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Update on the Trade Bar Store

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  • rollingonitrollingonit Member Posts: 1,322 Arc User

    Wouldn't it be nice if we lived in a world where people could create, but not have to worry about making money? Then we wouldn't have any need for the people who are making these decisions; only the ones who want to build a good game.

    Maybe in 100 years + whatever time it takes for humans to create a type 2 civilization. If we don't or something else doesnt destroy us by then.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNhhvQGsMEc
    We can pretend.
    Fox Stevenson - Sandblast
    Oh Wonder - Without You

    Do not go gentle into that good night.
    Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
    - Dylan Thomas
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  • lordrahllylordrahlly Member Posts: 62 Arc User

    Wouldn't it be nice if we lived in a world where people could create, but not have to worry about making money? Then we wouldn't have any need for the people who are making these decisions; only the ones who want to build a good game.

    Because we all know that a company that with its last publicly reported revenue of 3.05Billion and income of over 542Million yeah, they needed this badly. When Neverwinter was released it was a huge financial shot in the arm for this company as reported at the time of its release on pc;
    Online game operation revenues generated from international operations were RMB664.4 million
    in 2013 as compared to RMB580.2 million in 2012. The increase was primarily attributable to the
    continued strength of our U.S. and European subsidiaries, including the strong contribution of our new
    game Neverwinter launched in the United States and Europe in 2013, and the expanded online game
    operation by our own subsidiaries in Southeast Asia and Korea. This was partially offset by
    underperformance of some of the existing games in the Japanese market.
    So obviously the release on Xbox, still shy of a year old, must have nearly bankrupted them. LOL. As a player I see the problem s with this game and obviously they are overpaying someone if its ongoing development costs them too much.

    Long and short, this appears to be more greed, than keeping the company alive. Yes its nice to be able to make fistfulls of cash but is it really needed for survival and ongoing content creation?

    Someone in management saw the cash cow and decided it wasnt being milked enough. I for one hope it dries up and shows them, overmilking is as much a problem as undermilking.
    Pastor Martin Niemöller had it right, but remember, before they come for anyone, they silence all, because to have discourse, is to breed discontent.
  • leaudricleaudric Member Posts: 13 Arc User
    I've played neverwinter since 2013. Maxed my toon(CW),We were so OP during that time. Just face rolling everything.In dungeons GWF/CW,that was preferred. Anyway there were some tweaks here and there: Perma stealth TR, undying cleric, over buffing GF.....massive glitch that made the TR dish out million+ burst damage.

    The bugs, OMG, the bugs that almost led to the great depression(caturday, AD bug for infinite AD,etc). I couldn't take anymore of this game. I loved it at first but it got too grindy and felt like a job. Once a game feels like an obligation,clearly you doing something wrong. They introduced sharandar, dread ring, ice windale....which by the way were time gated campaigns. Then they released a special coin worth 5k zen to complete the campaigns for you,useful for alts but still.

    I lost hope and gave up playing neverwinter in late 2014. Came back this month to check things out for old times sake. Besides gear(artifact equipment) nothing has changed much.I'm actually shocked! There are virtually no new areas,just reworked old areas. No new events,just the same old things. At least enchantments got cheaper and the economy stabilized but that was attributed to the Trade store selling coalW for bars(I think) now that is out the window this game became even less new user friendly.

    Leveled up my CW to 65 and I was bored! OMG! The reptitive grind,vigilance tasks and massive Xp needed to level up is horrible. At one point I asked myself,"f**k why am I doing this? " I felt robotic in my actions. In light of all these things, I'm just gonna level to 70 run a few of the new content and quit( WITHOUT SPENDING A DIME ON THE GAME)

    The Magic Is Dead In This Game, find something better to do. Seriously. Cure cancer, go sky diving, try surfing, learn a new language, play another game,watch food channels and copy them, go star gazing, fry some ants with a magnifying glass.....Pretty much anything is more fun than Neverwinter.
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  • isaintify1isaintify1 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 414 Arc User
    "we all love this game and want it to thrive." This part made me laugh. Especially the "want it to thrive" part. They may see a impact of the economy, but they are also gonna see a impact of their wallets.
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  • l0th4ri0l0th4ri0 Member Posts: 589 Arc User
    commanderkruge has grasped the heart of it. If the game has become lame, then STOP playing. Certainly stop PAYING. Kudos to you if you haven't spent a dime here yet. Keep it that way.
  • marsambassadormarsambassador Member Posts: 74 Arc User
    edited February 2016
    I can't get over how badly you've overshadowed the dungeons coming back by dropping news of pulling coal wards from tarm bar. Castle Never coming back should be a big story for gamers, but that thread has just 347 views and 10 comments. This thread discussing change to coal wards has 27,000 views and 25 pages of comments in just a few days. And how many pages were deleted by mods? 5 or more?

    Pulling coal wards may even be a stupider move than pulling AD from leadership. At least there are other ways to earn AD. But now we need to pay $10 cold hard cash to get 1 coal ward. There is no other way to get them. And nobody is going to pay $310 just to get a single rank 12. That's $620 just to get rank 12 armour and weapon enchants on a single character. That means sellers need to charge 12 million AD for a Transcendent in the AH just to break even. How does that make sense???

    Sad what has happened to this game. Just plain sad.
  • marsambassadormarsambassador Member Posts: 74 Arc User

    Wouldn't it be nice if we lived in a world where people could create, but not have to worry about making money? Then we wouldn't have any need for the people who are making these decisions; only the ones who want to build a good game.

    This game had that in place. It's called the FOUNDRY. People creating amazing content for free. Should have been the heavily promoted and supported centerpiece to this game instead of the crazy cousin left locked in the attic.

    A functioning Foundry would result in infinite content created by players for players, for nothing more than pure enjoyment and a challenge. I created a Foundry quest. I liked playing it more than 90% of the game's content. The only limit to Foundry quests are our own imagination.
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  • mocketo#4136 mocketo Member Posts: 1 Arc User
    edited February 2016
    Could've fixed the lag, the DDos, the lack of balance, the multiple bugs/issues or the fact that people get banned for "exploits" on things you never fixed. But nope you broke something else, something that needed no fixing. I personally won't be buying wards, VIP, keys or even mounts for that matter I'll take advantage of this "free" to play game now and give my money to one of your competitors thanks for making it easy on me to choose. Hope this mess makes it another year.
  • marsambassadormarsambassador Member Posts: 74 Arc User
    Neverwinter Team:

    You build a profitable game by having a larger user base completing micro transactions with regular players subscribing to VIP for tangible benefits. I'm sure you understand this. There are plenty of MMO models you can copy here. I can only conclude that you're looking to kill the game to get out of a difficult licensing agreement that has terms you're unwilling or unable to fulfill. Am I close?
  • minotaur2857minotaur2857 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,141 Arc User
    l0th4ri0 said:

    commanderkruge has grasped the heart of it. If the game has become lame, then STOP playing. Certainly stop PAYING. Kudos to you if you haven't spent a dime here yet. Keep it that way.

    Yeah, but I still have 9 months of VIP paid for on completely false pretences.

    Nobody's buying their wards in the Zen store because they're overpriced by a factor of at least 10 and possibly closer to 20.

    The two acceptable solutions were to slash the price in the Zen store, or make all sources BoA.

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  • lunari#8880 lunari Member Posts: 35 Arc User
    As a new player of this game. I enjoyed it while it lasted. I played for a few months and it was fun at first until you reach to a certain level or time of the game where you need to focus on your gear in order to stay alive and move forward. I will admit I spent a few dollars here and there to do what I can to work on gear. During this time I was observing the costs and time it'll take to make a good set to continue without having to grind so much. That is why I spend some money to lessen the time it takes to get the items I need to improve. As time went on I've started to learn the game much more and where to get certain items at lower price, because it was getting a little too expensive to lash out more money. When I studied the VIP and how you can get keys for boxes to get items that could benefit me? I thought it was a good deal and I went for it. I enjoyed opening a box each day and see what goodies I could receive. Upon three months to four months paying VIP, I have accumulated enough Trade Bars to specifically get Coals or Perv Wards. Seeing how it was much cheaper to get rather spending tons of Zen, I was using that method to get the items I needed. Now upon hearing this drastic news? Yes it affects me a lot as well as a new player who once enjoyed this game and have no problem spending money, when I can, towards the game. I have a tight budget and when I can accumulate enough entertainment money, I chose it towards gaming. The choice of game? Never Winter, since I enjoyed it a lot. Not only news like this depresses me, but upon knowing certain things about the game that revolves around spending money? I become very discourage to even continue playing the game. Having to be only 4 months playing this game and didn't see any new content other than changes to the market. I became very bored these recent days.

    Boredom + Spending too much money or grind too much hours in order to enjoy the game= going to look elsewhere so I can find a game that would be valuable for time and money. Seriously, I totally understand everyone needs to make money from working or creating things for others to enjoy. I totally get it, but when not much creativity is shown to keep a player tuned to the game more. Makes it less enjoyable. Honestly I am currently looking for another game because I am bored of this one. Hoping for positive changes, yet I come to see negative ones. I had to reread the reasons behind these changes and did it several times to understand the reason to be more consumer friendly, yet each time I finished it all I could see it was a different way of saying the truth behind this reason. You guys should just be up front and say, "you did it because you need people to spend more real money on Zen so we can get paid."

    Look I know its too long to read, but in short sentence if you didn't want to read all that is, I do not enjoy this change one bit and I am going to stop paying for VIP. I will be using that money on another game that is worth having, because people who are on a budget can not afford to spend hundreds of dollars to improve your gear. And for what? Because the end game content really sucks too. Sorry to say, but it does because everything is repetitive and THAT gets boring after some time!
  • rapo973rapo973 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 831 Arc User


    Boredom + Spending too much money or grind too much hours in order to enjoy the game= going to look elsewhere so I can find a game that would be valuable for time and money. Seriously, I totally understand everyone needs to make money from working or creating things for others to enjoy. I totally get it, but when not much creativity is shown to keep a player tuned to the game more. Makes it less enjoyable. Honestly I am currently looking for another game because I am bored of this one. Hoping for positive changes, yet I come to see negative ones. I had to reread the reasons behind these changes and did it several times to understand the reason to be more consumer friendly, yet each time I finished it all I could see it was a different way of saying the truth behind this reason. You guys should just be up front and say, "you did it because you need people to spend more real money on Zen so we can get paid."

    Look I know its too long to read, but in short sentence if you didn't want to read all that is, I do not enjoy this change one bit and I am going to stop paying for VIP. I will be using that money on another game that is worth having, because people who are on a budget can not afford to spend hundreds of dollars to improve your gear. And for what? Because the end game content really sucks too. Sorry to say, but it does because everything is repetitive and THAT gets boring after some time!

    This!
    I'm with you, but I'm playing this game since Jan 2014, just to share how much I loved this game.
    Everytime it's a 1 step in the good direction and 4 steps in the bad direction.
    It's just like being betrayed by your parter/friend/girlfriend: you can forgive once, not always.
    This time is the worst: "I see you confused: the CWs were a mistake".

    Oltreverso guild leader
    Maga Othelma - DC | Svalvolo - SW | Dente Avvelenato- GWF
  • aettthornaettthorn Member Posts: 73 Arc User
    I know this might sound a bit conspiracy-theory-ish, but I'm wondering if the whole trade bar rework was done just so that they could remove the wards without too much legal issue.

    Before the whole rework, the only things of real value in the store were the wards. So if the Devs removed them before there were other things in the store, then players could perhaps make a legal claim that the removal had been a substantial reduction in the quality of something that they had paid for (either keys or VIP), and risk a class-action lawsuit.

    Fast-forward to now, and they have put pets, mounts, fashions, etc. into the trade bar store. So the removal of the wards and blood rubies is now, in their eyes, much less of a legal risk. Since there are other good items in the store, then VIP and Keys weren't substantially affected, and that might be all the difference from a legal standpoint that they felt they needed.
  • l0th4ri0l0th4ri0 Member Posts: 589 Arc User
    edited February 2016
    aettthorn said:

    I know this might sound a bit conspiracy-theory-ish, but I'm wondering if the whole trade bar rework was done just so that they could remove the wards without too much legal issue.

    Before the whole rework, the only things of real value in the store were the wards. So if the Devs removed them before there were other things in the store, then players could perhaps make a legal claim that the removal had been a substantial reduction in the quality of something that they had paid for (either keys or VIP), and risk a class-action lawsuit.

    Fast-forward to now, and they have put pets, mounts, fashions, etc. into the trade bar store. So the removal of the wards and blood rubies is now, in their eyes, much less of a legal risk. Since there are other good items in the store, then VIP and Keys weren't substantially affected, and that might be all the difference from a legal standpoint that they felt they needed.

    Legally, they can do whatever they want to the game with absolute impunity. We have no legal recourse to sue them over anything except billing issues; for example, "i paid money and didn't get my zen." That's it. Read the TOS. That goes for the forums, too.

    And before anyone starts: changing the tarm store is not a "billing issue". Your online experience may change without notice, remember? Be glad they even gave us a one day warning before they "fixed" the tarm store... it's more than the poor bastages playing the Xbox version got.

    If we wanted to get really semantic here: they could make everything in the game BoP, shut down the AH, shut down the ZAX, and make all of the ingame armor appear to be black leather gimp suits -- complete with ball gags, and there is nothing you could do about it. In fact, I'm pretty sure that ball gags are specifically mentioned in the TOS that we all agreed on. Can't remember which part exactly. :smile:
  • aboon#1086 aboon Member Posts: 15 Arc User
    Well.... the "moderator" has been through... and very inconsistent. Some of my comments about the censorship have been removed, but not others. How amusing.
  • regenerderegenerde Member Posts: 3,048 Arc User
    edited February 2016
    I'm wondering, how many "gifts" were received by AD seller or botter accounts,
    ... for now we’ve prepared the following gifts for players who had accounts prior to the posting of this message.
    if you take a look at how massive the AD seller spam is in PE these days, and that they only use an account once for spam.

    Sure, the gift itself is account bound, but what they can do with all those Coals, Pres and Rubies... and i doubt that there is anything done against this.

    Anyway, will we get some more official replies on this topic here, or is it just this announcement and nothing else?
    I do believe in killing the messenger...
    Want to know why?
    Because it sends a message!
  • aboon#1086 aboon Member Posts: 15 Arc User
    > @l0th4ri0 said:

    > Legally, they can do whatever they want to the game with absolute impunity.

    There was a long discussion of that earlier, and that's not at all clear. In fact, it's probably not legally the case. One of my previously censored comments mentioned "Fraud in the Inducement," as do many earlier.

    > "Your online experience may change without notice"

    If they really do take full advantage of that claim, that's a very good reason to avoid the game and the entire company.
  • yumifirebrandyumifirebrand Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2 Arc User
    I would like to thank Strumslinger for this ingenious move. He made my choice to move on to a new game very easy. Thanks but I will no longer spend a dime of money on this game and i will not recommend this game to anyone I know. Since the take away ad from leadership and now taking coal ward and preseveration wards from the trade bar store its next to impossible to generate ad in the game. I played about 1 to maybe 3 hrs a night and I sure as hell dont want to do dungeons and skirmishes over and over every night just to earn ad. I wish the Neverwinter community the best of luck but i see no future here with the leadership that's running this game.
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  • rubberpigsrubberpigs Member Posts: 1 Arc User
    I just came back to playing. i had not played since mod 2. noticed i had alot of catching up to do to...gear wise. bought VIP because i could get wards that way, to start catching up. Now you remove wards from trade bars... what you have done is crushing to new or returning players. if i have done the math right...it will cost 150$ in just wards to go from a rank 9 enchantment to a rank 12...and i currently dont have any rank 9 gems...and my current gear can hold 12 enchantments(once upgraded)...so that would be 1800$...that might be a "micro" transaction for some but not me... and that doesnt even include having to get the marks of this or that...or the cost of upgrading your main and off hand...or the cost of upgrading any other artifact equipment... or weapon enchants or artifacts. i like this game but sorry i dont like it enough to pay thousands of dollars to upgrade gear on A toon...let alone alts . i will keep playing but i will not spend any more money nor will i recommend this game to anyone i know.
  • urabaskurabask Member Posts: 2,923 Arc User
    edited February 2016

    I just came back to playing. i had not played since mod 2. noticed i had alot of catching up to do to...gear wise. bought VIP because i could get wards that way, to start catching up. Now you remove wards from trade bars... what you have done is crushing to new or returning players. if i have done the math right...it will cost 150$ in just wards to go from a rank 9 enchantment to a rank 12...and i currently dont have any rank 9 gems...and my current gear can hold 12 enchantments(once upgraded)...so that would be 1800$...that might be a "micro" transaction for some but not me... and that doesnt even include having to get the marks of this or that...or the cost of upgrading your main and off hand...or the cost of upgrading any other artifact equipment... or weapon enchants or artifacts. i like this game but sorry i dont like it enough to pay thousands of dollars to upgrade gear on A toon...let alone alts . i will keep playing but i will not spend any more money nor will i recommend this game to anyone i know.

    Not that it's really any better but you don't need to use coal wards on every enchantment. Still kind of screwed because you do need to use preservation wards and the amount you'll use on higher ranked enchants/artifacts will cost you about as much as a coal ward used to.
    I8r4ux9.jpg
  • naujxnaujx Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 3 Arc User
    a good solution and a good serious protest anyone who does not agree with the changes that have done would not play for a month and look for something else, there are many.
    that seeing the way this game is taking this payment again.
    PS: if something misspelled or been explained that what I'm doing with the translator of google :#
  • xenotorchxenotorch Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 196 Arc User

    To speak to this further, one of our guidelines for putting items into in-game stores is to never allow that exact item to also exist in the Zen Market. Doing so can create confusion, as well as introduce perceived equivalencies that aren’t actually true. We made a mistake when allowing these items to exist in both the Trade Bar store and the Zen Market. Though Coalescent Wards and Preservation Wards did exist (at a higher price) in the Trade Bar store before, our attempt to make them more prominent and significantly cheaper had a large negative impact on the in-game economy. We really thought this would be a positive change, but we were wrong and we apologize for taking them away now.

    I have to comment on this - these items have existed in the Trade Bar and Zen Market for some time (since Beta? I never checked as I never opened lockboxes back then). NO ONE is confused, really poor communication right there.
    Then removing them rather than returning them to the previous price just makes a complete mockery of the attempted point regarding the negative impact. Returning them to that previous price would have been the logical choice to make unless the reasoning is a blatantly clumsy cash-grab move.

    For the love of Lloth, listen to your community (for once - break the pattern why not??) and work with us to make this game better. You were doing some good things, returning our lost levelling dungeons was a step. This decision, you just kicked the ladder away from new players and the non-whales.

    And let us not now address the blatant bait-and-switch of the VIP program. Not one person I've spoken to in our guilds got VIP for any other reason than to get trade-bars for RP stuff from opening the lockboxes with the free keys. That is moving the goalposts by uprooting them to another stadium on another continent. I will be interested in the number of people not renewing VIP status - as I will be one of those.

    Shame on the suits and bean-counters for this decision. As usual removed from the community and just seeing the numbers on an Excel spreadsheet.

    Xeno, an unhappy Beta player.
  • asthazarfasthazarf Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 167 Arc User
    edited February 2016
    merilee said:

    I HAVE been playing this game for quite a long time and the notion that anyone has to spend one penny to advance or succeed is ludicrous.

    Please, tell us more about how the zen required to buy Coals (now) just falls from the sky. Oh, wait... you can get it for AD, right? Now tell us, where does the ZEN you get for AD come from? Try getting them without having to spend a penny now. :)

    Also, keep in mind that RNG on invocation boxes isn't exactly proficient for everyone. (4 months of play since I returned, 4 toons, daily invokes: 2 Coals)

    I don't support the change. At all. I'll see you all again when things get better. If they ever do.
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