CE is going up!
In the past couple days the price went up by almost 1k.
Soon the majority of Steam players will be in the CE hangover and the price will fly like a rocket since now there's a much bigger population in the game, meaning crowns will be worth even less.
edit: thanks to Acherpwn, my "Engrish" sucks
*seat belt >_>
and here come the endless number of posts complaining about ce prices etc. and how life is unfair
I wonder what it will settle around...also, it was more expensive yesterday because it was a weekend. It was actually cheaper this morning than yesterday night, haven't checked recently though.
It's not likely to rise up as high as it was unless the population takes a huge dip.
The decrease in price was because of the sudden explosion in population, and many wanted what they could get, fast. It was obvious the prices would eventually rise a bit after the chaos settled, but again, I highly doubt it's going to be reaching 7k, and even if it does it won't be likely to shoot up to that much in a few days like it did before Steam.
I think it may take a while but eventually will break the 10k barrier, due to the bigger population. Maybe the bigger population will have the opposite effect, but I'm betting the proportion non-paying/paying players will be greater than before. Time will tell...
Back to the days of playing with ME and no crafting it is :p
I did take this opportunity to craft as many things as I could....was fun while it lasted :o
There should be an achievement for crafting 10 things in a day.
Oh wait. Are they going to get ideas from this?
Buy low - sell high - or like me - use all the stockpiled CE you have high.
"Oh no, CE prices are on the rise!"
Players buy up as much CE as possible, outbidding one another to get CE as quickly as they can.
CE prices rise as a result.
Self-fulfilling prophecy is self-fulfilling.
Or rather, this kind of panic just serves to drive up the CE prices much faster than would otherwise be the case.
If I see one more Crystal Energy thread about rising/falling prices... Someone is going to get stabbed in the eye with a stiletto.
Replicant prepare your tools because when the price starts getting noticed by new steam players there will be a flood of those
Was playing yesterday and I saw someone plunk down over 200 bids at a price that was at least 50 crowns over the going rate. Either someone really needed a lot of energy our someone is up to their old tricks.
You guys forget most Steam players are used to paying; with such a large player base, I doubt the market can be manipulated the way it was before. Hopefully CE prices will settle around 4k or so
Amen.
Actually, if I see any more threads about rising CE prices ruining Spiral Knights, I'm reporting it to the mods as spam. [/halfjoking]
I'm a steam user. I got the starter pack because I was simply not going to play this game one run every day. No way no how.
I only sold a few units here and there to help out, but mostly I use it as a grind cushion. I can spend a whole lot of energy on crafting NOW and then grind it back when I feel like it rather than grinding forever then getting the item(works well so far since I can play to my mood). I make tons of cash on the AH. With energy prices hovering between three and four thousand, I can be more than self sufficient. Buy a bunch of energy here and there to replace some I spent. Buy some stuff I want. Whatever.
If energy prices go up to what people are saying they were, that's it. I'm not playing. That you need energy just to play is ridiculous with the state of the game as it is. I'm optimistic that things will remain stable with so many people around, but if things go to crap, thats it for me. I set time out for game time, and I play that one game for a while. I can't become immersed on a 100 free energy a day budget on how many levels I dive. I certainly hope the market stays stable on it's own. I know how game developers in ANY game work, and I know they won't do anything if worse comes to worse.
And thats that. I certainly hope to stick around. I want to. The game is nice enough.
I am about to make a guild for the sole purpose of spreading awareness about not posting stupid CE threads. Hoard your energy and hope prices reach 7k, problem solved you make a good profit.
It may take a while, but I'm preparing myself for when the price will once again float around the average JK run profit.
Steam users aren't cheap?
Pfffffhahahaha.
If I had money, do you think I would be playing Spiral Knights? I already feel bad about buying the starter pack at all. Granted, if I keep up this pace, I'll still spend less a month than a real gaming budget would cost, but this energy goes RIDICULOUSLY FAST. It's just stupid. You can't even play the game at all without spending loads and loads.
Here is the hard truth. I have four star equipment after a week of play. It's only one set, but still. I would not have minded if getting anything took a lot longer as long as I could actually play the game past ten levels. It could take me a month to get just a one star sword, and I would not have minded. Just let me actually play for a decent length of time. I would have grinded and grinded and grinded. Just let me play the game. I would have even still bought some stuff from them with real money to speed things up a bit.
I.. I just want to play as much as I want in a game that sells itself as free to play. Is.. is that a crime?
I'd even pay a monthly fee rather than energy going up as high as you guys say it will. The monthly fee could only take the energy cost off going down elevators and I would be happy.
For me, I don't have the money to spend on the game. I had planned on spending a little now and then to boost my gaming. But with the prices as they are... it's just not worth it. I'd be spending far more on the game than if I just went to the store and bought a full price game.
For now, I'm just using my 100 daily energy... basically stuck playing every other day.
What would be nice, is if maybe they set up a one time paid upgrade to your account.
Say $10-15 to get a Silver account, raising your daily Mist Energy limit to 200. And say $25 or so to get a Gold account, where you get a 500 daily Mist limit.
I would definitely pay for something like that. And that way I know I would be able to keep playing without having to shell out tons of cash, or just be stuck playing every other day.
Same, I can actually go positive easily, but only if prices stay where they are. Much higher and I don't know what I'll do. I should have just found a pay to play MMO if that happens. A monthly fee doesn't cost that much more than a starter pack. The game just isn't.. deep enough for it. There are other free to play games with enough content to make this look like a highschool C++ project that don't falsely advertise their free to play status.
Which is a shame. I actually like Spiral Knights for some crazy reason. I WANT to be able to play. Maybe I'd buy another bundle of energy next month too if the game was sustainable enough for it.
High prices keep veterans playing, but turn off new players, which are the lifeblood of this game. If prices get too high, then it acts as a barrier for new players, the playerbase stagnates, and then begins to shrink.
It's in the devs best interest to reform the market/energy concept and make it work at lower prices. Some older players may whine, but it'll keep paying players in the game
High prices keep veterans playing? Who have you been talking to? I didn't stop playing when energy was at 7k, but I play a lot more now that it's half that
@Veloc, you make a good point there. Not gonna argue that, even though I'd still play this game, having started saturday, if energy prices go up to 7k. Just ME it. But what I think the problem is, is in how CE can get used up in a snap. Elevators, crafting, etc. The devs don't mind - CE makes them money, the faster it gets used, the faster people buy more CE with real cash.
The problem is, there's nothing to sink CR into, really. Other than UVs on the AH, there's nothing other than recipies and CE that require CR. Granted, CE does snap up a lot of CR, but that only boosts the price of CE. To make the economy really stable, there needs to be a good CR sink, on par with CE. Something repeatable. Say, one of the new gremlins unbinding for CR, and making all crafted items BoP. It might get complaints, but it would take CR off the market, making everything cost less in absolute terms, while keeping costs equal in relation to the amount of CR floating around.
EDIT: Faux, think he means that while vets would keep on playing, newbies would get turned off by them. Nobody other than pay-to-players would want high prices. One group's more able to sustain themselves than the other.
^ that is what I meant; the higher prices can only be payed by veterans who've gotten most of what they want and don't have anything to do with all their CR they've accumulated; new players can't afford things like high-level players and it acts as a barrier to new players who want to play more.
The high prices only benefit the sellers and veterans who can afford the 7k prices; new players who are the lifeblood of any game, will be turned off if they can't afford CE until T2 or T3
I don't know guys. there still may be a lot of people in the game willing to buy a ton of CE. namely TF2 players who would buy tons of Keys to unlock Crates in TF2 may redirect some funds for some CE now and again; taking that they did not stop playing immediately after earning the TF2 hat you can get from this game.
Sturak suggestion would be nice, it would make a difference even if you burned all your CE. Currently if you burn your CE you're a regular F2P player once again, with better equips probably.
I like Sturak's suggestion too.
TL;DR:
Problem: Crown gain between tiers isn't high enough to support large CE costs. 10% auction sale fee means 10% of my hard earned money goes nowhere.
Solution: Remove or drastically reduce elevator fees and remove the auction sale fee.
The developers will have to make a change to the game if CE prices rise to 7k again. There just isn't a question. I don't want to sound like I'm trying to be snooty for force the hand of the devs, but it just isn't possible to make 7k in a run to moorcroft manor. That is what will turn noobs off.
The Crown gain between tier 1 and tier 2 isn't great enough to justify the CR alchemy prices. This is the key problem. Either you're willing to spend money on the game, or you're willing to grind for days and days and days to get the crowns to buy CE. This isn't really an option, because, unless you want to spend loads MORE time taking the first few steps into tier 2, you'll have to solo to get your mats to sell. No one is going to want to play an MMO where the only way that he can keep his head above water is by playing solo.
The only solution that I can see is to remove or drastically reduce the elevator fees. I think that the crafting fee could remain the way it is and still convince players to buy CE with money.
I know that most people won't agree with me, but I feel like the 10% fee for selling on the auction house is complete garbage. I don't know if this is meant for immersion, but when I go to the house, I don't think about giving money to support the AH. I think about how much of a profit I can make. The 10% sale price fee means that 10% of what I earned goes NOWHERE. It just empties itself out of my wallet. You can see that this ties in to my previous argument because it forces you, as a player, to need THAT many more materials in order to get off the ground. Having to pay taxes is something for the real world, where they can make an excuse that it's going somewhere good. Unless the government of cradle is going to give me some tax refunds, I can see no reason for the fee.
One big contributor to the rise in CE price is inflation. Crowns are produced from nothing with every Clockworks run, whereas CE is only produced when a player spends actual cash money. So with every Clockworks run CR becomes more plentiful; with every item crafted or player revived, CE becomes more scarce. Increasing supply of CR and decreasing supply of CE leads to the steady increase in the market price of CE.
What is really needed is a CR sink - something for players to spend CR on that removes it from circulation. If CR can be made to flow out of the economy at around the same rate that they are entering, the value of the currency will remain fairly stable. The 2% transaction fee on the CE market is one way, the 10% fee on Auction House sales is another.
Some thing makes me think PvP is going to be a big part of that.
This is done to purposely create panic among people and purposely trying to rise the prices of CE.
@ Lavatis
lower elevator fees = more crowns per 100 ME = higher energy prices
The market is what it is. New steam players = influx of CE, lower prices. The effect of these new steam players both progressing and quitting (the only two possibilities) is that the energy prices will rise. It was the only way things could change. Less people are buying CE with money, more people are making more crowns per run. The result is higher energy prices. No other outcome was possible.
IMO, the only two variables which really control the long term CE to crowns ratio are:
1. The number of crowns the average player receives on average per 100 mist energy
2. The price of CE in terms of real life cash
Damn. I saw it too, I bought 2100 CE before this rise more.