Now we put previously free event ships in a mega expensive bundle
https://www.playstartrekonline.com/en/news/article/11537903 which don't even have or come close to the lockbox promo ships usually being in there in terms of stats ect...
I'm sorry guys but the feedback you get on Facebook and Twitter is well earned and should be here in the official forum as well. Those ships should go to the phoenix box or offer them for a zen store ship price but this is just beyond greedy.
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Even if you did the full buyout during the events, it would have cost you 6k zen. This is a 250% markup for ships many people(including myself) got for free.
To add insult to injury, these bundles aren't even permanent additions to the market.
Maybe running an event where you have multiple rewards for completing (including a new non-ship reward for those who already have the ships or don't want them still) said Event. But charging Zen (and a huge amount even with the Mudd 'sale price') really comes across as poor form considering there were 'Free' event completion rewards previously.
If this is a Cryptic Marketing team test to see if they can get players to pay for what were at one time 'Free/Earnable just by playing certain content' rewards, I hope it fails big time.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
Of course the reason why these are in Mudd's is to keep the FOMO going -- either you grind now, or you know you will need to spend $150 later. That's good business in the sense that it gets people to grind for the ships and log in for 20 days even when they aren't that interested in the ship. More logins = more zen purchased = the servers keep running and staff get paid.
It's not ideal, but tricks like that seem to be necessary for a true F2P game where there is no cost for the base game, all expansions are free, crafting is free, they give away 3+ free ships a year, and there is no sleazy "energy" resource like mobile games use to limit your play time per day.
They're not aesthetically pleasing to me. By their own admission event ships are hamstrung performance-wise compared to Lobi, lockbox and promo ships. Yet they're asking exactly the same price as the previous choice packs with the aforementioned premium ships. The previous individual event ships in Mudd's were available at 4,250 Zen (75% off sale), whereas this, as a bundle, will at most be 50% off, meaning they will cost a minimum of 4,917 Zen per ship.
Most people either have them already from playing the events or only want one or two they missed. The trouble is, I don't believe any of the filler items are really worth a third of the cost of the bundle either.
On the upside, passing on it offers time to save up for something better at a later date.
I see we are backto 3 ship Bundles (in this case that's all they got). So now the 60k Zen Super Mega Bundle does not provide a fourth ship but just the three and a load of fluff.
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
It doesn't hurt to ask, but that dil is given away free by Cryptic along with all of the other F2P goodies I listed above. They are already supporting the pure-F2P players fairly well in my opinion. At some point they have to ask us for the cash monies to keep the lights on.
At a high price, such as this - many, many would have to buy dil with zen. And that would support devs AND players alike.
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People already whine about "pay to win" because the mere option to buyout the event exists. I also can't tell you the number of times I've seen people whine about "pay to win" because they bought a 10 pack of keys and didn't drop a lockbox ship off those 10 keys. Or they bought a set of 4 promo boxes from the cstore and didn't drop a promo ship. Far too many people think that if they have to pay more than $5 for something or if they don't drop a ship off $10 that it's "pay to win".
For me, I don't care if I got a ship for free during the event and someone drops cash to get the same ship as me after the fact. It has ZERO effect on my ability to play the game at all. Prime example being the Samsar. I got it during the event years ago, yet before phoenix boxes were a thing people whined about others being able to get it saying "well you should've been there" and "it takes away from people who were there if folks can get the account unlock after the fact." Like no, no it doesn't. Of course it's like pulling teeth to get some people to see that.
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And frankly people in STO who complain about P2W don't really understand that... win WHAT? Is it a race to get something? There really is no Pay 2 Win. Its Pay for Convenience. Pay to Have Now. As someone who has ground out a ton of large packs, I just don't see a reason to rage over it. So you have a choice of get the shiny now or get the shiny later. Why and how is that P2W? What unfair advantage does getting the shiny sooner than others give someone? A chance to mess around with it? A chance to find any potential bugs that need to be addressed later? The extra Dilithium that you still can only refine 8k a day? Seriously? What advantage is there over someone who doesn't buy out an event?
Anyways...
[/soapbox]
In future whoever comes up with these bundles have to remember that at this cost I could buy 7 to 8 AAA Games.
Fair points. Sometimes though you just have to rage for the little guy.
I own all 3 of these ships so it really shouldn't bother me... cause it doesn't effect me directly. I am however a little annoyed with the obvious greed on display here. I don't want new players getting pinched like this... chances are they won't stick around. (no idea what Cryptic is thinking... telling somewhat new players oh you missed the Anniversary event ship from 12 months ago.... here lets sell you a catch up unlock. If I was one year into the game and saw this deal I probably wouldn't make it to two years in)
I would be fine with them offering a 3 pack of these EVENT class ships if they want to offer people a discount to buy all 3. While offering each ship as a solo purchase. The part that makes this horrible is not being able to buy just one without being forced to buy filler to go with it.
Everyone wanted each one of these ships to go into the mudd store. Giving new players opportunities to pick up old event stuff is great. I am even fine with Cryptic charging a reasonable premium for that over the event buy out option. This just seems predatory. Imagine being the player that has two of these and wants the third. By Grabthar's hammer what a savings.
I will defend Mudd pack pricing in almost every case... promo pack and lockbox ship unlocks for for a little under 5k a piece is a very good deal considering some of the previous offerings have cost some players much more then that to acquire as a one off. It is also a great way to stick it to despicable gold sellers out there selling some of those same ships third party. I have only ever had an issue with two packs... the one where they decided to offer 4 ships in a choose 3 pack deal, trying to get people to buy the larger version. (think double buy at the time) also forcing players to buy a bunch of keys ect they don't need or want. This one I have an issue with for basically the exact same reason. These ships should be sold separately as the odds are high basically NO one needs all 3. Its the same greedy slime ball move they pulled with the 4 ship mudd pack.
This would be me. I, unfortunately, missed out on the Jarok. I will be acquiring it. And while I am happy to be able to get it as a Mudd's account unlock, I'm not entirely thrilled that I'll have to spend a bit extra for other items that I wouldn't have otherwise purchased at this time.
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It would definitely be a better pack if there were other good choices in it -- like 75 keys instead of 50, or 2 Phoenix tokens not 1 or the actual zero (since it's a single-character token), or add the account-wide phoenix ship token like they had for one event (or was it a giveaway?) on console.
You know you make actually an interesting point.
What if Cryptic made this a 6 ship pack instead.
This would allow people that only need one of these like baddmoon to buy the one event ship and grab a couple other old lockbox ships. It would allow people that really did want all 3 event ships to still get them like they could anyway. It would also allow people that maybe only want one of these event ships even if they didn't have them to mix in a couple other ships.
I know I said I hated the 4 ship pack... but that was because it forced a hard choice or double buy. Most people do not need these event ships at all and would just select the other 3 ships. People that say hey I want that nice carrier click console I grab that and something else.
Another crazy idea. Mix one of the lowest selling ships from 3 of the previous mudd packs and add them as options.
Hell Cryptic you wanna really really make money on a pack like this... make it a choose 3 from 9 items. Ya do it... add 6 ships the 3 events you wanna try and sell, 3 old ships... and the 3 filler choices. You would sell more... but not because people would spend more then they other wise would. You would just have more fence sitters say hey look this personal 3 choice pic would work for me here is my money.
In fact Cryptic why don't you just get super crazy.... sell one mudd bundle only ever. Treat it like an Event box. When the sale is on... pay your 14,750 and choose any of the 3 Mudd pack limited time choice options. Rebuy as many times as you want till you unlock them all. Every time you run the Mudd bundle sale just add 3 new old ships to it. Then you never again have to hear people say... if I wanted 50 keys I would just buy 50 keys.
I don't have any issues with Mudd Bundles, I own several, but I just can't see how this bundle will sell well enough simply because many people already have these ships account unlocked from the anniversary events. Previous Mudd bundles sold well because they are the only way to get account unlocked Lobi and gamble ships, this bundle on the other hand has a significantly smaller market due to it consisting of ships that a significant portion of the playerbase already obtained for free.
I may well buy this bundle at the 50% sale price point if I could choose three account-wide Epic Phoenix ship tokens instead of anything else in it. It would effectively be the same deal as choosing all the Alliance ships. Three old event ships...except of my choice instead. I'd certainly consider it.
I like those ideas. More choices would, in my not-a-marketing-guy view, sell a lot more of these bundles to people who right now are going to say no.
(and everything else) as Account Unlocks so this Bundle means nothing to me.
There is not enough value in any of these Bundles for the added fluff. There is not enough of those whatevers to be worthwhile. As I have all Event Ships already, an Epic Phoenix Token is worthless, What, for 8 stunted Phoenix Upgrades?
A repeat of the Christmas 2020 Mudd's Bundles 75% off sale would be great as is the ideas of putting all Mudd's Ships into a Choice Mudd's Bundle and let you pick three.from it.
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
The Mudd's Fighter bundle was already severely stretching the level of tolerance because it was still account-wide versions of expensive lockbox ships, but in this one, there is absolutely nothing justifying the price. Nothing.
Not sure what will come from it, but they heard. Now... only time will tell, so lets not go bashing anyone over it. The voices have been heard.
If the Bundle offer at least 10 event ships, then it might be worth its weight in gold, like the 10th anniversary bundle
There was at least one earlier bundle that they upgraded based on negative feedback, so it does happen.
(Don't ask me which one, it's been awhile and there have been so many bundles.)
Still took them more than one "try" and constant feedback until they officially caved in.
Feedback doesn't end until meaningful changes are made.
We need to see what they change before grabbing a fresh supply of torches and pitchforks.
^^^
I don't know of a for profit company that DOESN'T respond to that type of feedback.
So yeah, the best way to make yourself 'heard' is stop spending real money towards STO and also stop doing ANYTHING that also supports the in game economy. Get enough other STO players to join you and I guarantee Cryptic will do something to 'listen' in response.
Anything else is just white noise to them.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."