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5/17/2011 release feedback thread

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Wed, 05/18/2011 - 00:20
#301
Shinko
Legacy Username
Feedback

The crafting cost increase wasn't the most pleasant part of the patch, but I think most of the rest was good. Here's a few things I noticed though:

- Auction house is awesome thanks a bunch :D
- That training room would be a great place to test out new weapons and try different combos, but you can't switch weapons with ones in your inventory while you're in there :(
- The limitations you put on doing boss runs and basil runs makes it so that nobody wants to join parties anymore. I suggest making it so that parties lock after they've left the party staging area or the town to start going down. The terminal can also be an unlocked area, but otherwise people shouldn't go in and out of the party while they're going down. This way people joining a party won't get shafted for basil recipes or boss tokens.
- Any increase in energy costs is bound to get negative feedback, but I think this increase was too high. 3* forging and up doubled in energy cost, that's pretty harsh. A 50% or lower increase would've been more accepted.
- The crafting limitation along with the lowering of recipe prices and the addition of an auction house worked really well together good job s( ^ _ o )b

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 00:25
#302
Thakos
Tons of people are out lots

Tons of people are out lots of CR, CE, and mats because of this update due to reasons already stated. Tons more people have boatloads of now-useless bound items they were levelling, planning on selling.

Face it, devs. The game was played as follows: if you are a crafter, you level items to 4* and 5* for people as favors and to sell in trade chat. That is the game that was being played. Doing so was a huge investment of materials into a system already in place, and players would not have made those investments if the system did not give a return. You removed the return.

But the investment was never undone in any way. So again I say, a lot of progress was lost by a lot of players because of this update.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 00:41
#303
Eshajori
Legacy Username
*Sigh* What a joke.

Let me begin by saying I really did love this game, I'm not a naysayer or a flamer, I'm actually quite a positive person. I enjoy giving feedback, new ideas and constructive criticisms, and I've made a few posts on the forum to such ends. This isn't a rant. It's simply the opinion of a player that really loved the game, and probably won't play it anymore.

It's cute that you slide all these nerfs into a patch with a highly anticipated feature (see the less-useful Auction House). I'd like to put into perspective some things that might be misunderstood:

  • Concerning the Jelly King and the new boss gems, the range of jelly tokens dropped from the Jelly King used to be 3-5. Now it is 1-3. The minimum is now the maximum. Those who love this change, answer me this: Did it really disadvantage you if someone joined your group right before the boss? It may seem unfair - you did all the work - but the amount of tokens you earn is not divided. Did you even care anyway? The game is set to add players to groups in the earliest depth possible. It's very unlikely that a random player would joinyour group right before the boss, which means you probably invited them anyway. What DOES disadvantage you, (the one who fought his way down there) is this: if anyone has to leave, I'll be damned if you'll find someone to fill their place. People won't want to help you if they're getting punished for it.
  • I hear a lot of people complaining that the new energy costs screw over F2P players. While of course this is true, there seems to be a misconception that P2P players aren't effected too. At the prices they're asking and the rate energy is spent, this game will now cost more money to play regularly than a typical MMO. Even disregarding the rest of these blunders, there is NOWHERE NEAR enough Spiral Knights content to warrant such a cost.

I've only read through the first four pages. I'm not going to waste time reading more of the same stuff, nor do I have much to say about it. It should be quite obvious by now that most of this update was a big mistake. Both the logical, criticizing responses and the angry outbursts are quite warranted (though the former are clearly more helpful than the latter). I think Cheeserito's post sums it up nicely. Particularly:

"I feel a little hurt by this, because there isn't much of a difference between people who have already learned their recipes and those who have not. Other than the fact that the people who have unlearned recipes can now make a huge profit between selling it for even a 2k markup and the nice refund they must have gotten, while people like me who have learned recipes made a commitment to certain items and get nothing for it."

I bought energy on two occasions from you, Three Rings. Both were $20 purchases. I did so because I genuinely enjoyed this game, thought it had new horizons, and I had faith that my money was well placed. I could have stayed F2P - I'm not rolling in money. In fact, I'm deliberately not playing any MMOs right now because I CANNOT afford the monthly $15 subscription fee. But I gave you guys $40. Do you know why that is? I consider it a donation, to people I "know" are moving the gaming industry in the "right direction". I applauded your fairness and cleverness in finding a good, and surely successful balance between F2P and P2P gaming, and I shouldn't have to explain that part. But now you turn around and do this? And with no warning? I was wrong. I feel cheated, I feel like my $40 was wasted on the same old purse-gouging drudgery, and frankly, I don't know what you could do to make it up to me - or anyone.

Like many others, I wasn't even near my computer when the patch was applied... long before I knew what it entailed. I had been excited. My inventory was full of bound gear just waiting to be crafted. All of it to sell. Now it's all worthless. I had several sets intended for another character, but since I could merely trade him the armor after-the-fact, I kept the recipes on my main character with all the materials for simplicity's sake. Now that is worthless too, and I would have to find and re-purchase these recipes on the other character.

I'll never understand why MMOs drive themselves into the dirt time after time with the same failures:

  1. If your players are happy, they'll keep playing, and you'll keep getting money.
  2. If the players are unhappy, they'll quit, and the game will fail.

When you are making an update, you should be looking at every single change and analyzing the benefits/disadvantages to the PLAYERS. Keep that up and the cash flow will maintain itself. 90% of this patch was pure hindrance and disadvantage.

You're striving to hold us back so that you don't have to create reasons for us to move forward. This is a horrible strategy.

I understand that this game is having content issues. But you know what? I didn't see anyone quitting over it! I could barely scrape together groups to try and tackle Vanaduke. People were content farming for items and crafting different sets to add to their arsenal. I know a few people who took breaks... to wait for NEW CONTENT. And these were people who were serious about the game. Who bought LOTS of energy. And you think they'll keep playing when they return to see this? Costs inflated, rewards cut down, and still nothing new?

You're putting too much effort in fluff leaned towards packing your pockets, when new content would do just that, AND make the players happy (not that they weren't already - before this patch). And I hear you locked down a petition thread to revert the changes? Very mature of you.

This is all very depressing and disappointing. I really hope this changes, but I won't hold my breath. In the mean time, I'm removing my billing information and calling it quits. I'm sure plenty of other will be doing the same. We'll be listening, but it's going to take some doing to regain our trust.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 00:46
#304
Eshajori
Legacy Username
That's the point

@Feynt

The reason everything roots back to Energy is because Energy costs real money. They need it to be used to it runs out and you need to cash in.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 01:00
#305
Negimasonic's picture
Negimasonic
@Shinko about locking

@Shinko about locking parties
You must not have been invited to revive a friend before if you want parties to stay locked, sometimes things happen, whether its skill or just lag, and people die, parties get wiped. But as long as there's an open spot on a non boss level, you can call in a friend to save your tails without wasting any more energy. They do NOT need to stop invites altogether Also sometimes you may go in a level with the wrong gear and you want to switch out by returning to haven, locking the party in in between zones will stop people from doing that and I don't see that as very useful.

@monstrous

There is a difference between grinding to simply survive and grinding to turn a profit. Its the same thing but doing so for a profit makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. And to a certain point, grinding for profit doesn't take as much effort, one or two arenas can level a 3 star to level 5, even in Tier 1 I think. This job can also have the added bonus of being made easier by working with others, for if they die, you get their heat, for FREE. But having to fight to make sure that you always earn 5k crowns takes longer. Plus grinding for profit has the bonus of including grinding to survive INSIDE of it.

Oh and I never really bothered to level weapons for selling (did it thrice?). But that's still my opinion.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 01:01
#306
HitoriDBitch
Legacy Username
greed

they raised the crafting energy costs to make money with the logic that with recipes more easily available, people will have more recipes they want to craft so they need more energy and that increase need will hopefully create an increase in the buying of crystal energy.

I am too smart for this. I'm not buying anymore ce and i hope other people aren't going to continue to buy ce because this has just become another ripoff in my opinion. I really liked the game for the collection of mats and recipes to make something awesome to share with friends or sell to others. It was a roulette game that you could come out a big winner, but the House now wants more profits and that just ruins the game for me. I foresee the cr price of ce to go up as less buy ce and the demand for ce goes up with increased crafting costs, but I suppose that more people will join the game later and not know of the way things were before and will buy energy and eventually the price will come down again, probably long after I've quit.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 01:02
#307
Senshi
Legacy Username
Feedback.

The auction house is badly designed. The mails don't tell you the quantity (or, presumably, the UV) that was sold, so if you have more than one auction for shards or more than one auction for brandish, you get a completely ambiguous mail. Searching is very non-intuitive. I've figured it out, and noted how you have to be on 'materials' or 'swords' or whatever it is you want before you fill in that text search box, that search box isn't enough on its own. Still. It took time, some confusion and mistakes, and I have a degree in computer science as well as years of gaming. Not good. Also I led a newbie to the auction house so he could buy swordstones. An hour later I noticed the -same newbie- was trying in chat to buy a swordstone from someone, anyone. While standing next to the auction house. Okay, he was pretty stupid. Fine. Compared to 150+ iq computer game designers, most people - most CUSTOMERS - are pretty stupid. It's your job to be smart enough to cater to that, and you're failing.

Forcing all the feedback into a single thread sucks too. I'm reading over and over and over and over and over how we have to start from depth 1 to get tokens from the bosses (blatantly not true. Obvious from the release notes, plus I started a run from the terminal through the Jelly King and got my 4 tokens like everyone else) and who's quitting and whatever. You should have let there be a thread for bitching about changes in crafting and changes in tokens so that we could actually talk about the auction house, which nobody seems to be doing.

I do notice you changed the name of the thread, which feels like it's almost directly in response to my feedback on -that- issue, but... honestly... why is it in one thread? We can't have a discussion about -anything- in this thread, only bitching on top of bitching about crafting costs. I haven't read nearly all the posts, so I have no idea where the non-discussion is at, but I'm sure it's -still- about crafting costs but I've spent an hour reading this thread and I'm not reading any more. It always pi... ticks me off when people post blind, but this thread is growing absurdly fast so here I am doing it.

Also, since when is the saxon term for urination banned? Just because saxon terms for copulation and defecation are barred is no reason to add that word that I now am not even allowed to say on the forums ('if it's filtered in game, it should be filtered in the forums' ) ... not that that rule is actually enforced, every day people fill the forums with F- this and F-that and you're an A-hole, but, hey. Also words related to supressing and decreasing that are in some contexts used in reference to mental capacity are filtered. 'course we'd never have a conversation that uses those words approriately, just as we'd never actually talk about g... err, a synonym for homosexual and/or happy pride marches and days, or y'know, refer to friends or coworkers proclivities by a synonym for happy that is the -preferred- term by that community. Right, but, really 'p---d off' in American dialect and 'got p---d last night' (means drunk on their side of the pond, see) are hardly controversial phrases or worthy of filtering. Not to say the word in question can't be used offensively, but then again, I'm pretty sure I can offend anyone I want to without using a single controversial word. Filtering f---, sh--, and a--hole is one thing (just stop filtering the synonym for donkey when it doesn't join up with 'hole'... geez!) Seriously, I never minded the filter when I was on puzzle pirates too much, until I tried to... uh... the evil permaban word that isn't quite 'snicker', y'know. But clearly the filter dictionary is going to grow without bound until someone says 'enough is enough'. If it ain't in George Carlin's 7-words sketch, it shouldn't be filtered.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 01:07
#308
Negimasonic's picture
Negimasonic
looks at your post...looks at

looks at your post...looks at the person's forum name before you.

*starts loling*

well I know one word we can say I guess XD

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 01:18
#309
HitoriDBitch
Legacy Username
Definitely spot on

I feel this is a perfect and well thought out response to the update and I completely agree. I may continue to play for now but there isn't really any reason for me to continue. And the $90 bucks I spent on energy? And the $50 more I was planning to spend. Screw it. Forget the $50 I was going to spend to continue my crafting and recipe hunt and the $90 was lost to a game where I was looking for new bosses and new items to craft and sell and recipes to give/sell to those not lucky enough to find them. My main point, I played this game for the craft and sell because that is the kind of thing I like to do. Horde mats and make all kinds of stuff till i get something worthwhile to sell.

Also, just something that bugs me, why use our login name in the forums instead of one of our character names? It kind of makes the login in name kind of pointless since you are giving it to everyone and anyone to see anyways.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 01:51
#310
Semeskooma
Legacy Username
Well, it was a good run we

Well, it was a good run we had for the last few months.
This game had some great potential, and the community couldn't get better.
I won't be quitting for now, but I am absolutely appalled and disgusted by the crafting changes.

Let it be known that this patch, and the lack of developers open ears led to the games downfall.
They won't revert the changes, and they don't care. They want active free players to stop being active so that they don't have to pay and keep the servers up for them. This patch set out and will do exactly that. So long as such a change exists, I promise that they won't be getting as little as one penny from me.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 01:58
#311
Vicarious's picture
Vicarious
You guys really just ruined

You guys really just ruined this game for a lot of people. :/

The Auction House we wanted so bad is nothing more than a huge crown sink. The "Advanced Training Arena" is a waste of what could have been more levels, monsters, etc.. You killed half of the market by binding our four and five star gear. You jack the crafting cost up so high that I soon expect crystal energy costs to go well over 10k for 100. You give end-gamers nothing to do but grind.

Not logging on or spending anymore money until it's rolled back.

Seriously, you guys [banana]blocked yourselves.

Edit: Also, I love how an Admin or Developer hasn't shown that they have even acknowledged what has been posted here, except for editing out naughty words that we use to express our sincere disappointment and rage.

EDIT: language. (I acknowledge the irony of this edit after what you just said. We are watching this thread and cataloging the feedback you are all giving us.)

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 01:55
#312
Raspberry's picture
Raspberry
Endgame to Blackmarket

Leveling gear for people with lots of disposable income became pretty much the endgame content of Spiral Knights. So far this endgame content has been managed by mainly reputable guilds and veteran players.

One of the main reasons people with disposable income play online MMOs is it keeps them occupied and is less expensive than night clubbing and other forms of pricey entertainment. People with disposable incomes have a limited amount of time for entertainment, hence they buy the best possible gear they can afford so they are able to play at more challenging endgame levels without becoming dependent on their buddies who are able to play longer.

Taking the high level gear purchasing out of the equation will not stop people with disposable income from playing with their buddies. Neither will it force them to grind to level gear to craft themselves. Black market RMTs (real money traders) know this.

What tends to happen in popular online MMOs is the arrival of a thriving black market of entrepreneurs who sell endgame characters. The black market will not care about how the endgame characters are obtained nor do they care about Terms Of Service contracts. Black market traders are also very creative with reverse engineering the game mechanics to create 3rd party applications for further exploitation and bot play. The black market may employ sweatshop grinders in 3rd world nations or vigorously deploy hacking, phishing, and key logger methods to steal endgame accounts.

When the black market moves in, Spiral Knights will officially lose its innocence. Counter measures to combat the black market involve additional staffing (GMs/engineers/lawyers/help desk clerks) and many creative system security measures to combat all manner of INTERNATIONAL hacking breaches. Counter measures become costly and tedious. Counter measures begin to take-up creative energies that could otherwise be spent on developing new content.

Please prevent the black market from ruining the innocence of this delightful community. Return the ability to unbind high level gear. Create more endgame content.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 10:23
#313
izoold
Legacy Username
Mods are asleep.

#### you.

[Edited for language.]

EDIT: lolumad

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 02:18
#314
Amalric
While I understand the

While I understand the frustration of people who might have adopted certain customs and have been slapped in the face by a couple of unpopular decisions made overnight, I think there is a lot of exaggeration in their assessment. Besides, stating that hundreds of players from their guilds are going to quit only a few hours after the release is a childish bluff that no adult is going to buy, sorry kids.

Nevertheless I have to admit that introducing the new crafting policy out of the blue as well as rising by such a high rate the energy fee have been both a low blow that have caught a lot of players off guard. I guess people probably wouldn't be so angry if they had a couple of days to adapt their plans to the new deal, so they are kind of right here. Who is going to pay for those items people were levelling for their guildmates?!

I too think the energy fees are now a bit excessive. Granted, with 10$ you can still craft 4/5 of a 5* equipment, but I guess people won't be willing to collect several sets anymore (which I thought it was one of the most intriguing aspects of the game) and we are undoubtedly going to lose variety. So you can stop working on new fancy swords right now, since players are going to direct their choices over a couple of items anyway (Levi and DA?).

However, except for the unfortunate lack of communication and the new energy fees, overall this is a very good update. As a former (and disappointed) Puzzle Pirates player, when you came out with the Rose Regalia set I was afraid you would have turned the game into a crappy limited edition stuff machine like you did with Y!PP. Fortunately this release is a step in the right direction and I'm now positive that you'll soon release what people is now looking for: new content.

By the way, the Auction House is great. I have only a couple of suggestions:
1. Remove the listing fee.
2. Introduce a minimum starting price for items. This is not a real economy and free market principles do not work here. If advanced players are going to undersell their 1*-3* materials, all the fun is going to be spoiled.

The Training Hall is simply FANTASTIC. Big thumbs up on that!

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 02:33
#315
Anly
Legacy Username
Lol @ izoold

Lol @ izoold

---

The Spiral Knights team seem pretty cold with their cut and dry responses. Please hire a warm and cuddly representative if the company can "supposedly" make more money from the current update. Thanks.

---

As for me, I will discontinue to play this beloved game until more favorable changes are made in the future. Au revoir!

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 02:30
#316
Alexandriea
Nice to see something related

Nice to see something related to love puppies haven't been addressed. OOO, hot diggety, you sure do know how to prioritize your updates!

Glad to see you didn't ban Ariakus too, the biggest culprit in the whole love puppy fiasco. He's still selling now, and he will still be doing it. what do?

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 02:25
#317
Sophiera's picture
Sophiera
In a nutshell

The very essence of every opinion and debate is boiled down to one sentence about this patch

"Devs, you're doing it wrong."

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 02:26
#318
Sophiera's picture
Sophiera
In a nutshell

The very essence of every opinion and debate is boiled down to one sentence about this patch

"Devs, you're doing it wrong."

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 02:49
#319
Nathkuma
Legacy Username
The major mistake was a lack of warning!

The major mistake was a lack of warning!
This leaving people with lots of items that they can't sell or return to their friends. Lots of merchants disheartened by ruining their plans.
Here are some constructive ideas
Options:
Have a roll back (updates not data) - implement the changes in a week
unlock the 4* 5* equipment made before the update or all the equipment
make un-binding a piece of equipment possible maybe with a crown or energy fee

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 02:44
#320
Thakos
A good point about a black

A good point about a black market. The disparity between players willing to buy their way into endgame and those only willing to grind it is probably what's being addressed by this update, but in reality before the alchemy bind, players with time to grind were providing players with income to burn with a source of endgame achievement; in other games, spending a lot of money gets you into the endgame only because you get boons directly from the developers. But this real-money economy was almost perfect - entirely player-driven, and therefore subject to the ebb and tide of the game population's whims. Players were unable to purchase advancement from the company that existed outside of other players providing them with that advancement and, in that way, there was no true disparity of play versus pay: the payers had to rely on the players.

This is no longer true, and the ones willing to pay their way into the endgame are still willing to do it -- and the investment:return ratio will be much greater for those players who are willing to just buy characters that already have great advancement, than those who want to spend their money on the game itself. Games that prolong the grind are especially vulnerable to "chinese gold sellers."

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 03:15
#321
Solly
Nevermind.

Nevermind.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 03:02
#322
Diggidy
Legacy Username
Be reasonable everybody

I have to say I'm disappointed by the people who label any increase in cost-to-play as "greedy". OOO is a game company, and if I had to guess, I'd say any cost increase is closer to being an effort to keep food on the table, than it is an effort to reupholster the seats in their lexus's (lexi?).

As a F2P player I'm not sure exactly what my "value" to their company is. It's possible that I'm only a drain on resources, and the over-arching goal is to either convince me to start paying or convince me to leave. If that's the case, then I think this update may be a step in the right direction.

However, if a F2P player can be valuable to the game, and the game-creators desire an economy that can support those players, then the change I find most objectionable is this: bound items remain bound after upgrade. The market will adapt to any changes in recipe or material cost, but I don't believe it can support high-end players if they can't sell top-of-the-line equipment.

Unless an alternative source of revenue appears, I don't believe F2P players will be able to support themselves and progress at a reasonable pace with this new binding system.

As a side note, the training grounds seem a bit silly to me. The grounds are cool, and kind of fun, but they're designed to teach new players about combat in the clockworks, which is the most simple and intuitive part of the game. It seems like new players would benefit more from an area that teaches them about heat, recipes, and equipment, given the amount of questions I hear from beginners on the subjects.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 03:03
#323
Loest's picture
Loest
Disillusioned.

When this patch rolled out, I had two 5* items under construction by friends. I'd already turned over the materials and crafting costs. I'm out hundreds of thousands of crowns because of this patch, and it has added no content that I particularly care about. It is safe to say that I am disappointed.

I was really enjoying this game. I liked running the clockworks and working towards new items, but OOO's decision to destroy so much of the fruit of my effort over the last few weeks has left me disillusioned. I'm certainly not going to give them any more of my money until some of these policy decisions are reversed.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 03:04
#324
Loest's picture
Loest
Disillusioned.

Accidental double post. Stupid forum software.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 03:14
#325
Fallout's picture
Fallout
zoooooooooooom i love this

zoooooooooooom i love this update =D
specially the no trading past 4star thing - i was getting annoyed with people just buying 5 star equips with CE.
Sker4life

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 03:34
#326
sonofsega
Legacy Username
ok, you win, I quit

The game are forcing people to buy energy. I surrender now.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 03:37
#327
TwoCakes
Legacy Username
Some constructive feedback?

I've been playing for less than a month, got hooked instantly. Up till now I've only been playing off of ME + maybe 200 CE I bought with crowns to mess around with; so pretty casual overall. I just started doing JK runs 2 days ago (minus actually getting to JK, just the floors before him) and got really excited at the 7500+ crowns per run. My goal from the start was to collect every item in the game and stockpiling mats, not about reaching the endgame or crafting/selling items.

I don't mind the 4/5* binding change, only b/c I prefer to play solo and craft my own items, BUT I can definitely see how this peeves a lot of players. If I were into crafting, guilding, and playing with the game economy, I'd probably leave for that reason too.

As it stands, I'm leaving for the increase cost of crafting. It's just a grindfest at this point. Pre-update, every 24 hours I could either make one 3* gear or do one JK run to get crowns, and hopefully buy a new recipe along the way. I figure by the time I was ready to craft 4/5* gear I'd get CE with a mixture of crowns and real money. Now, not only do I need CE for every 3* item, but I need twice as much as before, AND for every 5* item I need more than double the original. I just finished doing a JK run, and it just wasn't fun anymore, b/c the whole time I just kept thinking about how many freaking times I would have to do this in order to fund everything. It just lost its fun & casual allure. Now it's just a grindfest. Sure, it's all a matter of perspective, if I'd picked up this game tomorrow all these post-update changes would be the "norm."

Sadly, less than 24 hours ago I was strongly considering buying some CE to 1) support the game & 2) to speed up my crafting, and I'm not just saying that to make a point. Will be checking the forums now and then to see if any positive changes occur, at which point I may come back to SK. For now, I've got other games to entertain me.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 03:56
#328
kitster121
Legacy Username
ok the new crafting costs

ok the new crafting costs isnt that fair compared to the old one.

My reason:
The old crafting costs (for example 5* item) is 45000cr and 300ce when u convert the ce in crowns its like 15000. if u add it to the recipe cost, it sums up to 60k. (regardless of mats). The new crafting cost for a 5* is 25000 and 800ce and when you convert the ce in crowns its like 40k. if u add this to the recipe cost, it sums up o 75k. The old one is better coz it is 15kcr lower than the new one.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 04:07
#329
Loest's picture
Loest
It's difficult to imagine any

It's difficult to imagine any player spending money on CE to upgrade a character, now that we all know that OOO is happy to literally destroy huge portions of your characters' extant value without warning.

It's like you've just bought a shirt, only it has a radio-controlled self-destruct switch. At any time, the manufacturer can just flip a switch and destroy the shirt you bought from them--with no warning and for no apparent reason. You might buy the shirt anyway cause it's not terribly expensive, it's a cool shirt, and the notion that the company would actually use the self-destruct switch seems so absurdly remote. The first time they do actually flip the switch on a handful of your shirts, though, I would expect you to stop buying stuff from that company.

That's what OOO has done with this patch. Every person who was leveling an item for eventual sale or who had paid in advance for such an item just had a huge portion of value--value that, in many cases, was paid for by CE that was purchased for real money--destroyed. OOO has literally stolen back the product they sold you. Keep playing the game if it's fun, but be leery of buying more product from OOO--they have demonstrated how little they respect their customers very clearly with this patch.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 04:07
#330
SirNiko
Legacy Username
When are we supposed to get a

When are we supposed to get a message from the devs explaining their logic behind the patch? I think we have a pretty clear impression that the vast majority of players hate these changes.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 04:20
#331
Coatl's picture
Coatl
So let me get this straight.

So let me get this straight. These updates included:

CONS-
1. Getting only 1 token for your boss run.
2. Crafting energy demands doubled.
3. Crafted bound items remain bound.

PROS-
1. Auction house included DERP DERP DERP.

If there are any pros or cons I'm missing, please let me know. PLEASE, let me know. Give me another perspective. Please.

Afternote-
I was really hoping to buy CE for SK. I thought, "Woah, this game is great! It's only going to get better so I'll sure buy some CE one day to support the game!"
Now, I'm not sure if the statement holds true anymore..
I'm not paying you anything.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 04:22
#332
Planet
Legacy Username
My opinion:

Training hall:

  • Good for new players, doesn't do much for me.

Auction house:

  • Listing fee is far too expensive for bulk materials
  • The mail spam is a pain, I'd prefer a chat message and instant refunding of the crowns.
  • Browsing for UVs is difficult, I'd prefer having an abbreviated description of the UV where the star level is currently displayed.
  • When sorting items by price, having it factor the amount of items into the sorting would be useful, or better yet display the price per item.

Recipe changes:

  • We should be refunded the appropriate amount of crowns for our learned recipes.
  • With the increased cost for crafting, I'm now never going to craft an item above two stars until I have an amazing UV.

Item binding changes:

  • This is a horrible, horrible idea that will only make you lose money and players.
Wed, 05/18/2011 - 04:29
#333
Azurenightmare
Stuff you left out: PROS: -

Stuff you left out:

PROS:

- Training hall (I guess if you are a 'tard... though you can like, test weapons, not that you can sell them off if you didn't like them).
- snipes with headgear
- lower recipe prices
- no energy cost if invited to clockworks

CONS:
-inviting to basil is now useless (not even crystals, which is silly considering you get less CR from crystals than it costs to port there)

Just in the spirit of fairness.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 04:48
#334
Starlight14
Legacy Username
Man oh man, yesterday I was

Man oh man, yesterday I was so happy that an auction house was on its way. Little did I know that all the other patch notes were going to be so gamebreaking.

>* Using a bound items in alchemy will result in the finished product being bound as well. For example, crafting a 4* item that >requires a item of heat level 5 will result in an item that is bound to the crafter.

I guess I can understand the reason behind wanting people to make their own 4* and 5* gear. It prevents people from skipping to end-game by paying to win. But I can't help but feel that we've lost a great social aspect of the game. Friends helping friends.

>* Crafting energy costs have increased.

I can only think of the horrible things this is going to do to the price of CE. Likely, people like myself will no longer be able to make enough money to purchase CE after a single run, which means we can only play for like an hour per day. I like the game very much, but I'd rather just put it behind me if it comes to that. Personally, I thought CE crafting costs were terrible before, but now they're at a whole new level.

In a game so thoroughly based on crafting and social interaction, the first change seems like a huge shame, but the second change is likely to have resounding effects throughout the game, mainly by altering CE prices. I would agree with most of the players that the last change is potentially gamebreaking, but it really depends on the CE market. I'm no economics professor, so I'll just have to see how it goes.

>We will also be watching cold, hard stats to see whether there is, as has been theorized, a major outflow of players, and we will >be watching to see whether people just stop buying things. Ditto for a multitude of factors.

Good to know.

Edit: And I recommend removing the listing price from the auction house so that people aren't potentially punished for using it. Between how common crafting materials are and the listing price and the fee afterward, we're probably going to have people selling items for a loss.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 04:44
#335
Gameface252
Legacy Username
I like to use the hall to

I like to use the hall to mess around when I'm bored. I'm going to explore mostly on mist for the time being and it's nice to be able to swing my sword without having to pay 10 ME for the ability. Also I've been trying to troll people by hitting them with the fire pots :P

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 05:01
#336
teejing
Legacy Username
oh well, game was really

oh well, game was really fun.

Me and most teamliquid guys reached t3 after 1-2weeks and since then the only thing for us to do is vanaduken runs or level gear on jelly runs and sell the 5* premades.

Now there is only van left haha, oh well our 150man guild is down to 5 active players and with the patch i guess thats it.

I am quitting and not primarily because of the patch but because i have been waiting for more content for almost 4 weeks now...seems this game is meant to be playewd though in 2 weeks and then forgotten.

I really liked the zelda like combat like everyone, nice quality game, just missing the content to entertain for longer.

see you guys in diablo 3 beta : P

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 05:17
#337
Sunflash
Legacy Username
-----

Oh good. So now there's no reason for all my recipies except the 2* versions?

So what, this turned from 'team/friend-based gameplay' to 'every knight for themselves and /only/ themselves'?

I guess the only upside to this change is that...oh wait. there /isn't/ one. What the BLOODY BLUE BLAZES IS THE POINT?! SERIOUSLY.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 05:19
#338
tyrannus1108
Legacy Username
#### Y O U WHOLE SYSTEM

####
Y O U
Action House
SYSTEM
and
you
whole
three Rings
SEGA
company
WTF
SUCK
PATCH
SHAMEFUL
UPDATE
5/18

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 05:30
#339
chalor
Legacy Username
I think Spiral Knights simply

I think Spiral Knights simply WAS too good to be true.

It was quite simply the best F2P model I've ever seen - those with patience could enjoy everything the game has to offer, and could play indefinitely for free, though progression is slowed after a certain amount of continuous play. Meanwhile, those more willing to part with their cash, or those less patient, funded their ability to do this.

I believe that if the new crafting costs had been in place from the start, nobody would have thought them outrageous. The game may not have been as popular, as free progression takes more than twice as long, and continuous free play may be tougher as energy is in higher demand and less people pay. But this is speculation.

I can think of three scenarios explaining the decision (these are not all mutually exclusive):

1 - The initial costs used have proved to make free play too attractive - this has led to a lower-than-projected income from CE, and the maths has been recalculated to take into account the lower-than-anticipated willingness of players to part with cash for CE. These new crafting costs are what has come out, and they've been directly applied.

2 - The game is not currently seen to have tapped enough of the market that changing the prices now will upset enough people to do the playerbase any long-term damage. Or at least, not enough damage to offset the additional anticipated income.

3 - The initial costs were intentionally used to make the game as a whole attractive, and build up a sufficient playerbase that the cost increase, though driving away many, would leave enough CE-buyers to make more money than before.

The effect the change will have on free players is yet to be seen - at best, however, progression has been drastically slowed past 2-star gear. At worst, if crown-energy prices rise as much as many doomsayers predict, free play will be much tougher once the player's mist energy dries up.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 05:31
#340
mingyism
Legacy Username
@Feynt on Crowns and Crystal Energy

Dude, I completely and whole heartedly agree with you. Energy is being used TOO much while Crowns are being made redundant. It would be excellent if they at least made entrances to the dungeons accessible with Crowns. THAT way, people would have a fair chance to play whenever they want, instead of having to wait around for the bloomin' energy to regenerate every..what....15 minutes?

Excellent stuff man.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 05:32
#341
Ouros
Legacy Username
I'm f2p, and I don't expect

I'm f2p, and I don't expect my 5* crafting to be that much tougher. I've been crafting what I have on my own, and I'm just going to turn the crowns I save on recipes into CE for the crafting. The CE hike on 4-5* isn't even worth discussing.

Basil ports were lame. Those of us who are reasonable prefer the game without them.

High level trading both is and isn't the late game. The late game which is built into SK is farming Vanaduke for Fang of Vog. Once you get Fang of Vog, you wait for updates. The late game that some people have created for themselves is about making tons of money by selling high level gear. That late game is now over, but it's not so core to the game that "the game is dead".

I'm just going to sit back and enjoy the inevitable opening of the core.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 05:49
#342
Rotten
Rotten's Thoughts

Preface..

I've been playing games since the commodore 64. Got the original Nintendo when I was 5 (1985) and I've been gaming ever since. I've played Free to Play games. I've played WoW for years (spent hundreds in game/subscription costs). I've played lots of games in between (Quake 1/2/3, Duke Nukem, Diablo, Star Craft, Half-Life 1/2, Counter-Strike Ori/Source, not including all the Nintendo, Super NES, N64, Gamecube, Wii, Gameboy, Gameboy Advance, XBox, XBox 360 games, etc, etc, etc, etc. I'm now 31 and I've got a great paying job. Cost, just doesn't matter to me that much as I've got the luxury of a little disposable income. If I like a game, I play it and pay what I think it's worth to me.

Why did I even bother to type the above?

Well, I liked this game, until last night. The auction house is nice! It's going to drop the crown price of materials, etc, big time, but that's because the EASE of selling. We've all got a common forum to sell stuff and that means everyone now has to compete with everyone else (even while they are offline/not in trade).

That's fine, maybe needs some tweaks.

But the binding of high level equipment, hugely increased costs of alchemy and making people run a whole dungeon (read: spend lots of CE going from level 1 all the way down) to get anything of value out of the boss... I just don't know what to say besides, it's obvious, it's a cash grab.

Honestly, I just don't want to dive all the way through every dungeon just to kill a boss for tokens that I can't even use to buy an item with the intention to sell. I have zero motivation to go into the clockworks anymore. Heck, I still need the omega shell recipe, however, instead of going down to Basil, it'll be smarter to just watch the Auction House for it.

I've spent money on this game, not only because it would help me in game, but because I truely wanted to give you guys some cash to keep developing the game. I feel really bad saying this, because it's obvious a lot of love/work went into making a great Auction House (and game in general), but you've kind of ruined it for me with the last patch.

I've said it in many other F2P games. SCALPUL. Use a SCALPUL, not a sledge hammer, when making updates/changes. You took a good game and instead of tweaking it, you absolutely smashed it (for better or worse, but it looks like the latter).

Not saying good bye yet, but subjectively, I just don't see much more reason to keep playing. I'll probably play with the AH a little (because I like to play the profit game) but I'm betting that will fade quickly from my hobbies. And unfortunately, so will this game.

=(

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 05:57
#343
kitster121
Legacy Username
T.T

This is the only update that turn us down T.T

You made a horrible mistake.

You know this is a good game but you ruined it.

Please Devs, PLEASE TAKE NOTE OF OUR COMMENTS.

Why did you put forums if you didn't read them?

well i don't care about your answer anyway... maybe a week i'll quit.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 06:02
#344
Stephaani
Legacy Username
After my last reply,

After my last reply, somewhere in this thread i went to bed and thought it over. There could've been so many other ways to have done this update w/o ruining the player experience ;/ Two things i thought of were;

Instead of raising energy costs on crafting, raise the crown cost and the amount of materials you need, its already pretty hard to obtain all of the *5 mats that you need, if you dont buy from players with CE.
& Make an item that can unbound equipped items, the guy who sells the things to open trinkets and weapon slots could sell it, for energy..

The auction house 10% of fees is extremely high too, you have to raise up your sell price to pay off the auction house whilst still gaining profit.
Maybe ive missed something, but why isnt there a "buying" bit aswell? I only saw places to sell.
For example if im looking for a *5 recipe i still have to spam trade chat hoping for someone to sell it me, where it could be so much easier to go on auction price, type what im looking for and my price im offering..

Meh, i really hope there is some improvement, I really liked this game and now i just dont have the motivation to keep playing it anymore, all ive done since the update is afk in town and watch people complain.
You say you want hard proof that this update was bad, isnt it enough proof to have a feedback thread of the majority of the game complaining that they hate it? Theres even threads being made about it which you close down. & Its funny how you have the time to edit small posts about swearing and little bugs in the game, but you dont have the time to reply back with a serious answer of what you are going to do about this update, to ANY of us.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 06:03
#345
Geminiman005
Legacy Username
SEEYA

The auction house, while a much needed addition, was implemented in the worst way possible.

  • Listing fees
    This is stupid. Seriously, way to try and nickel-and-dime the community. At the very best players will just pass the fees on to the buyer. (yes i know this gets refunded IF the item sells, but keep in mind thats a huge IF.)
  • Listings expire
    With the limited amount of available items to put up for auction (since this update so graciously removed all 4 and 5star items with the exception of a very limited few) there will be so much competition, that its going to take ages for anything to sell since the limited items available to even be put up will be in massive quantities. With that being said, items we put up are going to take a LOT longer than 2 days to sell unless its something insanely rare, in which case people will by pass the auction house completely.
  • Commission fees
    10% of the selling fee? Not so much a big deal on small items (though don't worry those wont sell since the market is flooded with them anyway) but, As far as reagents and items that are more rare (Like [Sun Silver] or a high grade [Heart Pendant]) are you really going to give up 1/10th of the asking price? Or are you going to take your chances and spam trade chat? It's just stupid.
  • Limited usage
    So intelligent players aren't going to waste money putting high grade items up for sale due to the stupid nickel and dime fees, They aren't going to bother putting common materials up due to the listing fees and high probability of not selling (who wants to waste money). And the only other thing that might have been viable, actual weapons and gears have been removed as a possibility.

So, tell me what is the point of an auction house that no remotely intelligent person would ever use?

While we do need changes to mechanics of crafting, the changes we got are not the changes we need.

  • Energy costs increased
    This is a complete mystery to me. Why increase the amount of energy people need to craft things? There are so many better solutions if you want to grub for money.
    1. Cash shop
      I mean expanding beyond the simple idea of cash currency (Crystal Energy) and allowing players to purchase items from an actual cash shop. These items would not interfere with in-game play these items would focus on fashion. People pay a lot of money for fashion (hence the success of that Rose Regalia "event").
    2. Unique Variant modifiers
      This is a little trickier, but perhaps allowing users to manually add a UV to their items? Or maybe allow "leveling" a UV on an item via a CE expendature (example Charge Time Reduction: Low-->Medium) for 2x the Energy cost of the weapon's Energy Crafting Cost?

      Or perhaps just paying a higher energy fee when crafting to increase the proc rate of UVs?
      10% more energy paid modifies the proc rate by 1.1 (which, assuming the proc rate being 10% would be 0.1 x 1.1 = 0.11, or a 1% higher proc rate...up to double the energy cost (200%) for a 0.1 x 2.0 = 0.2 double chance)

  • Price hike
    A mild price hike in the actual RMT (real money trade) value of Crystal Energy. People would be more understanding for a mild price hike for CE (after all we ALL understand F2P games need to rake money in some how). But players aren't stupid and we know when someone is trying to gouge our pockets.

All I am saying is, there are so many better solutions than what we were given it feels like either zero thought was put into the decision process, or someone hates their users.

  • Bound items
    This is the dumbest, most stupid, annoying and most of all useless "feature" of many, many online games. I don't know how it ever became so popular, but it is something that has become so ingrained in today's games that I won't argue against item binds (but I will fondly reminisce about the GOOD days of online gaming, like Ragnarok Online before that terribad Renewal update haha). I guess this bullet is a moot point. Moving on~ :P
  • Auto-bind crafting results
    Okay, this is taking the absurd level of stupidity associated with item binding to a whole new level of derpness that I have not seen on any game past or present. Seriously this is shocking because it is so absurd and stupid there is absolutely no intelligent, justifiable reason for it.

    Seriously, try me. Give me your best shot. Justify it (intelligently). You can't. No one can. All this "feature" does is destroy a facet of the game that people enjoyed. I know, people enjoying something? Better put an end to that.

  • Market destruction
    While no one can really say there was a "real" market (at least by conventional gaming standards), people will argue that a trade channel and whatever we had before this train wreck of an update came through was better. Through increased energy costs, and auto-binding you've not only destroyed people's ability to buy, sell, and trade items, you've effectively killed a lot of freedom in the play styles of a huge portion of the player base. That is what really has everyone so upset: the freedom to play how we want being killed. Instead we're all being forced to do the same thing with very, very little deviation (which is boring, duh!).
  • Boss tokens
    While I will partially concede that the way boss tokens are awarded and divided up is a good thing (after all its not fair for someone to get just as much reward as someone else for only 1/2 the effort...or whatever), there is another problem here as well. It goes back to the auto-binding (herp, derp) thing which is really lame. Some people really liked grinding those bosses, or would come along with other people on their runs because the rewards and the -freedom- they had with those rewards gave a lot of incentive. We're basically all being forced to be stingy misers with the fruits of our endeavors instead of having the freedom to acquire, sell, or trade things.
  • Basil ports
    Well this one is a partial victory for you guys as well. So what people can't cheat the system and skip to buying whatever recipes they want. That was an unintended exploit from the beginning that got fixed.

    However, since it's been fixed and the minerals have been removed from terminals, why not let us port directly down to the terminals from haven? As long as we've made it to that terminal once before legitimately, we should be able to skip to it again at any time we want (though a direct port would forfeit our ability to wheel and deal with Basil). If we're not looking for recipes why should we waste our time with the preceding levels if we've already proven our mettle?

    This should have been obvious (like so many other things). Now that I think about it, I'm not surprised that idea never occured to you guys, or if it did, I am not surprised it wasn't implemented (people might actually like it!).

    In closing, it is a common CM trick to open "feed back threads" that rope all the community's ramblings (likes, dislikes, rants, raves, etc, whatever) into one area for easy management. I think it is important to know, however, that these feedback threads aren't taken as legit suggestions by the people with power. Our feedback is no more useful to Three Rings/SEGA/whatever than reasoning with a brick wall. No, they wait to see what people do in-game.

    That is to say, they way to see if enough people are willing to suffer through the BS in game and keep playing and paying regardless of what we say on here. The truth is, no matter how unhappy we ALL are with the update, some people will continue to play (unhappily) because they're still convinced that they still like the game. This behavior tends to contradict our voiced opinions on the forum (hence why feedback threads are nothing but a parlor trick more or less). If you guys FEEL a particular way, then act the part. Don't say one thing and then do another.

    Sorry for the wall of text, I am gone until all this BS is fixed.

    -Adam

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 06:57
#346
Tsuyoi
Legacy Username
new Crown/CE tradeoff of crafting

This is simply a response to all those who argue that crafting costs haven't changed much, since they reduced the crown costs of recipes, so you can use those crowns to buy CE.

This only holds true if the CE-crowns market was held constant. However, that's simply not the case. OOO has shifted emphasis away from crowns, from which they get jack profit, to CE, from which they make oodles of cash. Know what that means? The crown-CE market is gonna inflate like no tomorrow. Crowns suddenly became a majorly useless currency, whereas thousands of CE will be needed to craft gear. Give it a few weeks, CE market will jump to 6-7k crowns per 100. Once you take this into consideration, then no, the crafting costs have not "stayed mostly the same". They simply now require less in game currency, which you can obtain freely by grinding, and more paid currency, for which you have to shell out real money.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 07:08
#347
Trisfald
Legacy Username
this update is very good, it

this update is very good, it shows how much the devs want to maintain this game on a certain style even if less CE will be brought complessively

come on it's common knowledge that a lot of players wanted to rush T3 and spent huge amount of money to buy the gear, do you still think the update is driven by greed?

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 07:11
#348
Tsuyoi
Legacy Username
@ Trisfald I do hope you're

@ Trisfald

I do hope you're just trolling. They're trying to force us to buy MORE CE to craft/do all levels of dungeons. They were upset because new players were simply using crowns they got for free to buy 4/5* gear, instead of paying cash to obtain ce to craft. Thus, they made it so you CAN'T just use crowns to buy your gear now, and they also increased CE(read, REAL MONEY) costs of all crafts.

So YES, this patch was ALL GREED. They simply tossed in auction house and training hall to try to cover up, but that failed spectacularly.

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 07:12
#349
NextTime000
Legacy Username
here is an Idea:

If the idea was to slow progression into the higher star weapons, why not just make higher-grade materials that much more rare? also perhaps increase the amount of said ingredients that are required to make higher-star equips? sure some people will still be able to "buy their way into the endgame" but I think you just missed a key word there: BUY, as in, they are SPENDING MONEY to get into the higher tiers. this update makes CE MUCH more valuable while making CR MUCH less valuable, which will prevent most casual players from playing beyond their ME allotment as they can't afford any CE from the market. 3* equips will be the farthest some may go, as it will... you know what, lets just see how this all plays out. I am now more curious that furious, and while people are wildly speculating stuff, I want to see what REALLY happens (besides the number of people quitting trolololo)

Wed, 05/18/2011 - 07:17
#350
Etendue's picture
Etendue
This update is crippling

This update is crippling trade. Please, for the love of god, remove the 4-5 star trade restrictions and the high CE crafting requirements!

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