The current setup is very unfair to occasional players.
It starts with "slot unlock" upgrades being calendar days instead of login days or "gate run" days.
Now, however, the "per gate" depth unlock -- a daily player can get 8 mist energy runs in on a single gate, but a weekly player might only get 2. Or they might get 1 if the timing is right.
I'm not sure if I'm just misunderstanding - but they removed the "per gate" locks. Its now just a singular tier lock, and after completing enough tier 1 runs on any gate, you can then access tier 2 on any gate as well, as well as with tier 3 after doing enough of the latter.
He has a certain point. Unless you go though the Announcements forum and read though every post it's difficult to know what's up with the current build unless you log on near daily. There's been more than a few returning players I've brought up to speed with the most recent release.
I think though with the new Spiral Uplink it would be a good idea to put in a Message of the Day or somehow be able to list changes since last log on in the message box.
> I'm not sure if I'm just misunderstanding - but they removed the "per gate" locks.
Are you sure? I just checked today, and there is both a global set of locks and a per-gate lock visible on the progress tab (I think that's where it was).
In any event, slot unlock is still this way -- calendar days regardless of usage. Kinda like labor badges.
> The current Gate Pass table in the Progress tab of the character panel will remain, albeit slightly tweaked as a handy tracker of tiers you have yet to explore on each gate.
Except that it doesn't say "explored" or "unexplored". It shows locked or unlocked.
Now, what is someone that sees this, and doesn't see that post, supposed to think?
They're supposed to think that they don't have access to that tier.
Yeah, once you have Tier access those locks will go away. A couple runs with a full party unlocks Tier 2 pretty quickly. The interface hasn't been updated to reflect this yet, only got by the overall clearance
If you haven't adventured down to that tier yet, it's "locked". But all that means is that you have to pay 200 crowns (tier 2) or 500 crowns (tier 3) to bypass the lock and continue playing.
Furthermore, if you join a party already in progress right before they hit the next tier, taking the elevator down from that last level to the next town is enough to "unlock" the tier. Take advantage of the social aspects; good friends are worth their weight in energy.
(Insofar as e=mc^2, that's a lot of energy)
> If you haven't adventured down to that tier yet, it's "locked". But all that means is that you have to pay 200 crowns (tier 2) or 500 crowns (tier 3) to bypass the lock and continue playing.
Sadly, not true. This morning I went down to Moorcroft, and discovered two things:
1. Instead of having 8 level passes, I only had 6 now -- apparently, they decay.
2. After reaching level 8, I had 14 of the 15 needed. Yep -- I was told to go back to Haven, and complete 1 level before I could go farther.
No option to pay crowns.
No option to say "I know what I'm doing".
Never mind the equipment , that's a different thread.
Reading what whole post?
>>>
If you haven't adventured down to that tier yet, it's "locked". But all that means is that you have to pay 200 crowns (tier 2) or 500 crowns (tier 3) to bypass the lock and continue playing.
Furthermore, if you join a party already in progress right before they hit the next tier, taking the elevator down from that last level to the next town is enough to "unlock" the tier. Take advantage of the social aspects; good friends are worth their weight in energy.
(Insofar as e=mc^2, that's a lot of energy)
<<<
Well, lets see:
1. I could not pay crowns to keep going.
2. I don't know people who were just finishing up tier 2 into emberlight, to join them.
3. It isn't reasonable or fair to expect new players to know other people in order to play.
4. Frankly, that wasn't even the point I was trying to bring up in this thread.
>>>
- As mentioned in my previous post, the gate passes required to access more advanced tiers from the Haven Arcade have been removed. A player will still need the appropriate Tier Clearance to access each tier from Haven, but no longer needs to work their way through each tier of each gate from Haven. The current Gate Pass table in the Progress tab of the character panel will remain, albeit slightly tweaked as a handy tracker of tiers you have yet to explore on each gate.
<<<
Yes, I read that.
Has nothing to do with what was said in response to what I said.
Still does nothing to address that my level tokens seemed to have declined from 8 to 6, so that I went from only needing one trip, to needing one trip plus one level.
Points to a flaw in the current setup -- different thread -- where going directly to moorcroft results in you being weaker than if you have 6 levels of loot to take with you -- if I'm going to spend the time getting stuff on the way, I can handle more stuff down there. Game doesn't care.
>>>
In any event, slot unlock is still this way -- calendar days regardless of usage. Kinda like labor badges.
<<<
Occasional players are still hurt. Even with per-gate unlocks out of the way, any sort of "decay over time" does not affect occasional players the same as it affects frequent players.
I agree on the trinket and weapon slot ugrades! When you buy them they should last 30 days of LOGGED in days. So if you only play 3 days a week, it should only count down 3 days out of the 30 days. This game is designed to be a casual game, not a hardcore game, so it should support features that go by days played rather then a set time period of days. B)
It's 50c worth of Energy, not $15.
For the amount of functionality you get from those trinket slots, it's a tiny amount to pay compared to upgrading certain Armour lines to 5-stars.
Its actually 150CE for trinket slots x2 and 250CE per weapon slot x2. thats 800CE all together, and the more important one is the weapon slots for beta testing reasons. Testing multiple weapons in the same situation is optimal for feedback on balance issue's. If this was out of beta, i probably wouldnt even buy additional weapon slots, im just fine with the 2 weapons i use the most, but since its a beta, and its our duty to test the game, I have purchased 2 weapon slots. On the other hand, my g/f who is a casual player purchased 2 weapon slots because she likes different weapons for different mobs. She playes maybe 3-4 days a week max, and she was really bummed out when her weapon slots dissapeard after a month cuz she didnt feel she got her moneys worth out of it. Players like that are the ones that put the money into the game, therefore im just expressing what I saw. If that laster her 30 days of in game play, she'd be much happier to throw her credit card number in and buy 30 more days worth of trinket slots. after all, from a game developers seat you want ur game to make money, and you want your players to keep spending money. Happy players = money. Sad players = players that dont come back and pay more money. Just stating the facts. go crawl back in your shoebox.
You go to the supermarket, you buy two loaves of bread but only eat one.
The other one goes bad.
OMG THAT BREAD WENT BAD BEFORE I COULD EAT IT I'M NEVER EATING BREAD AGAIN.
If you're not going to use it, don't buy it.
The expiration date is right there, written on the item you're buying.
It's not some hidden thing you don't find out until you spend your money.
800CE is still only $3.00, anyway.
Well I buy two loaves and just put one in the freezer, cause it's better than going shopping every week.
But, once again, when you buy it, the expiration date is written on the item itself.
It tells you the exact date and time of when it will expire.
It also says on the item itself, that it only lasts 30 days.
How that can be misconstrued as anything else, is a result of inattentiveness.
Also, arguing about the usefulness of an example when the point still got across kind of makes it a moot point.
You still understood what I was saying, regardless of how realistic the scenario is.
I just wanted to see if you'd argue back about it, figured you'd argue to anything i said, seems to be one of your favorite things to do. I was simply suggesting something that might help them make more money, as this is classified as a casual game, and the MAJORITY of ppl that play casual games are not acustomed to things like us hardcore players. Me personally will buy the trinket/weapon upgrades every month reagardless cuz I spend enough time playing to use in game currency, so they dont make money off of players like us no matter how its set up. I was just pointing out the players that dip into their purse/wallet to buy luxury items will be more likly to keep dipping into that purse/wallet if they feel like their getting their money's worth out of it.
You don't have to 'dip into your purse/wallet' to buy anything in this game, either.
You can buy it all off the exchange if you're persistent enough.
Most hardcore players now don't spend any money, they just buy and sell CE on the exchange to make money and CE while they play.
So you could just get it all for free if you wanted to.
Well thank you kind sir for supporting what I said, (Personal attack removed). Yes, like i said, hardcore players like me and you wont spend no money on the game, cuz we can earn it. Thus, the developers make no money for their hard earned work. Thus, spiral knights will die in the end. Now, back to what i was saying about casual players SPENDING MONEY TO KEEP THE GAME ALIVE. You want to keep those players happy so they will keep spending money. And as a hardcore player, WE should WANT these casual players to keep spending money so our game can stay alive. Casual players that spend money to get stuff they want are what makes it so we can play awesome games like this for FREE. My arguement for making it based off of days you log in is not for my own greedyness, as i play everyday, and if it was changed to that, it would STILL only last me a month. This suggestion was to help the game developers understand the minds of casual players, like my g/f, who play a couple days out of the week, and also throw their credit card into the system to pay money for things they want that they dont spend enough time to earn for free.
I know this is obviously hard for you to understand, but if we want SK to live, someones gotta pay the bills. I'm merly suggesting a MINOR incentive to keep players paying and playing. This would effect the players that play everyday and buy it for free to a minimal degree, as they if anything only miss one or two days out of a month of gameplay. I myself have payed for energy a couple times, merly because I understand the concept of the game makers needing to make money, and I have no problems tossing some money to support a game I play quite often. I also understand the hard work it takes to make a game like this, so as a thanks I throw some money their way when I have the extra money to throw. Dont get me wrong, I do enjoy the slight edge I get from having the additional purchased energy, but the main reason I buy is to thank them for their hard work. I also know if you make it too rediculusly cheap, or if it last for too long of a time period, these payers will only need to buy once, or even a couple times at intervals of greater distance which cuts down on profits made too. This was not just a random spur of the moment suggestion. I seen a causal player that pays get upset, I watched them then decided NOT to spend more money to buy that item, then I took that info and came up with a suggetion that seemed fair to both the player and the developer. I then came across a forum where another player also thought it was a good idea, and i have also heard other players (that also pay) complain about not getting a full 30 days out of it, so I decided to post my feedback. Now maybe u learned a little bit from this, but most likly you didnt, either way, I have made my point and am done having this childish arguement with you. (admitting that I contributed to the childishness also :P)
Happy Payers (not players) = more money = happy developers = SK's lifespan lasting longer
As much as I detest backseat moderating...
Game0ver please refrain from actively insulting anyone. It is against those wonderfully sticky'd forum rules. I give you the heads up now because it really is disappointing to see threads derailed and deleted due to personal attacks.
Also, please proofread your posts. The spelling errors, random caps words and occasional grammar errors make your posts rather difficult to read. If I'm not reading your posts the whole way though how am I to understand you're point of view?
No, I was just too lazy to bother trying to understand your terrible English.
For someone with a "4.0" GPA you type and spell (badly)
Also, Energy isn't just used to buy "Luxury Items", it's also used to play the game.
You know, going down a level costs you 10 energy, you only get 100 Mist Energy every 24 hours.
If you want to play more than that you need to buy CE, either with Crowns or real money.
And most people in the beginning of the game buy the CE with real money because the Crown cost is too expensive.
So every player pays up equally, regardless of whether they get the Trinket Slots or not.
There are no systems in this game that are meant to favour casual players or hardcore players.
At least not on purpose.
It goes at whatever pace you set it to.
That is the point of Spiral Knights.
And this is why I do not post on forums. There's always the player that "lives" on the forums, thats generally an idiot. He's had a bone to pick with me every since I stood up for a fellow friends guild and he transfer's all that to every post I make. My original post was quite clear on what I said, and in all honesty, I'm not going to take the time to proofread my arguement with something thats basicly a forum troll. Even the last post he stated has very little to do with what I posted about, lol.
WOW has a saying, "5%". That pretty much means they do everything 5% better then any other game, thats why they are so successful. Every tiny feature of their game has been well thought out, and done 5% better, in their opinions, then any other game out. Yes there is a bundle of other reasons people buy energy, but why not think about EVERY aspect of why people buy energy and make it that 5% better.
This did not need to be turned into a back in forth arguement, like one other post that shoebox apparently dosent agree with me on either. From now on I'll just stick to the suggestion box and bug report button, where people of actual intelligence will read the suggestions and they will not be hindered by people that dont know what their talking about.
There's only two people on this forum I don't actually like, you and BehindCurtai.
Because you type up essays to reply to three line posts, can't write or comprehend for (removed)
I come here to socialise, discuss things and suggest ways for Spiral Knights to improve.
I rarely log-in to the game because I am less than contented with the way it's been progressing lately, it's been almost a month since the last time I logged on to the game.
Quite honestly, people's opinion of me doesn't matter. You don't know anything about me, I've never told anyone here anything about me and the things that I do say aren't blatant ego stroking like people claim it is.
I have opinions on things, like everyone else.
As I am entitled to.
(Personal attacks are not cool.)
While we're definitely interested in hearing civilly-stated viewpoints from players on how best to appeal to a variety of playstyles, I'd like to point out the recently-posted forum rules and guidelines, especially the following parts of the "don't do this" section:
- Personal attacks--anything intended to insult or belittle another person.
- Foul and offensive language, the forums should reflect the same standards as the game. If it's filtered in the game, then it should be filtered on the forums.
The game's still new, and so are the forums. Please help us get started on the right foot in terms of atmosphere as well as everything else. Thanks!
- Hyperion
*Pats Hyperion on the back*
It happens, a job is a job. At least there are GM's now to move in at greater speed than the Devs ever could. I just wish there was a convenient in-forum report button.
Read subject.
I personally wish there would be at least one trinket slot open all the time. Cause I bought a Skelly Charm to give me shadow defense, which I want for those random zombies/ghosts or haunted areas, without having to buy/equip different armor. Either that, or like the first post:
>>
It starts with "slot unlock" upgrades being calendar days instead of login days or "gate run" days.
<<
If it's login days, this makes it worth buying upgrades with your real money. Also, this all means 6,750 crowns for the Charm, down the drain (probably).
P.S. I'm trying to express an opinion, not start the arguing again. (Though I do agree with the bread thing being redundant, being that we're in real life all the time, but most of us can only play SK for a few days a week.(That includes me.))
You don't lose Trinkets when the slot expires, just like you don't lose Weapons when the slot expires.
It just unequips.
Thats not what he's saying shoebox, he bought a trinket without realizing he needs to purchase a trinket slot, or that once he purchased the trinket with crowns, he saw that he needs to spend energy to be able to equip that trinket for a limited time. he's simply asking that there always be at least one trinket slot open, or that he would be more likely to purchase a trinket slot if it was based off of days logged in over days per month. Very simple request. I agree with him. I personally like the idea of days played over always having one trinket slot open, as trinket slots right now is a luxury item and it would still keep its luxury item appearance, just work better for those that cant play everyday. Believe it or not, but some ppl can only play 1 or 2 times a week, but would still enjoy wearing a trinket, so if they were to purchase one right now, they would get a total of 4-8 days max for 150ce. There are a lot better things to spend your CE on so it makes the trinket slots undesireable to purchase at this point, for those casual players. Were just suggesting something that wouldnt bankrupt the profits of the game, but would make it more fair to casual players.
"And this is why I do not post on forums." -Game0ver
You sure fooled me
Rather than complaining that aspects of the game should be changed to suit your personal needs why not change the way you play? The game is always being changed and improved why not just submit your complaint and wait for a change rather than throwing yourself onto the forums where, lets be honest, you probably knew you'd find someone to disagree with. If you're one of those people that thrives on internet arguments fair enough but lets try and be productive at the same time.
Oh and Game0ver just from seeing some of your other posts you may find this appropriate http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/we_get_it.png
Bump
There are no systems in this game that are meant to favour casual players or hardcore players.
At least not on purpose.
It goes at whatever pace you set it to.
That is the point of Spiral Knights.
A system that says "You get N calendar days, no matter how much or how little you play" favors frequent players and hurts infrequent players.
It does not matter if it is a monthly subscription, or a month long unlock.
The doubloon/"pay as you go" system was supposed to be about eliminating that -- you pay for play time, in essence. This model is "pay for potential play time, no matter if you use it or not". A heavy player pays less for a unit of game time than an infrequent player in this model.
That encourages hardcore, and discourages casual.
You want to encourage people to play the game.
You never want to discourage people from coming back again.
Case in point? I tried Vendetta online. I've got 15 minutes of "free trial" time left, and realized that with the setup over there, it's pointless for me to go back and try anything. That was a game where experimentation to learn what you could do penalized you and resulted in seeing less of the game. That was a game where the free trial penalized you if you tried to be social, even though social ties are the best way to keep people coming back.
YPP had great social mechanisms. Have SK's improved in the last three weeks of releases?
This game gives you 100 mist energy everyday.
Players who aren't logging in every day to use that 100 energy, be it through crafting or playing for a short period, are already missing out.
If you played 3 days a week, you'd miss out on 1800 energy, every month. That's enough to buy all your slots twice over.
I think people should just be encouraged to log-in daily, rather than encouraged to not log-in at all to save trinket/weapon slot days.
That is the problem though for a 'casual' game. If you can't pick it up and play at any time of your convenience (unless you pay), then I wouldn't really call it 'casual'. Then again, I'm not sure how casual they are trying to market the game as.
Forcing players to log in every day or they miss out just irks me... many people don't have time everyday to play, and some can just hop on weekends. It'd be cool if there was a separate Elevator Energy pool that built up beside the ME or something. Or, of course, those people could just pay. Hmm.
Oh please, Curtai, don't bump a thread that's been sitting in the back for a month just to resume an old argument.
So ... you don't think that casual forumers should participate in discussions?
Are you saying "forum frequently or stay silent"?
How does that differ from "Play frequently or expect to pay more than others"?
===
A good game design will be based around hours of play for advancement X.
Slot unlocks that are not based around play time fail that.
The idea of "Occasional players miss out on mist energy" isn't relevant. They are still getting X play per Y hours of play time.
No, I'm saying "Don't be a thread necromancer".
"A good game design will be based around hours of play for advancement X."
I disagree with this point.
One of the things that I found immediately attractive in Spiral Knights is that equipment is not restricted by arbitrary levels. Other MMOs I've played do introduce time-sinks to gain levels despite the fact I'm clearly demonstrating I'm ready for more difficult foes. The fact that I can already plunge into the arcade clockworks after a single tutorial is very attractive to me.
I'm interested in your reasoning for why you feel good game design bases advancement on hours of play as opposed to demonstrated player ability.
I agree 100% with what behindcurtai said. You should ALWAYS support causal gamers, cuz if you drive them away, you lose a large part of your profit ratio. Games generally do not profit off of hardcore gamers, as they will find a way to make the necessary funds to play for free, eventually. Even if it takes them months of playing for free to achieve that, they will find a way. Trust me, I am a hardcore gamer and I will play for free if i can. Now that does not limit me to not spending money on a game. For instance, I run outta energy, Also at the same time my trinket slots and weapons slots run outta time, I'll spent money on the past to upgrade these, but say I only got a week of play out of my 30 days, im not buying more, as they were useless to me. If i happen to find a rare item i can sell to make up for this difference, I may purchase it again. BUT if I dont, I will be without, no bother to me. Ok say this is 30 days of in game use. I may be a hardcore player, but I mainly play when my fiance plays, specially since I have a hand full of other games I play, and she is not a gamer at all. she was pretty upset when her trinket and weapons slots ran out. If it wasnt beta, she would not of puchased more energy to buy more upgrades, but I talked her into it, so we can beta test more guns at the same time.
She told me, and I quote "I will not spend money on this if this is the way the system is ran at offical release, i will quit playing and not thing twice about this game." ok this is true. She only plays to relate with me on 1 of the 10 games i play. if this game goes in the same path it currently is (In regards to puchasing extra slots with energy) she will just quit. As is, she spends 20 bucks ever 2 weeks on this game, but now that its getting harder, and she realized her trinket slots expire even if she's on or not, she's not enjoying the game. She would rather quit, then continue playing. Now I am a game designer in training, and my job is to realize this stuff, and figure out a way around it. if i want to make money in my industry, I gotta come up with solutions to all these problems, and I dont see why offering a trinket or weapon upgrade slot that last for days you log in as a loss of profit. if anything its a gain in profit, cuz the casual players, like my fiance, will continue to pay for energy when they run out.
Us hardcore players will NEVER pay for energy if we can avoid it, as we can outplay the game and make our "in game" profit over it. when deciding on what is proper to charge for and what is not, u should always keep the money maker's in mind. the casual players that have real jobs and pay to spend their time playing the game. Use League of legends for example, u can buy any character in game for "in game currency" of for "riot points" which cost USD, but u can only purchase Character costumes for "riot Points" which cost USD. Costumes are not part of the gameplay, yet players pay for them on a daily basis. just a different perspective to view money making from. As the main reason games are produced is to make money, since why else would you spend so much time and effort on something? B)
> One of the things that I found immediately attractive in Spiral Knights is that equipment is not restricted by arbitrary levels. Other MMOs I've played do introduce time-sinks to gain levels despite the fact I'm clearly demonstrating I'm ready for more difficult foes. The fact that I can already plunge into the arcade clockworks after a single tutorial is very attractive to me.
I'll give a bigger, more detailed response later. But a really brief, and incomplete response:
Right now, you can demonstrate the ability to go down below floor 8 with one star gear, but the gatekeeper doesn't care -- you'll be forced to get some 2 star equipment before you can go down.
This is no different than WoW requiring that you go back to a given quest giver three times before getting "permission" to finish an area off, even if you can wipe it clean the first time through.
You do have "experience points" -- you gain one per level completed, and with enough completed, you gain access to the next level.
Your comment was that GOOD game design ties advancement to time played. My point was that this is untrue in Spiral Knights. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding the purpose of your last comment, but are you now telling me that time-based advancement is actually bad?
World of Warcraft assumes a very steady XP rate. Players can punch this up a bit if they're clever with how they complete quests, but ultimately low-skilled players will advance simply by killing an arbitrary number of monsters for XP that unlocks the next zone. This is advancement by time played. Even the worst of players can expect to advance to the late level zones it a predictable amount of time just by participating. The difference between the skilled player and the unskilled player is relatively minor, and neither is denied advancement by skill-cap.
Spiral Knights locks player advancement by a very small set of skill-based goals - complete 15 levels worth of Tier 1, reach level 8, and have a set of 2-star gear. A low-skilled player who cannot survive further than level 5 will never complete this goal, a concept completely alien to the WoW model. Completing the 15 tokens worth of levels is highly dependent on skill - a high-skilled player will accomplish this very quickly, whereas a low-skilled player is likely to bumble and waste energy on unneeded revives. This is unlike WoW, where the monsters and quests you would complete to advance have relatively low variance between the skilled and unskilled.
The 2-star gear requirement is the only outlier, as it is a goal that can be chipped away by even the worst of players and cannot be greatly mitigated by skill - a high-skilled player is likely to achieve the 15 token requirement long before the 2-star equipment requirement, and there's no good way to optimize this goal except if you skip buying any upgrades other than 2-star gear. Perhaps if the officer gave you a no-frills 2-star set when you met the other objectives this would be changed.
Ultimately, Spiral Knights employs skill-based progression and I feel this is good design, not the time-based progression of a typical MMO.
Looking forward to reading your full response.
Good point made there SirNiko. The only thing that really takes skill in a game like WoW is end game raids. But a team of 15 good players out of 25 in a 25 man raid can pretty much accomplish anything but the latest raids very easily. Also, most unskilled players have very little interest in End game raids anyways since they seem to be facinated by all the little lame things the game has to offer (the things the higher skilled players dont like to do). The more i think about it, the more I notice this game is very skilled based. The cool thing about this game over WoW tho, is that WoW gets extreamly boring running low level quests and dungeon's, where as this game changes levels up so much, and offers a wide variety of levels and monsters that you could play for quite some time on Tier 1 and still be having fun. Enough time that eventually the skill will build and you will surpass the tier. B)
Calling things "lame" without supporting that statement doesn't help anyone. Why are they lame? When people understand why you don't like something they can try to fix that problem.
WoW does have the advantage of offering low-skilled players a great many things to do, which in turn encourages more participation. It's possible, then, for those low-skilled players to take an interest in things such as end-game raids and PvP that they normally would not do. It also rounds out the game population to spur the economy, and generally you can expect a portion of those players to donate to the game. There are advantages to a time-based progression design.
The skill-based design will keep players busier for longer. That's the advantage. Developing strategies, improving your reflexes, and getting higher scores means that a small amount of content can be drawn out over a longer period, whereas a WoW quest is amusing only the first one or two times you complete it. It attracts dedicated players, and in the right design those players will be willing to pay to keep playing at the high end.
... okay?