Feedback is not being ignored, we just aren't playing whack-a-mole with responses. We're collecting everything, filtering through it (because there's a lot of hamsters and some pretty unproductive commentary among the valuable information), and then we have to see what the next steps are. Asking for feedback doesn't mean immediate incorporation but it also doesn't mean we are disregarding it.
@nitocris83 on that note it would be nice to get an occasional post summarizing the feedback and how the Dev team interprets it. Point is.... so far I've not seen a compelling reason to have our expensive keys eaten.
So I'm curious, why do we even have about 50000 different types of keys? Why are they not all just "legendary dragon keys" that can unlock any extra chest in the game and you can make them using the same campaign currencies that we can now. Then reduce the price per key to around 5k each as well. This would be (at 500 AD/Zen) 200 Zen for 20 Keys. I would certainly buy more at that price. Others who make keys can just make a bunch (all still would be 20 hours) but they could make them across various campaigns if they wished.
Hell, IMO you could even chain the price of the keys to the AD/Zen exchange to keep it @ 5k AD to one key so if it drops we can't just horde a ton of the keys. If they stay account bound as well we cant resell so it limits the tendency to buy for resale when it's on sale.
Then you could have some of the salvagable gear as unbound (so people could sell or salvage) as well as have the possibility of having some items drop as either unbound or account bound so we still have a higher drop chance.
And of course, I've already mentioned about a dozen times. A ring exchange would be huge. Then people could get the ones they want not whichever one RNG forced upon them. And the new SKT rings should get the same treatment and also be account bound.
This is of course assuming you're trying to improve the game not just HAMSTER us in the HAMSTER to try and get more money out of us.
Can we just scrap the whole key system? People kill a dragon or demo or whatever, open all chests without a key, and go on their merry way.
Or, continue your plan to monetize the loot chest, and face a large outflux of ppl. The new loot table is window dressing to the suggested key fix, and your player base is seeing through it.
I think the least you could do is to remove the blue salvage from the chests. When I slay the almighty demon lord Orcus I don't want to see a rusty +1/ +2 ring within the loot chest. This 2.2k RAD junk feels like an insult. How far this game has gone, that players ask you to remove some of the "rewards"...
A player from the pc that ended up migrating to the ps4 when it came out.
While the key tab is a good and useful change that has been much needed, are you serious on how that is what you guys plan to implement as a change?
I can see why there was an exodus of players between modules for this game. How it stands why is it that such ways are used to make the game better when it clearly doesn't? The goal is of course for you (Cryptic) to make money with each new installment you make to a game but seriously with some of these decisions, do you really expect to make your money back or profit from it?
It seems the borderline is you forgot the one rule of gaming with this whole "free" game issue is that if a player doesn't feel they are winning at all for a certain amount of time, they stop playing. In your quest to try and provide an adequate solution to this problem you made yourself in how you treated the players on the issue of dungeon chests that you felt need tweaking whereas it needs to be addressed also on a few of the games limiting features.
1. Exactly what is the true endpoint of the game? We are shoehorned early by the sleeping dragon bridge battle and through much of the normal campaign that Vallindra is the head baddie we're supposed to take down, but to actually resolve the normal ark you have to complete an epic dungeon in order to do so? - Bad. The arc should in a way resolve itself WITHOUT the need for this to happen, perhaps add something to dread ring's campaign to point this out.
Take off more points there on the fact with so many distractions once you hit level cap you end up going every which direction since then. While the scroll of accomplishments by the seer is a great and justifyable addition that not only takes away some of the confusion, a story should have at that booknote a conclusion place before addressing more content. This is what your competition elder scrolls online seems to do rather well, and in most cases gets me to pay more for content AFTER the initial purchase.
2. Boring and bad campaigns. Now not all of these are like this. Dread ring and underdark and maze engine stand out at being really good and even a small fraction of elemental evil's story in part came be considered ok, but the quests to finish not so much. The first two I mentioned feel additional to the main story, really draw you in to complete and sometimes don't feel as tedious because like in the case of the underdark that it takes you all around to places you have already completed to showcase an even bigger picture of threats that are happening around the sword coast, bridging the world more in a way than a regular map locale. Did I forget to mention that in the case of the Dread Ring and Underdark boons they just flat out are awesome to use compared to other compaigns? Even by the time elemental evil wraps up I find it was worth the effort of all of that for not only the artifact weapon, but the boons made up for all the work to get there and it all fits into a nice story/campaign. I really feel like my characters accomplished something in getting them at the end as to how it should feel. The others however are tedious at best and flat out boring, even less story committed to them and just shoehorned to pad extra content and not as worthwhile to do. Well of dragons is horrible in how convoluted it is and very little payoff to get the boons, please rework asap. SKT boons are even worse.
3. Dungeons and chests....really? For a game being called neverwinter and the land of the 20 sided die would be king, RNG is something to be expected here but you (the devs) have clearly abused it with how you implement things such as this and as to why you have this corner you put yourselves into. The lockboxes are one thing, but to make just about everything RNG? Why would I play this? If you're expected to run a dungeon to take a break from the story (or lack of one in most cases) why would I run these for garbage? Let alone garbage I can't exactly sell to make some profit? The whole point in doing games like this is to make something for your trouble, something rare that is PROFITABLE for the time in doing it. So I can earn enough either by one run or 20 and something I do want or need. What you have done is circumvented dungeons so badly by your measures you basically neutered them from even bothered to be done which is basically HALF of your game. You did this by saying you would rather people pay for garbage for maybe a 0.01% chance at something good. Then if you get that item somehow, you decided to make sure it was bound so it can't be sold as to lose the value. You add "new" items that look fun but are useless at being lower value which will in turn just end up being garbage anyway and wasted your time. So in the case of putting items up in the auction house by this measure if someone could you are basically afraid of lost value as people won't run the content and just pay for it. If it's already rare and is worth thousands to millions of AD due to the RNG, why would this be an issue? Then for each of these items, people buy zen and get AD with it to buy said items. How would this break the economy? Sure some might get the item for "free" but everyone pays somewhere, and there's plenty that would pay with actual funds to get zen, and in some ways you profit more like this. This is where it helps if you have not just players play test this but some of your developers too. It really feels like someone there failed business 101 or needs to retake the basics. Put yourself in our shoes in using your product, do you honestly feel after the work we do that if you did the same work you would do the dungeons like this? No you wouldn't.
There are plenty of reasonable ways to fix this. If you really want to do the no peeking, hey that's great but you're also worried on that items would depreciate in value? I guess that means you can do several things:
1. I like you are adding announcements on some items from dungeons in zone, how about you rotate depending on module, events on exactly what you can get from chests and guess what make it bind on equip? But it'll lose value as more people get it? That's the point. Like supply and demand you make better things for us players to find and sell. It makes the economy go around, it's not rocket science really. This approach you did here? It's lazy and it shows. How lazy? You expect people to be distracted by the shiny new items that are half useless to excuse the fact that boxes are sealed now even with a key that it takes one to open them without peeking. It's fine if you can't make a new zone everytime, but rotating and making new useful items to old locales depending on what's around at the time can go a really long way with the LIMITED number of locations to do dungeons of.
2. Stop pay walling every bit of content. Make more items to put in chests and make it less like lockboxes too. The problem in doing so many keys from normal dungeon chest keys, to epic and now legendary dragon? You have to pay to open anything in this game, why would I again PAY to open any chest? How about you make bind on account or pickup items on non paying or lower level chests and make bind on equip items on higher chests. See the part again on if a player feels less winning in a game how long they stick around. A game that nickel and dimes me to do ANYTHING is not a game worth playing. That is exactly what you did to this game and it's wrong.
3. Rework the gear scores for dungeons and in most cases lower the difficulty to many epic dungeons. I should be able to get together any group of adventurers to your "Recommended" gear score and complete a dungeon no matter what. This is truly not the case at all. The 1600 dungeons like kessell will destroy players along with vallindra's tower and it shouldn't take getting in a party with someone at 2500 to carry other members to get through. In the case of vallindra's even 2500s couldn't take her down due to her 1 shot abilities. I mean really? Once again I highly doubt developers are playtesting these changes as they should. Even Castle Never should be reworked. If you plan on charging players like this for dungeons, shouldn't they be able to get to the end easier for you to make money? Again players are winning less so less reason for them to play or even pay.
4. Add more fashion items to the trade bar store or even put some in chests that can be sold in the auction house. Higher boxes BOE, the lowers, you get it by now. While it might feel tedious at this point to put in, again players need more items to sell. With every new layer of content, there should be more items a player can sell to make some profit to make the game's economy work. That's part of a job when you make games like this is controlling the economy in a fair way. This game should not have players rely on refinement stones and lockbox items as income and in most cases it exactly is this. Players shouldn't have to rely on those items for income. In that quest to make money you just don't get the entire game like this to pricemeal it behind paywalls like this. Look at champions online and then back here. They found a perfect balance between lockboxes to make people WANT to subscribe to play it. They have new cosmetic items all the time which this game sorely lacks now.
There is supposed to be a game under this lotto somewhere and it's sorely missing. If half of the game is dungeons, but you get garbage from dungeons, that's half the game people just will not play or stop playing. If there's supposed to be a story but it's buried under campaigns, that's another issue too. The point in all of this is there is just so much you guys need to fix really not just the boxes. This game needs more than you're putting into it. At the end of the day it's supposed to be more fun than work, so why does Neverwinter feel like a second or third job than an actual game?
Here are my suggestions and some of the suggestions i think to be the best from the topic:
* All Dungeon, Drops should be Bount to Equip, this will add a lot of replay value to dungeons as we will able to farm some specifc itens to sell on the AH. * Diferent dungeons should drop diferent stuff based on its dificulty, but all of then must have at least 20k AD whorty of loot in the chest opened with a campaign key or with a legendary dragon key... *Seals, demonic inchor and other stuff should be used to provide a slow but steady way of progression... Example: You can make a Shard of orcus to be sold for 50.000 Seals of protector +5 Ring to be sold for 50.000 Demonic Inchor * MSva marks MUST BE UNBOUND with these changes, otherwise ppl will just give up on legendary relic weapon
Hope devs dont ignore this post...
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silverkeltMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,235Arc User
I will state this again as simply as I can, as for right now, it appears to be competely fallen on daft ears.
No one in thier ight mind is going to pay to you PER run to run things..
Either add keys to VIP , or have 1 free chest and 1 bought chest WITH The same exact loot rolls, poeple can of course pay to double thier odds on any given run..
but to simply kill off free to play with this one strike of a code, as you would, is just not going to work.
Look , Ive paid this company money.. many times, over the course of years, I WILL not do this.. I simply will not.
You are barking up the wrong tree..
and its "not just about loot" its how we can access it.
The way you put it right now, will simply not be feasible for most players.
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viperwitch23Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 205Arc User
I am sorry my Photoshop skills aren't great, but I tried my best here
This is what Key Grinding looks like now
Anyone would like to order seats before key changes go live?
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shadowgod244Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 44Arc User
edited January 2017
after running on the test server with a few guildies and trying to obtain the new loot to test not one of us in 6 runs got any drops from the chests that were anything but the same old drops, i know thats not much to go by but we should of had a least one purple between us after opening not only the normal chest but the special as well, i mean come on thats 60 chest total opened and nothing so i dont notice any increase whatsoever.
i will once again state that whilst the idea of giving away pets in chests is a good idea and helps to put certian pets back in game (like SCA) other pets like the ambush drake and cambion magus should NOT be included as the people who currently have their's either had to pay during an event to obtain or pay a massive amount in AH to people that did so to give a pet away that some paid $100 is more than disrespectful its disheartening.
also the 'special chests' from ESOT, kessels and LOL are so outdated and underwhelming with prizes that they are not worth the 25000 that you spend on dragon keys even with the new gear (if it drops) so you may want to consider either giving a 100% chance at purple with the chance at an artifact or consider a new cheaper dragon key for the T1 content
on a side note if you are going to give out new equipment with new abilities then it may be an idea to have instant access on preview so we can test and see if they have any bugs or if they are useful at all, it was done in SKT with the ability to try out the new eye of the giant and the relic gear so why not this new stuff?
Feedback is not being ignored, we just aren't playing whack-a-mole with responses. We're collecting everything, filtering through it (because there's a lot of hamsters and some pretty unproductive commentary among the valuable information), and then we have to see what the next steps are. Asking for feedback doesn't mean immediate incorporation but it also doesn't mean we are disregarding it.
Really? If feedback isn't being ignored then why is it that we still have a mess here? In the 50 page thread you can see asked over and over again, make the dungeon at least pay back the cost of keys. And do something about the fact that campaign keys take a day to make.
No one is asking you to play "whack-a-mole," but the fact of the matter is, you guys stone wall us a lot. This issue, and a great many others, wont go away by ignoring them or telling us you're working on them. We've been very patient and we've gotten very little for our effort. How long does it take to filter through these posts? It's not very labor intensive to read a post and then meet up to discuss it.
"Asking for feedback doesn't mean immediate incorporation but it also doesn't mean we are disregarding it."
Fixing keys is something you should've been doing by now. Not removing an important feature and offering us companions and a vague buff to the drop rates of the rarest items. You guys always want feedback, but often times we hear nothing about it unless its a huge long thread(like the last thread or the swiftness nerf/bug fix).
I think the least you could do is to remove the blue salvage from the chests. When I slay the almighty demon lord Orcus I don't want to see a rusty +1/ +2 ring within the loot chest. This 2.2k RAD junk feels like an insult. How far this game has gone, that players ask you to remove some of the "rewards"...
An insult you say? and I say it's an insult to kill all three of the bosses in top tier FBI dungeon and receive an Elven Ward Greaves in the chest... First two bosses often don't drop a jack HAMSTER! and please do not give us Peridots, you want me to thank you for removing black pearls out of the loot tables?
Nancy - Dragonborn, SM Guardian Fighter A proud member of "mythical horde of DPS GFs"
1). Is SW more dps or tank based? 2). Yes. I am panzer! 3). Get ACT if you want to celebrate your epeen. 4). Horniness will not stand between me and what I believe - "MM"
Feedback is not being ignored, we just aren't playing whack-a-mole with responses. We're collecting everything, filtering through it (because there's a lot of hamsters and some pretty unproductive commentary among the valuable information), and then we have to see what the next steps are. Asking for feedback doesn't mean immediate incorporation but it also doesn't mean we are disregarding it.
Good morning,
I believe my comment was kinda unproductive.
And i apologize for that. So i will add my two cents to this whole 50 + discussion if that is okay.
First of all , please do not think we are ungrateful. I can say that my guild ( around 120 daily active people / 150 accounts ) is very happy with the changes made to the tab. More space in our bags is always welcomed. And to us who have legendary bags and no space at all, is a very welcomed change.
We appreciate the effort and the patience you have , including your effort to reply to us. Even when the community may not agree with some of the things to be done / or the preview of the changes.
I speak for my guild since a lot of them come here and just look at what is going on without posting. The main problem they have with this change was basically said by the rest of the people here.
1 . Loot value of the chest vs value of a legendary key / basic dungeon key
2. RNG is so low we would have a bigger chance getting a reward in an online casino games
( Not speaking for the lockboxes since we accepted them as they are, and we are fully aware that is how it functions. Either you are lucky or not. Yet we still buy the keys and gamble like addicts in a casino. And even there , sometimes you win , so you are actually motivated to play again. )
Being forced to open a chest vs peeking what is in the chest and making a choice for yourself, are two very different ways of giving us a reward for our effort, for doing and finishing a dungeon.
We would not have a problem with it , if the amount of the awards was equal to the price of the keys. But it is not.
In 5 runs of CN , by opening both chests i could not cover the amount of Zen spent on the keys.
( I am not talking about AD since VIP covered my epic keys, i can not even imagine what the people without VIP are going through. )
When we have a key , the process should be as follows :
1. Get a key 2. Do a dungeon 3. Get a reward 4. If you Sell the reward 5. You get the amount of the money back spent on that key ( or more as profit ) 6. Repeat the circle
However , we do a dungeon , only to get a salvage item worth less then the value of the epic dungeon key. And that is where the problem hides..
The same can be applied to a legendary key. What we get in return should be the same amount as the price of that legendary key , since it is bought only by Zen. And that is a minimum requirement.
If you are making us open the chest without giving us a choice at this matter.
You need 300 Zen to buy 5 keys. That is 149'000 AD. ( 499 AD per 100 ZEN )
How exactly are people going to get 149k to 150 k to buy Zen keys to open double chests if the loot inside is worth 2,2 k , with some nice blue items that we do not really need. And a shard, that we can not refine , since we do not have 500 k for a coal ward.
The new prizes are very nicely made and i salute the people developing it for their ideas. But this game is run by AD / Zen and IL . That is how it was made and that is how we see it. That is how your whole community sees it. And while that is sad , this is how it functions.
After we do a dungeon let us say , 20 times. And get that particular item we want, or a companion we always wanted , what then ?
We can not sell them for AD.
We can not equip them since we already have them.
We can give them to our alts but the truth is , people just do not have time to level their alts any more. It is just how it is.
The range of years of the players in my guild is from 25 to 60. A lot of them are working more years then i am alive. And they do not have time to play this game 24 / 7. So 80 % of them are playing only one character. Thanks to previous changes. But that is how it is. Again. Between fishing ( or not ) , doing dailies and running FBI , CN and MSVA, not a lot of time is left for anything else.
And if this change gets implemented as it is, i am afraid even the people who we only got back, will leave again.
Instead of motivation we are forced to do something . And that is what we are unhappy about.
Feedback is not being ignored, we just aren't playing whack-a-mole with responses. We're collecting everything, filtering through it (because there's a lot of hamsters and some pretty unproductive commentary among the valuable information), and then we have to see what the next steps are. Asking for feedback doesn't mean immediate incorporation but it also doesn't mean we are disregarding it.
If I look at the history of this upcoming change, there's a clear pattern. When the change was announced, the level of dissatisfaction was very high (myself included): many ideas were published by the players to improve the situation. The change went in stand-by mode, 2.5 devs were dedicated to improve the change, but after some weeks of work the result seems to be unsatisfactory again and the same ideas are published twice across two different threads.
Imo the pattern is simple: there's always a big gap between the ideas coming from the player base and how they are interpreted,digested and then implemented by the devs. I don't expect that the devs implement all the ideas, but the dimension of the gap is partially unknown because we don't have important info like the drop rate, the complete list of changes and so on. That is called asymmetric information. The only things we know are that every chest will consume a key, the loot and the progression are managed by a RNG that the players don't love while the game experience collapses on repetitive tasks that no one wants to do again and again unless you don't buy the legendary keys. Furthermore even if you grind like a hell or buy the legendary keys, the expected level of reward doesn't match the value for money (or time) invested in the game by the players due to the RNG. This is a lose-lose situation: the players don't take the risk, the company has less revenues, less players or less time spent playing.
This is my snapshot and I want to add that it's quite difficult to have a productive discussion if the available info is incomplete: it triggers emotional feedbacks and a few concrete proposals based on quantitative analysis (and we have very good players who can do it). I fully understand that the RNG is the "business secret" of this game, but no players love investing resources and time in high risky assets (like the legendary keys). Many ideas have been already published, but the problem is always the same: how do the devs interpret and implement them? Because this gap injects the belief that we are not listened.
Post edited by rapo973 on
Oltreverso guild leader Maga Othelma - DC | Svalvolo - SW | Dente Avvelenato- GWF
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arcticblitzMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 126Arc User
Feedback is not being ignored, we just aren't playing whack-a-mole with responses. We're collecting everything, filtering through it (because there's a lot of hamsters and some pretty unproductive commentary among the valuable information), and then we have to see what the next steps are. Asking for feedback doesn't mean immediate incorporation but it also doesn't mean we are disregarding it.
Would you mind following up with the dev team if we will or will not be getting the loot tables / Misc items list posted with the drop chances? with much respect it should not take a week to make a yes or no call and communicate it back to the player base.
Blitzy : PVE only Barbarian
Martin ConDion PVE only Ranger Guild Founder: -HunterS-
my concern is getting the superior marks needed for the relic weapons, ive only got 3 in 60-70 runs. what am i suppose to do with not being about the look in the chest and still get the purple and blue marks ? throw them away ? You should make a vender so that if you get a unhealthy amount of purple and blue marks and no superior marks you can atleast trade them in. Most of my guild have their relic weapons at legendary but they are not that happy with, it seeing on how much $$ and time they spent getting them that way. Msva needs to have a good looking at on how you can still implement the key changes but also get the stuff you want/need to progress.
I agree with many of the posts here. As a player who only started this summer I have to say the changes don't sound promising and my entire guild and alliance feel the same. We're all a bit worried about this update...
Why run all these dungeons and end game stuff if it's not worth the key? I want to say as politely as I can, but everyone feels as though we're being pushed closer and closer to pay to play.
No one minds spending money when they want to, we happily spend our money, buying things we really want... however when we start to feel as if we have to spend money, like we're being forced, our pockets start to feel much tighter...
I suggest if you must have keys consumed upon opening the chest, do so only with epic dungeon keys but not the legendary dragon keys... we pay real money for those, we should be able to choose if we want the reward in those chests at least.
And to echo what many have said, if greater demonic keys will be consumed and we're getting +1 rings still, we should get a decrease in the amount of time it takes to make one. An entire day to get a +1 ring that only salvages for 2k is not worth it.
Or worse the legendary keys... 300 Zen is worth upwards of 100k AD... to open 5 chests and end up with 10k AD from salvage garbage is a terrible terrible exchange rate. Even if you happen to get all epic armor it's still only 35k AD at best using up all five keys... it makes it seem not worth buying them at all. Especially with chances for the better items being so low.
I can say for myself I am skeptical of spending any more on this game than I already have due to the changes and I think many others feel the same. I can't really say until I've ran a few dungeons and such post change, but my initial reaction is that I don't like this new system. I hope we see some compromise and some input from the players more seriously considered and implemented.
Changes and SVH I did the math with my RNG luck and current drop rates I would have to spent ~40 kk AD in keys for my legendary weapon set (each char). With 5 x better drop rate it would 'just' be 4 kk AD for keys. Add the cost in time/AD for vonin blood, lanolin etc. and this will make ppl stop playing, period. I would have the AD to spent for the keys, but comparing the time or money you have to invest for 40 kk AD and the 'reward' (legendary weapons you will refine in half a year) I dont think, that this changes will go well with the players
Chars: CW, DC, GF, GWF, HR and TR.
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krasensilverMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 27Arc User
never seen a company so passionate to lose own customers
if all of these items are BOA then allows us to salvage these items for ASTRAL DIAMONDS not RAD. For a rate of green = 1,000AD blue = 5,000AD and Purple = 10,000AD
this would give players some incentive to run these dungeons after they have acquired most of the good from the dungeons.
i lost count, but im somewhere between 200 and 300 msva completions, and still short of 4 marks to complete the set. mk said, that sva already contains the "improved" lootsystem, so it doesnt matter, if its 200 or 300 runs. either way, removing the peak function is an insult towards the players.
i was unhappy, that i couldnt extend my vip, but when reading this, it was probably better, that i ran out of zen back then.
just add another seal vendor and seal type that sells all the new items added in these chests as well. Give us 10 seals for every boss downed and 50 seals for every chest opened. Make items received from dungeon chests BoE and make items bought from the vendor BOA. /thread
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ironzerg79Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,942Arc User
I guess the overall frustration I'm seeing here is the feeling that the key system creates a "pay to play" mentality. When you enter a dungeon, if you want loot, you have to exchange something that has a cost attached to it, the key. And the results from "purchasing" the right to get loot often times feels like it's not worth the cost.
So again, I wholeheartedly ask...what's the freaking obsession with keys, and how is that healthy for the game?
Why do you need to attach an inherent "cost" to getting loot. It just feels so punitive at this point.
"Meanwhile in the moderator's lounge..."
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viperwitch23Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 205Arc User
I guess the overall frustration I'm seeing here is the feeling that the key system creates a "pay to play" mentality. When you enter a dungeon, if you want loot, you have to exchange something that has a cost attached to it, the key. And the results from "purchasing" the right to get loot often times feels like it's not worth the cost.
So again, I wholeheartedly ask...what's the freaking obsession with keys, and how is that healthy for the game?
Why do you need to attach an inherent "cost" to getting loot. It just feels so punitive at this point.
I would say we need Dungeon Delve event again I think this whole issue would 90% go away or may be 70%
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ghoulz66Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 3,748Arc User
If the devs and management did a proper job at making the zen store robust we wouldn't be in this lazy key issue. Shortcuts, they're merely just making frustrated players pay for shortcuts.
I like that you are trying to make changes for the better. As I read the responses I think they all sort of sound like, if you are going to force me to use a key, please let me sell the loot.
Personally my toons are in good shape, I don't need another companion, another mount nor an artifact that is bound to my account unless it is BiS and legendary. What I need are ways to make AD through salvage or sales and a rank 8 enchant is marginal in my opinion as a reward from a dungeon that ultimately cost me a fair amount of time and money to build a character than can do the content, unlock and learn the content, and run the content.
Right now I don't mind the RNG too much on the chests, but it does not take my key, so that is the difference. If you are taking my key, the loot needs to be able to replace my key and something for the effort or there will be no reason to make the effort. I counted up my keys this weekend. My main character has over 1000 unused epic keys as the loot in the chests are not really of interest to me.
There was another forum post with dozens of pages of suggestions on what types of things would be better. I am sure it is a huge task to reread all of that post as well, but there were some great ideas there.
TR - Sun: 16000 IL OP - Sunshine: 16000 IL
Casual Dailies
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viperwitch23Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 205Arc User
edited January 2017
To make campaign keys now you need:
For Malabog's Castle need to a weekly for 100 Sparks. For Gold Crescent need to do daily for 10 of them and 10 other daily to get 10 more. Or buy Fomorian Concoction for about 7500 AD Per 100 But stuff from that chest isn't worth 7500ad So you need to do all this then wait 20h to get that key
For Greater Demonic Key you need 300 Faerzress To get those is to do x2 Normal Demogorgon and get Gold Or do x2 Epic Demogorgon with Gold rank Then 20h to wait so you can open chest tomorrow
Same goes if you want to open Castle Never chest as well you need x4 Ndemo or x3 Edemo so you can open 1 Edemo chest today and 1 Castle Never chest tomorrow
To make key for Valindra's Tower you need 15 Vanguard Scrip and 5 Thayan Scroll To get this need x3 dailes = 9 script and daily lair – 2 or 3 script and you fall short still. So if you don't buy Onyx Fragments need to wait another day for dailys do start 1 key and open chest on third day
To make Keys for Kessel's Retreat need 3 Dwarfen Gold, 3 Auril's Tear 10 Coins Fot that need to do Denon Hunting daily or Needless Distractions for 10 coins And all Icewind Pass and Dwarfen Valley dailys to get enough to make 1 key then open chest next day
To make Elol and Esot keys need: Esot = 4 Cult Secret 4 Dragon Sigil 20 Dragon Hoard Coins Elol = 6 Cult Secret 6 Dragon Sigil 30 Dragon Hoard Coins
Common Cause gives 1 Dragon Sigil for daily mini-dungeon Culling the Cultists – 1 Cult Secret Neverdeath grave yard = 2 Cult Secrets Ice Spire Peaks = 2 Cult Secrets Rothe Valley = 2 Dragon Sigil Whispering Caverns = 2 Dragon Sigil
Total 5 Sigils and 5 Cult Secrets So we fall short here and need to to go to Well of Dragons to do dailys here too I won't list those here but they gives usually 2 cult secrets , 2 Dragon Sigils or 1 of each including Fallen Dragon Fang
So Dragon timer is 19mins And we need to wait average 15 for each of the 4 dragons That is 1h just to kill dragons Add riding to the place and other things I have done this myself it is about 2h work for everything Could be more also
To make Dragon Queen's Key – need 2 Fallen Dragon Fang and Dragon Hoard Coins 20 Coins. This needs you to do Well of Dragons weekly and dailys if you want 1 key a day for Tiamat
So you need like 1 full day or even 2 days just to do all those places to make 1 key for tomorrow This is my suggestion: 1 – Reduce amount of campaign goods needed for a key. Like Greater demonic key to make 1 for 50-100 Faerzress and 1h or 2h each one Elol/Esot keys from 4/4 to 1/1 and from 6/6 to 2/2 and same time frame This excludes 5 Gold you need per key generally
Here are some of my screen shots from Castle Never Chests I never seen Orcus Shard Those Screen shots of the best chests I gave gotten so far in Castle Never And to get those I peeked in may be 9-10 times before using key for those
Also to simmer down on the grinding of dailies to make keys allow us to turn in those "insignia's" for campaign currency. Maybe 50 for minor one and 100 for a major campaign one?
It took me a year of farming ELoL to get a Horn drop. In that time, every other member of my party had gotten at least one (one got two, another, three, and another got seven). I got mine during the discussion about fixing it, which they did a couple of weeks later. It never felt good getting that drop.
My spouse farmed tirelessly for legendary rings. Has still has never had one drop. He's given up.
The joke about running CN is we need to get our daily +1 ring. We've never seen the Shard. (Currently listed ~4.8M AD. Prohibitively high.)
I currently don't use my keys the majority of the time because the rewards aren't worth it. The feel-good sentiment at the end of a dungeon is "at least I save a key!", because it means less grinding to make another.
Back in the day, a mod would be released, I'd work to get the new shinies and be ready for the next. It was fun. Now it feels like I'm still working on mods not just released last year but on one from 2015. By the time I get stuff, it runs the risk of not being relevent anymore.
Similarly to what another poster said, my trust in this company has eroded. It always tries to make bad stuff sound good. Getting a key/misc bag sounds great, until you realise they're also adding a ton of stuff to the loot tables, which mean all that space freed up (and more besides) just got taken up.
For people to feel motivated to play, there have to be goals, they have to be realistic, achievable and in a timely manner. (Working toward 40 twisted ichor was far more satisfying then depending on RNG drops in MSVA.) Unmovtivated people simply wander away to do something else.
But, ugh, whatever. These aren't new ideas. The player-base has come up with some fantastic ideas, which, for whatever reasons haven't being considered. The power-that-be favour a more punitive style of managment and that's their perogative. I have hope things will change for the better, but zero expectation they will.
What's the point of adding more companions to the game if they lose all functionality after level 35 content? Running level 73 content with a combat companion at Legendary (40) and he dies very quickly, most times instantly, and does a whopping 400 damage every 2-8 seconds. Controller Companions? I think not. Augments as alternative? Why would anyone do that? 3 rank 7 bondings in a Combat Companion already renders augments useless.
You're trying to balance classes around a broken system. Bonding Stones are the problem. You are only seeing game breaking class features because players are able to buff themselves through what is essentially a glorified augment companion. All of the companion abilities and powers are nothing more than Companions Gift procc'ing variables. The effort and detail in creating Meteor Strike on companion is meaningless if it does 800 damage to a spiderlings that has a million hit points. So taking a companion that has a really cool power but has really long cool downs is pointless. You also now have half a dozen runestones that are worth nothing more than Refinement. No one is slotting an Eldrytch Runestone Rank 12 in a companion...ever. No one is buying a Black Dragon Ion stone from the Zen market..ever.
My suggestion:
Making Bondings work in reverse. - Companion gets X% of players stats. This would fix both the power creep and the companion scaling in one fix. All combat companions would run equal to their player companion making everything from healer, striker, controller, and leader/defender a viable option. This would also bring back Ion Stones/Augments for players who don't care about sharing their stats and just want to push their own ability to higher levels. Both would be equal in the end. You've now brought all aspects of the companion system back to present content and made them all viable, while balancing the growing issue with over powered class balancing.
This would create an entirely new aspect to running dungeons. A 5 man super group would turn into a 10 man raid. For PuGs this is even better! If you don't get a tank, someone brings out a tank companion and fills that roll. No controller, break out a Control companion. Instead of 5 players running around with 170k power why not 10 players running around at 30k? The combination of class roles to companion roles are endless. It would breathe new life into an otherwise neglected aspect of the game that's long over due for some attention. Please think about this as an alternative to nerfs and class fixes in an attempt to balance classes.
Ladies and Gents we are fighting a losing battle here. If you are posting to vent and make yourself feel better then more power to you.. but they are not going to change the roll out. This is a financial move for the company plain and simple and they are betting that the truly dedicated and faithful will continue to stick around. Lets all face the facts that this is a sinking ship and we are but a few people who have stuck around to see if she actually goes under. We are posting to nowhere/no one on this forum and as history has CLEARLY shown, they don't listen to their customers. If they gave a hoot about this product and our happiness then they would be fixing the 3 year old bugs, correcting the completely misleading/wrong tool tips and bringing back the old dungeons that everyone has asked for. My question to all of you is why are we posting endlessly and complaining about the same things over and over instead of finding something different to do?
Comments
So I'm curious, why do we even have about 50000 different types of keys? Why are they not all just "legendary dragon keys" that can unlock any extra chest in the game and you can make them using the same campaign currencies that we can now. Then reduce the price per key to around 5k each as well. This would be (at 500 AD/Zen) 200 Zen for 20 Keys. I would certainly buy more at that price. Others who make keys can just make a bunch (all still would be 20 hours) but they could make them across various campaigns if they wished.
Hell, IMO you could even chain the price of the keys to the AD/Zen exchange to keep it @ 5k AD to one key so if it drops we can't just horde a ton of the keys. If they stay account bound as well we cant resell so it limits the tendency to buy for resale when it's on sale.
Then you could have some of the salvagable gear as unbound (so people could sell or salvage) as well as have the possibility of having some items drop as either unbound or account bound so we still have a higher drop chance.
And of course, I've already mentioned about a dozen times. A ring exchange would be huge. Then people could get the ones they want not whichever one RNG forced upon them. And the new SKT rings should get the same treatment and also be account bound.
This is of course assuming you're trying to improve the game not just HAMSTER us in the HAMSTER to try and get more money out of us.
Or, continue your plan to monetize the loot chest, and face a large outflux of ppl. The new loot table is window dressing to the suggested key fix, and your player base is seeing through it.
How far this game has gone, that players ask you to remove some of the "rewards"...
While the key tab is a good and useful change that has been much needed, are you serious on how that is what you guys plan to implement as a change?
I can see why there was an exodus of players between modules for this game. How it stands why is it that such ways are used to make the game better when it clearly doesn't? The goal is of course for you (Cryptic) to make money with each new installment you make to a game but seriously with some of these decisions, do you really expect to make your money back or profit from it?
It seems the borderline is you forgot the one rule of gaming with this whole "free" game issue is that if a player doesn't feel they are winning at all for a certain amount of time, they stop playing. In your quest to try and provide an adequate solution to this problem you made yourself in how you treated the players on the issue of dungeon chests that you felt need tweaking whereas it needs to be addressed also on a few of the games limiting features.
1. Exactly what is the true endpoint of the game? We are shoehorned early by the sleeping dragon bridge battle and through much of the normal campaign that Vallindra is the head baddie we're supposed to take down, but to actually resolve the normal ark you have to complete an epic dungeon in order to do so? - Bad. The arc should in a way resolve itself WITHOUT the need for this to happen, perhaps add something to dread ring's campaign to point this out.
Take off more points there on the fact with so many distractions once you hit level cap you end up going every which direction since then. While the scroll of accomplishments by the seer is a great and justifyable addition that not only takes away some of the confusion, a story should have at that booknote a conclusion place before addressing more content. This is what your competition elder scrolls online seems to do rather well, and in most cases gets me to pay more for content AFTER the initial purchase.
2. Boring and bad campaigns. Now not all of these are like this. Dread ring and underdark and maze engine stand out at being really good and even a small fraction of elemental evil's story in part came be considered ok, but the quests to finish not so much. The first two I mentioned feel additional to the main story, really draw you in to complete and sometimes don't feel as tedious because like in the case of the underdark that it takes you all around to places you have already completed to showcase an even bigger picture of threats that are happening around the sword coast, bridging the world more in a way than a regular map locale. Did I forget to mention that in the case of the Dread Ring and Underdark boons they just flat out are awesome to use compared to other compaigns? Even by the time elemental evil wraps up I find it was worth the effort of all of that for not only the artifact weapon, but the boons made up for all the work to get there and it all fits into a nice story/campaign. I really feel like my characters accomplished something in getting them at the end as to how it should feel. The others however are tedious at best and flat out boring, even less story committed to them and just shoehorned to pad extra content and not as worthwhile to do. Well of dragons is horrible in how convoluted it is and very little payoff to get the boons, please rework asap. SKT boons are even worse.
3. Dungeons and chests....really? For a game being called neverwinter and the land of the 20 sided die would be king, RNG is something to be expected here but you (the devs) have clearly abused it with how you implement things such as this and as to why you have this corner you put yourselves into. The lockboxes are one thing, but to make just about everything RNG? Why would I play this? If you're expected to run a dungeon to take a break from the story (or lack of one in most cases) why would I run these for garbage? Let alone garbage I can't exactly sell to make some profit? The whole point in doing games like this is to make something for your trouble, something rare that is PROFITABLE for the time in doing it. So I can earn enough either by one run or 20 and something I do want or need. What you have done is circumvented dungeons so badly by your measures you basically neutered them from even bothered to be done which is basically HALF of your game. You did this by saying you would rather people pay for garbage for maybe a 0.01% chance at something good. Then if you get that item somehow, you decided to make sure it was bound so it can't be sold as to lose the value. You add "new" items that look fun but are useless at being lower value which will in turn just end up being garbage anyway and wasted your time. So in the case of putting items up in the auction house by this measure if someone could you are basically afraid of lost value as people won't run the content and just pay for it. If it's already rare and is worth thousands to millions of AD due to the RNG, why would this be an issue? Then for each of these items, people buy zen and get AD with it to buy said items. How would this break the economy? Sure some might get the item for "free" but everyone pays somewhere, and there's plenty that would pay with actual funds to get zen, and in some ways you profit more like this. This is where it helps if you have not just players play test this but some of your developers too. It really feels like someone there failed business 101 or needs to retake the basics. Put yourself in our shoes in using your product, do you honestly feel after the work we do that if you did the same work you would do the dungeons like this? No you wouldn't.
There are plenty of reasonable ways to fix this. If you really want to do the no peeking, hey that's great but you're also worried on that items would depreciate in value? I guess that means you can do several things:
1. I like you are adding announcements on some items from dungeons in zone, how about you rotate depending on module, events on exactly what you can get from chests and guess what make it bind on equip? But it'll lose value as more people get it? That's the point. Like supply and demand you make better things for us players to find and sell. It makes the economy go around, it's not rocket science really. This approach you did here? It's lazy and it shows. How lazy? You expect people to be distracted by the shiny new items that are half useless to excuse the fact that boxes are sealed now even with a key that it takes one to open them without peeking. It's fine if you can't make a new zone everytime, but rotating and making new useful items to old locales depending on what's around at the time can go a really long way with the LIMITED number of locations to do dungeons of.
2. Stop pay walling every bit of content. Make more items to put in chests and make it less like lockboxes too. The problem in doing so many keys from normal dungeon chest keys, to epic and now legendary dragon? You have to pay to open anything in this game, why would I again PAY to open any chest? How about you make bind on account or pickup items on non paying or lower level chests and make bind on equip items on higher chests. See the part again on if a player feels less winning in a game how long they stick around. A game that nickel and dimes me to do ANYTHING is not a game worth playing. That is exactly what you did to this game and it's wrong.
3. Rework the gear scores for dungeons and in most cases lower the difficulty to many epic dungeons. I should be able to get together any group of adventurers to your "Recommended" gear score and complete a dungeon no matter what. This is truly not the case at all. The 1600 dungeons like kessell will destroy players along with vallindra's tower and it shouldn't take getting in a party with someone at 2500 to carry other members to get through. In the case of vallindra's even 2500s couldn't take her down due to her 1 shot abilities. I mean really? Once again I highly doubt developers are playtesting these changes as they should. Even Castle Never should be reworked. If you plan on charging players like this for dungeons, shouldn't they be able to get to the end easier for you to make money? Again players are winning less so less reason for them to play or even pay.
4. Add more fashion items to the trade bar store or even put some in chests that can be sold in the auction house. Higher boxes BOE, the lowers, you get it by now. While it might feel tedious at this point to put in, again players need more items to sell. With every new layer of content, there should be more items a player can sell to make some profit to make the game's economy work. That's part of a job when you make games like this is controlling the economy in a fair way. This game should not have players rely on refinement stones and lockbox items as income and in most cases it exactly is this. Players shouldn't have to rely on those items for income. In that quest to make money you just don't get the entire game like this to pricemeal it behind paywalls like this. Look at champions online and then back here. They found a perfect balance between lockboxes to make people WANT to subscribe to play it. They have new cosmetic items all the time which this game sorely lacks now.
There is supposed to be a game under this lotto somewhere and it's sorely missing. If half of the game is dungeons, but you get garbage from dungeons, that's half the game people just will not play or stop playing. If there's supposed to be a story but it's buried under campaigns, that's another issue too. The point in all of this is there is just so much you guys need to fix really not just the boxes. This game needs more than you're putting into it. At the end of the day it's supposed to be more fun than work, so why does Neverwinter feel like a second or third job than an actual game?
* All Dungeon, Drops should be Bount to Equip, this will add a lot of replay value to dungeons as we will able to farm some specifc itens to sell on the AH.
* Diferent dungeons should drop diferent stuff based on its dificulty, but all of then must have at least 20k AD whorty of loot in the chest opened with a campaign key or with a legendary dragon key...
*Seals, demonic inchor and other stuff should be used to provide a slow but steady way of progression... Example:
You can make a Shard of orcus to be sold for 50.000 Seals of protector
+5 Ring to be sold for 50.000 Demonic Inchor
* MSva marks MUST BE UNBOUND with these changes, otherwise ppl will just give up on legendary relic weapon
Hope devs dont ignore this post...
No one in thier ight mind is going to pay to you PER run to run things..
Either add keys to VIP , or have 1 free chest and 1 bought chest WITH The same exact loot rolls, poeple can of course pay to double thier odds on any given run..
but to simply kill off free to play with this one strike of a code, as you would, is just not going to work.
Look , Ive paid this company money.. many times, over the course of years, I WILL not do this.. I simply will not.
You are barking up the wrong tree..
and its "not just about loot" its how we can access it.
The way you put it right now, will simply not be feasible for most players.
This is what Key Grinding looks like now
Anyone would like to order seats before key changes go live?
i will once again state that whilst the idea of giving away pets in chests is a good idea and helps to put certian pets back in game (like SCA) other pets like the ambush drake and cambion magus should NOT be included as the people who currently have their's either had to pay during an event to obtain or pay a massive amount in AH to people that did so to give a pet away that some paid $100 is more than disrespectful its disheartening.
also the 'special chests' from ESOT, kessels and LOL are so outdated and underwhelming with prizes that they are not worth the 25000 that you spend on dragon keys even with the new gear (if it drops) so you may want to consider either giving a 100% chance at purple with the chance at an artifact or consider a new cheaper dragon key for the T1 content
on a side note if you are going to give out new equipment with new abilities then it may be an idea to have instant access on preview so we can test and see if they have any bugs or if they are useful at all, it was done in SKT with the ability to try out the new eye of the giant and the relic gear so why not this new stuff?
No one is asking you to play "whack-a-mole," but the fact of the matter is, you guys stone wall us a lot. This issue, and a great many others, wont go away by ignoring them or telling us you're working on them. We've been very patient and we've gotten very little for our effort. How long does it take to filter through these posts? It's not very labor intensive to read a post and then meet up to discuss it.
"Asking for feedback doesn't mean immediate incorporation but it also doesn't mean we are disregarding it."
Fixing keys is something you should've been doing by now. Not removing an important feature and offering us companions and a vague buff to the drop rates of the rarest items. You guys always want feedback, but often times we hear nothing about it unless its a huge long thread(like the last thread or the swiftness nerf/bug fix).
First two bosses often don't drop a jack HAMSTER! and please do not give us Peridots, you want me to thank you for removing black pearls out of the loot tables?
A proud member of "mythical horde of DPS GFs"
1). Is SW more dps or tank based?
2). Yes. I am panzer!
3). Get ACT if you want to celebrate your epeen.
4). Horniness will not stand between me and what I believe - "MM"
I believe my comment was kinda unproductive.
And i apologize for that.
So i will add my two cents to this whole 50 + discussion if that is okay.
First of all , please do not think we are ungrateful.
I can say that my guild ( around 120 daily active people / 150 accounts ) is very happy with the changes made to the tab.
More space in our bags is always welcomed.
And to us who have legendary bags and no space at all, is a very welcomed change.
We appreciate the effort and the patience you have , including your effort to reply to us.
Even when the community may not agree with some of the things to be done / or the preview of the changes.
I speak for my guild since a lot of them come here and just look at what is going on without posting.
The main problem they have with this change was basically said by the rest of the people here.
1 . Loot value of the chest vs value of a legendary key / basic dungeon key
2. RNG is so low we would have a bigger chance getting a reward in an online casino games
( Not speaking for the lockboxes since we accepted them as they are, and we are fully aware that is how it functions.
Either you are lucky or not. Yet we still buy the keys and gamble like addicts in a casino. And even there , sometimes you win ,
so you are actually motivated to play again. )
Being forced to open a chest vs peeking what is in the chest and making a choice for yourself, are two very different ways of giving us a reward for our effort, for doing and finishing a dungeon.
We would not have a problem with it , if the amount of the awards was equal to the price of the keys. But it is not.
In 5 runs of CN , by opening both chests i could not cover the amount of Zen spent on the keys.
( I am not talking about AD since VIP covered my epic keys, i can not even imagine what the people without VIP are going through. )
When we have a key , the process should be as follows :
1. Get a key
2. Do a dungeon
3. Get a reward
4. If you Sell the reward
5. You get the amount of the money back spent on that key ( or more as profit )
6. Repeat the circle
However , we do a dungeon , only to get a salvage item worth less then the value of the epic dungeon key.
And that is where the problem hides..
The same can be applied to a legendary key.
What we get in return should be the same amount as the price of that legendary key , since it is bought only by Zen.
And that is a minimum requirement.
If you are making us open the chest without giving us a choice at this matter.
You need 300 Zen to buy 5 keys. That is 149'000 AD. ( 499 AD per 100 ZEN )
How exactly are people going to get 149k to 150 k to buy Zen keys to open double chests if the loot inside is worth 2,2 k , with some nice blue items that we do not really need.
And a shard, that we can not refine , since we do not have 500 k for a coal ward.
The new prizes are very nicely made and i salute the people developing it for their ideas.
But this game is run by AD / Zen and IL . That is how it was made and that is how we see it.
That is how your whole community sees it. And while that is sad , this is how it functions.
After we do a dungeon let us say , 20 times.
And get that particular item we want, or a companion we always wanted , what then ?
We can not sell them for AD.
We can not equip them since we already have them.
We can give them to our alts but the truth is , people just do not have time to level their alts any more.
It is just how it is.
The range of years of the players in my guild is from 25 to 60. A lot of them are working more years then i am alive.
And they do not have time to play this game 24 / 7.
So 80 % of them are playing only one character. Thanks to previous changes. But that is how it is. Again.
Between fishing ( or not ) , doing dailies and running FBI , CN and MSVA, not a lot of time is left for anything else.
And if this change gets implemented as it is, i am afraid even the people who we only got back, will leave again.
Instead of motivation we are forced to do something .
And that is what we are unhappy about.
I hope you can make sense of my post.
With best regards,
When the change was announced, the level of dissatisfaction was very high (myself included): many ideas were published by the players to improve the situation.
The change went in stand-by mode, 2.5 devs were dedicated to improve the change, but after some weeks of work the result seems to be unsatisfactory again and the same ideas are published twice across two different threads.
Imo the pattern is simple: there's always a big gap between the ideas coming from the player base and how they are interpreted,digested and then implemented by the devs. I don't expect that the devs implement all the ideas, but the dimension of the gap is partially unknown because we don't have important info like the drop rate, the complete list of changes and so on. That is called asymmetric information.
The only things we know are that every chest will consume a key, the loot and the progression are managed by a RNG that the players don't love while the game experience collapses on repetitive tasks that no one wants to do again and again unless you don't buy the legendary keys.
Furthermore even if you grind like a hell or buy the legendary keys, the expected level of reward doesn't match the value for money (or time) invested in the game by the players due to the RNG. This is a lose-lose situation: the players don't take the risk, the company has less revenues, less players or less time spent playing.
This is my snapshot and I want to add that it's quite difficult to have a productive discussion if the available info is incomplete: it triggers emotional feedbacks and a few concrete proposals based on quantitative analysis (and we have very good players who can do it).
I fully understand that the RNG is the "business secret" of this game, but no players love investing resources and time in high risky assets (like the legendary keys).
Many ideas have been already published, but the problem is always the same: how do the devs interpret and implement them? Because this gap injects the belief that we are not listened.
Oltreverso guild leader
Maga Othelma - DC | Svalvolo - SW | Dente Avvelenato- GWF
Would you mind following up with the dev team if we will or will not be getting the loot tables / Misc items list posted with the drop chances? with much respect it should not take a week to make a yes or no call and communicate it back to the player base.
Martin ConDion PVE only Ranger
Guild Founder: -HunterS-
Why run all these dungeons and end game stuff if it's not worth the key? I want to say as politely as I can, but everyone feels as though we're being pushed closer and closer to pay to play.
No one minds spending money when they want to, we happily spend our money, buying things we really want... however when we start to feel as if we have to spend money, like we're being forced, our pockets start to feel much tighter...
I suggest if you must have keys consumed upon opening the chest, do so only with epic dungeon keys but not the legendary dragon keys... we pay real money for those, we should be able to choose if we want the reward in those chests at least.
And to echo what many have said, if greater demonic keys will be consumed and we're getting +1 rings still, we should get a decrease in the amount of time it takes to make one. An entire day to get a +1 ring that only salvages for 2k is not worth it.
Or worse the legendary keys... 300 Zen is worth upwards of 100k AD... to open 5 chests and end up with 10k AD from salvage garbage is a terrible terrible exchange rate. Even if you happen to get all epic armor it's still only 35k AD at best using up all five keys... it makes it seem not worth buying them at all. Especially with chances for the better items being so low.
I can say for myself I am skeptical of spending any more on this game than I already have due to the changes and I think many others feel the same. I can't really say until I've ran a few dungeons and such post change, but my initial reaction is that I don't like this new system. I hope we see some compromise and some input from the players more seriously considered and implemented.
I did the math with my RNG luck and current drop rates I would have to spent ~40 kk AD in keys for my legendary weapon set (each char). With 5 x better drop rate it would 'just' be 4 kk AD for keys. Add the cost in time/AD for vonin blood, lanolin etc. and this will make ppl stop playing, period. I would have the AD to spent for the keys, but comparing the time or money you have to invest for 40 kk AD and the 'reward' (legendary weapons you will refine in half a year) I dont think, that this changes will go well with the players
this would give players some incentive to run these dungeons after they have acquired most of the good from the dungeons.
mk said, that sva already contains the "improved" lootsystem, so it doesnt matter, if its 200 or 300 runs.
either way, removing the peak function is an insult towards the players.
i was unhappy, that i couldnt extend my vip, but when reading this, it was probably better, that i ran out of zen back then.
So again, I wholeheartedly ask...what's the freaking obsession with keys, and how is that healthy for the game?
Why do you need to attach an inherent "cost" to getting loot. It just feels so punitive at this point.
I think this whole issue would 90% go away or may be 70%
Personally my toons are in good shape, I don't need another companion, another mount nor an artifact that is bound to my account unless it is BiS and legendary. What I need are ways to make AD through salvage or sales and a rank 8 enchant is marginal in my opinion as a reward from a dungeon that ultimately cost me a fair amount of time and money to build a character than can do the content, unlock and learn the content, and run the content.
Right now I don't mind the RNG too much on the chests, but it does not take my key, so that is the difference. If you are taking my key, the loot needs to be able to replace my key and something for the effort or there will be no reason to make the effort. I counted up my keys this weekend. My main character has over 1000 unused epic keys as the loot in the chests are not really of interest to me.
There was another forum post with dozens of pages of suggestions on what types of things would be better. I am sure it is a huge task to reread all of that post as well, but there were some great ideas there.
OP - Sunshine: 16000 IL
Casual Dailies
For Malabog's Castle need to a weekly for 100 Sparks.
For Gold Crescent need to do daily for 10 of them and 10 other daily to get 10 more. Or buy Fomorian Concoction for about 7500 AD Per 100
But stuff from that chest isn't worth 7500ad
So you need to do all this then wait 20h to get that key
For Greater Demonic Key you need 300 Faerzress
To get those is to do x2 Normal Demogorgon and get Gold
Or do x2 Epic Demogorgon with Gold rank
Then 20h to wait so you can open chest tomorrow
Same goes if you want to open Castle Never chest as well you need x4 Ndemo or x3 Edemo so you can open 1 Edemo chest today and 1 Castle Never chest tomorrow
To make key for Valindra's Tower you need 15 Vanguard Scrip and 5 Thayan Scroll
To get this need x3 dailes = 9 script and daily lair – 2 or 3 script and you fall short still.
So if you don't buy Onyx Fragments need to wait another day for dailys do start 1 key and open chest on third day
To make Keys for Kessel's Retreat need 3 Dwarfen Gold, 3 Auril's Tear 10 Coins
Fot that need to do Denon Hunting daily or Needless Distractions for 10 coins
And all Icewind Pass and Dwarfen Valley dailys to get enough to make 1 key then open chest next day
To make Elol and Esot keys need:
Esot = 4 Cult Secret 4 Dragon Sigil 20 Dragon Hoard Coins
Elol = 6 Cult Secret 6 Dragon Sigil 30 Dragon Hoard Coins
Common Cause gives 1 Dragon Sigil for daily mini-dungeon
Culling the Cultists – 1 Cult Secret
Neverdeath grave yard = 2 Cult Secrets
Ice Spire Peaks = 2 Cult Secrets
Rothe Valley = 2 Dragon Sigil
Whispering Caverns = 2 Dragon Sigil
Total 5 Sigils and 5 Cult Secrets
So we fall short here and need to to go to Well of Dragons to do dailys here too
I won't list those here but they gives usually 2 cult secrets , 2 Dragon Sigils or 1 of each including Fallen Dragon Fang
So Dragon timer is 19mins
And we need to wait average 15 for each of the 4 dragons
That is 1h just to kill dragons
Add riding to the place and other things
I have done this myself it is about 2h work for everything
Could be more also
To make Dragon Queen's Key – need 2 Fallen Dragon Fang and Dragon Hoard Coins 20 Coins.
This needs you to do Well of Dragons weekly and dailys if you want 1 key a day for Tiamat
So you need like 1 full day or even 2 days just to do all those places to make 1 key for tomorrow
This is my suggestion:
1 – Reduce amount of campaign goods needed for a key. Like Greater demonic key to make 1 for 50-100 Faerzress and 1h or 2h each one
Elol/Esot keys from 4/4 to 1/1 and from 6/6 to 2/2 and same time frame
This excludes 5 Gold you need per key generally
Here are some of my screen shots from Castle Never Chests
I never seen Orcus Shard
Those Screen shots of the best chests I gave gotten so far in Castle Never
And to get those I peeked in may be 9-10 times before using key for those
My spouse farmed tirelessly for legendary rings. Has still has never had one drop. He's given up.
The joke about running CN is we need to get our daily +1 ring. We've never seen the Shard. (Currently listed ~4.8M AD. Prohibitively high.)
I currently don't use my keys the majority of the time because the rewards aren't worth it. The feel-good sentiment at the end of a dungeon is "at least I save a key!", because it means less grinding to make another.
Back in the day, a mod would be released, I'd work to get the new shinies and be ready for the next. It was fun. Now it feels like I'm still working on mods not just released last year but on one from 2015. By the time I get stuff, it runs the risk of not being relevent anymore.
Similarly to what another poster said, my trust in this company has eroded. It always tries to make bad stuff sound good. Getting a key/misc bag sounds great, until you realise they're also adding a ton of stuff to the loot tables, which mean all that space freed up (and more besides) just got taken up.
For people to feel motivated to play, there have to be goals, they have to be realistic, achievable and in a timely manner. (Working toward 40 twisted ichor was far more satisfying then depending on RNG drops in MSVA.) Unmovtivated people simply wander away to do something else.
But, ugh, whatever. These aren't new ideas. The player-base has come up with some fantastic ideas, which, for whatever reasons haven't being considered. The power-that-be favour a more punitive style of managment and that's their perogative. I have hope things will change for the better, but zero expectation they will.
You're trying to balance classes around a broken system. Bonding Stones are the problem. You are only seeing game breaking class features because players are able to buff themselves through what is essentially a glorified augment companion. All of the companion abilities and powers are nothing more than Companions Gift procc'ing variables. The effort and detail in creating Meteor Strike on companion is meaningless if it does 800 damage to a spiderlings that has a million hit points. So taking a companion that has a really cool power but has really long cool downs is pointless. You also now have half a dozen runestones that are worth nothing more than Refinement. No one is slotting an Eldrytch Runestone Rank 12 in a companion...ever. No one is buying a Black Dragon Ion stone from the Zen market..ever.
My suggestion:
Making Bondings work in reverse. - Companion gets X% of players stats. This would fix both the power creep and the companion scaling in one fix. All combat companions would run equal to their player companion making everything from healer, striker, controller, and leader/defender a viable option. This would also bring back Ion Stones/Augments for players who don't care about sharing their stats and just want to push their own ability to higher levels. Both would be equal in the end. You've now brought all aspects of the companion system back to present content and made them all viable, while balancing the growing issue with over powered class balancing.
This would create an entirely new aspect to running dungeons. A 5 man super group would turn into a 10 man raid. For PuGs this is even better! If you don't get a tank, someone brings out a tank companion and fills that roll. No controller, break out a Control companion. Instead of 5 players running around with 170k power why not 10 players running around at 30k? The combination of class roles to companion roles are endless. It would breathe new life into an otherwise neglected aspect of the game that's long over due for some attention. Please think about this as an alternative to nerfs and class fixes in an attempt to balance classes.