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Why not just sell the Lockbox ships?
nephilim83
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
How many people would rather just buy the D'Kora and Galor outright? I'd gladly pay $25 for each. They're both amazing ships. But after the hundred or so dollars I've spent in the past opening Cardassian, Ferengi, and Tholian lockboxes, I've not gotten a single ship. My luck is TRIBBLE. I will not be buying anymore keys. I'm sure there are plenty more players who are just as burned out as I am. I work too hard for my money to spend it on a chance to get the one thing I really want. Why not just let me buy it?
I honestly see no reason why you can't put the ships on the Zstore AND in the lockbox. Many folks who don't have the funds for the zstore would still be buying keys off the exchange, which means people will also still be buying keys to sell for EC. I can't imagine Cryptic losing much money on this deal. In fact, why not put some of the other Zstore ships in lockboxes. I'm sure plenty of people would open a Federation lockbox for a chance to get a "free" Armitage or something.
I know they are in the lockboxes for the sake of selling keys, but I imagine you would get a lot of day one sells if you put the Galor and D'Kora on the Zstore. And you would still be selling keys to those who can't quite afford to buy the ships. I predict you'd actually come out ahead. Maybe I'm way off. If I am, I apologize. But the way I see it, it'd be the perfect solution for everyone. Imagine all the lockbox bickering it'd lay to rest. :P
Think about the children!
I honestly see no reason why you can't put the ships on the Zstore AND in the lockbox. Many folks who don't have the funds for the zstore would still be buying keys off the exchange, which means people will also still be buying keys to sell for EC. I can't imagine Cryptic losing much money on this deal. In fact, why not put some of the other Zstore ships in lockboxes. I'm sure plenty of people would open a Federation lockbox for a chance to get a "free" Armitage or something.
I know they are in the lockboxes for the sake of selling keys, but I imagine you would get a lot of day one sells if you put the Galor and D'Kora on the Zstore. And you would still be selling keys to those who can't quite afford to buy the ships. I predict you'd actually come out ahead. Maybe I'm way off. If I am, I apologize. But the way I see it, it'd be the perfect solution for everyone. Imagine all the lockbox bickering it'd lay to rest. :P
Think about the children!
Post edited by nephilim83 on
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As the Lobi store items are now going to be listed for an extended time and possibly even indefinitely this means the Recluse will be consistently available for purchase.
So that argument, seems thin and disingenuous.
That is your answer. $25 dollar one-off or potentially $100-200. If I could sell my RL products in a lottery like that I would retire next year!
True that the original post kind of answers it's own question.
Why take $25 dollar from each player who wants the ship, when you can convince 75% or more of them to spend up to hundreds of dollars trying to maybe get the ship.
Once you figure out that making millions of ec isn't so hard (even without spending real cash to get zen to buy keys , etc etc) , you realize that the ships ... much easier to get on the exchange.
thier a company in it to make money.
-starbases forces smaller fleets who want the tier 5 stuff to either wait or purchase zen for dil.
-recluse is between 150-200 lobi depending how lucky you get(So no everyone is flying it(and you still need the orb weaver console to make it any decent.)(so not everyone is flying it)
-lockboxes forces people to grind or pay alot to get goodies, way more then 25 dollar fee, Im not going to say how much I spend on the game but even though its alot, it supports them and it gives me doffs, and other stuff.
-Spells
| Dues Ex Mechina |
Fleet Leader
Vice Admiral Volmack ISS Thundermole
Brigadier General Jokag IKS Gorkan
Centurion Kares RRW Tomalak
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
The Lobi Store ships are really just very expensive C-Store ships. A Key guarantees you nothing more then 4 Lobi. If you need 800 Lobi to buy a ship that means you need around 100-200 Keys to get them, depending on the Lobi earned per Lockbox - which is $120-$240.00.
I laugh when I see people complain about $25.00 ships in the C-Store - especially when you can earn that $25.00 in Zen in a short time just by playing the game - and then notice they're flying a Lobi Store ship - which probably cost them many times more then a $25.00 C-Store ship.
But that's counting all the boxes. So it was roughly $100 in the pursuit of 3 different ships, among a few other things. If they put those 3 ships for sale for $25, they still would have gotten a guaranteed $75 bucks from me. And if they did the same with some of the other stuff in those boxes, they'd get more. I understand your point, and it's good one, but now that I know better, they won't be getting a dime from me. Not for keys, at least. So that next fancy lock box ship will be $25 guaranteed compared to zero.
You say you'll never buy another Key, but if the ship you really, really, really want goes into a Lockbox next week they odds are extremely good that you'll buy more Keys to try and get it. That's nothing against you. It's just part of human nature. There's a reason why the old saying goes: "put your money where your mouth is." Most people talk a good show but when it comes right down to it they'll follow their impulses and the words mean nothing.
For myself, I have only ever bought and used 13 Keys since the Lockbox promotions started, but if there was a ship I really, really, really wanted I'd probably dump Zen into it too. Fortunately for me I now have over 17,000 Zen and make 3,000+ more each month so I wouldn't feel all that bad if it cost me 15,000 of it to get something I wanted. I'd never spend $150.00 of real money to buy it, though. Not for a single-character cyber-trinket.
Some peoples' assumption that Cryptic and PWE are exploiting it _might_ be correct, however if they are making this extra income then it becomes very worthwhile to keep updateing the game and improving hardware to increase a player base to "exploit", so it is still a win for us.
I am middle of the road, I don't know what PWE and Cryptic have to do to keep this game running so it is very hard to comment, and over all I find if I don't know it's better to just be optimistic, it's less stressful and also the reason why I think lockboxes should be renamed to Donation Boxes.
* CBS - They don't, according to devs, want a fleet of Galors and Jem'Hadar bugs running around in massive numbers. I can't blame them for that, really.
* Cash - They manage to make $25 off of a c-store ship. If it's an account-wide unlock that's the only cash they'll ever make from that particular player for this particular ship. Not good if your're making a ton of money off of people slavishly pouring keys into an endless stream of boxes. As such, if you can buy them for $25, that caps how much money they can make off of the ships. Lock boxes are a cash cow, and shooting it's legs out from under it is unwise. And if they were to boost it to $100 per ship in the c-store the rage would be audible from places hundreds of miles from the nearest computer.
Officially Nerfed In Early 2410
Quite right, think of them as donation boxes!!! That is how i look at it also. I take it a step further and "donate" a portion of what i get out of the boxes to other players.
A feature they might borrow from APB reloaded is giving players extra boxes depending on how much zen they purchase. Ah well, im sure they will get the right balance sometime.