totaly agree the price is insane ... and they seem to dont care they actualy found a reason now "active bonus OP" you must grind ur life into game to upgrade them..... seriously is beyond stupid ... and yea i read the stuffs some fan boys say about upgrades and upgrade for mount like " you can buy purple from zen store and u dont need to upgrade" but maybe some of us enjoy some green quality mounts want them to be able to upgrade to purple with decent cost same goes for the companions
Yup. Not upgrading my companion. Ridiculous. The more people who do not buy into this gouging the more likely they will lower prices. I think they'd make more money if their prices were lowered on most things. But who knows, maybe there's more rich people than I think blowing their money away at mounts etc.
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reagenlionel1Member, Neverwinter Beta UsersPosts: 0Arc User
edited December 2013
I greatly agree the pricing is far too high. I am not tempted what so ever to buy anything simply because the prices is so outragous.
And i will continue not to buy anything. I love this game, but the pricing is what I hate most.
I've played quite a few f2p mmos and this is just horrible pricing. The prices are supposed to intice people to buy things from the cash shop. But these horribly high prices do the very opposite. I wont support this pricing and havent since open beta.
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khalith01Member, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 32
edited December 2013
The companion upgrade system and the mounts are the biggest points of irritation for me, I feel the prices are too high and at the same time there is not enough to spend gold on, if we could exchange gold for AD I'd be perfectly content. It would be one thing if the grind had been gated... i.e. a new level 16 shouldn't immediately have an epic companion, I get that. But by the time we hit 60 we should be able to have a rank 30 companion through strictly in-game means, i.e. hitting level 40 should give us one companion upgrade to 20, level 50 should have an upgrade to 25, level 55 should give us one to upgrade to 30.
I'm not asking for a full set of rank 30 companions, but I feel we should be able to get one by the time we hit 60 solely through in-game rewards for leveling with more than that requiring some Zen purchases, the same could be applied to bags for inventory space.
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silvergryphMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 740Arc User
The companion upgrade system and the mounts are the biggest points of irritation for me, I feel the prices are too high and at the same time there is not enough to spend gold on, if we could exchange gold for AD I'd be perfectly content. It would be one thing if the grind had been gated... i.e. a new level 16 shouldn't immediately have an epic companion, I get that. But by the time we hit 60 we should be able to have a rank 30 companion through strictly in-game means, i.e. hitting level 40 should give us one companion upgrade to 20, level 50 should have an upgrade to 25, level 55 should give us one to upgrade to 30.
I'm not asking for a full set of rank 30 companions, but I feel we should be able to get one by the time we hit 60 solely through in-game rewards for leveling with more than that being requiring some Zen purchases, the same could be applied to bags for inventory space.
While I do agree that companions in particular are overpriced, I would like to point out that you can actually convert gold to AD via the Auction House. There are a number of vendor items that can be sold for AD. For example, mounts usually sell pretty well since a new level 20 may not have the gold to buy one from the vendor but almost certainly has 5000AD to spare. There are also good markets for tools and consumables.
The thing is unlike Champions and Star Trek, Neverwinter doesn't have a subscription so where the other two games get a steady trickle of money from people paying their $15 a month on top of C-Store sales Neverwinter ONLY get's money from Zen sales so the prices are kinda borked.
Ironically though character slots are cheaper on NW than the other two so you can get mules that just exist to get free AD from invoking and leadership cheaper than in the others.
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michaelpoynerMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 75
edited December 2013
You raging out at their prices? stop blowing your money then.
My biggest pricing issue in this game is the wide difference in price for same-tier items.
Take the new mount. When it was released, it was set to 3500z - more than some epic mounts.
It's "proper," reduced price is 1800z - which other than the wolf mount that's green, is more than 3 times more than other green mounts (well, there is also a 800z horse, but even then that's over twice as much for the new mount)
I can understand if they want people to pay more for "pretty" stuff, but especially with mounts that have no storage, give us the stats to match the price range (so in the case of the new undead horse mount, make it blue not green rank).
That green wolf mount should be either blue or purple.
-Rajani Isa
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beckylunaticMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 14,231Arc User
edited December 2013
The decaying horse tooltip still says it's 80% speed.
if you are going to outright purchase zen with real money to buy zen shop items, yes, it could get costly. or exchange zen for AD, same deal. and if you think that's the only possible way to acquire these items, then perhaps your perception is skewed, not the pricing.
because there is the zen exchange in-game, you can acquire everything in game for free. granted, it may take you some time to grind/acquire, but that's not the focus. you may also subsidize your zen store purchases by paying half in-game acquired currency and half real world dollars. or any percentage you so choose.
if your complaints involve the pricing based on wanting items now versus waiting to purchase items after you've earned the currency for it, then is it the pricing or is it impatience? yes, we all desire to have the things we want when we want them. but it's always at a cost. think about air fares and how expensive premium seating is or how much more you may spend on a ticket well in advance vs short notice.
also, the higher priced items i would consider to be premium items not necessarily needed to progress in-game. if they were all priced for 1000z or lower, because there is a zen/AD exchange in game, they would be incredibly easy to acquire at zero cost. there needs to be an incentive to buy zen. this, after all, is a free to play MMO. it needs to make money.
there are players that would usually be paying a sub for an MMO and they choose to limit their zen purchases to what a sub's monthly charges are. or they buy zen and save it month to month until they can afford what they want to get. either way, it's just another way that people choose to spend their money or how they justify their spending.
People come home from work and don't want to do more work while gaming. Grinding is just more work.
People come home from work and don't want to do more work while gaming. Grinding is just more work.
That is understandable, but people also need to understand that the game is 'free to play', not 'free to get the best stuff instantly' nor 'free to be the best PvPer in the game as soon as you hit level 60'. Therein lies most of the complaints in this thread - everybody wants "to keep up with the Joneses" and feel so entitled that they should get everything now. You can complete all the initial content in this game without spending a cent using the items you get from drops. You want the other stuff, either you work for it (long) or you pay for it (quick). There are always people whose competitive nature will take the quick way because they want to be the 'first' or the 'best', and then everyone else is playing catch-up and complaining about fairness if they can't or won't take the quick way. Not that different from real life - size of house, type of car, newest video game console, newest mobile phone/device, etc.
Have I dropped money on this game? Yes. I paid for the Feywild pack (basically buying a new pc game like Diablo III would be). A one-time charge for a game and I get 600k AD, purple mount and companion, extra char slot, and some other frills. I find that worth $60. Others don't. I have bought zen - generally for keys, some bank slots, greater bags, some dyes for one character after level 60 to work on his look - mostly small things. I don't have hours to play at age 41. I have a family, teenage kids with lots going on, house, 40-60hr/wk job, etc. I find that it's ok to have to spend some money to get some niceties in my situation. Have I bought enough keys to open every lockbox I've received? No. Can't afford that.
Now, back to the actual thread topic - Angrysprite has an excellent thread started somewhere else about the worst pricing piece of the store - the character-bound companions, and the fact that you're pretty much character locked if you buy one. Most people won't delete a character to start over if they're going to lose a $30 investment, and if that character isn't what they want it to be, their frustration level is just going to go through the roof since the option to delete and start over is gone (or they wasted $30). I was frustrated losing my Caturday cape and some other stuff when I deleted so I could change shards (months before shard merge), and I didn't even pay for those items. I disagree with whomever said above that the 'responsible spending group' in the middle is a 'thin slice'. Statistically, that group, just like the 'bang-for-buck' computer builders, is much larger than the 'spend anyway' group. Those who will just spend no matter what is actually very small. The difference is where the value-to-dollar ratio falls for the different levels of people in the middle group. The upper tiers who are closer to the 'spend anyway' group don't need things to be really cheap, the lower tiers want really cheap. My opinion is that $30 character-bound companions limit PWE to a much smaller purchasing group than they thought. If they dropped prices by a third to a half and made them account-bound, I think the number of purchases would increase significantly because the value of (1) safety in not losing your item if you want to delete your character to start over, and (2) not being as expensive for an add-on would appeal to many more people.
Being able to safely start over also increases the re-playability of the game, bringing more chances to spend money. The add-on modules wouldn't have to always be for level 60s, since there would be a way to safely go back and start over for those people who may not want to purchase another character slot, either because they don't want to spend, or they already have 15 chars and would rather just start one over because it isn't exactly how they would like it. Even the spend anyway crowd eventually hits their limit and ends up in that second group. They've been there, done that, and you need to find a way to keep them enjoying the game because their the ones who bring other people. Re-playability keeps people in the game, instead of leaving for more interesting pastures. My guild started 17 years ago in the original Neverwinter Nights on AOL. Most of them who came here are back playing WoW, or FF, or betas of other new stuff on the horizon, because they've hit the top and are bored with the game. They pop back in on occasion to check out new content, but epic level 60 stuff gets very repetitive after awhile.
Those who play D&D know what I mean. Eventually you put your favorite uber-god characters aside and start over because it's more interesting.
My earlier post got cut short because work interrupted my forum browsing. I started off intending to defend Cryptic and PWE on the pricing, but when I went through the math, there simply is no defending it. So I want to leave them with a suggestion that would make the game better and increase their bottom line.
1) Make all store bought purchases account wide. This means companions and bags. Just try it! You will make a LOT more money!
2) For people whom already purchased similar items on multiple characters give them Zen or AD in the game to compensate the change. I know this is some work, but the efforts would go a LONG way with the paying customers in the community.
3) Decrease the cost of upgrading companions.
White ---> Green = 10G and 25,000 AD
Green ---> Blue = 20G and 50,000 AD
Blue ---> Purple = 30G and 100,000 AD
I have money I am willing to spend on this game, if only Cyptic and PWE show more (I like some of the recent changes a lot, like putting the Shadowmantle pack on the Zen store) good faith. You guys (Cryptic / PWE) are close, keep listening, we are telling you what will make us spend money!
Possibly add in a new coffer to the celestial coins with a super rare chance to drop a companion upgrade token! I would make this a 14 coin box and allow the coins to stack to 14. We could also introduce some 28 coin coffers down the road that could drop purple crafting assets and 4 coin coffer that can drop a dragon egg.
I found the companion prices to be a bit high, considering their usefulness and the fact that they are Bind on Equip. I liked the fact that they lowered the price. But I felt rather cheated having bought a companion for full price, less than a week before the 60% off sale, followed by a permanent price drop.
I found the companion prices to be a bit high, considering their usefulness and the fact that they are Bind on Equip. I liked the fact that they lowered the price. But I felt rather cheated having bought a companion for full price, less than a week before the 60% off sale, followed by a permanent price drop.
Certainly you didn't feel cheated. Life works like that, the longer you wait the lower the price gets. Id also assume eventually companions will be account wide, it's the next logical move from them. How long you intend to wait for such a change is up to you.
One thing to keep in mind about criticizing prices is they are seeing feedback for those prices in terms of sales (or lack there of) everyday. They know how well they are selling or not compared to the size of the player base. I'm sure it's difficult to balance the prices so they can take advantage of those who have plenty of money to burn while not putting off other players by making them feel too poor to play or restricting access to content.
I think the game has a little bit of a problem with the latter at endgame which is partly (or even mostly) due to other players. I had someone complain in PK run that two of our members were under 10k GS. That just seems obnoxious. Then there's the issue of exploits inflating the economy and required gear scores (which tends to benefit those who already farmed their gear before the inflation or exploiters).
I haven't even seen Malabog's Castle or Valindra's Tower yet, but there's also the issue of creating challenging content across the spectrum of paying and free players.
The free artifact and the campaign boons definitely seem to help by offering relatively inexpensive progression to get players past some of the gear inflation. Well, at least for earlier dungeons.
But noone is saying that everything should be given to the players for no reason. All anyone is saying is that the prices in the game are laughable, and that if Cryptic/PWE actually wanted Neverwinter to work out as a business investment, then they should strongly re-evaluate their marketing scheme and their business tactics.
Neverwinter is a great game. Clearly there are alot of players who love the game; that can be seen in this thread alone. When the players that love the game feel as if they can't support it because of how unreasonably priced everything is, however, there is a serious issue with the game's potential longevity. It's very clear, based on past trends with PWE games, that whoever is in charge of pricing views this game as a passing fad, instead of a real MMO that could have a lasting place in the genre.
They have lowered the cost to companions in the Zen market. the more feedback is given the more it is listened to and changes happen. Just stay positive. give constructive feedback any chance you get on things.
Last warning: If I have to prune any more cheap shots, pay to win arguments, or outright shills for other games, I'm locking this thread. If you want to sing the praises of other games' shops or whatever, please go do so on THEIR boards. These are the official boards for Neverwinter Online, please confine your discussions to such. Thank you.
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degraafinationMember, Neverwinter Beta UsersPosts: 0Arc User
After reading through about half of these posts the rest just seem like blah blah... repeat. Got tired of reading the same thing over and over, so I'm just going to add my own very short opinion on the matter: Prices are clearly way too high for the 'value' that you get! No ifs or buts, thats how I see it.
I'm fine with the prices for the game for the most part. I do hope that they reduce the price for the companion upgrades and to upgrade mounts but really if they don't they don't. I just found ways to make more AD so that these "AD sinks" became ok for me. I make enough AD every month just from leadership and playing the game a couple hours a night that I can easily upgrade several companions to purple if I so choose (and I have upgraded several to purple). I will however wait to see if they bring down the cost to upgrade mounts as I think the price to reward doesn't work at least for me. For companions you are getting something (active bonus) for mounts you are just getting another skin once you already have a tier 3 mount (and I already have the Horse from the first $60 pack, The unicorn from the second $60 pack and I bought the White Tiger as I wanted it so having 3 of the 110% speed mounts gives me ZERO interest in paying millions of AD to upgrade the shadow wolf or Sled although I'd at least think about it if they dropped it to about 500k to take a mount from lowest to highest.
Cheers
To be honest, the prices of the stuff in the Cash shop don't bother me that much, you can use one mount across all your characters on one account, so you're only buying one. (With the exception of lockbox mounts). Granted some of the other stuff is pricey like the bag expansions but hey, they have to make money somehow, but I will agree with the companion upgrade prices being over the top. Anyone here who has played PWE's flagship game can probably agree with me when I say I'm glad the micro-transaction store is no where near as bad here as it was there.
Alright two things, the primary one is going to be #2.
1. I've put hundreds of dollars into Cryptics games (just over the last couple of months in fact) it's pretty much my only source of entertainment nowadays in my sad, increasingly painful, life. Not to mention that I've noticed that they have actually started producing content at a fairly regular pace, with the two campaigns for Neverwinter, and the adventure zones they released last year for STO (which is my favorite Cryptic game, but I'm a bit burned out on it). The way I see it is that what you spend is an investment in the game's future, and it is CRAZY expensive at times compared to the cost of single player games and such, but at the same time I've got like 1000+ hours alone invested in STO and that's just since I liked it to my STEAM account and had it tracked there. It comes down to decisions. But this is the cost of supporting a game so it produces more content.
2.
Simply put mounts starting at $25 - $30 apiece is quite high, but really it's not the mounts that bother me as they are fairly cosmetic. What bothers me are the companions which cost similarly large investments of cash, and actually have a tangible, in-game effect, with the game being balanced around each player having a companion with them (and now up to 5 active companions adding bonuses). A mount gives you nothing beyond a certain point, and the game zones are honestly not so big that travel speed is an issue (I walk a lot of places and kill everything I see as it is). On the other hand when you consider that you pretty much have to pay money (or covert lots of ADs over a lengthy period of time given the 24k a day refinement cap) to get the full 5 active companion slots just to have the potential to match other players in active bonuses BEFORE you consider getting 5 companions to go into those slots, that becomes an issue. Not to mention the quality of the bonuses and special perks that come from the slotted companions.
Overall I like the philosophy Cryptic was initially rolling with, that the idea of the game is that by playing a lot you can obtain anything in the game, which justifies a lot of these stat bonuses. However given the relative chore involved in getting ADs (there aren't as many ways of doing so as there are of getting Dil in STO) and crazy high prices with a small cap even if you put in the effort... it's just not a practical argument with the current system.
At the end of the day Cryptic DOES need to make money to stay in business, and as I said I have been paying them quite a bit (as have doubtlessly others), but I do think they should be slashing their prices substantially OR putting ways into the game to obtain things like high quality companions with decent abilities through game play other than spending money or ADs, such as quests, dungeons, and the like. As it is now it seems in-game obtainable companions are capped at green. The SCA pet, the "Lightfoot" requires having a number purple companions to begin with in order to even consider obtaining it.
Ideally in a "Perfect World" (pun intended) I would suggest Cryptic do the following:
1. Leave mount prices as they are, mounts are a perfect example of the kind of harmless cosmetic item that are perfect for cash shops to carry to collect money and donations. I bought an armored war bear for my rarely played DC to ride around on, and it's fun, as well as showing I support the game rather openly.
2. Leave clothing sets the way they are, again perfect examples of harmless, cosmetic items. Indeed expanding on the game's wardrobe would be a plus. Other than the starting peasant costume, I don't think I've seen anything with pants or leggings for female characters. Likewise transmute items for adventuring equipment are something this could be extended into harmlessly enough.
3. I find the idea of paying huge numbers of ADs to increase the level of companions ridiculous, especially when the cash value of those AD amounts oftentimes equals or exceeds the cost of a purple companion to begin with. When it comes to green companions in the AD shop for example it's pretty much looking at the cost of the companion flat out on top of the effective cost of another purple companion just to max that one out.
ALL cash shop companions should be purple, and I'd argue that the price should be lowered to about $10 a pop. When you consider your looking at an investment of $50 for a player to fill 5 active slots with purple companions that's a pretty good potential profit which just grows when you consider people who are going to want to swap companions out for different situations. What's more companions bought in the cash shop should be account wide unlocks.
In addition, in keeping with the spirit of the system (as was hyped when Neverwinter came out) *EVENT* pets should also be made purple. Allowing a long term player who puts in the work to potentially get an entire set of companions for free without having to pay. This is VERY similar to what STO already does with it's star ships, one of the big ways I defend STO to critics is to point out that yes a ship costs $25, but at the same time if you play long enough (which you will if you like the game) your going to get the ability to get a ship just as good from Christmas, Summer, or even potentially anniversary events (The universal slot Oddy was good when it came out, less impressed with the Ambassador). That right there kind of kills "pay to win" arguments, in a way that can't be done with Neverwinter and it's companion system. Simply by showing up for some quick ice races in STO daily during the winter event that's running you can walk away with a fancy Breen Cruiser or Raider (well now it's too late to get involved enough for the big prize, but the event did let you do this).
Likewise now that there is a statistical benefit, all players should have 5 active companion slots on a character, even if they wind up filling them with whites for 2G apiece for a while.
In addition there should be ways to get companions from questing and projects, it's something that will keep people playing. Not to mention that it's not exactly going to kill "cash pets" anymore than the free ships prevented the dedicated STO players from buying up tons of them from the Zen store (I mean seriously, look at some of the stuff in my hangars some time, and I'm a lightweight compared to some people I know who must have every ship available in the game). Make pet abilities an integral part of strategy in setting up characters and the problem will solve itself, especially if the pets aren't that expensive, dare I say it a "gotta catch 'em all" pet collection attitude can be tapped heavily. What's more while I hate to directly mention other MMOs, with just static pets WoW managed to find a use for them (and collecting them) by adding in a "pet battle" system much like Pok
From what I can see, mount and companion prices have come down. Plus the 60% discount was a real treat. Bought a Stone for 800 zen, which was peanuts. This ties in to something I said on another thread last year; high prices could have been due to a new product recovering investment/development costs.
PSA: You don't need to grind Spinward Rise for your Elemental artifact main hand if you have some AD lying around. You can craft it via the Tyranny of Dragon's campaign screen.
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hobokenboyBanned Users, Neverwinter Beta UsersPosts: 3Arc User
edited January 2014
This seems to be YET ANOTHER "issue" that keeps cropping up. I recall threads about this from "open beta".
I would think a seasoned studio like Cryptic with two(I'm only counting the games produced after the split from NCSoft) MMO titles under it's belt, most ESPECIALLY one that has such a distinguished IP as the Star Trek IP, could have worked this out by now.
2nd Edit:
I also recall Perfect World buying Cryptic several years before the announcement of this game, and prices in their game stores were....comparable. Yes, this game's started out much higher than the other two, but those other two were initially sub to play games.
I also recall Perfect World buying Cryptic several years before the announcement of this game, and prices in their game stores were....comparable. Yes, this game's started out much higher than the other two, but those other two were initially sub to play games.
And to be fair to Cryptic: both Champions Online and Star Trek Online are *still* pay-to-play games. At least that's an option that is still available: you can play 100% for free, or pay monthly, or even invest with a Lifetime account. These "Gold Tier" subscriptions and Lifetime purchases help to heavily subsidize the Zen Store.
Neverwinter was build from the ground-up as a free-to-play venture. There is no subscription or "Gold Tier" level for players, therefore the Z-Store for Neverwinter is not subsidized in any way whatsoever, therefore it makes sense that item prices there are much higher. However, just because I understand it and it may be justified does't mean I agree with it. Two words for me: sticker shock. And hence, I agree: most pricing is way out-of-whack for the perceived value of the items sold.
I'd been greatly hoping that Neverwinter would be designed similarly to CO and STO with a "Gold Tier" level that players could buy into (and I have no doubt a lot of players would do just this). However, the only reason this "Gold Tier" still exists at CO and STO is to take care of all those players who paid subscriptions or bought Lifetime accounts before the games were converted from 100% pay-to-play into free-to-play; Neverwinter started out as free-to-play and, admittedly, not having such subscription options is far easier to manage by the CFO.
TL;DR: It's understandable why the Neverwinter Z-Store prices are so much higher than those in Champions and Star Trek, though that does't mean I agree with it or like it. Unfortunately it is what it is and will always be just that: what it is.
And for the record to the OP: The title of this thread is wrong: when PWE bought Cryptic, all the Z-Store prices stayed exactly the same. Neverwinter was created after the fact and I refer to be description above.
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And i will continue not to buy anything. I love this game, but the pricing is what I hate most.
I've played quite a few f2p mmos and this is just horrible pricing. The prices are supposed to intice people to buy things from the cash shop. But these horribly high prices do the very opposite. I wont support this pricing and havent since open beta.
I'm not asking for a full set of rank 30 companions, but I feel we should be able to get one by the time we hit 60 solely through in-game rewards for leveling with more than that requiring some Zen purchases, the same could be applied to bags for inventory space.
While I do agree that companions in particular are overpriced, I would like to point out that you can actually convert gold to AD via the Auction House. There are a number of vendor items that can be sold for AD. For example, mounts usually sell pretty well since a new level 20 may not have the gold to buy one from the vendor but almost certainly has 5000AD to spare. There are also good markets for tools and consumables.
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Ironically though character slots are cheaper on NW than the other two so you can get mules that just exist to get free AD from invoking and leadership cheaper than in the others.
Answered
close thread.
Take the new mount. When it was released, it was set to 3500z - more than some epic mounts.
It's "proper," reduced price is 1800z - which other than the wolf mount that's green, is more than 3 times more than other green mounts (well, there is also a 800z horse, but even then that's over twice as much for the new mount)
I can understand if they want people to pay more for "pretty" stuff, but especially with mounts that have no storage, give us the stats to match the price range (so in the case of the new undead horse mount, make it blue not green rank).
That green wolf mount should be either blue or purple.
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That is understandable, but people also need to understand that the game is 'free to play', not 'free to get the best stuff instantly' nor 'free to be the best PvPer in the game as soon as you hit level 60'. Therein lies most of the complaints in this thread - everybody wants "to keep up with the Joneses" and feel so entitled that they should get everything now. You can complete all the initial content in this game without spending a cent using the items you get from drops. You want the other stuff, either you work for it (long) or you pay for it (quick). There are always people whose competitive nature will take the quick way because they want to be the 'first' or the 'best', and then everyone else is playing catch-up and complaining about fairness if they can't or won't take the quick way. Not that different from real life - size of house, type of car, newest video game console, newest mobile phone/device, etc.
Have I dropped money on this game? Yes. I paid for the Feywild pack (basically buying a new pc game like Diablo III would be). A one-time charge for a game and I get 600k AD, purple mount and companion, extra char slot, and some other frills. I find that worth $60. Others don't. I have bought zen - generally for keys, some bank slots, greater bags, some dyes for one character after level 60 to work on his look - mostly small things. I don't have hours to play at age 41. I have a family, teenage kids with lots going on, house, 40-60hr/wk job, etc. I find that it's ok to have to spend some money to get some niceties in my situation. Have I bought enough keys to open every lockbox I've received? No. Can't afford that.
Now, back to the actual thread topic - Angrysprite has an excellent thread started somewhere else about the worst pricing piece of the store - the character-bound companions, and the fact that you're pretty much character locked if you buy one. Most people won't delete a character to start over if they're going to lose a $30 investment, and if that character isn't what they want it to be, their frustration level is just going to go through the roof since the option to delete and start over is gone (or they wasted $30). I was frustrated losing my Caturday cape and some other stuff when I deleted so I could change shards (months before shard merge), and I didn't even pay for those items. I disagree with whomever said above that the 'responsible spending group' in the middle is a 'thin slice'. Statistically, that group, just like the 'bang-for-buck' computer builders, is much larger than the 'spend anyway' group. Those who will just spend no matter what is actually very small. The difference is where the value-to-dollar ratio falls for the different levels of people in the middle group. The upper tiers who are closer to the 'spend anyway' group don't need things to be really cheap, the lower tiers want really cheap. My opinion is that $30 character-bound companions limit PWE to a much smaller purchasing group than they thought. If they dropped prices by a third to a half and made them account-bound, I think the number of purchases would increase significantly because the value of (1) safety in not losing your item if you want to delete your character to start over, and (2) not being as expensive for an add-on would appeal to many more people.
Being able to safely start over also increases the re-playability of the game, bringing more chances to spend money. The add-on modules wouldn't have to always be for level 60s, since there would be a way to safely go back and start over for those people who may not want to purchase another character slot, either because they don't want to spend, or they already have 15 chars and would rather just start one over because it isn't exactly how they would like it. Even the spend anyway crowd eventually hits their limit and ends up in that second group. They've been there, done that, and you need to find a way to keep them enjoying the game because their the ones who bring other people. Re-playability keeps people in the game, instead of leaving for more interesting pastures. My guild started 17 years ago in the original Neverwinter Nights on AOL. Most of them who came here are back playing WoW, or FF, or betas of other new stuff on the horizon, because they've hit the top and are bored with the game. They pop back in on occasion to check out new content, but epic level 60 stuff gets very repetitive after awhile.
Those who play D&D know what I mean. Eventually you put your favorite uber-god characters aside and start over because it's more interesting.
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1) They realize they can't afford the things they want
2) They look at their bank accounts and realize how much money they've spent
1) Make all store bought purchases account wide. This means companions and bags. Just try it! You will make a LOT more money!
2) For people whom already purchased similar items on multiple characters give them Zen or AD in the game to compensate the change. I know this is some work, but the efforts would go a LONG way with the paying customers in the community.
3) Decrease the cost of upgrading companions.
White ---> Green = 10G and 25,000 AD
Green ---> Blue = 20G and 50,000 AD
Blue ---> Purple = 30G and 100,000 AD
I have money I am willing to spend on this game, if only Cyptic and PWE show more (I like some of the recent changes a lot, like putting the Shadowmantle pack on the Zen store) good faith. You guys (Cryptic / PWE) are close, keep listening, we are telling you what will make us spend money!
Possibly add in a new coffer to the celestial coins with a super rare chance to drop a companion upgrade token! I would make this a 14 coin box and allow the coins to stack to 14. We could also introduce some 28 coin coffers down the road that could drop purple crafting assets and 4 coin coffer that can drop a dragon egg.
Certainly you didn't feel cheated. Life works like that, the longer you wait the lower the price gets. Id also assume eventually companions will be account wide, it's the next logical move from them. How long you intend to wait for such a change is up to you.
I think the game has a little bit of a problem with the latter at endgame which is partly (or even mostly) due to other players. I had someone complain in PK run that two of our members were under 10k GS. That just seems obnoxious. Then there's the issue of exploits inflating the economy and required gear scores (which tends to benefit those who already farmed their gear before the inflation or exploiters).
I haven't even seen Malabog's Castle or Valindra's Tower yet, but there's also the issue of creating challenging content across the spectrum of paying and free players.
The free artifact and the campaign boons definitely seem to help by offering relatively inexpensive progression to get players past some of the gear inflation. Well, at least for earlier dungeons.
But noone is saying that everything should be given to the players for no reason. All anyone is saying is that the prices in the game are laughable, and that if Cryptic/PWE actually wanted Neverwinter to work out as a business investment, then they should strongly re-evaluate their marketing scheme and their business tactics.
Neverwinter is a great game. Clearly there are alot of players who love the game; that can be seen in this thread alone. When the players that love the game feel as if they can't support it because of how unreasonably priced everything is, however, there is a serious issue with the game's potential longevity. It's very clear, based on past trends with PWE games, that whoever is in charge of pricing views this game as a passing fad, instead of a real MMO that could have a lasting place in the genre.
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1. I've put hundreds of dollars into Cryptics games (just over the last couple of months in fact) it's pretty much my only source of entertainment nowadays in my sad, increasingly painful, life. Not to mention that I've noticed that they have actually started producing content at a fairly regular pace, with the two campaigns for Neverwinter, and the adventure zones they released last year for STO (which is my favorite Cryptic game, but I'm a bit burned out on it). The way I see it is that what you spend is an investment in the game's future, and it is CRAZY expensive at times compared to the cost of single player games and such, but at the same time I've got like 1000+ hours alone invested in STO and that's just since I liked it to my STEAM account and had it tracked there. It comes down to decisions. But this is the cost of supporting a game so it produces more content.
2.
Simply put mounts starting at $25 - $30 apiece is quite high, but really it's not the mounts that bother me as they are fairly cosmetic. What bothers me are the companions which cost similarly large investments of cash, and actually have a tangible, in-game effect, with the game being balanced around each player having a companion with them (and now up to 5 active companions adding bonuses). A mount gives you nothing beyond a certain point, and the game zones are honestly not so big that travel speed is an issue (I walk a lot of places and kill everything I see as it is). On the other hand when you consider that you pretty much have to pay money (or covert lots of ADs over a lengthy period of time given the 24k a day refinement cap) to get the full 5 active companion slots just to have the potential to match other players in active bonuses BEFORE you consider getting 5 companions to go into those slots, that becomes an issue. Not to mention the quality of the bonuses and special perks that come from the slotted companions.
Overall I like the philosophy Cryptic was initially rolling with, that the idea of the game is that by playing a lot you can obtain anything in the game, which justifies a lot of these stat bonuses. However given the relative chore involved in getting ADs (there aren't as many ways of doing so as there are of getting Dil in STO) and crazy high prices with a small cap even if you put in the effort... it's just not a practical argument with the current system.
At the end of the day Cryptic DOES need to make money to stay in business, and as I said I have been paying them quite a bit (as have doubtlessly others), but I do think they should be slashing their prices substantially OR putting ways into the game to obtain things like high quality companions with decent abilities through game play other than spending money or ADs, such as quests, dungeons, and the like. As it is now it seems in-game obtainable companions are capped at green. The SCA pet, the "Lightfoot" requires having a number purple companions to begin with in order to even consider obtaining it.
Ideally in a "Perfect World" (pun intended) I would suggest Cryptic do the following:
1. Leave mount prices as they are, mounts are a perfect example of the kind of harmless cosmetic item that are perfect for cash shops to carry to collect money and donations. I bought an armored war bear for my rarely played DC to ride around on, and it's fun, as well as showing I support the game rather openly.
2. Leave clothing sets the way they are, again perfect examples of harmless, cosmetic items. Indeed expanding on the game's wardrobe would be a plus. Other than the starting peasant costume, I don't think I've seen anything with pants or leggings for female characters. Likewise transmute items for adventuring equipment are something this could be extended into harmlessly enough.
3. I find the idea of paying huge numbers of ADs to increase the level of companions ridiculous, especially when the cash value of those AD amounts oftentimes equals or exceeds the cost of a purple companion to begin with. When it comes to green companions in the AD shop for example it's pretty much looking at the cost of the companion flat out on top of the effective cost of another purple companion just to max that one out.
ALL cash shop companions should be purple, and I'd argue that the price should be lowered to about $10 a pop. When you consider your looking at an investment of $50 for a player to fill 5 active slots with purple companions that's a pretty good potential profit which just grows when you consider people who are going to want to swap companions out for different situations. What's more companions bought in the cash shop should be account wide unlocks.
In addition, in keeping with the spirit of the system (as was hyped when Neverwinter came out) *EVENT* pets should also be made purple. Allowing a long term player who puts in the work to potentially get an entire set of companions for free without having to pay. This is VERY similar to what STO already does with it's star ships, one of the big ways I defend STO to critics is to point out that yes a ship costs $25, but at the same time if you play long enough (which you will if you like the game) your going to get the ability to get a ship just as good from Christmas, Summer, or even potentially anniversary events (The universal slot Oddy was good when it came out, less impressed with the Ambassador). That right there kind of kills "pay to win" arguments, in a way that can't be done with Neverwinter and it's companion system. Simply by showing up for some quick ice races in STO daily during the winter event that's running you can walk away with a fancy Breen Cruiser or Raider (well now it's too late to get involved enough for the big prize, but the event did let you do this).
Likewise now that there is a statistical benefit, all players should have 5 active companion slots on a character, even if they wind up filling them with whites for 2G apiece for a while.
In addition there should be ways to get companions from questing and projects, it's something that will keep people playing. Not to mention that it's not exactly going to kill "cash pets" anymore than the free ships prevented the dedicated STO players from buying up tons of them from the Zen store (I mean seriously, look at some of the stuff in my hangars some time, and I'm a lightweight compared to some people I know who must have every ship available in the game). Make pet abilities an integral part of strategy in setting up characters and the problem will solve itself, especially if the pets aren't that expensive, dare I say it a "gotta catch 'em all" pet collection attitude can be tapped heavily. What's more while I hate to directly mention other MMOs, with just static pets WoW managed to find a use for them (and collecting them) by adding in a "pet battle" system much like Pok
I would think a seasoned studio like Cryptic with two(I'm only counting the games produced after the split from NCSoft) MMO titles under it's belt, most ESPECIALLY one that has such a distinguished IP as the Star Trek IP, could have worked this out by now.
2nd Edit:
I also recall Perfect World buying Cryptic several years before the announcement of this game, and prices in their game stores were....comparable. Yes, this game's started out much higher than the other two, but those other two were initially sub to play games.
And to be fair to Cryptic: both Champions Online and Star Trek Online are *still* pay-to-play games. At least that's an option that is still available: you can play 100% for free, or pay monthly, or even invest with a Lifetime account. These "Gold Tier" subscriptions and Lifetime purchases help to heavily subsidize the Zen Store.
Neverwinter was build from the ground-up as a free-to-play venture. There is no subscription or "Gold Tier" level for players, therefore the Z-Store for Neverwinter is not subsidized in any way whatsoever, therefore it makes sense that item prices there are much higher. However, just because I understand it and it may be justified does't mean I agree with it. Two words for me: sticker shock. And hence, I agree: most pricing is way out-of-whack for the perceived value of the items sold.
I'd been greatly hoping that Neverwinter would be designed similarly to CO and STO with a "Gold Tier" level that players could buy into (and I have no doubt a lot of players would do just this). However, the only reason this "Gold Tier" still exists at CO and STO is to take care of all those players who paid subscriptions or bought Lifetime accounts before the games were converted from 100% pay-to-play into free-to-play; Neverwinter started out as free-to-play and, admittedly, not having such subscription options is far easier to manage by the CFO.
TL;DR: It's understandable why the Neverwinter Z-Store prices are so much higher than those in Champions and Star Trek, though that does't mean I agree with it or like it. Unfortunately it is what it is and will always be just that: what it is.
And for the record to the OP: The title of this thread is wrong: when PWE bought Cryptic, all the Z-Store prices stayed exactly the same. Neverwinter was created after the fact and I refer to be description above.