And, as others have stated, buying xp from the zen store is a way for them to make money. The coal wards are also an option I don't think most players would take issue with.
inthefade462Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 0Arc User
edited November 2014
yeah except no.
They want you spending 4,645,200 AD or there abouts (some fluctuation with ah prices) for 4,645,200 RP.
basically around $80 - $100.
It's enough time commitment farming from the #letmefarmandneverpayadime crowd that they get a reasonable AD return on their time so that they stay and keep being content for others, and it's cheap enough from the #igotajobandkidsnot100hoursaweektoplay crowd that they can pay in small increments whenever they get fed up or just need a bit more to get to that next rank.
Whales of course are going to be legendary day 1 and will pay whatever it takes.
It's about balance, time and money, convenience vs frustration. Again you can't outright remove a profit driver.
also the zen xp boosters are not monetized with artifacts in mind. it's, what is it? 50 bucks to double your leveling speed from 1-60, and that's it. Using it at level 60 (to get artifact xp, if it were implemented) would cost the same 50 bucks to get enough XP for 2 post-60 level ups. that's like 4 days just doing dailies without using a zen booster. So keeping the $ cost the same you'd want the xp cost to be about $100 in boosters, which is only a little over a week of dailies without using the boosters. Ie pay $100 bucks and get your artifact to legendary in 4 days or pay nothing and get it in 8? it makes no sense.
The only way to monetize it would be to make the xp to level artifacts so astronomically high that in turn you'd spend thousands of dollars in boosters (far more than the current system buying bloodrubies), and all your are doing is doubling your level up speed. Thus no one would do it thus they wouldn't bother coding it.
They want you spending 4,645,200 AD or there abouts (some fluctuation with ah prices) for 4,645,200 RP.
basically around $80 - $100.
It's enough time commitment farming from the #letmefarmandneverpayadime crowd that they get a reasonable AD return on their time so that they stay and keep being content for others, and it's cheap enough from the #igotajobandkidsnot100hoursaweektoplay crowd that they can pay in small increments whenever they get fed up or just need a bit more to get to that next rank.
80$ to 100$ is not "cheap enough" for a single item that gives you nothing gameplaywise. It is too expensive in basically every currency: Money, AD or time. Especially time. Ever tought about on how long it would take to get all the RP needed for a single legendary just by playing and having fun?
It's definitely something that could work better than what we already have. As someone who used to enjoy dungeons, I'd like extra rp options from dungeons, such as boss drops say a flawless sapphire each, or a seal that you can trade for rp and maybe other things eg companion tokens in a small but achievable amount since I don't think most people upgrade them. They can be in chests too. Basically I need a reason to actually run dungeons instead of just dailies.
Yes experience to artifacts is going to be universally loved. You've done a great job with the mock ups.
Unfortunately there is no monetary incentive / $ kickback to PWE. Just letting you play the game and level your artifacts? without the hassle of farming for months / breaking down and buying zen?
For this to work, the xp required would have to be so astronomically high that it makes no difference or real impact on leveling artifacts, which is to say that it's a whole lot of coding changes for nothing. Just an allusion that you can level artifacts with xp. ie, by the time you've earned enough xp to level 1 artifact to 60 it's been made obsolete atleast once by several mods of content.
Now if they added a few more upgrade points (rather than just green>blue, blue>purple, purple>orange), say 6 total upgrade points instead of 3, and dropped the chance to upgrade to 1%, forcing you to use a coal ward ($$) each time, then yeah, i could see this getting implemented.
People don't buy zen for leveling up artifacts so if that is their idea plan it has failed. Flawed design and it's going to benefit 3rd party websites more and those guilds that exploited and got away with it since they don't really like competition. Great job PWE!
This is a much better and player friendly idea than the current grindy hellhole mess the developers have planned for us , it rewards players for actually playing ,it gives players an incentive to rerun dailies from campaigns they haven't touched for months .
This is a much better and player friendly idea than the current grindy hellhole mess the developers have planned for us , it rewards players for actually playing ,it gives players an incentive to rerun dailies from campaigns they haven't touched for months .
This is exactly what I think
Awesome idea man and gratz for the images, very useful and intuitive!
| Cìrdan - GF | Cìrdan The Lightbringer - OP |
< Guild: Pugno Fiammante >
0
ironzerg79Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,942Arc User
The purpose of the refinement system is to make money.
I disagree, too. And the reason is, if you take out the obvious amount of Refinement Points available to players via the AH that is bot farmed, it's extremely low. We also know they're making Refinement Stone drops from Dragon Hoard enchants BoA to eliminate the botters, which is going to crush the supply of RP stones on the market.
Which is a great change, albeit it one that's going to "hurt" the players initially. But if something is dependent on botters to be sustainable, it needs to stop.
What I think the intention of the Artifact and Artifact Equipment systems was to create a "long term" goal for players, with a way to better customize and enhanced their characters post-60. I'm not arguing that it's not suppose to be a big time sink.
However, what I'm proposing (with my Experience Empowerment System) is to make that time sink FUN. Again, let's get back to the reason why we're all here. Neverwinter is a really fun game to play. So let's reward players for playing. Earning 4.6 million Experience in order to get an Artifact Weapon from 1 to 60 is NOT a trivial task. That's leveling from 1 to 60 over five times. People are still going to use refinement stones and blue weapons to help shortcut this process, but at least they have more options.
And if they want to invest a lot of Zen or AD to get their Artifacts leveled up quickly and be done with it, that's cool, too.
If you want to correctly monetize a F2P game, you have to balance out the "I want it now" with the "I'm willing to put some effort into it". But as part of that equation, you can't make the "effort" part so tedious that people out-right quit before they even become invested in the game.
We know Neverwinter made a surprising amount of money in a very short time. If you go back and look at some of the interviews, you'll find they were very successful right out of the gates, well before this entire Refinement/Artifact system got started.
Neverwinter proved when it launched that you could do a F2P game without locking content behind gates, or forcing people to spend money to achieve levels in the game. If you made the game fun and engaging, people would throw money at it. So I genuinely believe the Development Team here wants THAT...they don't want to make a cash-grab grinder that people quit in a month. It's important to them as a company that people look at Neverwinter and say, "Wow, that games is super fun!" We also know that Cryptic is 100% responsible for the monetization decisions made in this game. They are a subsidiary of PWE, but Cryptic still calls the shots.
Anyway, it's been said over and over again in this thread, but I'll repeat it one more time.
myles08807 said, "Back in my day, we didn't have any of this fancy Mulhorand gear while we were leveling . . . we walked uphill both ways while dying once every five seconds while leveling, and we liked it fine!" . . . Now, get off my lawn, you kids!" pointsman said, "I don't rue the game. In fact I don't feel any regret for the game at all." looomis said, "I don't like people changing to alts and then bragging about their mains like schizophrenic role players."
OMG! This is the best idea I have ever seen presented on these forums since I started playing the game!
Very, very well done, ironzerg79! Awesome!
Please, devs, implement this with Mod 5!!!! Please?!!!
Unless they plan on making module 5 last a long time before mod 6, then I doubt that if they worked on this that they'd release it during mod 5. I mean it took them quite a while just to increase dragon hoard stacks and add pretty simple items to the shop.
0
beckylunaticMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 14,231Arc User
I disagree, too. And the reason is, if you take out the obvious amount of Refinement Points available to players via the AH that is bot farmed, it's extremely low. We also know they're making Refinement Stone drops from Dragon Hoard enchants BoA to eliminate the botters, which is going to crush the supply of RP stones on the market.
You're forgetting about the existence of blood rubies in the Zen store. Infinite supply of those. Pony up.
Edit:
My serious answer is yes, oh dear lord, a thousand times yes. Let the power of our gear be tied to us being all heroic and stuff and not a bunch of mind-numbing, joint-destroying drag-and-drop BS, regardless of where the points came from.
Unless they plan on making module 5 last a long time before mod 6, then I doubt that if they worked on this that they'd release it during mod 5. I mean it took them quite a while just to increase dragon hoard stacks and add pretty simple items to the shop.
This is why I used the Black Ice Empowerment system as the basis for my idea. It seems to me like all the pieces are coded, they'd just need to put some resources into converting the system over to recognize Artifact gear instead of Black Ice. I know it's not a trivially change, but I would hope it's doable.
We've both seen how contentious the forums have been since the new Artifact Equipment was released on the preview server, so it's obvious the community wants to see a different avenue towards progress presented by Cryptic. They're going to have to do something, and if they plan on making Artifact gear a key part of the game going forward, it's best that they tackle this issue early on.
My serious answer is yes, oh dear lord, a thousand times yes. Let the power of our gear be tied to us being all heroic and stuff and not a bunch of mind-numbing, joint-destroying drag-and-drop BS, regardless of where the points came from.
That's my basic thought process, too. Leveling our gear up should be done by being heroes: delving into dungeons and killing dragons! Not some silly click and drag mini-game.
Just want to say I like this idea.
Yesterday I had a chat with guildmates about upcoming patch and leveling up artifacts&eq; we came to conclusion that artifacts should be lvld up also by using them or when they're quipped.
So yeah, good idea.
actually you're missing the point: people who want to gain rp fast will buy stuff anyway, people who don't want to buy stuff will not pay for something no matter what.
Anyone who buys stuff in this game "because it's the only way" is missing the point of playing a game and if its major income from zen store then devs and publisher is also missing the point of creating game that makes people want to buy stuff in it.
I personally bought several things from zen store (mount, dyes, keys, companions) but not because I wouldn't be able to progress (or progress at very low pace) without them but because I wanted to buy them, because I enjoyed the game.
PS (example of failed F2P model) I played SWTOR for a bit and was ready to buy premium there but "F you, give us $$$" on every aspect of the game made me throw this piece of failure and forget about it.
That's my basic thought process, too. Leveling our gear up should be done by being heroes: delving into dungeons and killing dragons! Not some silly click and drag mini-game.
Ironzerg, I would like to compliment you on taking so much time, not only to create this thread but also to respond to as many posts as you have. It is clear to see that you care about the longevity of this game so that we can all keep logging in to enjoy the various things we enjoy about it.
This "turn the enormous time sink into a fun time sink in which your character gets rewarded for playing" makes perfect sense. SO MUCH SENSE. I love the pictures you created to show how such a feature could be implemented. Those sliders, omg. The system you propose fits D&D lore perfectly, too.
Your hero of the north title needs to be changed. I propose hero of the forum.
However, as a few other people have argued, this would be a very big change for Cryptic to implement. The people asking for this by mod5 are crazy. That's 8 days away. Even optimistically, though, I don't think a change like this would ever make it to live. A freemium game such as neverwinter uses a strategy that doesn't need to make a super fun player experience. Personally, if I weren't so worried about the future of this game, and it were more fun for f2p gamers, I would dump more and more money into it. Game publishers, however, feel that if the game is fun enough without paying, then people will not pay for anything. The game has to be just fun enough to make you log in, with this current strategy. After you log in to the barely fun game you may pay lots of money to experience a muchore fun version of it. I do not agree with this logic at all, but this reasoning does exist.
Frankly, now that hoard and blessing drops will be boa, something will need to change. It was expensive enough to refine even with AH prices at all-time lows thanks to the botters. Once AH empties out something will need to be done. A more realistic result has already been mentioned. They will probably just add rp to seal vendors, something abyssal such as 1 drake seal = 1 peridot.
I do thank you for the effort you've put into this idea. It really is wonderful. We need to be realistic, though. This isn't A game in which the community has any real power to change anything.
I'll add my thumbs up for this too. This is the best idea I've seen proposed. And very well thought out and reasoned too. Given a choice of using exp, rp or glory for refining, I can see everyone benefitting from this.
The only downside for PW would be the decrease in demand for buying blood rubies from the zen market, not that I think many people do this if they are in their right mind.
0
ironzerg79Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,942Arc User
edited November 2014
First, thanks for the compliments...but I just really, really enjoy Neverwinter. And it personally hurts me to see people unhappy with the direction some of the aspects of the game have taken. But I trust the guys at Cryptic. I personally knew one of the guys who worked on Champions Online, and they're all good dudes. Gamers and geeks, just like the rest of us. I really believe that Cryptic wants to put forth a really fun game, and do the best they can to keep it free to play, while having a very fair monetization model.
However, as a few other people have argued, this would be a very big change for Cryptic to implement. The people asking for this by mod5 are crazy. That's 8 days away.
If I'm in a conference room in CA with these guys, I would expect that question. Here's what I would do. The first priority is the Riches tab update. Just start tracking the experience people are gaining when Module 5 goes live. They're already updating the Riches tab, and they already track your experience, so I think this should be easy to do.
Second, is work on the new Empowerment system post Module 5 launch. Realistically it's still going to take some time for players to advance the campaign and battle Tiamat, as well as get the new Artifact drops, so there's time. But put the system out there to players so that they know it's coming, and can hold tight knowing a more fun way to refine stuff is coming soon.
Even optimistically, though, I don't think a change like this would ever make it to live. A freemium game such as neverwinter uses a strategy that doesn't need to make a super fun player experience.
Google Jack Emmert and Neverwinter. Jack's the CEO of Cryptic, and he did a ton of interviews prior to Neverwinter launching talking about launching into F2P, but making it FUN for players. He spoke a lot about creating a game people loved and wanted to spend money on, without forcing them to pay their way through. I actually sent Akro a PM earlier today to see if he could find out what Jack was up to, and if he'd be up for doing an interview with Akro, giving his thoughts on the current state of Neverwinter, and the F2P model. But for now, take a look at some of the videos and interviews that Jack gave, and you'll see that he shares the same thoughts as a majority of the community when it comes to Fun vs. Grind.
I don't think the people at cryptic are bad people. They created a wonderful game. They are too understaffed though, and don't seem to be adept at maintaining a wonderful game. There is so little communication, if any at all, between the devs and the community. The live streams they've been doing lately area joke.
They need to halt content creation for a time and deal with year old bugs, the mm system, the refinement system, give foundry some love (so they can create new content for the community while devs perform these needed fixes--2 birds, one stone), and make AD obtainable by the majority of players.
0
chemboy613Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,521Arc User
edited November 2014
There are merits to both sides of the argument. As you know, I like zerg's idea and would very much encourage it to be implemented.
Vic's (inthefade) counteragrument is also good. The system has to be tedious to create the pressure to spend money. Granted, I think a lot of the regular players do spend a decent amount of money on the game, there is a constant churn of casuals who get in and get out . I am personally not sure the percentage they are.
I think a combination is probably optimal. Yes progress through playing, and yes for those who play a lot of hours, it will be possible (but still expensive). For those who don't have a lot of time, there has to be a cash option so that PWE can make money, that's also reasonable.
So we have to a have a fusion. Not "speed hundreds of dollars or farm foundries for hundreds of hours" and not "easy to get just running content" but somewhere in the middle. The time spent in content should be significant, but not prohibitive.
Cryptic needs to hire the OP as the new artifact equipment ASAP!
In all seriousness, I have thought of similar ways to refine artifacts that is better then the currently flawed and painful system. What the OP suggests here is perfect. My only concern would be how this would impact already upgraded artifacts, and what the ratio of EXP:RP would be - after the last two modules, I can see Cryptic botching it to be something like 100exp=1rp or some insane ratio like that....
Vic's (inthefade) counteragrument is also good. The system has to be tedious to create the pressure to spend money.
But let me refute hist point further. Leveling up via experience is still going to take a while. It's just more fun.
If you want your Artifact Equipment to reach Legendary status as fast as it possibly can, you're going to need to buy a large supply of Refinement Stones off the AH (and likely exchange Zen for AD to do it) or buy Blood Rubies off the Zen market, although the AD:RP ratio of those is pretty rotten, even without bot deflated stone prices.
But as of today, how is the Refinement system monetized? And how does that change going forward?
First of all, the option to exchange Zen for AD and then buy large amounts of Refinement Stones of the AH simply won't exist in Module 5. The supply of Refinement stones won't be high enough to provide enough RP, even if a lot of people are looking to go this route. Looking at what's up on the AH, BoA stones will remove about 95%+ of the available Refinement Points "for sale" on the AH.
Just looking at Green Resonance stones right now, I'm guessing there's about 16,000 on the AH. I'm no expert, but about 15,800 of those look like they're coming from bots. But 16,000 stones times 2500 a stone is only 40 million RP, or enough to get about 8 pieces of Artifact gear to level 60. Drop that by 90-95%, and see what you get.
Which leaves us with people either buying equipment off the AH to feed to their Artifact (again, the total available points is relatively small) or buying Blood Rubies off the Zen market. At 2000 Zen for a 3 pack (150,000 RP), that's over $600 to take a piece of Artifact Equipment to Legendary. That's not the kind of cash 99.9% of people are going to blow on a single item. And the people who are going to blow that kind of cash probably don't have the patience to level up an Artifact via playing the game and spending experience.
So that being said, I'm not sure where the "lost revenue" is coming from. If people want to claim the current system exists only to make money, then show me where that money is coming from.
It's far more likely that Cryptic is losing customers and potential income via the perceived grind of refining Artifact Equipment, and the exasperation that Artifact Equipment seems to be the path they're marching down.
That being said, I don't think Cryptic intended the Refinement process to be a cash cow, but more of a time sink for keeping people in the game. The issue is that a lot of people are viewing the current system as a not fun grind. What I propose is a way to make that time sink more fun (and manageable) for your average player.
"Meanwhile in the moderator's lounge..."
0
ironzerg79Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,942Arc User
My only concern would be how this would impact already upgraded artifacts, and what the ratio of EXP:RP would be - after the last two modules, I can see Cryptic botching it to be something like 100exp=1rp or some insane ratio like that....
Nothing changes with the current system. My Experience Empowerment system supplements the current Refinement system. With the exception of being able to spend Experience to add points to Artifacts and Artifact Equipment, there's no other changes.
And I would highly, highly advocate a 1:1 ration. Even if you play a lot, 4,600,000 exp is A LOT of experience. It's more experience than it would take to level up 5 toons to 60. Not a trivial task by any means.
When DAOC introduced the whole "level a weapon" concept years ago, I thought it was silly. And I still do.
To be fair the pedigree goes to PnP RPGs; you could do something of the sort back in 3.x D&D and GURPS at least mentions the concept. And those are just the ones I know of.
I really like this idea of experience leveling my stuff. However, if I created a free to play game, I would probably not like this idea, unless I already had a lot of money and only made the game for people to have fun.
Comments
They want you spending 4,645,200 AD or there abouts (some fluctuation with ah prices) for 4,645,200 RP.
basically around $80 - $100.
It's enough time commitment farming from the #letmefarmandneverpayadime crowd that they get a reasonable AD return on their time so that they stay and keep being content for others, and it's cheap enough from the #igotajobandkidsnot100hoursaweektoplay crowd that they can pay in small increments whenever they get fed up or just need a bit more to get to that next rank.
Whales of course are going to be legendary day 1 and will pay whatever it takes.
It's about balance, time and money, convenience vs frustration. Again you can't outright remove a profit driver.
also the zen xp boosters are not monetized with artifacts in mind. it's, what is it? 50 bucks to double your leveling speed from 1-60, and that's it. Using it at level 60 (to get artifact xp, if it were implemented) would cost the same 50 bucks to get enough XP for 2 post-60 level ups. that's like 4 days just doing dailies without using a zen booster. So keeping the $ cost the same you'd want the xp cost to be about $100 in boosters, which is only a little over a week of dailies without using the boosters. Ie pay $100 bucks and get your artifact to legendary in 4 days or pay nothing and get it in 8? it makes no sense.
The only way to monetize it would be to make the xp to level artifacts so astronomically high that in turn you'd spend thousands of dollars in boosters (far more than the current system buying bloodrubies), and all your are doing is doubling your level up speed. Thus no one would do it thus they wouldn't bother coding it.
Seriously, devs, pay attention
80$ to 100$ is not "cheap enough" for a single item that gives you nothing gameplaywise. It is too expensive in basically every currency: Money, AD or time. Especially time. Ever tought about on how long it would take to get all the RP needed for a single legendary just by playing and having fun?
All kind of artifacts change to BtA instead of BoE (BoP)?
The input with twinking in PvP @ low levels has to be considered, though!
People don't buy zen for leveling up artifacts so if that is their idea plan it has failed. Flawed design and it's going to benefit 3rd party websites more and those guilds that exploited and got away with it since they don't really like competition. Great job PWE!
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, Life is but a dream.
This is exactly what I think
Awesome idea man and gratz for the images, very useful and intuitive!
| Cìrdan - GF | Cìrdan The Lightbringer - OP |
< Guild: Pugno Fiammante >
I disagree, too. And the reason is, if you take out the obvious amount of Refinement Points available to players via the AH that is bot farmed, it's extremely low. We also know they're making Refinement Stone drops from Dragon Hoard enchants BoA to eliminate the botters, which is going to crush the supply of RP stones on the market.
Which is a great change, albeit it one that's going to "hurt" the players initially. But if something is dependent on botters to be sustainable, it needs to stop.
What I think the intention of the Artifact and Artifact Equipment systems was to create a "long term" goal for players, with a way to better customize and enhanced their characters post-60. I'm not arguing that it's not suppose to be a big time sink.
However, what I'm proposing (with my Experience Empowerment System) is to make that time sink FUN. Again, let's get back to the reason why we're all here. Neverwinter is a really fun game to play. So let's reward players for playing. Earning 4.6 million Experience in order to get an Artifact Weapon from 1 to 60 is NOT a trivial task. That's leveling from 1 to 60 over five times. People are still going to use refinement stones and blue weapons to help shortcut this process, but at least they have more options.
And if they want to invest a lot of Zen or AD to get their Artifacts leveled up quickly and be done with it, that's cool, too.
If you want to correctly monetize a F2P game, you have to balance out the "I want it now" with the "I'm willing to put some effort into it". But as part of that equation, you can't make the "effort" part so tedious that people out-right quit before they even become invested in the game.
We know Neverwinter made a surprising amount of money in a very short time. If you go back and look at some of the interviews, you'll find they were very successful right out of the gates, well before this entire Refinement/Artifact system got started.
Neverwinter proved when it launched that you could do a F2P game without locking content behind gates, or forcing people to spend money to achieve levels in the game. If you made the game fun and engaging, people would throw money at it. So I genuinely believe the Development Team here wants THAT...they don't want to make a cash-grab grinder that people quit in a month. It's important to them as a company that people look at Neverwinter and say, "Wow, that games is super fun!" We also know that Cryptic is 100% responsible for the monetization decisions made in this game. They are a subsidiary of PWE, but Cryptic still calls the shots.
Anyway, it's been said over and over again in this thread, but I'll repeat it one more time.
If the game is FUN, the money will COME.
Very, very well done, ironzerg79! Awesome!
Please, devs, implement this with Mod 5!!!! Please?!!!
myles08807 said, "Back in my day, we didn't have any of this fancy Mulhorand gear while we were leveling . . . we walked uphill both ways while dying once every five seconds while leveling, and we liked it fine!" . . . Now, get off my lawn, you kids!"
pointsman said, "I don't rue the game. In fact I don't feel any regret for the game at all."
looomis said, "I don't like people changing to alts and then bragging about their mains like schizophrenic role players."
Unless they plan on making module 5 last a long time before mod 6, then I doubt that if they worked on this that they'd release it during mod 5. I mean it took them quite a while just to increase dragon hoard stacks and add pretty simple items to the shop.
You're forgetting about the existence of blood rubies in the Zen store. Infinite supply of those. Pony up.
Edit:
My serious answer is yes, oh dear lord, a thousand times yes. Let the power of our gear be tied to us being all heroic and stuff and not a bunch of mind-numbing, joint-destroying drag-and-drop BS, regardless of where the points came from.
Neverwinter Census 2017
All posts pending disapproval by Cecilia
This is why I used the Black Ice Empowerment system as the basis for my idea. It seems to me like all the pieces are coded, they'd just need to put some resources into converting the system over to recognize Artifact gear instead of Black Ice. I know it's not a trivially change, but I would hope it's doable.
We've both seen how contentious the forums have been since the new Artifact Equipment was released on the preview server, so it's obvious the community wants to see a different avenue towards progress presented by Cryptic. They're going to have to do something, and if they plan on making Artifact gear a key part of the game going forward, it's best that they tackle this issue early on.
That's my basic thought process, too. Leveling our gear up should be done by being heroes: delving into dungeons and killing dragons! Not some silly click and drag mini-game.
Yesterday I had a chat with guildmates about upcoming patch and leveling up artifacts&eq; we came to conclusion that artifacts should be lvld up also by using them or when they're quipped.
So yeah, good idea.
actually you're missing the point: people who want to gain rp fast will buy stuff anyway, people who don't want to buy stuff will not pay for something no matter what.
Anyone who buys stuff in this game "because it's the only way" is missing the point of playing a game and if its major income from zen store then devs and publisher is also missing the point of creating game that makes people want to buy stuff in it.
I personally bought several things from zen store (mount, dyes, keys, companions) but not because I wouldn't be able to progress (or progress at very low pace) without them but because I wanted to buy them, because I enjoyed the game.
PS (example of failed F2P model) I played SWTOR for a bit and was ready to buy premium there but "F you, give us $$$" on every aspect of the game made me throw this piece of failure and forget about it.
Ironzerg, I would like to compliment you on taking so much time, not only to create this thread but also to respond to as many posts as you have. It is clear to see that you care about the longevity of this game so that we can all keep logging in to enjoy the various things we enjoy about it.
This "turn the enormous time sink into a fun time sink in which your character gets rewarded for playing" makes perfect sense. SO MUCH SENSE. I love the pictures you created to show how such a feature could be implemented. Those sliders, omg. The system you propose fits D&D lore perfectly, too.
Your hero of the north title needs to be changed. I propose hero of the forum.
However, as a few other people have argued, this would be a very big change for Cryptic to implement. The people asking for this by mod5 are crazy. That's 8 days away. Even optimistically, though, I don't think a change like this would ever make it to live. A freemium game such as neverwinter uses a strategy that doesn't need to make a super fun player experience. Personally, if I weren't so worried about the future of this game, and it were more fun for f2p gamers, I would dump more and more money into it. Game publishers, however, feel that if the game is fun enough without paying, then people will not pay for anything. The game has to be just fun enough to make you log in, with this current strategy. After you log in to the barely fun game you may pay lots of money to experience a muchore fun version of it. I do not agree with this logic at all, but this reasoning does exist.
Frankly, now that hoard and blessing drops will be boa, something will need to change. It was expensive enough to refine even with AH prices at all-time lows thanks to the botters. Once AH empties out something will need to be done. A more realistic result has already been mentioned. They will probably just add rp to seal vendors, something abyssal such as 1 drake seal = 1 peridot.
I do thank you for the effort you've put into this idea. It really is wonderful. We need to be realistic, though. This isn't A game in which the community has any real power to change anything.
The only downside for PW would be the decrease in demand for buying blood rubies from the zen market, not that I think many people do this if they are in their right mind.
But that being said.
If I'm in a conference room in CA with these guys, I would expect that question. Here's what I would do. The first priority is the Riches tab update. Just start tracking the experience people are gaining when Module 5 goes live. They're already updating the Riches tab, and they already track your experience, so I think this should be easy to do.
Second, is work on the new Empowerment system post Module 5 launch. Realistically it's still going to take some time for players to advance the campaign and battle Tiamat, as well as get the new Artifact drops, so there's time. But put the system out there to players so that they know it's coming, and can hold tight knowing a more fun way to refine stuff is coming soon.
Google Jack Emmert and Neverwinter. Jack's the CEO of Cryptic, and he did a ton of interviews prior to Neverwinter launching talking about launching into F2P, but making it FUN for players. He spoke a lot about creating a game people loved and wanted to spend money on, without forcing them to pay their way through. I actually sent Akro a PM earlier today to see if he could find out what Jack was up to, and if he'd be up for doing an interview with Akro, giving his thoughts on the current state of Neverwinter, and the F2P model. But for now, take a look at some of the videos and interviews that Jack gave, and you'll see that he shares the same thoughts as a majority of the community when it comes to Fun vs. Grind.
They need to halt content creation for a time and deal with year old bugs, the mm system, the refinement system, give foundry some love (so they can create new content for the community while devs perform these needed fixes--2 birds, one stone), and make AD obtainable by the majority of players.
Vic's (inthefade) counteragrument is also good. The system has to be tedious to create the pressure to spend money. Granted, I think a lot of the regular players do spend a decent amount of money on the game, there is a constant churn of casuals who get in and get out . I am personally not sure the percentage they are.
I think a combination is probably optimal. Yes progress through playing, and yes for those who play a lot of hours, it will be possible (but still expensive). For those who don't have a lot of time, there has to be a cash option so that PWE can make money, that's also reasonable.
So we have to a have a fusion. Not "speed hundreds of dollars or farm foundries for hundreds of hours" and not "easy to get just running content" but somewhere in the middle. The time spent in content should be significant, but not prohibitive.
Everything you need to know about CW:
http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?780981-Chem-s-CW-Compendium-Everything-you-need-to-know
In all seriousness, I have thought of similar ways to refine artifacts that is better then the currently flawed and painful system. What the OP suggests here is perfect. My only concern would be how this would impact already upgraded artifacts, and what the ratio of EXP:RP would be - after the last two modules, I can see Cryptic botching it to be something like 100exp=1rp or some insane ratio like that....
|| Axios Guild Leader || Neverwinter Trade Forum Moderator || Infernal Paragons ||
Check out my foundry, titled "Akro's Gone Wacko", featuring our ex-CM Akromatik!: NW-DL8J7BY5T
Erza Moonstalker | Lara Moonstalker | Julie Marvell | Erza Moonhunter | Annie Hellangel | Jenn Moonstalker
Thaumaturge's Time To Shine: A Complete Guide
But let me refute hist point further. Leveling up via experience is still going to take a while. It's just more fun.
If you want your Artifact Equipment to reach Legendary status as fast as it possibly can, you're going to need to buy a large supply of Refinement Stones off the AH (and likely exchange Zen for AD to do it) or buy Blood Rubies off the Zen market, although the AD:RP ratio of those is pretty rotten, even without bot deflated stone prices.
But as of today, how is the Refinement system monetized? And how does that change going forward?
First of all, the option to exchange Zen for AD and then buy large amounts of Refinement Stones of the AH simply won't exist in Module 5. The supply of Refinement stones won't be high enough to provide enough RP, even if a lot of people are looking to go this route. Looking at what's up on the AH, BoA stones will remove about 95%+ of the available Refinement Points "for sale" on the AH.
Just looking at Green Resonance stones right now, I'm guessing there's about 16,000 on the AH. I'm no expert, but about 15,800 of those look like they're coming from bots. But 16,000 stones times 2500 a stone is only 40 million RP, or enough to get about 8 pieces of Artifact gear to level 60. Drop that by 90-95%, and see what you get.
Which leaves us with people either buying equipment off the AH to feed to their Artifact (again, the total available points is relatively small) or buying Blood Rubies off the Zen market. At 2000 Zen for a 3 pack (150,000 RP), that's over $600 to take a piece of Artifact Equipment to Legendary. That's not the kind of cash 99.9% of people are going to blow on a single item. And the people who are going to blow that kind of cash probably don't have the patience to level up an Artifact via playing the game and spending experience.
So that being said, I'm not sure where the "lost revenue" is coming from. If people want to claim the current system exists only to make money, then show me where that money is coming from.
It's far more likely that Cryptic is losing customers and potential income via the perceived grind of refining Artifact Equipment, and the exasperation that Artifact Equipment seems to be the path they're marching down.
That being said, I don't think Cryptic intended the Refinement process to be a cash cow, but more of a time sink for keeping people in the game. The issue is that a lot of people are viewing the current system as a not fun grind. What I propose is a way to make that time sink more fun (and manageable) for your average player.
Nothing changes with the current system. My Experience Empowerment system supplements the current Refinement system. With the exception of being able to spend Experience to add points to Artifacts and Artifact Equipment, there's no other changes.
And I would highly, highly advocate a 1:1 ration. Even if you play a lot, 4,600,000 exp is A LOT of experience. It's more experience than it would take to level up 5 toons to 60. Not a trivial task by any means.
When DAOC introduced the whole "level a weapon" concept years ago, I thought it was silly. And I still do.
To be fair the pedigree goes to PnP RPGs; you could do something of the sort back in 3.x D&D and GURPS at least mentions the concept. And those are just the ones I know of.