a big mistake to ask for more money when we're not getting anything out of it.
Thank you TT for posting this list. I must admit, I do not like how the costume sets are spread out among the tier prices. There are more than 20 costume sets within the 375, 600 and 750 zen tiers; this will give the devs a good reason to make only 1000z costume sets. I can hear it now, "Well, since there are a variety of costume sets at the lower tiers, we feel it's time to give you guys the quality costumes you deserve, and unfortunately they will cost 1000z."
It seems that most, if not all, of the costume sets that are free to gold/lifetime members are within the 375z tier. Lifetime members should at least have the choice of recieving one 1000z costume set for free and gold members should have the choice of recieving one 750z costume set for free. Why? Because in my opinion, the value of the gold and lifetime memerships are going down; without new content to present to the players and the recent price increase having a membership is not as enticing as it once was. The emblems should be free perks just for signing up and playing the game; they are not worth one red zen! (pun intended)
Please consider raising the stipend to 750z; that way, the player can decide to either use it for a "decent" costume purchase now or wait 2 months to get the "premium" costume set. Since there is always the possibility of other store items to fall into this "tier" price system, the stipend may as well be raised now instead of later.
'Caine, miss you bud. Fly high.
In most forums, every change of any sort, without exception, is greeted with wailing and gnashing of teeth, fervent declarations that this change is the one that will End It All, and over-the-top proclamations that this or that user is Leaving Forever and everyone else is supposed to be utterly devastated by this news. (In my experience, these same people quietly creep back in after a few days.) And none of this makes the least damned bit of difference - the change becomes the new norm, people either settle down or continue crying at every opportunity, and when the next change comes those same folks are at it again, screaming about how this new change is The Worst Thing Ever, even if it's in fact changing back the thing they didn't like the first time.
I'll take calm, adult deliberation, thanks.
- David Brin, "Those Eyes"
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Happy with the changes? Good, you needn't bother any longer. You can go be jolly about any an all other upcoming things the company might have in the works. You can leave us to our boiling out the pot.
Honest question:
Are you actually saying that those happy with, or at least not unhappy with, a change should be silent on the matter so that only those who are unhappy will be heard ?
'Caine, miss you bud. Fly high.
Words cut deeper than any knife could. :rolleyes:
- Better new Costumes? Hmm well no, all the wording gives us is to keep the actual level (wich can be pretty bad, for example the missing textures on the scoundrel jacket on every material that isnt cloth), not increasing.
- Bug-Fixing? Not tied to this Price-Increase, it will happen "as usual", wich usually means that one or two minor fixes a year will be the best we can expect. Clipping Errors? If any of those were ever fixed it must have been before I started playing.
- Enabling new Material-Options or lifting some costume creator restrictions? Not tied to this Price-increase, they "may" happen though. Well it "may" happen that a meteor of pure gold hits my lawn tomorrow too.
- looking at that Price-List its damn obvious that quality is a very minor factor in the decision in wich price-tier a costume ends up. The ones they can hope to get the most sales out of go in the upper tier, the older ones (already sold so often), the gold-free ones (big part of the player base has no need buying them anyway) and those that are just undesireable end up in the bottom tier. So the real price increase (especially for new gold-members) might be a lot steeper than those 20%.
So thanks for the heads-up and not outright lying (at least I hope so) in the meaningless lip-service about caring for the games development. Who ever believes a second that this will actually benefit the players might need to check in with reality.
And yea I second what a lot of people here already voiced, the change irks me for its obvious CO-squeezing (my hope that this will in any way increase COs funding is... non existant) but overall, why should I really care for a game whos Managers and Devs obviously see as a dying cash-cow that has to be squeezed for the last drops before feeding it to the dogs.
Uh guys, I wasn't reading the forums then, and I have no idea where to find them in the mass of old "Archived Posts", but I belive c-store costume prices were changed when Questionite was added to the game, and other C-store items prices adjusted as well. This sort of thing has happened before, perhaps not to such a tiered extreme, but it has happened.
Can we please not panic, start a riot or shoot the messenger?
I'm silver, and nearly all of my Q and C-points goes to character slots, costume slots or costume sets. I dont buy them often, and I would like to have more of them, but if this set price increase allows the devs more funding to work on other parts of the game [like, y'know, more content?] then I'm cool with it. I just have to stock up more Q and buying my To-have list will simply take a little longer. A bit annoying, sure... But I can deal with it.
Why can't you?
^____^
Pshaw, No one remembers things from that far back :P
Looking at the pricing, it seems like thing are shaking out about as expected. Prices in general are going up, but with putting the top tier at 1000, hopefully we'll be seeing costume sets in that vein more often. I'd love to see the Cadillac costume sets dominating in the future.
Because there are lot of "IF's".
And the Costume pricing itself didn't change, just the C to to the Z.
And they did kill the messenger in the ancient Greece, if he bought Bad News(or No News At All...)
And playing by myself since Aug 2009
Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
That's why we get such a sudden raise of Z store costumes :rolleyes:
Oh so the full costume price is up...
Are you ****ting me?
This is one of the WORST, most lazy and less detailed Costume Parts the Z store ever got
The Science VESTs are freaking RAW, they don't even have details or textures, they are made of Plastic! You are able to make a BETTER Scitentist costume with the already available costumes (HECK even the Firefighter's Jacket makes a BETTER scientist costume because it actually has DETAILS)
So you are gonna make this Pathetic set EVEN more expensive
It DOESN'T Deserve the 600 Zen Price
Neither Urban Anime Costume deserve the 750 Zen price at the current state, Buggy, the Vests' Pockets cannot be coloured as Advertised and have NO Textures
Those two costumes set DON'T Deserve those Prices! UNLESS they get redone, get additional textures and materials
At least the Animal Heads & Masks got the Price it worth
Thank you for making sure Neverwinter Online will get another expansion CO players.
Just like the Government, they don't do anything that doesn't serve their self interest.
I take this quote from a review that I agree with.
"customisation is so linear; everyone is after the optimal dps:survivability ratio with 0 reliance on other players = autonomous gameplay... Players don't need each other anymore... which in my opinion is a bad thing."
My bad. Actually took about 3 minutes to put them in a more useful order. Feel free to copy and paste to the other page.
1000 ZEN
Cosmic Knight Costume Set
Costume Variety Pack Bundle
Halloween All in One Bundle
Holoforce Costume Set
Power Armor Bundle
Psionic Dragon Costume Set
Robotic Samurai Costume Set
750 ZEN
Arabian Nights Costume Set
City Street Defender Costume Set
Cyborg Beast costume set
Dark Ages Fantasy costume set
Golden Age Costume Set
Harajuku Girl Costume Set
Heroic Formal costume set
Iron Age Costume Set
Legacy Power Armor costume set
Power Armor Costume Set
Pulp Costume Set
Retro Sci-Fi Costume Set
Roinesh Costume Set
Sakura Mecha Armor costume set
Sci-Fi Soldier costume set
Steelhawk Costume Set
Tactical Armor Costume Set
The Nighthawk Costume Set
Urban Anime Costume
Victorian Costume Set
Wizard and Witch Set
600 ZEN
Ancient Rune Armor Set
Beast Heads Costume Set
Bone Armor Costume Set
Cape Collection costume set
Dark Fantasy Armor Costume Set
Dryad costume set
Feather Armor Costume Set
Geo Armor Set
Halloween Creature costume set
Halloween Mask Pack
Hi-tech costume set
Jet Pack Costume Set
Luchador Costume Set
Magical Girl costume set
Melee Weapon Pack
Ranged Weapons Pack Modern
Scientist Costume Set
Stars Tights set
Steampunk Cyborg Costume Set
Tesla Coil costume set
The Armory Collection: Patterned Armor
375 ZEN
Animal Heads & Masks
Cardboard Armor Costume Set
Classic Heroic Tights Costume Set
Dark Demon Costume Set
Demon Knight Costume Set
Elemental A-Symmetry Tights
Epic Samurai Costume Set
Halloween Hats Costume Set
Halloween Skeleton Costume Set
Halloween Webs Costume Set
Hats and Heads Costume Set
High Plains Drifter Costume Set
Martial Arts Master Costume Set
New Millennium Tights Costume Set
Ninja Warrior Costume Set
Pharaonic Master Costume Set
Redeemed Villain Costume Set
Serpent Armor Costume Set
Shining Knight Costume Set
Soldier of Fortune Costume Set
Spartan Armor Costume Set
Swamp King Costume Set
Tech Tights Costume Set
Viking Warrior Costume Set
Wild Things Costume Set
Wild Things Costume Set
Wired Cyborg Costume Set
Zombie Costume Set
50 ZEN
Bestial Emblem Pack
Sci-Fi Emblem Pack
Weapons Emblem Pack
:rolleyes:
How much the Ship prices went up in STO
And Companions in NW?
Or is CO used to keep the Servers rolling?
And playing by myself since Aug 2009
Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
As for ship prices, I don't know if they've gone up previously, because honestly I didn't pay that much attention, but currently they start at 500 Zen for the Tier 1 ships (which you'll outlevel after a few hours of gameplay at most), and range up to, IIRC, around 3000 Zen for Tier 6. (I'll go check out the store in STO later and refine these figures; they're down for maintenance now, of course.)
OTOH, in STO, pay attention during the seasonal events (mostly Summer and Anniversary) and you can pick up some of those ships for free; I recently equipped most of my toons with the Tier 6 Kobali Samsar cruiser, at the expense of having to play the game for 25 days straight. (Such a sacrifice, I know, but there were still people complaining about the "grind".)
- David Brin, "Those Eyes"
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They're not there in the beginning, but when your story ends / Gonna last with you longer than your friends
I was partly thinking along the same lines, lower server populations and higer wages and more man hours spent means somethigns gotta move. By the looks of the list 600z is the new average costume price to be unless they do a good job or great job.
However, I have to say that I always thought that the CURRENT costume prices were too high, which would explain why I've never bought them. Granted, I've never dug around to actually look at how the full sets look in-game, but have just gone by the promo pix that have been shown from time to time. None of them have made me say "I need that".
And now it seems that the sets generally considered to be 'bad' are going to be cheaper. The ones that may rate a 'so-so' are getting a slight bump and the ones considered good or better are going to be increased significantly.
If I wouldn't pay for the good or better ones as they are priced currently, I sure as heck won't purchase them after the price increase. My guess would be that this is an attempt to get new players to shell out more money for the 'good stuff', since they wouldn't know that these things used to be cheaper.
Oh well, I get that Cryptic needs to make money but this move just leaves me scratching my head.
"We can't get things to sell at their current prices, so let's raise the prices!"
Next thing you know they'll be raising the price on the Freeform slot for Silvers so that they can make more money off that. :rolleyes:
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
On the other tentacle, now I'm glad I grabbed Holoforce and Psionic Dragon when they were still cheap...
- David Brin, "Those Eyes"
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"Fear cuts deeper than swords. Just so!"
I see other characters all the time, I have no idea what pieces are base stuff or things that can be earned in-game and what ones are C-Store items. Okay, some are easier to spot than others, but not all. And just because items were selling before, doesn't mean they will now with higher prices.
Would you buy any current sets you may have at the higher price point?
How about if they lowered the price on everything, are there things you were on the fence about but may decide to buy since they would be cheaper?
None of the pieces/sets I've seen advertised over the years look good enough to *me* to spend the money they wanted for them. Even when they run sales it's still too much for *me*.
Now, I'm not averse to purchasing costume sets as I bought pretty much every costume set that was released in CoH. It's just the sets here do not appeal.
I'm not saying everyone should have the same sense of style I do, heaven forbid. This is all personal preference and opinion.
Perhaps I did exaggerate that the items weren't selling, since I know people who have bought them. It just doesn't make sense to me that if you want something to sell better, raising the price seems like the opposite of a good way to do that.
This is why I'm not in business though. As much grief as I give Cryptic sometimes, someone there or at PW at the very least, must have a clue or they'd be out of business.
I get that fancier sets take more time to create and that the price should reflect that.
On future sets.
Raising the price on already released sets, where they've likely made their money back, just seems odd.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Now for my own personal reaction to this wonderful list by TT : AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAA !!
No plans for that. While I know not everyone likes the lockbox model of monetization, it has its place in our business strategy. While we aren't going to cut other methods (like direct C-Store releases), we aren't going to cut lockboxes out either, and that change would drastically drop sales of keys.
Derp. Thanks.
Thanks, but that's not quite true. While my title still says Community Manager, my actual position is Assistant Product Manager. I'm basically the ranking stakeholder for CO on the PWE side, and I help with publicity, monetization, community work, etc. (I just keep the CM tag because that's what I do on the forums.)
We may not be seen a lot in-game, but we do lurk in chat, and we do skim the forums.
But you still don't care, TT
frankly 600 Zens for the scientist costume is an outrage : it totally doesn't fit in your description of raising prices, beside the glasses it has no new material like glass, holoforce or psi, it is amateurishly designed and has an amazing number of clipping bugs like the skirt, not per say an abysmal lack of textures on the blouse which looks like cardboard and the number of pieces is scarce to say the least
Same with the feathered armor which has a ridiculous amount of pieces and is quite an old costume
Same with magical girl and harajuku which should be half listed price since they can be worn only by half of our characters
Why do you want we believe you since you do not even obey your own rules?
And if i buy the weapon packs can i equip them on my nemesis ? Since those specific costume sets cannot be used on nemeses they should as well have a significant price decrease since i cannot use on this particular purpose unlike the other costume sets....unless you are announcing that you finally fixed the weapon nemesis bug which lasts since the creation of the nemesis system?
Pretty much off topic, but I really hate cash shop crafting items. Oddly I have no problem with boosts, even drop rate boosters.
Likewise way off topic, NW's astral gems ruined the game for me. I went in thinking 'yeah, AD&D semi-gritty fantasy!' and something about the shop keepers babbling about astral gems just felt way too FFVII/anime to me.
/end threadjack
This was to be expected at a some point in future.
Maybe it's a sign that CO is to get some more attention. Or maybe not. But we had it coming since a very long time.
Now, that some of costume sets are bugged and need attention, is a rather unrelated issue.
Though, with costumes being more expensive, people will pay more attention to bugged releases, so overall quality standards needs to be raised.
People suggested great ideas on king sekhen and scientist costumes on pts forums, have they been listened to? no. Same with vehicles, same with aura unlock account wide, same with nemesis bug, same with more contents, same with queen of the pale demonflame bug, same with an extended zone city map, same with the present thread.
If they gain less money with the present +85% price increase they will likely increase something else to compensate
Expect some well-thought speech about how underpriced the auras are and how since now on you will pay your energy aura pack 1000 zens
The only ones I've really seen panicking are people I've never, ever seen on here or in game. For all I know, some of the heavy duty ranters are plants from still-in-development superhero games, or still-bitter CoH trolls, not actual, regular players.
That being said, to the two main points in your post:
1) As Finn indicated, prices weren't increased, the number attached to the price just got higher when C changed to Z. That was a great change, since it now reflects a simple 1Z to $.01 conversion. It also came with a corresponding increase to the number next to the stipend.
2) I would love to believe that money made from increased sales will be reinvested in CO to create meaningful improvements. I just haven't seen any evidence that it has been the case in the past, or even any evidence that it has ever been the plan to do so. Actually, it seems that each (trying to avoid buzzwords like "corporate greed" or "cash grab") optimistic monetization has led to less and less development, and more and more bugs that go completely untouched. Five years of experience has left me doubting.
This isn't the worst thing that could happen, obviously. The lights are still on, and if I don't want to buy something, nobody will ever make me. I'll still be playing CO till it shuts down, we will still get some costume sets that are great, and I made my peace with never getting new powers or zones years ago.
Mainly, this irks because it is a change with no positive outcome that any of us will ever see, and it has been marketed in terms that are at best disingenuous. I will gladly eat my words if these changes lead to even a quarter of the annoyances, bugs, and broken features that have been untouched for years getting some attention, or if we got even one of the new power sets people have been wanting for years, or if it freed up enough time and resources to simply re-open old leveling paths, put old costumes back in, etc., you get the idea.
I just won't hold my breath while I wait to be proven wrong. I'll be punching bad guys, wearing everything other than a $6 Scientist set.
Nah. I'm fine with it. But if you WANT to have that conversation, we can certainly do so. Personally, as was said earlier, I've been rather fond of the fact that the CO forums are relatively mature and calm.
If you're fine with things, and are relatively calm and mature, then you're obviously not one of the trolls I was talking about.
Bridge Packs, to change the appearance of your ship's bridge for those rare occasions you venture into it - 400 Zen. Most packs range from 2 to 4 bridges for that price, although the Klingon Bird of Prey pack includes six variants.
Shuttles and Fighters go for 500Z each, as do the Tier 1 ships, the ones you'll fly as a fresh Lieutenant. You'll outlevel those quickly, as I noted above.
Tier 2 ships go for 750Z, Tier 3 for 1000Z, Tier 4 (the ones you'll fly as a Captain, or a Commander if you're Romulan) 1500Z, and Tier 5, the Rear Admiral ships, 2500Z, although there are 3-ship bundles for the Odyssey-class, Bortasq'-class, and one big ol' Rom ship class I forget the name of, for 4000Z.
The newest tier, Tier 6, which can also be flown by Rear Admirals and above but which are "balanced" for Vice Admiral and above, run 3000Z each, with 3-ship bundles of the new Command Cruisers for 6000Z. Also, you can purchase an Upgrade Token, to upgrade a Tier 5 ship to Tier 5-U (gaining a few hull points and one bridge seat) for 700Z.
There are also Fleet Ships, slightly-upgraded versions of the existing ships, which require the purchase of Fleet Modules. The number of Modules needed varies according to what you're upgrading and what you already have unlocked; each Module costs 500Z.
Uniform packs, which can have as few as one piece, cost 550Z.
Oh, and Master Keys, the STO equivalent of Cosmic Keys of Power? Those run 125Z each.
- David Brin, "Those Eyes"
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-CO was/is in the black.
-CO wants to be more in the black.
-CO wants more profits because it's a business.
-A Tailor Pass is not part of the deal with this price adjustment.
-Content is not part of the deal with this price adjustment.
-Improvements/Additions/Repairs to Costume Sets is not part of the deal with this price adjustment.
-There are currently no announced plans for the future...other than this.
-There has not been a State of The Game in ages.
-Aside from this thread, communication is low to non-existent.
-Some positive QoL Changes have occurred this year.
-Some of them are mostly froob-centric...but still, IMO, long overdue and positive.
-This amount of focus on customization in the face of the state of the tailor and the "polish" with Space Scoundrel and, especially, Mad Scientist appears to be, at the very best, very very poorly timed and perhaps should have been postponed until improvements/repairs could be in the works.
-The current state of the PTS Process is, IMO, only a smidge above that of the Old Cryptic Days presently. This should be addressed.
Ok, short form. Let's see how that works.
Join Date: Aug 2009 | Title: Devslayer
If they actually cared for not alienating the player base, they'd just announce new costumes will cost 1000zen BUT put all older costumes under some "legacy category" and keep them at their current price (while still unacceptable, that would at least be less alienating, consumers hate retro-active price changes)... but then, to do that they'd need to care.
At this point...being a broken record would be an upgrade really. <sighs>
Join Date: Aug 2009 | Title: Devslayer
Typically it goes...
job security > personal feelings.
And yet it doesn't have to be like this, if you're unaware the why to what is, go research about the Elites and their System causing despair, using the working man as slaves to pay their banksters & Corpses their fraudulent legal tender to keep us in debt, Humanity can do better but we need to wake up and do something about it, otherwise, New World Order anyone?
I take this quote from a review that I agree with.
"customisation is so linear; everyone is after the optimal dps:survivability ratio with 0 reliance on other players = autonomous gameplay... Players don't need each other anymore... which in my opinion is a bad thing."
...really? Really RTMA? No.
Join Date: Aug 2009 | Title: Devslayer
Just because they don't make themselves known doesn't mean it isn't their, take a good look around and see how people are manipulated, lied, controlled and bought, how do you explain the way things are? all this greed and corruption in the world and most people only see it at a certain level, so where is the root of the proverbial evil? why do these things perpetuate? prey on human nature to profit, you think they're here for our benefit? nope.
I take this quote from a review that I agree with.
"customisation is so linear; everyone is after the optimal dps:survivability ratio with 0 reliance on other players = autonomous gameplay... Players don't need each other anymore... which in my opinion is a bad thing."