As you may have heard, we recently announced, and put up on Preview, a new system for dungeon keys wherein viewing rewards would no longer be an option without using the key. Then you spoke to us: loudly, clearly and - amazingly so and in many ways - that this breaks something in the game that you have relied upon. A fail safe for checking to see if you are going to use your keys on loot - at least loot that is a return on investment on the key and time in the dungeon. Our forward looking goal has always been to be able to create better rewards tables in those (and other) chests, but we needed to secure the dungeon chest system first. We totally put the cart before the horse here. We’re all sorry for the heartache such a half move has caused.
What good is first change without the second part?! I think you all were pretty clear on that, and you are right! When I’m reading on the forums that Aulduron opened 1,000 chests and used only a dozen keys on rewards he liked, this made me get my team really looking into the bigger issue here. The Rewards. Not just the rewards but the percentage chances of getting them.
We hear you. I hear you. We are going to fix this.
So, here’s what we are going to do. We are pulling back the dungeon key change for our upcoming update, Sea of Moving Ice, and scheduling time to evaluate and rebuild the rewards for the dungeon chests. This change will still happen, but when it does it will be with better rewards and a much better chance of actually getting the chase loot. Once the change is in, the plan is to schedule updates to these rewards each major expansion so that there is reason to revisit the dungeons.
With that in mind, we would love to hear from you. What do you want to see in your Dungeon chests? I’m serious about this. Your feedback is important. Reply in this post!
Regards, Thomas “Mimic King” Foss
I want to see on every single lockbox, dungeon chest, and game mechanic, "a chance" replaced with exact percentages. Especially when my money is coming into play. Until you start showing us the odds, this game is nothing but an unregulated gambling scam hidden behind smoke and mirrors. As for putting the wagon before the horse, maybe you should take a step back and look at all your methods of changes cause you have repeatedly destroyed the game then tried to salvage after the fact. For the love of god, either fail so we can get a real DnD game or start being an actual game developer instead of a digital Scratch ticket company exploiting peoples weakness for gambling.
Dungeon Chest loot suggestions: 1. all t2 and higher dungeons chance at cragmire artifact drop 2. random epic mount insignia chance 3. armor transmutes from old T1 and T2 dungeons... such as Dark Armor of Lolth 4. Gmop/Smop Extra Chest loot suggestions: 1. +5 ring choice box in content that offers +5 rings, at a slightly increased droprate..... I haven't gotten a single +5 ring since last supposed droprate increase, and with my luck i would get a ring that is useless to any of my played characters if i did get one 2. epic level refinement stones in stacks of 5 unbound 3. epic insignia choice box 4. lesser weapon/armor enchants
also on refinement stones please replace the union, stability, power refinement stones with a single artifact rp stone... 3 grades of each of these in 3 bind options is a huge unnecessary bagspace sink
The change to the loot tables is well appreciated. However, I think you may have missed one of the other core issues from the first post about this change: We can only make one key a day.
As others have mentioned, I understand that you guys need to entice players to spend some money on your game, but forcing players to choose between spending money they may not have and being able to do the bear minimum each day is not doing you any favors. As it is, we can make some keys only once every 20 hours. This means that if a player simply can't or won't put real money into the game, they are forced to run 2 different dungeons each day for their daily astral-diamonds. Especially with the increased loot tables, many people are going to want to run a single dungeon multiple times in hopes of a certain reward. With a maximum of one key per day per dungeon, a lot of players will be cutting back on how many dungeon runs they do.
My suggestion for this is 2 fold. Lower some of the time frames for crafting these keys (and perhaps some of the base requirements) and also add the key to the chest at a medium - low drop rate. You want people to play your content, you want people to be buy your keys for real money, but if a player logs on for a single dungeon and logs off, no one is going to party up to run a dungeon with their guild/friends multiple times. And in my experience, when you start off with a few keys and get into a good group who wants to run a dungeon 50 times in a row, that's when you WANT to spend money on keys.
Personally I would redesign the loot system to a sliding scale on a PER CHARACTER BASIS. Run dungeon once have .5% chance for top end chest reward, run twice 1% chance all the way up to 100% for those without luck. This way the dedicated player can run it 200 times and garuntee the drop. Make that drop bop like the fabricant suggested in first chest.
For the second chest lower the number to .1% chance but still be on a sliding scale run twice .2% run three times .3% etc. So even the unlucky has a chance in 1k runs to get a drop that is boe.
Spread the loot out. Why can't we get back the old dungeon system of head drops here chest drops there boots there etc. It is not fun for some players to run one dungeon all the time for everything. People get bored take breaks and don't come back.
Thank you for asking. First I would request that this is a change to the overall loot system not just the chests. The value of loot should correspond to the time/effort/money invested and I don’t think that is true for most of the loot in the game. I think the loot system should allow free players to know that they will get the gear they want through time and effort, not rely on RNG, but also allow paying players to advance faster. Below are some ideas.
Ardent coins take a fixed amount of time and we have no way to farm them other than creating an army of toons yet the vendor for those doesn’t offer anything of interest. Consider updating this store to include valuable items like wards and upgrades for mounts and companions. It already has a gate in place to reduce the opportunity for abuse yet offers players a way to plan and upgrade. You could add an ardent coin coffer in the Zen store to support those who want to pay to progress faster.
Set the time to build area keys and the Zen to purchase them equivalent then make the loot worth that much on average. For example, the second chest could offer extra seals then expand the stores to allow buying more items of value like all of the equipment from that particular campaign or adding wards and mount/companion upgrades to the other seal stores. Players who want to progress faster can buy keys from the store.
I think these ideas follow a strategy that help keep the loot in line with the time/effort/money invested, allows paying players to progress faster, and allows free players to know that they can get the gear that they want eventually.
Thank you for listening to the player base and averting catastrophe before it happened.
I think this was a case of putting the cart before the horse, as most would not have minded this change as long as it was accompanied by a complete revamping of dungeon loot first. As a lot of players have pointed out there is almost no point in running certain dungeons at this stage in the game unless your farming for salvage.
Adding things like purple insignia drops instead of blue that aren't bop but bound to account would definately be a step in the right direction. Also maybe increase the drop rate on those pesky orcus shards so latecomers can actually have a chance at getting the set wouldn't be a bad idea either.
I read so many posts about people wanting a guarantee return for their money of equal or greater value than the price of the key...
Really?
I'd like to win the lottery too, but spending my money to buy a ticket is no guarantee that it will happen, (*hopefully chances of getting a good drop from a chest will be significantly better than winning the lottery) but I still occasionally buy a lottery ticket, because there is still that chance.
I'd just settle for being to get something of value out of chests I have to purchase a key for...
Maybe a very rare drop that completely compensate me for the purchase of the one key used to open it but more often a drop that will or has the chance of at least partially (by random changable amounts) compensate me for the purchase price of the key either from resale value, refinement purposes or salvage and occasionally (again rarely) the chest that turns into a mimic that has to be defeated before there is any prize drop and even more rare (about the same chance as a drop that completely compensates for the price of a key) a chest that is empty or contains more or less common items but still marketable in the AH just so it isn't a complete loss.
That I think more than anything else will encourage people to buy keys and VIP privlidges specifically to get keys, people feeling that the return from their investment of purchasing keys or VIP privlidges won't be a complete loss.
The thing with rewards is, the more people with access to them, the lesser the value. So you can't add good rewards and keep 'em as good rewards.
I'm a bit tired of having to say this in every thread involving the RNG and/or rewards, but EVERYONE KNOWS ABOUT BASIC SUPPLY AND DEMAND. IT ONLY TAKES A TINY AMOUNT OF IMAGINATION TO FIGURE OUT A REWARD THAT IS ALWAYS WORTHWHILE, LIKE ASTRAL DIAMONDS OR VALUABLE SALVAGE.
(puts down megaphone)
It is entirely unhelpful and unproductive to feed Cryptic even one voice that for some self-hating reason doesn't want worthwhile rewards.
I never said that... With your comment on Lockboxes, I'm saying the rewards value won't stay where it is. I didn't say I don't want worthwhile. If every dungeon run gave you a SMoP, they'd go for 5k in the AH, the reward you thought would be cool no longer is though this is welcome to as upgrades get a whole lot cheaper, but its no longer 'rewarding', that's what I'm trying to tell you.
It ain't an easy task.
BtW, you already get Astral Diamonds and 'valuable' salvage, so you want the 'rewards' to continue?
that's fine though. if it makes it cheap and possible to get the upgrades by lowering the difficulty that's great. that's half the battle. I don't care if the price goes down on things. give us the coalwards to get reasonable enchants. make it possible to get a bis toon without spending thousands of dollars. (cause lets be honest expecting the player base to give thousands of dollars to get enchants up is not reasonable) being able to actually get a set of gear and not have to pay thousands... the end goal here shouldn't be to keep prices in the multi millions of ad for things. the idea is to make end game gear accessible with grind. right now it's not. the good things just don't drop.. I've never even been in a run where someone ELSE gets the orcus shard. I was in a run where someone got the beholder tank. to me that says the beholder tank is more likely to drop than an artifact for a set. an artifact which many consider necessary for a good build. yes the value of somethings will go down this way but the actual VALUE of things will still be there. thats also why diversity is a good thing. if a LOT of things are gainable from the end game dungeon than nothing is flooding the market.
I read so many posts about people wanting a guarantee return for their money of equal or greater value than the price of the key...
Really?
I'd like to win the lottery too, but spending my money to buy a ticket is no guarantee that it will happen, (*hopefully chances of getting a good drop from a chest will be significantly better than winning the lottery) but I still occasionally buy a lottery ticket, because there is still that chance.
I'd just settle for being to get something of value out of chests I have to purchase a key for...
Maybe a very rare drop that completely compensate me for the purchase of the one key used to open it but more often a drop that will or has the chance of at least partially (by random changable amounts) compensate me for the purchase price of the key either from resale value, refinement purposes or salvage and occasionally (again rarely) the chest that turns into a mimic that has to be defeated before there is any prize drop and even more rare (about the same chance as a drop that completely compensates for the price of a key) a chest that is empty or contains more or less common items but still marketable in the AH just so it isn't a complete loss.
That I think more than anything else will encourage people to buy keys and VIP privlidges specifically to get keys, people feeling that the return from their investment of purchasing keys or VIP privlidges won't be a complete loss.
why should we expect that this change should be fully lottery. they're asking us to spend money on something with trust that the result won't be garbage. the reward should guaranteed be worth the effort at least on a base level. why is it ridiculous to demand that they give us something for MONEY we give them? that's like saying I go to the sandwich store and buy a sandwich for 8 dollars and if they actually give me anything other than two slices of bread is kind of lucky.
this is a consumer product and we're just demanding that they give us something worth while if they're putting in a paywall. otherwise why should we continue playing. it's really not unreasonable. the lockboxes should be a bit better too imo. people spend a lot of money on them. the drop rates should be a bit better for the legendaries. if people know the chances of getting something good are real a lot more will be spent. you can't equate this to a real life honest to god lottery where real money is out there or real prizes are being given for money spent. this is all in a freakign virtual game.. no matter what we win it's only good in this game. it's not real. we get nothing tangible for our money. and beyond paying the wages of the people working here (and it's not just this game paying salaries they have a lot of games) their cost on these items is ZERO...
I believe in spending to a point where you've bought the game but beyond that it's charity. it's not unreasonable to ask for something good if you're spending money.
I read so many posts about people wanting a guarantee return for their money of equal or greater value than the price of the key...
Really?
I'd like to win the lottery too, but spending my money to buy a ticket is no guarantee that it will happen, (*hopefully chances of getting a good drop from a chest will be significantly better than winning the lottery) but I still occasionally buy a lottery ticket, because there is still that chance.
I'd just settle for being to get something of value out of chests I have to purchase a key for...
Maybe a very rare drop that completely compensate me for the purchase of the one key used to open it but more often a drop that will or has the chance of at least partially (by random changable amounts) compensate me for the purchase price of the key either from resale value, refinement purposes or salvage and occasionally (again rarely) the chest that turns into a mimic that has to be defeated before there is any prize drop and even more rare (about the same chance as a drop that completely compensates for the price of a key) a chest that is empty or contains more or less common items but still marketable in the AH just so it isn't a complete loss.
That I think more than anything else will encourage people to buy keys and VIP privlidges specifically to get keys, people feeling that the return from their investment of purchasing keys or VIP privlidges won't be a complete loss.
why should we expect that this change should be fully lottery. they're asking us to spend money on something with trust that the result won't be garbage. the reward should guaranteed be worth the effort at least on a base level. why is it ridiculous to demand that they give us something for MONEY we give them? that's like saying I go to the sandwich store and buy a sandwich for 8 dollars and if they actually give me anything other than two slices of bread is kind of lucky.
this is a consumer product and we're just demanding that they give us something worth while if they're putting in a paywall. otherwise why should we continue playing. it's really not unreasonable. the lockboxes should be a bit better too imo. people spend a lot of money on them. the drop rates should be a bit better for the legendaries. if people know the chances of getting something good are real a lot more will be spent. you can't equate this to a real life honest to god lottery whre real money is out there or real prizes are being given for money spent. this is all in a freakign virtual game.. no matter what we win it's only good in this game. it's not real. we get nothing tangible for our money.
I believe in spending to a point where you've bought the game but beyond that it's charity. it's not unreasonable to ask for something good if you're spending money.
Another person who seems to think there should be a guaranteed return on their key purchase... it would be nice, but realistically it isn't very practical, feasable or profitable for the company who has the expense of providing this game in the first place, no profit - no game.
First of all it seems to me to be ridiculous as you say, to "demand" anything, I'm not suggesting people have to be grateful is someone hands you a HAMSTER sandwich, but you do have the opportunity to walk away if you think things aren't up to your required standards.
Secondly there's a difference between "won't be garbage" and something of "some value" to the player...
For instance, a rank 1 enchantment isn't garbage, it has "some personal value" for upgrading artifacts and other enchantments and it can be sold in the Auction House - it may be less than desirable or of very little use to a higher level player - but it isn't "garbage" and is part of that "partial return" I mentioned.
Now granted if people pay ten bucks for keys and start regularly getting level 1 enchantments, Neverwinter isn't going to be selling many keys so it would be counter productive economically for them to do something like that.
As you said, we are being "asked" to spend money on something - no one is holding us at gunpoint and forcing anyone to make these purchases, if anyone believes that the return for their investment isn't worth what they paid it would seem to me the simple solution is not to purchase anything instead of purchase it anyway and then complain about it.
Your statement that people spend a lot of money on lockboxes is the same kind of thing...
People choose to spend their money on lockbox keys, if someone believes that the return for their investment isn't sufficient, they can also choose not to purchase any more lockbox keys, that seems all too simple and obvious, to me at least.
I think Cryptic and a lot of people are starting to see that there are many different rewards that individual players consider worthwhile.
I agree it should not cost 1000's of dollars to have BiS, unless your trying to do that overnight. I have been playing this game for 3+ years now and my main is pretty much BiS, i got a couple of 11's i need to make to 12 but thats it. I bought 1 coal ward earlier on and realized my mistake as soon as upgraded the weapon shards I had... I have bought none from zen market since... but it almost took me three years to get my enchants were they are almost rank 12... Of course you honestly don't need 12's (cept maybe FBI). My alts have enchans between rank 8 and 10, and i have successfully completed FBI with my main and one alts so far. So, any enchant between 8 and 10 will allow you to smoothly run all content (cept maybe FBI), so in that case I had that last year... believe or not enchants were not a priority until after mod 6 was released.
Ok, enough of the sidebar, for every player out there they have what they consider to be good loot. Lot's like the RoI in the form of AD, some have a desire for different skins/fashion, others are looking at BiS gear(companion, weapons, armor, and the RP to feed said gear), some look at campaign progression, and maybe strong hold vouchers (sorry if I missed a loot group out there). So, Cryptic will have its hand full trying to figure this out and will have to obviously come up with a system that pleases a majority of the players while not alienate those players that don't quite want the same thing as the majority.
Argument for a Themed Dungeon Experience
Pretty tough task, at least from my point of view. So it is my desire, that they give each dungeon a Loot Theme. Each theme dungeon should have seals a respectable amount of seals that players can use towards purchasing that same drop gear from a vendor located in the City of Neverwinter (The game is Neverwinter and centers around the city and there are many neglected and not used vendors contained within the city).
Gear that drops from bosses and chests from the themed dungeons should be BoE (that way they have resale value and that AH AD sink will kick in more often, its over 9million on Zax now...), and gear purchased with seals should be BTA or BTC. Ohh, and all dungeons should always have the most current campaign progression seals or currency (don't include armor/weapon drops, if you want those to come from new dungeon). Put a cap on the amount of seals/currency you can get from these dungeons if you have to, as long as it is time-gated correctly I will not complain about a cap. By incorporating a system like this it does 4 things:
1. Normalize/limits the amount of RnG players have to deal with to get the item they want to enhance there style of game play. 2. This system will hit just about all players and what they consider valuable and a worthwhile investment of there game time/money. 3. For the Devs, I think instead of trying to make one chest at the end of dungeon please them all, you can now focus on making sure each dungeon has the correct loot tables and wont require as much manipulation. I don't know, maybe do the updates in steps so you can roll it out in incriminates while making sure the system works correctly. 4. No matter what dungeon you choose to run it will always count towards progress in the new campaign (removes some of the grind we feel now), and what ever you consider desirable as loot drops.
I don't know seems like a good idea to me, not sure how much programming would have to go into it.
make the key tab or consolidated other keys (Master Keys for boss chests and Dragon Keys for end-zone last boss' room for "epic" dragon chests).
Master chests should be different loot types than Dragon chests reward list table. i already post some ideas in other topics, you can look up my posts. so let me repeat. Master Chests, 1. seals 2. gems (no white or green) 3. random blue refine stones. 4. random blue profession or crafter items and resources. 5. random armor/weapon enchant gems (no shards). 6. any random appearance items. 7. any other choice items voted by players or devs new items to be added.
Dragon Chests, 1. bonus seals 2. gems (high grades) 3. chance of random profession access item, and few rare/epic resources 4. random epic grade refine stones 5. chance of refine epic marks 6. random epic armor/weapon 7. chance of rings (no +3 or under)
since Gateway got pull out, we need new replacement for Companion's Quest mode, same concept as STO used for duty officers and admirality (ship missions) for companions that are in idled pack, send them out and get chance of new companion gears and runestones, and earn few companion upgrade tokens. call it as "Companion's Adventures".
let put that awful RNG adjusted, only usefull for lockboxes, not in adventures or in any quests.
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bigredbrentMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 155Arc User
I have only three letters to say about this: BOE
Include valuable BOE equipment that people actually want to buy and sell on the auction house and then maybe this key change might, I repeat might, fly.
From the above link i doubt very much that we will see zen market items(coal/pres wards, companions, certain other keys, and etc...) drop from chests. You know what I kinda understand their stance on this (flame me if you want), the game has to make money somehow. If the game doesn't make money we will see it become more unsupported. The more money it make the better it will be supported and the game will continue to thrive. So, Cryptic has to be smart on how they make money off a FTP game. The player see a lot of these (coal/pres wards) as choke that drive us to spend money, and obviously puts us odds with spending money.
The Compromise
1. We already have a system in the game that works and anyone with VIP understands this system: Discount Vouchers. Lot's of those vouchers are useless (IMHO) some see a decent amount of usage (at least from me). To the point, if they added 50 to 75 percent off vouchers that lasted a week to chest drops, my money says that those vouchers would not be discarded. As matter of fact they would probably see immediate use.
Because of this compromise the players might be more willing to spend on something in the zen market that they deem out of their price range and Cryptic see's an inflow of money were they might not have. Come on people how many are not waiting to spend some money on a 50 percent off sale??? Instead of waiting 6 months to a 1 year, now we have a chance at see it a little more often and Cryptic might see more cash flow there way between these sales....
It's all about compromise and finding solution that works!
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feanor70118Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,170Arc User
The thing with rewards is, the more people with access to them, the lesser the value. So you can't add good rewards and keep 'em as good rewards.
I'm a bit tired of having to say this in every thread involving the RNG and/or rewards, but EVERYONE KNOWS ABOUT BASIC SUPPLY AND DEMAND. IT ONLY TAKES A TINY AMOUNT OF IMAGINATION TO FIGURE OUT A REWARD THAT IS ALWAYS WORTHWHILE, LIKE ASTRAL DIAMONDS OR VALUABLE SALVAGE.
(puts down megaphone)
It is entirely unhelpful and unproductive to feed Cryptic even one voice that for some self-hating reason doesn't want worthwhile rewards.
I never said that... With your comment on Lockboxes, I'm saying the rewards value won't stay where it is.
AS I ALREADY SAID, EVERYONE UNDERSTANDS BASIC SUPPLY AND DEMAND.
I didn't say I don't want worthwhile. If every dungeon run gave you a SMoP, they'd go for 5k in the AH, the reward you thought would be cool no longer is though this is welcome to as upgrades get a whole lot cheaper, but its no longer 'rewarding', that's what I'm trying to tell you.
AS I ALREADY SAID, EVERYONE UNDERSTANDS BASIC SUPPLY AND DEMAND. Repeating yourself or elaborating on the obvious does not make your input productive or interesting. And by the way, I don't care if SMOPS are cheap on the AH. I'll need them, so I want them to be cheap. Your example fails.
BtW, you already get Astral Diamonds and 'valuable' salvage, so you want the 'rewards' to continue?
Obviously you lack the tiny amount of imagination to which I referred and do not appear to have much experience with dungeon chests and boss rewards, which often fail to appear at all or are so worthless they might as well have not appeared. Therefore it is plainly not really worth discussing this with you since you either do not know what you are talking about or are simply being disingenuous. Have a nice day.
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feanor70118Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,170Arc User
I read so many posts about people wanting a guarantee return for their money of equal or greater value than the price of the key...
Really? [snipped for brevity]
Yes, really. If I spent an amount of money that I know should get me a 20 oz. soda, I want a 20 oz. soda, not a 1/10 chance in getting a 20 oz. soda, most likely 1/2 oz. to 6 ozs.
Money is real. Loot in a video game is not. If one wants people to spend real money on imaginary rewards, the rewards should have some actual value. The current system treats players as if we are gambling addicts whose real reason for buying keys is a behavioural disorder instead of reasonable expectation of return on investment.
1:1 return on the price of the key should be the minimum reward. That is beyond obvious.
@uptondarkdiamond I thought you brought up a couple of interesting points I agree with, first of all those discount vouchers... does anyone actually use those things? Like you I consider the majority of them to be on the verge of worthless with a couple of exceptions - for example after the latest update when keys went on sale for 15% off, I got a voucher for 40% off keys - I had to laugh...
To get an in game announcement that there will be 15% discount on companions, when you know that eventually you will get a 15% (or better) discount on companions by one of those invocation discount vouchers, that completely removes the impetus for anyone to buy a companion on those announced special 15% off sales (didn't anyone think of or notice that before making it part of the game?).
Same thing for the discount vouchers for refining items... if someone can't afford or doesn't care for the price of a refining item, does Neverwinter actually think a mere 15% off voucher is going to suddenly entice that person to purchase the item?
It never works for me and IMO the only people it does work for, are the players who would have purchased that item anyway, the 15% is just a tiny bonus for them.
There also used to be weekly sales of what many people considered 'useful' items in the Zen Market, I've even plunked down a few bucks when something I really wanted came up for sale (say the Greater Bag of Holding - BEFORE they suddenly decided to make it bound to character)... I have no idea why they discontinued that, but they did so on to the next point.
There has been special sales where just about everything in the Zen Market is deeply discounted - yeah, I've spent a bunch of money buying Zen there, not just for myself but by way of gifts and 'stocking stuffers' for friends and family (but as the 17 people who started out playing Neverwinter only three of us remain, it looks like I have to reexamine my options here).
I also agree that compromise is always the key, the problem is a lot of people seem to have a different opinion of what actually constitutes "compromise".
Reading some of the comments here it seems a few people seem to believe having a guarantee 100% return on their key investment is a compromise, needless to say I disagree.
Just about everyone here agrees that for their purchase of a key, they shouldn't be getting "junk" but the same thing applies some players might believe a peridot or a level 5 enchantment is a good return for some keys - then you will have other players who will think something like that constitutes junk.
But the fact remains no one is forcing anyone to buy keys or anything for that matter.
If those inclined to do so don't believe the price of the keys are worth the return they get they will quit buying keys - if someone believes their investment in keys and the return they get is worth it, they will buy more keys.
The one's who entertain me are the people who buy keys, gripe and groan about the lousy returns they get - then buy more keys...
I read so many posts about people wanting a guarantee return for their money of equal or greater value than the price of the key...
Really? [snipped for brevity]
Yes, really. If I spent an amount of money that I know should get me a 20 oz. soda, I want a 20 oz. soda, not a 1/10 chance in getting a 20 oz. soda, most likely 1/2 oz. to 6 ozs.
Money is real. Loot in a video game is not. If one wants people to spend real money on imaginary rewards, the rewards should have some actual value. The current system treats players as if we are gambling addicts whose real reason for buying keys is a behavioural disorder instead of reasonable expectation of return on investment.
1:1 return on the price of the key should be the minimum reward. That is beyond obvious.
First surely you recognize that no one is forcing you to spend money on keys... yet you continue to do so - there has to be a reason despite your complaining about it.
As I see it when someone purchases a key they aren't purchasing a guaranteed (particularly a guaranteed 100%) return on their investment they are purchasing the chance to obtain something that will make their investment worthwhile - it's not the same as buying a 20oz soda - not even close.
In all the years I've been playing Neverwinter I've never seen anyone even suggest that players will always (or even most of the time) get a fair exchange for the money they spend on keys - and to think that's the way it should be is just unrealistic IMO.
If anyone want a guarantee return, put some money into buying Zen and buy that item from the Zen Market - if the Zen Market doesn't carry that item, well then your only other alternative is to either take a chance on getting it some other way or just write it off as unobtainable but to make the decision to take a chance on something then gripe that it didn't happen... then turn around and buy more keys... how does that even make sense?
The thing is though if a person wants a particular mount and spends a bunch of money on keys to finely get it, once they have it that player usually decides they want something different, newer or better and the whole process starts all over again -complete with all the whining that they had to spend so much to finely get what they wanted.
Sorry perhaps that was a little too harsh, I still think its true, but harsh none the less, mea culpa - mea culpa.
Another person who seems to think there should be a guaranteed return on their key purchase... it would be nice, but realistically it isn't very practical, feasable or profitable for the company who has the expense of providing this game in the first place, no profit - no game.
That's exactly it -- no profit, no game. And there's no profit in trying to sell a product people won't buy because they see that it's worthless. There's no profit in upsetting the player base to the point that they will leave and/or not pay any more money.
(snip)
OK first it seems we are in agreement that the returns for the investment in keys needs to be better... we've already heard that is probably going to happen...
Secondly how it giving everyone exactly what every time they want it, profitable for the people who run this game?
If you want a legendary mount (or whatever) from a chest, you buy a key and take a chance on getting it...
If you bought one key and got that legendary mount on the first try, you wouldn't need to buy any more keys would you - at least not for that mount.
Even if you had a shopping list of things you wanted, bought one key and got them on the first try or bought one and even though you didn't get the particular item you wanted - but could sell what you received for the price of another key... how many keys would you need to buy - just one that's how many...
How in anyone's mind does that equate to a profit for Neverwinter, giving them the revenue to keep the game running and develop new content?
It doesn't IMO.
DD~
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feanor70118Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,170Arc User
First surely you recognize that no one is forcing you to spend money on keys... yet you continue to do so - there has to be a reason despite your complaining about it.
Well, I'm spending zen anyway, only at a 40% discount once in a while.
And I'm doing it because it's free, i.e. not real. But if Cryptic actually wants people to spend money, they should be offering something worth money. There is no demand if there is no reward.
In all the years I've been playing Neverwinter I've never seen anyone even suggest that players will always (or even most of the time) get a fair exchange for the money they spend on keys - and to think that's the way it should be is just unrealistic IMO.
Things that cost money should be worth money. Nothing about that is unrealistic. There is no demand if there is no reward.
If you haven't seen anyone actually elucidate that, it's because it's too obvious to need saying.
0
putzboy78Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,950Arc User
Keep on rocking that tinfoil hat. The idea that Publishers want to decrease player population has to be one of the most ridiculous things I've read on these forums.
No tinfoil hat necessary. I didn't say to decrease player population. I said to reduce peak activity. By being able to run whatever you want at any time the server load is peaked more by geography than by designed activity times. When Dungeon Delves existed people would log in when they got home, check when the event was scheduled and plan their evening accordingly (eat now delve later or delve now eat later for example). This created spikes in demand which any business wants to avoid. Do you think McDonalds keeps 20 people on the clock all day long. No, they bring them in for lunch then send them home. You can't send home spare CPU cycles.
I read so many posts about people wanting a guarantee return for their money of equal or greater value than the price of the key...
Really?
I'd like to win the lottery too, but spending my money to buy a ticket is no guarantee that it will happen, (*hopefully chances of getting a good drop from a chest will be significantly better than winning the lottery) but I still occasionally buy a lottery ticket, because there is still that chance.
I'd just settle for being to get something of value out of chests I have to purchase a key for...
Maybe a very rare drop that completely compensate me for the purchase of the one key used to open it but more often a drop that will or has the chance of at least partially (by random changable amounts) compensate me for the purchase price of the key either from resale value, refinement purposes or salvage and occasionally (again rarely) the chest that turns into a mimic that has to be defeated before there is any prize drop and even more rare (about the same chance as a drop that completely compensates for the price of a key) a chest that is empty or contains more or less common items but still marketable in the AH just so it isn't a complete loss.
That I think more than anything else will encourage people to buy keys and VIP privlidges specifically to get keys, people feeling that the return from their investment of purchasing keys or VIP privlidges won't be a complete loss.
why should we expect that this change should be fully lottery. they're asking us to spend money on something with trust that the result won't be garbage. the reward should guaranteed be worth the effort at least on a base level. why is it ridiculous to demand that they give us something for MONEY we give them? that's like saying I go to the sandwich store and buy a sandwich for 8 dollars and if they actually give me anything other than two slices of bread is kind of lucky.
this is a consumer product and we're just demanding that they give us something worth while if they're putting in a paywall. otherwise why should we continue playing. it's really not unreasonable. the lockboxes should be a bit better too imo. people spend a lot of money on them. the drop rates should be a bit better for the legendaries. if people know the chances of getting something good are real a lot more will be spent. you can't equate this to a real life honest to god lottery whre real money is out there or real prizes are being given for money spent. this is all in a freakign virtual game.. no matter what we win it's only good in this game. it's not real. we get nothing tangible for our money.
I believe in spending to a point where you've bought the game but beyond that it's charity. it's not unreasonable to ask for something good if you're spending money.
Another person who seems to think there should be a guaranteed return on their key purchase... it would be nice, but realistically it isn't very practical, feasable or profitable for the company who has the expense of providing this game in the first place, no profit - no game.
First of all it seems to me to be ridiculous as you say, to "demand" anything, I'm not suggesting people have to be grateful is someone hands you a HAMSTER sandwich, but you do have the opportunity to walk away if you think things aren't up to your required standards.
Secondly there's a difference between "won't be garbage" and something of "some value" to the player...
For instance, a rank 1 enchantment isn't garbage, it has "some personal value" for upgrading artifacts and other enchantments and it can be sold in the Auction House - it may be less than desirable or of very little use to a higher level player - but it isn't "garbage" and is part of that "partial return" I mentioned.
Now granted if people pay ten bucks for keys and start regularly getting level 1 enchantments, Neverwinter isn't going to be selling many keys so it would be counter productive economically for them to do something like that.
As you said, we are being "asked" to spend money on something - no one is holding us at gunpoint and forcing anyone to make these purchases, if anyone believes that the return for their investment isn't worth what they paid it would seem to me the simple solution is not to purchase anything instead of purchase it anyway and then complain about it.
Your statement that people spend a lot of money on lockboxes is the same kind of thing...
People choose to spend their money on lockbox keys, if someone believes that the return for their investment isn't sufficient, they can also choose not to purchase any more lockbox keys, that seems all too simple and obvious, to me at least.
some people like being hamstered and some don't. it's pretty obvious which category you fall into if they do follow your logic they're going to lose the vast majority of their player base.
0
frozenfirevrMember, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,475Community Moderator
Loot themed dungeons... that way we don't get bored running the same dungeon over and over cause they drop similar stuff but one dungeon takes a tad bit longer... i.e. eGWD and eToS....
If you say for instance make eGWD the companion loot dungeon well if i want to increase my chances of seeing companion gear i got there...
\o/ Thanks @strumslinger! That'd be great, also, please look into the prices of the keys. And a new system perhaps?
A new key creation system, where there is just 1 key (along with the keys from WB, VIP, Daily Key, so 5 keys in total), that can be made using each of the campaigns with the respective campaign currency. For example, a common 'Campaign Chest Key' (that can open all of the chests like Legendary Dragon Key) that can be made using each of the campaigns, separately. That is, I should be able to Sharandar dailies and make a 'Campaign Chest Key', simultaneously, I should be able to do Dread Ring dailies, Icewind Dale dailies, etc and make 'Campaign Chest Keys' with their respective currencies. This has 2 benefits, firstly, there's a reason to do old campaigns. Secondly, people who would like to do more runs can make more keys by working for them. The Legendary Dragon Keys can continue to be available for those who don't have time or are lazy and want to buy them.
And/or remove keys from our bags.
Unrelated, can you please stop 'Return on Investment' from being auto-added (it's from Icewind Dale). It has been the biggest reason for my hatred for Icewind Dale, and I still refuse to go there except for my daily thanks to that quest. You can give that quest to the guy in the middle, between the AB and TT leaders. Also, remove the tools like Fishing Rods, Hammerstone Pick, etc from out bags please.
Also, please change the ring system to give a token instead of a ring itself. For example, if we were to get a +1 Ring of Natural Order give us a '+1 Ring Token' instead... This'll save a LOT of irritation. The system is already in place (Sahha Ticket Ball Tickets). You've been giving us an RNG within an RNG and that ain't fair. And, allow us to trade our existing rings for other rings or respective tokens.
Edit: Another idea, a single ring with a cube system like our Artifact Main and Offhands might work too, if you wanna monetize it. I'd not prefer this though
BtW, I've read somewhere in forums about some 'mercy?' system... Don't remember it properly. Something similar would be,
You should get a token for each run you make. You should be able to get a reward of your choice from the loot table of that dungeon for a 100 (ain't a small number in any way) of those tokens. That'd be great, and be a huge boost to us unlucky players. You get more numbers in the process too.
Edit: *sigh* One more thing, Please remove the 5x R5 enchantments form overflow reward, seriously, that's terrible in exchange for 1750000 XP!
Thank You. I'll go sleep peacefully now.
you forgot the single sapphire the single aquamarine and other various terribad rewards. every single xp roll over should come wiht a power point along with other things. r5's need to go the way of the dodo though. they should be replaced with r7
Sure, but those aren't as terrible as the R5s, I got R5s just yesterday!
The thing with rewards is, the more people with access to them, the lesser the value. So you can't add good rewards and keep 'em as good rewards.
I'm a bit tired of having to say this in every thread involving the RNG and/or rewards, but EVERYONE KNOWS ABOUT BASIC SUPPLY AND DEMAND. IT ONLY TAKES A TINY AMOUNT OF IMAGINATION TO FIGURE OUT A REWARD THAT IS ALWAYS WORTHWHILE, LIKE ASTRAL DIAMONDS OR VALUABLE SALVAGE.
(puts down megaphone)
It is entirely unhelpful and unproductive to feed Cryptic even one voice that for some self-hating reason doesn't want worthwhile rewards.
I never said that... With your comment on Lockboxes, I'm saying the rewards value won't stay where it is.
AS I ALREADY SAID, EVERYONE UNDERSTANDS BASIC SUPPLY AND DEMAND.
I didn't say I don't want worthwhile. If every dungeon run gave you a SMoP, they'd go for 5k in the AH, the reward you thought would be cool no longer is though this is welcome to as upgrades get a whole lot cheaper, but its no longer 'rewarding', that's what I'm trying to tell you.
AS I ALREADY SAID, EVERYONE UNDERSTANDS BASIC SUPPLY AND DEMAND. Repeating yourself or elaborating on the obvious does not make your input productive or interesting. And by the way, I don't care if SMOPS are cheap on the AH. I'll need them, so I want them to be cheap. Your example fails.
BtW, you already get Astral Diamonds and 'valuable' salvage, so you want the 'rewards' to continue?
Obviously you lack the tiny amount of imagination to which I referred and do not appear to have much experience with dungeon chests and boss rewards, which often fail to appear at all or are so worthless they might as well have not appeared. Therefore it is plainly not really worth discussing this with you since you either do not know what you are talking about or are simply being disingenuous. Have a nice day.
I'm an Economist and Accountant, stop saying what Demand and Supply is to me. We aren't talking about you buying SMoPs, but rather selling them, cheap isn't good there. *sigh* If you got an Orcus Wand every 5 runs do you think it'll still be 5mil?
"which often fail to appear at all or are so worthless they might as well have not appeared."??? "A REWARD THAT IS ALWAYS WORTHWHILE, LIKE ASTRAL DIAMONDS OR VALUABLE SALVAGE." That's what you get, what you consider 'valuable' depends on you. We're talking about chests, not drops.
"it is plainly not really worth discussing this with you" pfft... Like I care.
that's fine though. if it makes it cheap and possible to get the upgrades by lowering the difficulty that's great. that's half the battle. I don't care if the price goes down on things. give us the coalwards to get reasonable enchants. make it possible to get a bis toon without spending thousands of dollars. (cause lets be honest expecting the player base to give thousands of dollars to get enchants up is not reasonable) being able to actually get a set of gear and not have to pay thousands... the end goal here shouldn't be to keep prices in the multi millions of ad for things. the idea is to make end game gear accessible with grind. right now it's not. the good things just don't drop.. I've never even been in a run where someone ELSE gets the orcus shard. I was in a run where someone got the beholder tank. to me that says the beholder tank is more likely to drop than an artifact for a set. an artifact which many consider necessary for a good build. yes the value of somethings will go down this way but the actual VALUE of things will still be there. thats also why diversity is a good thing. if a LOT of things are gainable from the end game dungeon than nothing is flooding the market.
This is a proper response, unlike you screaming DEMAND SUPPLY DEMAND SUPPLY DEMAND SUPPLY like a crazed kid.
And, agreed cat, since the AD is anyways used to max out. So, this would lead to self sustenance but lower income which ain't a bad thing.
Don't forget that the value can be perceived differently:
Perceived value: is the difference between a prospective customer's evaluation of the benefits and costs of one product when compared with others(key consumption vs. chest contents). If someone gets a peridot and a blue salvage and considers that worth than we have a happy costumer if the customer doesn't see it as valuable than they we have an unhappy customer. Also, incorporated into this is how much they might be able to trade or auction contents, and part of that value is its rarity and how others in the game perceive the value.
If i'm using the free/vip key and I get a peridot and some blue salvage not a big deal, no real time or money investment.
If i'm using a campaign key or dragon then we have a little bit of problem. If you repeat the process over a hundred times getting pretty close to the same value of items, we really do have a problem I think.... but we have already discussed this a lot, now it time to figure out at what point this process becomes unacceptable if we can no longer can peek and decline.
I also think that you don't need to get the AD value of the key every time you open a chest, but you should get something rewarding or at least get you closer to that reward you are scoping out...
0
lantern22Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,111Arc User
Alas, for a week we all agreed and were united . . . . . .
I read so many posts about people wanting a guarantee return for their money of equal or greater value than the price of the key...
Really?
I'd like to win the lottery too, but spending my money to buy a ticket is no guarantee that it will happen, (*hopefully chances of getting a good drop from a chest will be significantly better than winning the lottery) but I still occasionally buy a lottery ticket, because there is still that chance.
I'd just settle for being to get something of value out of chests I have to purchase a key for...
Maybe a very rare drop that completely compensate me for the purchase of the one key used to open it but more often a drop that will or has the chance of at least partially (by random changable amounts) compensate me for the purchase price of the key either from resale value, refinement purposes or salvage and occasionally (again rarely) the chest that turns into a mimic that has to be defeated before there is any prize drop and even more rare (about the same chance as a drop that completely compensates for the price of a key) a chest that is empty or contains more or less common items but still marketable in the AH just so it isn't a complete loss.
That I think more than anything else will encourage people to buy keys and VIP privlidges specifically to get keys, people feeling that the return from their investment of purchasing keys or VIP privlidges won't be a complete loss.
why should we expect that this change should be fully lottery. they're asking us to spend money on something with trust that the result won't be garbage. the reward should guaranteed be worth the effort at least on a base level. why is it ridiculous to demand that they give us something for MONEY we give them? that's like saying I go to the sandwich store and buy a sandwich for 8 dollars and if they actually give me anything other than two slices of bread is kind of lucky.
this is a consumer product and we're just demanding that they give us something worth while if they're putting in a paywall. otherwise why should we continue playing. it's really not unreasonable. the lockboxes should be a bit better too imo. people spend a lot of money on them. the drop rates should be a bit better for the legendaries. if people know the chances of getting something good are real a lot more will be spent. you can't equate this to a real life honest to god lottery whre real money is out there or real prizes are being given for money spent. this is all in a freakign virtual game.. no matter what we win it's only good in this game. it's not real. we get nothing tangible for our money.
I believe in spending to a point where you've bought the game but beyond that it's charity. it's not unreasonable to ask for something good if you're spending money.
Another person who seems to think there should be a guaranteed return on their key purchase... it would be nice, but realistically it isn't very practical, feasable or profitable for the company who has the expense of providing this game in the first place, no profit - no game.
First of all it seems to me to be ridiculous as you say, to "demand" anything, I'm not suggesting people have to be grateful is someone hands you a HAMSTER sandwich, but you do have the opportunity to walk away if you think things aren't up to your required standards.
Secondly there's a difference between "won't be garbage" and something of "some value" to the player...
For instance, a rank 1 enchantment isn't garbage, it has "some personal value" for upgrading artifacts and other enchantments and it can be sold in the Auction House - it may be less than desirable or of very little use to a higher level player - but it isn't "garbage" and is part of that "partial return" I mentioned.
Now granted if people pay ten bucks for keys and start regularly getting level 1 enchantments, Neverwinter isn't going to be selling many keys so it would be counter productive economically for them to do something like that.
As you said, we are being "asked" to spend money on something - no one is holding us at gunpoint and forcing anyone to make these purchases, if anyone believes that the return for their investment isn't worth what they paid it would seem to me the simple solution is not to purchase anything instead of purchase it anyway and then complain about it.
Your statement that people spend a lot of money on lockboxes is the same kind of thing...
People choose to spend their money on lockbox keys, if someone believes that the return for their investment isn't sufficient, they can also choose not to purchase any more lockbox keys, that seems all too simple and obvious, to me at least.
Rank 1 enchantments are garbage because of bag space limits. If we had unlimited inventory slots this wouldn't be true but one rank 5 enchantment has the same value as 108 rank 1 enchantments.
Keep on rocking that tinfoil hat. The idea that Publishers want to decrease player population has to be one of the most ridiculous things I've read on these forums.
No tinfoil hat necessary. I didn't say to decrease player population. I said to reduce peak activity. By being able to run whatever you want at any time the server load is peaked more by geography than by designed activity times. When Dungeon Delves existed people would log in when they got home, check when the event was scheduled and plan their evening accordingly (eat now delve later or delve now eat later for example). This created spikes in demand which any business wants to avoid. Do you think McDonalds keeps 20 people on the clock all day long. No, they bring them in for lunch then send them home. You can't send home spare CPU cycles.
See the problem with your assumption is that you think they're doing this by design. Any time a publisher or developer does something that causes player populations to drop it's because of incompetence. MMO publishers aren't in the business of being stingy like you think. They want to increase player retention and convert more players into paying players. Those are the goals for anything that they do. Any time that you think you can explain why they're doing something for a different reason it's because they screwed up.
I read so many posts about people wanting a guarantee return for their money of equal or greater value than the price of the key...
Really?
I'd like to win the lottery too, but spending my money to buy a ticket is no guarantee that it will happen, (*hopefully chances of getting a good drop from a chest will be significantly better than winning the lottery) but I still occasionally buy a lottery ticket, because there is still that chance.
I'd just settle for being to get something of value out of chests I have to purchase a key for...
Maybe a very rare drop that completely compensate me for the purchase of the one key used to open it but more often a drop that will or has the chance of at least partially (by random changable amounts) compensate me for the purchase price of the key either from resale value, refinement purposes or salvage and occasionally (again rarely) the chest that turns into a mimic that has to be defeated before there is any prize drop and even more rare (about the same chance as a drop that completely compensates for the price of a key) a chest that is empty or contains more or less common items but still marketable in the AH just so it isn't a complete loss.
That I think more than anything else will encourage people to buy keys and VIP privlidges specifically to get keys, people feeling that the return from their investment of purchasing keys or VIP privlidges won't be a complete loss.
why should we expect that this change should be fully lottery. they're asking us to spend money on something with trust that the result won't be garbage. the reward should guaranteed be worth the effort at least on a base level. why is it ridiculous to demand that they give us something for MONEY we give them? that's like saying I go to the sandwich store and buy a sandwich for 8 dollars and if they actually give me anything other than two slices of bread is kind of lucky.
this is a consumer product and we're just demanding that they give us something worth while if they're putting in a paywall. otherwise why should we continue playing. it's really not unreasonable. the lockboxes should be a bit better too imo. people spend a lot of money on them. the drop rates should be a bit better for the legendaries. if people know the chances of getting something good are real a lot more will be spent. you can't equate this to a real life honest to god lottery whre real money is out there or real prizes are being given for money spent. this is all in a freakign virtual game.. no matter what we win it's only good in this game. it's not real. we get nothing tangible for our money.
I believe in spending to a point where you've bought the game but beyond that it's charity. it's not unreasonable to ask for something good if you're spending money.
Another person who seems to think there should be a guaranteed return on their key purchase... it would be nice, but realistically it isn't very practical, feasable or profitable for the company who has the expense of providing this game in the first place, no profit - no game.
First of all it seems to me to be ridiculous as you say, to "demand" anything, I'm not suggesting people have to be grateful is someone hands you a HAMSTER sandwich, but you do have the opportunity to walk away if you think things aren't up to your required standards.
Secondly there's a difference between "won't be garbage" and something of "some value" to the player...
For instance, a rank 1 enchantment isn't garbage, it has "some personal value" for upgrading artifacts and other enchantments and it can be sold in the Auction House - it may be less than desirable or of very little use to a higher level player - but it isn't "garbage" and is part of that "partial return" I mentioned.
Now granted if people pay ten bucks for keys and start regularly getting level 1 enchantments, Neverwinter isn't going to be selling many keys so it would be counter productive economically for them to do something like that.
As you said, we are being "asked" to spend money on something - no one is holding us at gunpoint and forcing anyone to make these purchases, if anyone believes that the return for their investment isn't worth what they paid it would seem to me the simple solution is not to purchase anything instead of purchase it anyway and then complain about it.
Your statement that people spend a lot of money on lockboxes is the same kind of thing...
People choose to spend their money on lockbox keys, if someone believes that the return for their investment isn't sufficient, they can also choose not to purchase any more lockbox keys, that seems all too simple and obvious, to me at least.
some people like being hamstered and some don't. it's pretty obvious which category you fall into if they do follow your logic they're going to lose the vast majority of their player base.
Fortunately MK appears to recognise the current imbalance between effort & reward (and probably has the metrics to show the impact it's having).
There's always one person saying "well nobody is forcing you to buy stuff" as though that's the problem. The problem is Cryptic need to create a situation where people want to pay rather than need to.
Please Do Not Feed The Trolls
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
Comments
1. all t2 and higher dungeons chance at cragmire artifact drop
2. random epic mount insignia chance
3. armor transmutes from old T1 and T2 dungeons... such as Dark Armor of Lolth
4. Gmop/Smop
Extra Chest loot suggestions:
1. +5 ring choice box in content that offers +5 rings, at a slightly increased droprate..... I haven't gotten a single +5 ring since last supposed droprate increase, and with my luck i would get a ring that is useless to any of my played characters if i did get one
2. epic level refinement stones in stacks of 5 unbound
3. epic insignia choice box
4. lesser weapon/armor enchants
also on refinement stones please replace the union, stability, power refinement stones with a single artifact rp stone... 3 grades of each of these in 3 bind options is a huge unnecessary bagspace sink
As others have mentioned, I understand that you guys need to entice players to spend some money on your game, but forcing players to choose between spending money they may not have and being able to do the bear minimum each day is not doing you any favors. As it is, we can make some keys only once every 20 hours. This means that if a player simply can't or won't put real money into the game, they are forced to run 2 different dungeons each day for their daily astral-diamonds. Especially with the increased loot tables, many people are going to want to run a single dungeon multiple times in hopes of a certain reward. With a maximum of one key per day per dungeon, a lot of players will be cutting back on how many dungeon runs they do.
My suggestion for this is 2 fold. Lower some of the time frames for crafting these keys (and perhaps some of the base requirements) and also add the key to the chest at a medium - low drop rate. You want people to play your content, you want people to be buy your keys for real money, but if a player logs on for a single dungeon and logs off, no one is going to party up to run a dungeon with their guild/friends multiple times. And in my experience, when you start off with a few keys and get into a good group who wants to run a dungeon 50 times in a row, that's when you WANT to spend money on keys.
For the second chest lower the number to .1% chance but still be on a sliding scale run twice .2% run three times .3% etc. So even the unlucky has a chance in 1k runs to get a drop that is boe.
Spread the loot out. Why can't we get back the old dungeon system of head drops here chest drops there boots there etc. It is not fun for some players to run one dungeon all the time for everything. People get bored take breaks and don't come back.
First I would request that this is a change to the overall loot system not just the chests. The value of loot should correspond to the time/effort/money invested and I don’t think that is true for most of the loot in the game. I think the loot system should allow free players to know that they will get the gear they want through time and effort, not rely on RNG, but also allow paying players to advance faster. Below are some ideas.
Ardent coins take a fixed amount of time and we have no way to farm them other than creating an army of toons yet the vendor for those doesn’t offer anything of interest. Consider updating this store to include valuable items like wards and upgrades for mounts and companions. It already has a gate in place to reduce the opportunity for abuse yet offers players a way to plan and upgrade. You could add an ardent coin coffer in the Zen store to support those who want to pay to progress faster.
Set the time to build area keys and the Zen to purchase them equivalent then make the loot worth that much on average. For example, the second chest could offer extra seals then expand the stores to allow buying more items of value like all of the equipment from that particular campaign or adding wards and mount/companion upgrades to the other seal stores. Players who want to progress faster can buy keys from the store.
I think these ideas follow a strategy that help keep the loot in line with the time/effort/money invested, allows paying players to progress faster, and allows free players to know that they can get the gear that they want eventually.
Thank you for listening to the player base and averting catastrophe before it happened.
I think this was a case of putting the cart before the horse, as most would not have minded this change as long as it was accompanied by a complete revamping of dungeon loot first. As a lot of players have pointed out there is almost no point in running certain dungeons at this stage in the game unless your farming for salvage.
Adding things like purple insignia drops instead of blue that aren't bop but bound to account would definately be a step in the right direction. Also maybe increase the drop rate on those pesky orcus shards so latecomers can actually have a chance at getting the set wouldn't be a bad idea either.
Really?
I'd like to win the lottery too, but spending my money to buy a ticket is no guarantee that it will happen, (*hopefully chances of getting a good drop from a chest will be significantly better than winning the lottery) but I still occasionally buy a lottery ticket, because there is still that chance.
I'd just settle for being to get something of value out of chests I have to purchase a key for...
Maybe a very rare drop that completely compensate me for the purchase of the one key used to open it but more often a drop that will or has the chance of at least partially (by random changable amounts) compensate me for the purchase price of the key either from resale value, refinement purposes or salvage and occasionally (again rarely) the chest that turns into a mimic that has to be defeated before there is any prize drop and even more rare (about the same chance as a drop that completely compensates for the price of a key) a chest that is empty or contains more or less common items but still marketable in the AH just so it isn't a complete loss.
That I think more than anything else will encourage people to buy keys and VIP privlidges specifically to get keys, people feeling that the return from their investment of purchasing keys or VIP privlidges won't be a complete loss.
why should we expect that this change should be fully lottery. they're asking us to spend money on something with trust that the result won't be garbage. the reward should guaranteed be worth the effort at least on a base level. why is it ridiculous to demand that they give us something for MONEY we give them? that's like saying I go to the sandwich store and buy a sandwich for 8 dollars and if they actually give me anything other than two slices of bread is kind of lucky.
this is a consumer product and we're just demanding that they give us something worth while if they're putting in a paywall. otherwise why should we continue playing. it's really not unreasonable. the lockboxes should be a bit better too imo. people spend a lot of money on them. the drop rates should be a bit better for the legendaries. if people know the chances of getting something good are real a lot more will be spent. you can't equate this to a real life honest to god lottery where real money is out there or real prizes are being given for money spent. this is all in a freakign virtual game.. no matter what we win it's only good in this game. it's not real. we get nothing tangible for our money. and beyond paying the wages of the people working here (and it's not just this game paying salaries they have a lot of games) their cost on these items is ZERO...
I believe in spending to a point where you've bought the game but beyond that it's charity. it's not unreasonable to ask for something good if you're spending money.
First of all it seems to me to be ridiculous as you say, to "demand" anything, I'm not suggesting people have to be grateful is someone hands you a HAMSTER sandwich, but you do have the opportunity to walk away if you think things aren't up to your required standards.
Secondly there's a difference between "won't be garbage" and something of "some value" to the player...
For instance, a rank 1 enchantment isn't garbage, it has "some personal value" for upgrading artifacts and other enchantments and it can be sold in the Auction House - it may be less than desirable or of very little use to a higher level player - but it isn't "garbage" and is part of that "partial return" I mentioned.
Now granted if people pay ten bucks for keys and start regularly getting level 1 enchantments, Neverwinter isn't going to be selling many keys so it would be counter productive economically for them to do something like that.
As you said, we are being "asked" to spend money on something - no one is holding us at gunpoint and forcing anyone to make these purchases, if anyone believes that the return for their investment isn't worth what they paid it would seem to me the simple solution is not to purchase anything instead of purchase it anyway and then complain about it.
Your statement that people spend a lot of money on lockboxes is the same kind of thing...
People choose to spend their money on lockbox keys, if someone believes that the return for their investment isn't sufficient, they can also choose not to purchase any more lockbox keys, that seems all too simple and obvious, to me at least.
I agree it should not cost 1000's of dollars to have BiS, unless your trying to do that overnight. I have been playing this game for 3+ years now and my main is pretty much BiS, i got a couple of 11's i need to make to 12 but thats it. I bought 1 coal ward earlier on and realized my mistake as soon as upgraded the weapon shards I had... I have bought none from zen market since... but it almost took me three years to get my enchants were they are almost rank 12... Of course you honestly don't need 12's (cept maybe FBI). My alts have enchans between rank 8 and 10, and i have successfully completed FBI with my main and one alts so far. So, any enchant between 8 and 10 will allow you to smoothly run all content (cept maybe FBI), so in that case I had that last year... believe or not enchants were not a priority until after mod 6 was released.
Ok, enough of the sidebar, for every player out there they have what they consider to be good loot. Lot's like the RoI in the form of AD, some have a desire for different skins/fashion, others are looking at BiS gear(companion, weapons, armor, and the RP to feed said gear), some look at campaign progression, and maybe strong hold vouchers (sorry if I missed a loot group out there). So, Cryptic will have its hand full trying to figure this out and will have to obviously come up with a system that pleases a majority of the players while not alienate those players that don't quite want the same thing as the majority.
Argument for a Themed Dungeon Experience
Pretty tough task, at least from my point of view. So it is my desire, that they give each dungeon a Loot Theme. Each theme dungeon should have seals a respectable amount of seals that players can use towards purchasing that same drop gear from a vendor located in the City of Neverwinter (The game is Neverwinter and centers around the city and there are many neglected and not used vendors contained within the city).
Gear that drops from bosses and chests from the themed dungeons should be BoE (that way they have resale value and that AH AD sink will kick in more often, its over 9million on Zax now...), and gear purchased with seals should be BTA or BTC. Ohh, and all dungeons should always have the most current campaign progression seals or currency (don't include armor/weapon drops, if you want those to come from new dungeon). Put a cap on the amount of seals/currency you can get from these dungeons if you have to, as long as it is time-gated correctly I will not complain about a cap.
By incorporating a system like this it does 4 things:
1. Normalize/limits the amount of RnG players have to deal with to get the item they want to enhance there style of game play.
2. This system will hit just about all players and what they consider valuable and a worthwhile investment of there game time/money.
3. For the Devs, I think instead of trying to make one chest at the end of dungeon please them all, you can now focus on making sure each dungeon has the correct loot tables and wont require as much manipulation. I don't know, maybe do the updates in steps so you can roll it out in incriminates while making sure the system works correctly.
4. No matter what dungeon you choose to run it will always count towards progress in the new campaign (removes some of the grind we feel now), and what ever you consider desirable as loot drops.
I don't know seems like a good idea to me, not sure how much programming would have to go into it.
make the key tab or consolidated other keys (Master Keys for boss chests and Dragon Keys for end-zone last boss' room for "epic" dragon chests).
Master chests should be different loot types than Dragon chests reward list table.
i already post some ideas in other topics, you can look up my posts.
so let me repeat.
Master Chests,
1. seals
2. gems (no white or green)
3. random blue refine stones.
4. random blue profession or crafter items and resources.
5. random armor/weapon enchant gems (no shards).
6. any random appearance items.
7. any other choice items voted by players or devs new items to be added.
Dragon Chests,
1. bonus seals
2. gems (high grades)
3. chance of random profession access item, and few rare/epic resources
4. random epic grade refine stones
5. chance of refine epic marks
6. random epic armor/weapon
7. chance of rings (no +3 or under)
since Gateway got pull out, we need new replacement for Companion's Quest mode, same concept as STO used for duty officers and admirality (ship missions) for companions that are in idled pack, send them out and get chance of new companion gears and runestones, and earn few companion upgrade tokens.
call it as "Companion's Adventures".
let put that awful RNG adjusted, only usefull for lockboxes, not in adventures or in any quests.
BOE
Include valuable BOE equipment that people actually want to buy and sell on the auction house and then maybe this key change might, I repeat might, fly.
From the above link i doubt very much that we will see zen market items(coal/pres wards, companions, certain other keys, and etc...) drop from chests. You know what I kinda understand their stance on this (flame me if you want), the game has to make money somehow. If the game doesn't make money we will see it become more unsupported. The more money it make the better it will be supported and the game will continue to thrive. So, Cryptic has to be smart on how they make money off a FTP game. The player see a lot of these (coal/pres wards) as choke that drive us to spend money, and obviously puts us odds with spending money.
The Compromise
1. We already have a system in the game that works and anyone with VIP understands this system: Discount Vouchers. Lot's of those vouchers are useless (IMHO) some see a decent amount of usage (at least from me). To the point, if they added 50 to 75 percent off vouchers that lasted a week to chest drops, my money says that those vouchers would not be discarded. As matter of fact they would probably see immediate use.
Because of this compromise the players might be more willing to spend on something in the zen market that they deem out of their price range and Cryptic see's an inflow of money were they might not have. Come on people how many are not waiting to spend some money on a 50 percent off sale??? Instead of waiting 6 months to a 1 year, now we have a chance at see it a little more often and Cryptic might see more cash flow there way between these sales....
It's all about compromise and finding solution that works!
Money is real. Loot in a video game is not. If one wants people to spend real money on imaginary rewards, the rewards should have some actual value. The current system treats players as if we are gambling addicts whose real reason for buying keys is a behavioural disorder instead of reasonable expectation of return on investment.
1:1 return on the price of the key should be the minimum reward. That is beyond obvious.
To get an in game announcement that there will be 15% discount on companions, when you know that eventually you will get a 15% (or better) discount on companions by one of those invocation discount vouchers, that completely removes the impetus for anyone to buy a companion on those announced special 15% off sales (didn't anyone think of or notice that before making it part of the game?).
Same thing for the discount vouchers for refining items... if someone can't afford or doesn't care for the price of a refining item, does Neverwinter actually think a mere 15% off voucher is going to suddenly entice that person to purchase the item?
It never works for me and IMO the only people it does work for, are the players who would have purchased that item anyway, the 15% is just a tiny bonus for them.
There also used to be weekly sales of what many people considered 'useful' items in the Zen Market, I've even plunked down a few bucks when something I really wanted came up for sale (say the Greater Bag of Holding - BEFORE they suddenly decided to make it bound to character)... I have no idea why they discontinued that, but they did so on to the next point.
There has been special sales where just about everything in the Zen Market is deeply discounted - yeah, I've spent a bunch of money buying Zen there, not just for myself but by way of gifts and 'stocking stuffers' for friends and family (but as the 17 people who started out playing Neverwinter only three of us remain, it looks like I have to reexamine my options here).
I also agree that compromise is always the key, the problem is a lot of people seem to have a different opinion of what actually constitutes "compromise".
Reading some of the comments here it seems a few people seem to believe having a guarantee 100% return on their key investment is a compromise, needless to say I disagree.
Just about everyone here agrees that for their purchase of a key, they shouldn't be getting "junk" but the same thing applies some players might believe a peridot or a level 5 enchantment is a good return for some keys - then you will have other players who will think something like that constitutes junk.
But the fact remains no one is forcing anyone to buy keys or anything for that matter.
If those inclined to do so don't believe the price of the keys are worth the return they get they will quit buying keys - if someone believes their investment in keys and the return they get is worth it, they will buy more keys.
The one's who entertain me are the people who buy keys, gripe and groan about the lousy returns they get - then buy more keys...
That just speaks for itself IMO.
First surely you recognize that no one is forcing you to spend money on keys... yet you continue to do so - there has to be a reason despite your complaining about it.
As I see it when someone purchases a key they aren't purchasing a guaranteed (particularly a guaranteed 100%) return on their investment they are purchasing the chance to obtain something that will make their investment worthwhile - it's not the same as buying a 20oz soda - not even close.
In all the years I've been playing Neverwinter I've never seen anyone even suggest that players will always (or even most of the time) get a fair exchange for the money they spend on keys - and to think that's the way it should be is just unrealistic IMO.
If anyone want a guarantee return, put some money into buying Zen and buy that item from the Zen Market - if the Zen Market doesn't carry that item, well then your only other alternative is to either take a chance on getting it some other way or just write it off as unobtainable but to make the decision to take a chance on something then gripe that it didn't happen... then turn around and buy more keys... how does that even make sense?
The thing is though if a person wants a particular mount and spends a bunch of money on keys to finely get it, once they have it that player usually decides they want something different, newer or better and the whole process starts all over again -
complete with all the whining that they had to spend so much to finely get what they wanted.Sorry perhaps that was a little too harsh, I still think its true, but harsh none the less, mea culpa - mea culpa.
Secondly how it giving everyone exactly what every time they want it, profitable for the people who run this game?
If you want a legendary mount (or whatever) from a chest, you buy a key and take a chance on getting it...
If you bought one key and got that legendary mount on the first try, you wouldn't need to buy any more keys would you - at least not for that mount.
Even if you had a shopping list of things you wanted, bought one key and got them on the first try or bought one and even though you didn't get the particular item you wanted - but could sell what you received for the price of another key... how many keys would you need to buy - just one that's how many...
How in anyone's mind does that equate to a profit for Neverwinter, giving them the revenue to keep the game running and develop new content?
It doesn't IMO.
And I'm doing it because it's free, i.e. not real. But if Cryptic actually wants people to spend money, they should be offering something worth money. There is no demand if there is no reward. Things that cost money should be worth money. Nothing about that is unrealistic. There is no demand if there is no reward.
If you haven't seen anyone actually elucidate that, it's because it's too obvious to need saying.
"which often fail to appear at all or are so worthless they might as well have not appeared."??? "A REWARD THAT IS ALWAYS WORTHWHILE, LIKE ASTRAL DIAMONDS OR VALUABLE SALVAGE." That's what you get, what you consider 'valuable' depends on you. We're talking about chests, not drops.
"it is plainly not really worth discussing this with you" pfft... Like I care. This is a proper response, unlike you screaming DEMAND SUPPLY DEMAND SUPPLY DEMAND SUPPLY like a crazed kid.
And, agreed cat, since the AD is anyways used to max out. So, this would lead to self sustenance but lower income which ain't a bad thing.
Perceived value: is the difference between a prospective customer's evaluation of the benefits and costs of one product when compared with others(key consumption vs. chest contents). If someone gets a peridot and a blue salvage and considers that worth than we have a happy costumer if the customer doesn't see it as valuable than they we have an unhappy customer. Also, incorporated into this is how much they might be able to trade or auction contents, and part of that value is its rarity and how others in the game perceive the value.
In this post: http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/neverwinter/#/discussion/1224531/a-key-compromise, I try to show what the value of a key could mean.
If i'm using the free/vip key and I get a peridot and some blue salvage not a big deal, no real time or money investment.
If i'm using a campaign key or dragon then we have a little bit of problem. If you repeat the process over a hundred times getting pretty close to the same value of items, we really do have a problem I think.... but we have already discussed this a lot, now it time to figure out at what point this process becomes unacceptable if we can no longer can peek and decline.
I also think that you don't need to get the AD value of the key every time you open a chest, but you should get something rewarding or at least get you closer to that reward you are scoping out...
There's always one person saying "well nobody is forcing you to buy stuff" as though that's the problem. The problem is Cryptic need to create a situation where people want to pay rather than need to.
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