Heirloom Packs

shadoewrayth

Back when I first came to Xbox, I purchased the Heirloom Pack. It was something like $25, and since I had played on PC and loved the game, I figured it would be a safe purchase and investment. The pack was 'In Perpetuity' a grant of a full set of gear (not artifacts of course, or some other special case items) of main and off hand weapon/item, head, chest, pants, etc etc. gifted every so many levels. I never used to be able to open the box prior to level 5, but every 5 levels could open the next 'tier', and get a new set of gear to adventure with.

Yes, this trivialized most of the leveling process, but honestly the leveling process was already pretty much trivial after going through it the first go round. It just made it even easier, and set me up with a great jumping off point once at cap level.

The problem, now, is two-fold. I took a pretty long break, so missed the changeover to 20 being cap, as well as many other changes, such as the addition of the Bard. So, on coming back, made a Bard. Due to the level differences and changes, made sense I could claim the pack as soon as I got to PE. BUT, unlike other classes (and I tested it out, just to make certain I still received full gear set), the Bard only receives main/off and rings. That's a lot of missing gear. Also, on reaching 5th level, the pack says I've already opened the pack.

I know, some might say wait til 10, or something. But, issues with that mentality:

1- The game had 50 levels when I purchased it, which amounted to 10 packs of gear. This increased a LOT with the level cap going up. Now that there are only 20 levels, every 5 only comes to 4 packs if evenly divided, 5 packs if 1st level was included (which apparently is not). That is an amazing loss of value without any compensation for that loss. It's basically a renegotiation without consent.

2- The way the Heirloom Pack worked was that on opening it, a NEW pack was put into the inventory for opening later. On opening the 5th level one, a full gear set, AND a new Pack that had level req 10th level. The pack does not do that anymore, which makes me think that instead of getting the Pack as it was agreed upon, I now get a vastly inferior version.

3- Bard isn't even getting a full STARTING set. Again, a nerfed version, without my consent. It was an agreed upon contract. They stated what it was, and for what price, and then decided to forcefully renegotiate the terms. That's actually completely illegal. What makes this worse, is that there is all manner of likelihood they will add further classes eventually, assuming the game continues to exist. With how they are only providing the Bard with less than a handful of gear instead of a full set, this is likely to mean those future classes will also NOT get what they are supposed to receive.

This is beyond irritating, to the point it royally ticks me off. I understand that PWE is greedy, and tries to get as much money however they can, and all that. But, breaking laws isn't the way to do it. Since a lot of people bought those Packs, it would NOT be a good idea to push this, and instead they need to make amends and fix the problem.

If anyone knows different information, please reply, let me know. But, as of currently, based on what I have seen so far, this is beyond shady or iffy, this is outright illegal activity.

ksell

if i understood u well, then sadly this pack is no more here, n some content of it was reworked; u can get similar one with recruitment even - but its less than once a year now; also bard have not been gear wisely fully updated yet

shadoewrayth

ksell said:

if i understood u well, then sadly this pack is no more here, n some content of it was reworked; u can get similar one with recruitment even - but its less than once a year now; also bard have not been gear wisely fully updated yet

Problem with that is that the pack was not offered, or worded, as a temporary. It was an 'as long as the game lasts, you get X' deal. So, if I am not getting the agree upon deal, then they broke contract. I don't care what they think they should be allowed to do, or anything. And, if this was several other games/companies, I might be more lenient, forgiving, etc.

However, PWE and NW have consistently, throughout the years, only gotten greedier and greedier, cared less and less about the players (especially the loyal ones), and worse. Had they been like most developers, I might view it differently. But, these? I know that were the shoes on different feet, if they had players doing something that cheated THEM? There would be bans, suspensions, maybe even pulling people into courts, because they MUST protect the #1 priority: GREED.

They have extremely clearly made their positions and interests known. And, they would be seriously doing something about it, no matter how, apparently, tiny the slight. I am only treating them as they would have treated me, and I expect the same kinds of actions and recompense for the alterations to the agreement. The easiest way to fix it would have been to NOT change things, keep same level cap, etc. But, they didn't listen to players when these proposed changes were first put forth, nor did they listen as time went by.

Now, I have heard, also, that the new way of things is that it gives gear that levels up WITH the character. However, there is nothing that says this is how it works, so it is completely likely that a player will ditch pieces of it if they find better (which never happened before except when purples or something dropped, and only lasted until the next tier where those were replaced by the new blue Heirloom gear.

The Packs worked in this way:

Open box, receive full set of blues, also the next pack. So, at 5, the character had a full set of good quality gear, AND the pack they would open at the next tier. There was no need to return to the Claims Agent, or worry about the gear. They could sell it off, destroy it, whatever they wanted to do. They could even 'misplace' the Heirloom Pack itself, because if needed, they could just go back to the Agent and get a new box, start all over again.

But, if what I hear is right, the new way is: open box, get gear. No new box, no new gear, etc. That gear levels with the character. Supposedly. But, with no indication it does this, no warnings, no explanations of changing the system, the player is very likely to do what they always did, and change things out when needed, etc, and LOSE the Heirloom Gear. Worse, going and getting a new Pack from the Agent (what fixed the problem in the past), no longer works. Get a new Pack, but, even if the character has ZERO of the items remaining, it won't let them open it, because they already HAVE opened it.

So, no warnings, no indications, nada, about the system changing. And, no way to fix it on OUR end to cover for their decisions to change things. And, I then repeat: with NO consent from the people holding the other end of those contracts. It's a complete bungle on their part, and in an area that they can actually be held to the flames for their choices. If they had been any other way with their players, I'd care, let it pass. But, PWE? Nah. They get what they give.

ksell

few thing i can point out

communication on any changes that is not part of big realase is almost nonexistent
removing premium content is a thing, eg citadel pass
not rescaled items to new level cap, are mostly untouched since mod 21, like SH food

but in the end u have to submit ticket, for to get any statement from em

shadoewrayth

ksell said:

few thing i can point out

communication on any changes that is not part of big realase is almost nonexistent
removing premium content is a thing, eg citadel pass
not rescaled items to new level cap, are mostly untouched since mod 21, like SH food

but in the end u have to submit ticket, for to get any statement from em

Because they don't check their own official forums? That says a lot...

ksell

they do check forum, guess not everythin tho;
propably u will hear to post a ticket first , thats why i hinted at this

dont know how it will take but i hope u will get ur problem solved

plasticbat

shadoewrayth said:

If they had been any other way with their players, I'd care, let it pass. But, PWE? Nah. They get what they give.

It is not PWE anymore. Not PWE for a long while now.

shadoewrayth

plasticbat said:

shadoewrayth said:

If they had been any other way with their players, I'd care, let it pass. But, PWE? Nah. They get what they give.

It is not PWE anymore. Not PWE for a long while now.

Ahh, I had not noticed that they changed hands! This still doesn't change the result, however, OR the issue.

I have noticed other distressing issues that need rectified, too. I have gone through looking for info on the items that are no longer 'current' and say turn in at the Scholar or Claims Agent, but have no spot for exchanging them. Not surprisingly, I am FAR from alone in this matter. It seems there are quite a number of people who have returned at various points in the last year or so, after a break of 1-3 years. And a large portion of them come back to find that items that took a great deal of effort to acquire, refine, work on, etc, are now obsolete.

This is perfectly fine, honestly.

However, they go to turn these items in for whatever the 'going rate' is, only to find that there is no way to exchange the items. This is because the company ran exchanges for these items as, basically, 'limited time only', for some dumb reason. Leaving the options in the vendor costs absolutely nothing. It actually requires the programmers to DO something to remove those options from the vendor. If they were going to go ahead and expend that effort, then just put the stuff on their own page for the vendor, or something. Otherwise, should have just left it alone.

The result, as it is, is a ton of extra players who would have come back and spent even more money, instead leaving again, because they feel that turned off, pretty abandoned and abused, so why stick around? As bag and bank space is at a premium in this game, having so many items returned, or having to collect all sorts of new items, and not having a viable place to exchange the old items (like Bonding Runestones, or Companion Experience Tomes, etc) leaves players not wanting to just chuck the items in the bin, but also without extra space to compensate.

This is made even worse when most of those old players had 4+ (sometimes several more - I know I had 8 characters myself) characters who now have all that extra stuff. It compounds the issue. And for no logical reason. They could have just left those exchange options on the Scholar, and everything would be fine. But, when you have a lot of those BR's at 12-15 rank? And, no way to turn them in? As well as many other obsolete items that cost a lot of Zen, or required using a ton of keys? Sorry, but that is a major problem.