Spiral Knights - Triple O: Hypocrites. Announcements contradict Actions greatly.

Triple O: Hypocrites. Announcements contradict Actions greatly.

67 replies [Last post]

Wed, 03/07/2012 - 23:33

#51

Kleuse

Ashtail gear recipes still

Ashtail gear recipes still sell, for one. I know, I do it. Also, BTS and other stuff not in the HoH, needless to say. You probably wouldn't rely on rec-selling as a primary source of income any more, but it still helps if you're judicious in your choice.

Ashtail isn't available in the HoH? Pretty sure it is. I don't doubt there are some players still getting recipes off the AH for higher than HoH cost out of sheer ignorance that the HoH exists. And yes, there is still a market for the recipies that don't exist in HoH. For now.

And Rise and Fall allows any T2 F2P to play indefinitely while making modest profits. 3k gross each time for under 2k in energy costs. Not so bad.

This is a double edged sword. It's my theory that OOO has allowed only this mission to remain F2P profitable as ammo for a mea culpa that sounds exactly like your quote when us rabble rousers come out. RoF does indeed keep the F2P in spiral knights. But it's practically the only thing left. It boils down to Three Rings axing more and more of the options left to keep the F2P part of Spiral Knights intact and I for one don't like it.

For those late night mods/devs watching this thread, if I believed that this game had no hope of avoiding the horror that is today's market of dime-a-dozen mmo's that claim they are F2P when infact they are bottomless money pits, I wouldn't bother posting to this forum. It's also worth noting that I joined just before missions and the axing of F2P began. This would be my reaction if I had joined today.

Wed, 03/07/2012 - 23:42

#52

Derpules

@Kleuse

Ashtail is available in HoH. It still sells, presumably to people who haven't unlocked that tier of HoH yet, or who are, as you say, ignorant. But ignorance is probably not going away, especially since there is a built-in gap between getting 3* stuff and accessing the 4* HoH. I still sell Standard Supply Packs at a profit on the AH, albeit at a much slower rate than initially. :P

Is Rise and Fall really the only thing? How about FSC? And yeah, I know that's T3, but it's still there.

Maybe RnF really is just a sop to F2Pers, and if and when it goes away, I'll be one sad jelly-killer. As of now, though, I have to say that F2Pers are in a better position than ever.

1) They can grind crowns for CE purchase indefinitely with the click of a button.

2) If they want to buy 4-5* gear rather than crafting it, they can do so more cheaply than ever.

3) CE is cheaper now than when I started a few months back, even after the post-mission rise.

F2Pers as a class have benefited. (And yes, each of those 3 could be changed, and/or have knock-on effects in future, but it's hard to predict for now.) Who's suffered so far? Rich, successful F2Pers whose money-making machines have suddenly become that much less efficient. I sympathise, I really do--that could easily have been me, had I started SK earlier!--but I just don't agree that their loss is everyone's loss. Quite the contrary.

Wed, 03/07/2012 - 23:49

#53

Rommil

any argument

regardless of how well constructed, or poorly shouted, cannot circumvent the claims i made in post #1, and reiterated later on. There is a total and utter lack of connection to what Nick stated in the announcement and what we have seen implemented today.

Its insulting if you view it for what it is. They expect you gwen, kleuse, and even you treize, to purchase gear from the supply depot, unbind, and join in on the AH. Now how the hell they expect you to do that, now that you'll have a 7500 ce piece of junk that nearly any player can buy for 3500 ce, is a bit of a mystery to me. But rest assured, they understand the in game economy, and expectt that you will use the supply depot and join in :crazyface:

Its just so blatantly what it is that it laughable. And it is only made worse by them addressing it in the announcement, acting like they are reassuring the populace that it'll be okay, and then poo-ing on it all the same.

Wed, 03/07/2012 - 23:56

#54

Derpules

Um. No.

Your claim: "They expect you gwen, kleuse, and even you treize, to purchase gear from the supply depot, unbind, and join in on the AH."

OOO's statement: "Lastly, it's worth noting that the Supply Depot is built to exist in a world where crafting and unbinding is an important part of Spiral Knights. It is our expectation that the players that choose to use the Supply Depot will be active crafters, unbinders and Auction House patrons like our current players."

Not at all the same. OOO is saying that depot users are also expected to be crafters, unbinders, and AH users. Not that they expect people to buy stuff off the depot, then craft, unbind, and AH *that same stuff*. They're saying that the depot doesn't replace the other things, and indeed it does not.

Come on. Common sense.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 00:02

#55

Kleuse

@Treizeknight That's because

@Treizeknight
That's because stuff like EVE is serious business as well and people in that game are more than likely to track you down and kill you in real life if you renege on a major deal.

I was pointing out that the market in eve is indeed so serious that players can dedicate their time to it and actually end up playing eve totally free through use of PLEX and careful trading and micromanaging. Thus, it is a playstyle that shouldn't be dismissed and crapped on as you do in previous posts because it draws people to an mmo that offers said playstyle.

Second, the fact that a company hires an economist is irrelevant to the argument of player controlled economies. Actually, it favors my side because it shows that the company is more interesting in reading trends to better manipulate to economy to maximize profit.

It is completely relevant that CCP hired an economist. He is there to help CCP understand trends in the player economy because that aspect is important to players and thus, CCP. Saying that Dr. Egg (cant remember the spelling) is there to help CCP manipulate the ingame economy is even more ::tinfoil:: than my half joking assertion that OOO tells paid mods to create shill accounts on the forums. Yet, the major difference between what CCP does and what OOO does is that there is no argument on whether or not F2P is being phased out in Spiral Knights. This whole forum post illustrates proven examples of it very clearly while your example of CCP's manipulation is based on hearsay at best.

Finally, where does being able to buy time come from? While there is the possibility to create a middle man, it starts and ends with the company.

It does start and end with the game company. But why did they create the PLEX in CCP's case, or the chronoscroll in TERA's case? To allow players to trade this 30 day block of game time as an item ingame. To create a market for this item and to possibly allow high end players to fund their accounts purely on these items, therefore making them essentially F2P. If they didn't want this possible, they wouldn't have created the item. Just as it's becoming obvious that OOO doesn't want F2P as possible as it was before the nerfs mentioned ad nauseaum in this thread.

@Gwenyvier
I haven't gotten very far in missions either, so I didn't know that. Okay, 5* unbinding still exists as a F2P option for making CR/CE. When Basil is the main method of getting recipes and are able to buy the expansion with crowns or CE, then I'll be the first one on my knees praising OOO's glory. Mark my words on that.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 00:12

#56

Kleuse

@Derpules

F2Pers as a class have benefited. (And yes, each of those 3 could be changed, and/or have knock-on effects in future, but it's hard to predict for now.)

Call me negative nancy or whatever, but your own admitted reservation against your first statement in that line is exactly the problem IMO. OOO has set the expectation that F2P is at the whim of the bean-counters. If we aren't paying in enough cash to OOO, maybe RoF's crown output gets halved. Or maybe all recipes become bound, period. Rommil's pointed out a significant tone change in OOO's thought process on how SK should work and I don't like it.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 00:22

#57

Derpules

Of course all that could happen.

F2Pers in any game are always already at the mercy of the bean-counters. That's the nature of the beast. Who knows what future updates will bring? I would not have been surprised if the missions had made everything harder for F2Pers. But they didn't. They made things far easier.

I still am prepared for future changes that would do all the awful stuff you're suggesting, but I don't see how an update that does *the exact opposite* gives us additional reason to fear that possibility.

I reiterate: maybe F2Pers will suffer in future. But right now, it's a very specific sub-class of *merchants* who have made a loss, not F2Pers in general.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 00:43

#58

Kleuse

@Derpules

You're right, and I should know better by now. I've been burned by F2P games before and should have learned my lesson.

I agree that it's mostly *merchants* as you put it, that have suffered the most. I disagree where you say this update "does the exact opposite" of making it easier for F2P players to do their thing. Playing the market was one F2P playstyle that existed before missions and the expansion. Taking away an option of play is a cause of making a game more tedious with the effect of making it more difficult to play without paying money to skip the tedium.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 03:08

#59

Derpules

Hence "F2Pers in general".

The class of 4*-5* merchants includes many F2Pers, yes. But they are still a small part of the larger class.

I'm still not having problems buying up 2*s under 1k and selling them at 1.7k and up. I guess that's more tedious than dealing in a few higher grade items, though. Can't deny that.

Edit: Okay, the 12k FSC mission thing? That probably will screw F2P players who are not T3. So I'm not saying *everything* is peachy.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 03:11

#60

Dirt

The thing I don't get about

The thing I don't get about the rage at the depot is that you have to reach a certain level in order to gain access to higher-star gear. The only people who should be buying 5* gear, in my opinion, should be newbies. Even then, I don't think anyone should be.

UV gear excluded from that statement, of course.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 07:42

#61

Ivorise

@Rommil

Was reselling 5* weapons your main source of income? Just curious.

There's seriously no reason to be that frustrated, since there are so many ways to earn CR/CE in SK. Reselling was just but one of the many other ways out there.

Its amazing that you be would be so enraged over this. You say in OP that OOO is trying to cut down on player-to-player interaction. Haven't they already done part of that with accessories in Featured Auction? Its pretty funny hearing this from someone who has paid OOO millions of crowns for his accessories.

Chill bro.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 04:24

#62

Uuni

@Ivorise "Reselling was just

@Ivorise
"Reselling was just but one of the many other ways out there."

For me it was THE way. I played the game to have fun, heated items at the same time to make profit
Now I can just play the game until I run outta crowns, no more accessories or new items for Uuni. Feels kinda pointless to do those runs now :(

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 05:01

#63

Derpules

Or you could just play using your mist.

Like many, many people do.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 07:39

#64

Ivorise

@Uuni: Well Uuni, all I have got to say is that if reselling was the ONLY way you earned, I'll go out on a limb and say that you've probably missing out on a lot in SK.

@Derp: Can't be any truer.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 07:50

#65

Uuni

@ both of youI never enjoyed

@ both of you
I never enjoyed the low end content, always wanted the most expensive stuff and shadow lair runs
Only way I could do this was by selling these weapons, I just can't gather those hudreds of thousands of crowns by grinding fsc or tokens, it gets repetitive. I mostly sold callahans, made about 300k cr profit for each before the elevator fees. Sure it took some time and the mats added extra price but still I can't make that kinda money anywhere else. Also most of the profit went into unbinding fees of the next weapon but yeah, it was a fun way to manage my expenses, lots of crowns and energy going around

PS. It sure took a long time to gather that 4000ce for the first time, plenty of time to experience playing with mist :I

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 08:13

#66

Vescrit

Wait and watch, its

Wait and watch, its coming.

Don't worry, you can be totally prepared.

Thu, 03/08/2012 - 08:35

#67

Derpules

@Uuni

I do see where you're coming from. I can imagine how frustrating it must be to have a patch remove the viability of your playstyle. But y'know, that's the nature of constantly updated games, and not just F2P ones. Ever play DotA? I've had favourite heroes nerfed into the ground, or buffed in ways which make them unfun, too many times to count. It's one of those things you either live with in a game or. . . don't.

I'm not saying "put up or shut up". I'm saying changes are going to happen, and it's probably better to reach some accommodation with them than to rage. Maybe you can live with gathering new gear at a slower rate. Maybe you can live with FSCing a bit more frequently (it isn't the only profitable run, anyway--Rise and Fall still turns a profit, and many less popular missions/runs still break even CE-wise). Maybe you can live with forking out a few dollars for an ele pass, and spend every month in three playing super-actively to build up wealth. Maybe you could buy the expansion with CE or money, so you have one more profitable (albeit less so) FSC alternative. Maybe you could start dealing in stuff that can't be bought in the depot.

Or maybe this is no longer the game for you. :( I hope not.

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Triple O: Hypocrites. Announcements contradict Actions greatly.