5 bucks is still enough money to buy an entire game with, referencing personal incomes is still irrelevant to that.
And as long as ships are sold for "5 times what one can buy an entire game with," how much some other game in the bargain bin costs is completely irrelevant.
By this argument everything in this game is free. Free that is if your time isn't precious and you can devote hours to grinding dilithium ... instead of actually playing the game for fun. /Facepalm
THIS!
I have been wanting to SCREAM this since page two when the "Just Grind" vs "Lower price will sell more" war started.
Please, carry on. I've got popcorn and a fresh soda...
Season 9 came around with Cryptic touting the changes to rep offering more flexibility to players. This was mainly achieved by making trait changes free. Yea! And it works, thank you Cryptic. But they left one gaping hole in that flexibility equation, skill spec. Each build could be optimized with spec, but we can't do that, at least as it is now. I don't mind paying, but when it's something this overpriced it eats at me and makes me less willing to support the game.
The cost is just too high for how often it needs to be done. I don't care what other games charge, I am here, STO is what matters to me. Every single newbie will have to respec at least once unless they quit or don't understand how skills work. Even people who have been around a long time have recurring needs for a respec. New ships or new gear from Rep often necessitate it. Considering these things and how many char some people have, 250 would be reasonable, 500 is just plain irritating. Will they do anything, no. But one can always hope.
I have been wanting to SCREAM this since page two when the "Just Grind" vs "Lower price will sell more" war started.
Please, carry on. I've got popcorn and a fresh soda...
^^ This!
Time = money; hard to see why ppl find that concept so difficult to grasp.
So, with our feet back on the ground, respecs are not free: they cost 500 Zen.
Personally, I don't like the idea of free respecs, as it would, de facto, invalidate all our skill choices. What I *would* like, however, is a skill loadout system, with just 2, or max 3 (for the trinity) loadouts to choose from.
"Oh look, a new post ! I'll just skip everything to quote half a sentence out of context to give it a new meaning !".
I just said it would make sense to have this as a gold feature. SWTOR have it (otherwise the respec can be paid by ingame resources).
I think the current respec system is much too limited, especially compared to other MMOs using hybrid system.
Lotro, SWTOR, Rift, DDO, all of them use an ingame resources system.
Grinding or not cash shop money is irrelevant. You do that on those MMO to.
As for 3 of them (4 ? I'm not sure for DDO), you have a double spec system. I think even Champions have free respec (granted the system is much more limited if you are not gold).
And your argument "I'm poor and yet I can pay for it" is also dumb. I'm sure you would be able to pay 5$ once in a while to be able to log in. Wouldn't make it a welcome feature. We are speaking QoL improvement, not if we can or not pay for it.
Wrong. I made a financial observation based on my personal experience of living the past 10 years on a fixed income of $9,600 a year. An income which is $10,000 dollars below the poverty line for a three person household in the US. Which is the number of people I support.
And in spite of being on the bottom of the financial barrel I still manage to live on a budget that lets me pay all my bills and still save something to splurge on a few entertainments.
Also my income doesn't come from welfare or public assistance. The only money I accept is my military disability.
So your attempts to impugn my opinion has failed. If I can afford a measly $5 bucks so can everyone else, unless they make a couple hundred less a month less than I do.
Nice try tho.
It's not about weather someone can afford those 5 bucks, it's about what you're getting in return. People can afford to pay $10 for a single cigarette, a can of mass-produced beer or half a quart of gasoline, but that doesn't mean that the price is justified.
You're poor or at least on a low budget and you're arguing against something that will benefit you as well, without any kind of penalty and that appearantly isn't selling well according to the company that sells it. That's just stupid. Plain and simple.
How about they introduce two different packages in the c-store? A pack of 3-5 unbound (or at least account-bound) respec tokens, which can be traded on the exchange, and a "classic" pack with a single, bound token for the same price. That way people like you can still throw away their already sparse money, while the rest of us can buy something that is worth the amount it costs.
While they're at it, they could also introduce single Doff slots, single inventory slots, 1-million-EC increases for the EC-cap and single, common Doff packages alongside the old options for the same price, for people like who who like to spend more....
Personally, I wish we could have multiple skill specs that we could switch between. I would pay for extra skill spec slots that I could optimize for any type of ship I want to use or role I want to play.
"Let me guess, my theories appall you, my heresies outrage you, I never answer letters and you don't like my tie" - The Doctor
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" -Agatha Heterodyne
Devs have already mentioned that they were surprised at how badly respec tokens sold, considering how useful the service is.
As I understand, that's the issue with uniforms. They don't sell well, so there's not a lot of development in them. However, the wonky pricing scheme is probably what is keeping most from buying them.
Hrmm, I'm curious what games out there charge more. This was the first game I had played where they charged either with real money or a time-limited internal currency.
Heck, not only did other games have far cheaper respecs not requiring external currency or time-limited currency; they also oft provided means to carry multiple specs reducing the actual need to respec as you could have your XYZ specs for doing things.
Prior to S7, I just rerolled the toon rather than paying the respec cost - cause I could regear a toon within a week and be good to go with the new spec. Since S7, actually since LoR, I've bought two respecs for Willard. Other than that, I just buy more toon slots instead. In the end, it's cheaper just to run more toons with different builds than it is potentially to have to keep paying for respecs to go back and forth...
Ive made some terrible choices with pretty much all of my characters, but with Skill Respecs being so costly, it is neither worth my time nor my money to get one. 5 Lost sales. And obviously, I am not alone in this.
If they were lower priced they would sell - and 1 for say 100 Zen is better than 0 for 500 Zen, as one brings in 1 dollar and the other nothing.
The fact is Sopwithsnipe, you're entire point is completely irrelevant - Now, we all appreciate your time in service, but your "I have sandwich, so you can't be hungry" argument is not a valid argument.
Add in the fact someone paid for your Zen in the first place, and well, not many people would agree with your position.
Of course, the really daft thing is almost all utility C-Store items cost more than the character did in the first place...
i support the idea of getting a "loadout slot" for skillpoints
as we now have for loadouts for ship, traits, DOFFs and BOFFs, we should have one for skills
not necessarily added to the ships loadout, but as a standalone feature,
with the possibility to swith between them at wish (out of combat, sector space...)
....................
example:
- gold and lifers get 2 Skill loadouts for free /per toon
- F2P folks can acquire this slot for 1000 Zen
Traits are currently not tied to the loadout mechanic...possible future feature?
I wasn't aware of the low sales of respecs...would they actually gain more "sales" if the price was lower? Absolutely...but will those margins be higher then a 500 cost? Well...when something becomes cheap enough to spend on alts, a whole new world of spending could open up.
I think it's funny they still try to sell overpriced skill respecs when everything they did in the last few months screams "more flexibility".
The whole point of being able to switch ships, equipment and traits (almost) on the fly is to allow more flexibility and to get players to fly (and buy) more ships.
And at the same time they don't allow multiple skill lines or changing your skill layout on the fly. Probably the best solution would be to allow free respecs any time you are in sector space or on non-combat ground maps and save the skills with the loadouts.
That way I could fly a science ship with maxed out graviton generators, an engineering ship with maxed out hull, resistances and threat, or an escort with maxed out weapons and maneuverability.
In the current system I can either build a "one size fits all" generic spec, or I can build a spec that is ideal for one purpose and ship. This second case is what most people end up doing, which means the whole new "fly any ship any time" motto gets thrown out the window.
The whole thing feels like they created the new system (which would be beautiful if they could get rid of the bugs) and at the last minute accounting stepped in and said "OK, you can remove trait and rep respecs, those could be paid in dilithium. But we keep the skill respecs in the shop, because MONEY!!!".
As pointed out, Cryptic stopped charging for rep and trait respecs - presumably as a loss-leader, figuring that this would increase sales of lockboxes for the "boxed" traits therein.
OTOH - what would benefit from free skill respecs? Ship sales, perhaps, but if those are already strong... I guess the calculation would be whether what they made up in ships, would be balanced by the loss of revenue from respecs.
Anyway; subscribers get 500Z/month stipend, which neatly pays for a respec. Problem solved .
Mmh, you got three chars for free, this is 25,5k dil per day (8k+ .5k from Mine per char). With a good fleet/team you get that amount in 1 hour, maybe 1,5hours with STFs, while getting a surplus of marks.
That makes around 3 days for a respec.
There are enough guides out there, how to spec.
Normally you dont respec everyday, and if you want to test something, there is a tribble testserver.
Sure, I dont have anything against free or cheaper ones, but they are not really needed. If its one free lv50 respec, I am quite for it, but making all of them cheap as dirt isnt needed.
I could get behind a cheaper respec, consider this: the minimum amount of Zen one can buy at a time is 500, as such anyone paying for an item priced lower than that still has to pay for 500 Zen, as such there is no harm in dropping the price of things 500 zen or lower into the realm of dilithium grinding.
Wrong. I made a financial observation based on my personal experience of living the past 10 years on a fixed income of $9,600 a year. An income which is $10,000 dollars below the poverty line for a three person household in the US. Which is the number of people I support.
And in spite of being on the bottom of the financial barrel I still manage to live on a budget that lets me pay all my bills and still save something to splurge on a few entertainments.
Also my income doesn't come from welfare or public assistance. The only money I accept is my military disability.
So your attempts to impugn my opinion has failed. If I can afford a measly $5 bucks so can everyone else, unless they make a couple hundred less a month less than I do.
Nice try tho.
First, I would like to say I am sorry to hear that you are disabled. I know from experience, it can be hard to deal with sometimes. I do wish you the best.
Also, I do understand your side of the discussion. I know a lot of my friends who have it rough in the financial department, and still they will save up to spend money on games, or other forms of entertainment like fishing, vacation, etc. There are lots of people that do this because they are spending their money on what matters to them, and how they like.
I also see the other side of the discussion. Yes, everything except for monthly/LT subscriptions are free in the game, just by grinding Dilithium. However, some people don't have the time, or they might save their money up for other reasons that matter to them.
Then, you can also have others that are also disabled, but have no income, and have to stay with friends, or family that are willing to take them in, but really can't afford to. One might think that all disabled players have all the time in the world to play the game because... well... they are disabled, and can't work.
The truth is that some disabled players don't have the time because their health will not allow it. For whatever reason, they can't get on for 9 days straight to grind Dil on a single toon, or to even do it in a few days on multiple toons. There are even some that it might take a whole month just to get to level 50.
The fact that they can get everything in the game just by farming/grinding Dil when they get the chance to get on means a lot to them. In fact, it makes STO one of the very few free to play games that still gives them a chance, or even hope that they can get that ship, or ship bundle, eventually. And they work as hard as they can to do so.
I am not saying that they are entitled to anything from the developers. However, everyone was new to STO at some point, and made mistakes on their skill tree, builds, etc. If they don't give a free respec to all players at level 50, then I personally would like to see the price of them drop so that those that struggle for whatever reason (financial, health, or just not enough time) can afford them better.
When something is more affordable, it sells much better. Think about it... why does everyone not ride in a Rolls Royce that wants one? They just can't afford it. If they were the price of the car they now have, and they would prefer the Rolls, where would their resources be? Same here. A number of players are not buying respects, they are stuck with where they are.
I support not only the reduction of the respec, but also the idea of the developers going through the C-Store, and seeing what other prices on services might be a bit steep of a price for the resources asked. I am not talking about keys, or ships. Those obviously are selling. Lol.
Leader of Elite Guardian Academy.Would you like to learn how to run a fleet? Would you like to know how to do ship builds (true budget as well as high end)?The join the Academy today!
Mmh, you got three chars for free, this is 25,5k dil per day (8k+ .5k from Mine per char). With a good fleet/team you get that amount in 1 hour, maybe 1,5hours with STFs, while getting a surplus of marks.
That makes around 3 days for a respec.
There are enough guides out there, how to spec.
Normally you dont respec everyday, and if you want to test something, there is a tribble testserver.
Sure, I dont have anything against free or cheaper ones, but they are not really needed. If its one free lv50 respec, I am quite for it, but making all of them cheap as dirt isnt needed.
But I want it free . . . Anyway, maybe a discounted respect at level 50 . . . Buy one get one free?
you get a respec token every time you level. I think I've respecced 4 times on all the toons. I guess if you are tweaking for min/max... but for the average player it's a non-issue
you get a respec token every time you level. I think I've respecced 4 times on all the toons. I guess if you are tweaking for min/max... but for the average player it's a non-issue
you get a respec token every time you level. I think I've respecced 4 times on all the toons. I guess if you are tweaking for min/max... but for the average player it's a non-issue
As cbrjwrr has mentioned, you need to be a lifer. Or a gold member and it's every 10 levels.
Since it's all about the micro transactions and the player base is mostly silver players, the average player does have an issue
Devs have already mentioned that they were surprised at how badly respec tokens sold, considering how useful the service is.
Perhaps it has to do with it being sold at a ripoff price? Charge what it's actually worth, and maybe it'll actually sell. And no, the consumer decides what it's worth, not supplier.:P
I'm one of those weirdos that like to change ships, builds, all that every now and then. But the respec cost is a bit much, so the skillboxes tend to be in the "in between" builds that can be used in a variety of styles.
Not the most effective, but I'm not forking out that much zen to a new skill layout that may not work out like I thought it would.
And there's the entirety of the "reduce the price" faction's argument.
Not really. As many of us have pointed out, STO is the only game many of us play that charges real world money for respecs and that the amount asked is somewhat exorbitant for what it offers. I don't think anyone mentioned 'free' specifically.
Not really. As many of us have pointed out, STO is the only game many of us play that charges real world money for respecs and that the amount asked is somewhat exorbitant for what it offers. I don't think anyone mentioned 'free' specifically.
Comments
And as long as ships are sold for "5 times what one can buy an entire game with," how much some other game in the bargain bin costs is completely irrelevant.
But by all means, carry on.
THIS!
I have been wanting to SCREAM this since page two when the "Just Grind" vs "Lower price will sell more" war started.
Please, carry on. I've got popcorn and a fresh soda...
The cost is just too high for how often it needs to be done. I don't care what other games charge, I am here, STO is what matters to me. Every single newbie will have to respec at least once unless they quit or don't understand how skills work. Even people who have been around a long time have recurring needs for a respec. New ships or new gear from Rep often necessitate it. Considering these things and how many char some people have, 250 would be reasonable, 500 is just plain irritating. Will they do anything, no. But one can always hope.
^^ This!
Time = money; hard to see why ppl find that concept so difficult to grasp.
So, with our feet back on the ground, respecs are not free: they cost 500 Zen.
Personally, I don't like the idea of free respecs, as it would, de facto, invalidate all our skill choices. What I *would* like, however, is a skill loadout system, with just 2, or max 3 (for the trinity) loadouts to choose from.
I just said it would make sense to have this as a gold feature. SWTOR have it (otherwise the respec can be paid by ingame resources).
I think the current respec system is much too limited, especially compared to other MMOs using hybrid system.
Lotro, SWTOR, Rift, DDO, all of them use an ingame resources system.
Grinding or not cash shop money is irrelevant. You do that on those MMO to.
As for 3 of them (4 ? I'm not sure for DDO), you have a double spec system. I think even Champions have free respec (granted the system is much more limited if you are not gold).
And your argument "I'm poor and yet I can pay for it" is also dumb. I'm sure you would be able to pay 5$ once in a while to be able to log in. Wouldn't make it a welcome feature. We are speaking QoL improvement, not if we can or not pay for it.
It's not about weather someone can afford those 5 bucks, it's about what you're getting in return. People can afford to pay $10 for a single cigarette, a can of mass-produced beer or half a quart of gasoline, but that doesn't mean that the price is justified.
You're poor or at least on a low budget and you're arguing against something that will benefit you as well, without any kind of penalty and that appearantly isn't selling well according to the company that sells it. That's just stupid. Plain and simple.
How about they introduce two different packages in the c-store? A pack of 3-5 unbound (or at least account-bound) respec tokens, which can be traded on the exchange, and a "classic" pack with a single, bound token for the same price. That way people like you can still throw away their already sparse money, while the rest of us can buy something that is worth the amount it costs.
While they're at it, they could also introduce single Doff slots, single inventory slots, 1-million-EC increases for the EC-cap and single, common Doff packages alongside the old options for the same price, for people like who who like to spend more....
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" - Agatha Heterodyne
As I understand, that's the issue with uniforms. They don't sell well, so there's not a lot of development in them. However, the wonky pricing scheme is probably what is keeping most from buying them.
Heck, not only did other games have far cheaper respecs not requiring external currency or time-limited currency; they also oft provided means to carry multiple specs reducing the actual need to respec as you could have your XYZ specs for doing things.
Prior to S7, I just rerolled the toon rather than paying the respec cost - cause I could regear a toon within a week and be good to go with the new spec. Since S7, actually since LoR, I've bought two respecs for Willard. Other than that, I just buy more toon slots instead. In the end, it's cheaper just to run more toons with different builds than it is potentially to have to keep paying for respecs to go back and forth...
If they were lower priced they would sell - and 1 for say 100 Zen is better than 0 for 500 Zen, as one brings in 1 dollar and the other nothing.
The fact is Sopwithsnipe, you're entire point is completely irrelevant - Now, we all appreciate your time in service, but your "I have sandwich, so you can't be hungry" argument is not a valid argument.
Add in the fact someone paid for your Zen in the first place, and well, not many people would agree with your position.
Of course, the really daft thing is almost all utility C-Store items cost more than the character did in the first place...
Refining it takes the time, but you don't have to sit there staring vacantly at the monitor waiting for 20 hours.
I do, however, agree that 500 zen is pricey for summat you can actually get for just playing the game.
as we now have for loadouts for ship, traits, DOFFs and BOFFs, we should have one for skills
not necessarily added to the ships loadout, but as a standalone feature,
with the possibility to swith between them at wish (out of combat, sector space...)
....................
example:
- gold and lifers get 2 Skill loadouts for free /per toon
- F2P folks can acquire this slot for 1000 Zen
respecs cost extra
I wasn't aware of the low sales of respecs...would they actually gain more "sales" if the price was lower? Absolutely...but will those margins be higher then a 500 cost? Well...when something becomes cheap enough to spend on alts, a whole new world of spending could open up.
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
Definitely. And it does still count as a sale if a player grinds Zen - someone bought that Zen originally with real money and sold it for dilithium.
The whole point of being able to switch ships, equipment and traits (almost) on the fly is to allow more flexibility and to get players to fly (and buy) more ships.
And at the same time they don't allow multiple skill lines or changing your skill layout on the fly. Probably the best solution would be to allow free respecs any time you are in sector space or on non-combat ground maps and save the skills with the loadouts.
That way I could fly a science ship with maxed out graviton generators, an engineering ship with maxed out hull, resistances and threat, or an escort with maxed out weapons and maneuverability.
In the current system I can either build a "one size fits all" generic spec, or I can build a spec that is ideal for one purpose and ship. This second case is what most people end up doing, which means the whole new "fly any ship any time" motto gets thrown out the window.
The whole thing feels like they created the new system (which would be beautiful if they could get rid of the bugs) and at the last minute accounting stepped in and said "OK, you can remove trait and rep respecs, those could be paid in dilithium. But we keep the skill respecs in the shop, because MONEY!!!".
OTOH - what would benefit from free skill respecs? Ship sales, perhaps, but if those are already strong... I guess the calculation would be whether what they made up in ships, would be balanced by the loss of revenue from respecs.
Anyway; subscribers get 500Z/month stipend, which neatly pays for a respec. Problem solved
That makes around 3 days for a respec.
There are enough guides out there, how to spec.
Normally you dont respec everyday, and if you want to test something, there is a tribble testserver.
Sure, I dont have anything against free or cheaper ones, but they are not really needed. If its one free lv50 respec, I am quite for it, but making all of them cheap as dirt isnt needed.
First, I would like to say I am sorry to hear that you are disabled. I know from experience, it can be hard to deal with sometimes. I do wish you the best.
Also, I do understand your side of the discussion. I know a lot of my friends who have it rough in the financial department, and still they will save up to spend money on games, or other forms of entertainment like fishing, vacation, etc. There are lots of people that do this because they are spending their money on what matters to them, and how they like.
I also see the other side of the discussion. Yes, everything except for monthly/LT subscriptions are free in the game, just by grinding Dilithium. However, some people don't have the time, or they might save their money up for other reasons that matter to them.
Then, you can also have others that are also disabled, but have no income, and have to stay with friends, or family that are willing to take them in, but really can't afford to. One might think that all disabled players have all the time in the world to play the game because... well... they are disabled, and can't work.
The truth is that some disabled players don't have the time because their health will not allow it. For whatever reason, they can't get on for 9 days straight to grind Dil on a single toon, or to even do it in a few days on multiple toons. There are even some that it might take a whole month just to get to level 50.
The fact that they can get everything in the game just by farming/grinding Dil when they get the chance to get on means a lot to them. In fact, it makes STO one of the very few free to play games that still gives them a chance, or even hope that they can get that ship, or ship bundle, eventually. And they work as hard as they can to do so.
I am not saying that they are entitled to anything from the developers. However, everyone was new to STO at some point, and made mistakes on their skill tree, builds, etc. If they don't give a free respec to all players at level 50, then I personally would like to see the price of them drop so that those that struggle for whatever reason (financial, health, or just not enough time) can afford them better.
When something is more affordable, it sells much better. Think about it... why does everyone not ride in a Rolls Royce that wants one? They just can't afford it. If they were the price of the car they now have, and they would prefer the Rolls, where would their resources be? Same here. A number of players are not buying respects, they are stuck with where they are.
I support not only the reduction of the respec, but also the idea of the developers going through the C-Store, and seeing what other prices on services might be a bit steep of a price for the resources asked. I am not talking about keys, or ships. Those obviously are selling. Lol.
But I want it free . . . Anyway, maybe a discounted respect at level 50 . . . Buy one get one free?
If you have a Lifetime Subscription yes.
As cbrjwrr has mentioned, you need to be a lifer. Or a gold member and it's every 10 levels.
Since it's all about the micro transactions and the player base is mostly silver players, the average player does have an issue
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
I'm one of those weirdos that like to change ships, builds, all that every now and then. But the respec cost is a bit much, so the skillboxes tend to be in the "in between" builds that can be used in a variety of styles.
Not the most effective, but I'm not forking out that much zen to a new skill layout that may not work out like I thought it would.
And there's the entirety of the "reduce the price" faction's argument.
Does Wal-Mart make money by charging prices as high as other stores or do they move more volume at a lower price and generate higher revenue?
Not really. As many of us have pointed out, STO is the only game many of us play that charges real world money for respecs and that the amount asked is somewhat exorbitant for what it offers. I don't think anyone mentioned 'free' specifically.
You don't? Let's look again:
-facepalm-
Reading is Fundamental. :rolleyes:
Sarcasm is Fundamental.