Training Costs are a Thing of the Past

[Karkais]

I could be wrong, but in my experience with this Rishi and Yavin 4, there simply aren't enough quests to not take a net loss on training. There aren't enough quests to even level to 60 on.

 

And you would be right at that. The money earned through quests and selling vendor junk from mobs during lvl 55->60 is not enough to pay the full training costs at level 60.

 

Overall, it is a good thing that training costs are going away, it was unfortunate that subscribers had to play a week and pay billions of credits before devs realized what the problem was.

 

They just move the credit sink somewhere else. Or they reduce rewards. Training costs have been intentional from the start.

 

In this particular instance, its a case of credit sink being greater than the faucet. That tells me that someone somewhere made wrong calculations.

Edited December 8, 2014 by Karkais

[Orizuru]

Training costs were a terrible credit sink to begin with. They really only impacted the players with the least credits. Anyone who knows how to make money in the game earned credits at such a rate that the cost of training was nothing to even bat an eyelash at.

 

One-time purchases that are never needed to be purchased again aren't very good credit sinks for this reason. All they really do is slow down the players who already struggle to earn credits.

[eartharioch]

Training costs were a terrible credit sink to begin with. They really only impacted the players with the least credits. Anyone who knows how to make money in the game earned credits at such a rate that the cost of training was nothing to even bat an eyelash at.

 

One-time purchases that are never needed to be purchased again aren't very good credit sinks for this reason. All they really do is slow down the players who already struggle to earn credits.

 

To be clear, as a player, I never "liked" training costs. That said, training costs have been part of the RPG genre since pnp dnd, so BW wasn't breaking new ground here. You say that all they really do is slow players down -- well, for a game that was designed to make money by charging people a monthly access fee, why would that be 9from the devs' perspective) a bad thing?

 

In swtor's case, getting rid of costs now makes sense, since the augment system (which wasn't in place at launch) serves pretty much the same function -- 42K to install the kit, 75K for the kit itself, and the BiS augments are going for upwards of 250K. Yeah, prices will go down a bit, but even after 1.5 years of level 55, it was easily 150K per item to gear up, so over 2M. With that kind of credit sink in place, training costs were just a free kick to the crotch.

[DarthTHC]

I have a suggestion to add to the list.

 

Modify the game in such a way that, via the forum software, BioWare admins / mods can set a "chronic whiner" flag on an account. Once that flag is set, it lasts for 30 days. The flag would be invisible to everyone but admins / mods.

 

The ingame effect of this flag would be a disadvantageous pressure on all ingame die rolls. The player's characters would hit less often for less damage. They would be hit more often for more damage. They would have less of a chance to win loot rolls. Nodes they harvest would grant fewer items. Crafting missions would fail more often and crit less often.

 

The only benefit to this would be to make the developers feel better, of course, but it's still more productive and rational than anything else suggested except "do nothing".

Edited December 8, 2014 by DarthTHC

[Code_Airwolf]

"Oh quit complaining/whining/crying, money is easy to make in this game, I've got trillions, just run some dailies!"

 

BW: We are going to do away with training costs altogether!

 

"What? This is an outrage! I want a refund for my valuable credits that I spent, I'm at a tremendous disadvantage now and feel completely shafted"

 

 

Too funny.

 

Run some dailies.

[BlownSi]

"Oh quit complaining/whining/crying, money is easy to make in this game, I've got trillions, just run some dailies!"

 

BW: We are going to do away with training costs altogether!

 

"What? This is an outrage! I want a refund for my valuable credits that I spent, I'm at a tremendous disadvantage now and feel completely shafted"

 

 

Too funny.

 

Run some dailies.

 

You obviously have missed the point of the complaints.

[Code_Airwolf]

You obviously have missed the point of the complaints.

 

Not really. I've been here through this entire conversation since the release. I find it ironic that these same credits that were last week so easy to obtain by doing dailies as if growing on trees, is now such a disastrous loss needing to be refunded w//the fate of the galaxy depending on it.

 

The issue was a forced respec that we were having to pay to retrain. A free respec w/refund for spent was the request, but instead they went the additional mile and will be removing training costs permanently, forever!!! I call that a fair trade and for whatever I did already spend I will definitely break even in the very near future, and profit exponentially w/55-60 and all our Alts. I realize Spock is from another universe, but it's using something called logic.

Edited December 8, 2014 by Code_Airwolf

[pan_sObak]

And you would be right at that. The money earned through quests and selling vendor junk from mobs during lvl 55->60 is not enough to pay the full training costs at level 60.

.

 

Wrong.

 

Rishii and Yavin main line gives about 350k. And there are also side quests on Rishii.

And daylies on Yavin and Rishii give 100k more (without weeklies) for 1 run.

And you can sell a lot of loot and old armor - you'll get full set of 168 and full set of 178 on Rishi and Yavin.

 

And doing all quests on Rishi and Yavin (including daylies), only with 10% guild xp buff, i've got to 60 before Revan

No flashpoints, no ops no other dayly planets.

 

If you want to use legacy gear changing mods - pay extra for it.

If you want to skip content and lvl through flashpoints or PVP - pay extra for it.

 

Yes, skill costs were deliberately invented as credits sunk - but quests rewards give all you need to lvl

It's suposed to make people not to skip the game content but to play through it - in order to get credits at least

 

If you prefer to skip the game, to run fast and miss a lot - it's your own fault.

You skip content, you skip the game, you skip money and xp.

Blame nobody but yourself. Period.

[Orizuru]

To be clear, as a player, I never "liked" training costs. That said, training costs have been part of the RPG genre since pnp dnd, so BW wasn't breaking new ground here. You say that all they really do is slow players down -- well, for a game that was designed to make money by charging people a monthly access fee, why would that be 9from the devs' perspective) a bad thing?

 

In swtor's case, getting rid of costs now makes sense, since the augment system (which wasn't in place at launch) serves pretty much the same function -- 42K to install the kit, 75K for the kit itself, and the BiS augments are going for upwards of 250K. Yeah, prices will go down a bit, but even after 1.5 years of level 55, it was easily 150K per item to gear up, so over 2M. With that kind of credit sink in place, training costs were just a free kick to the crotch.

 

I think we are agreeing?

 

I was simply pointing out why training costs shouldn't be considered a credit sink because there was some back and forth here about how this change would impact credit sinks in the game.

[BlownSi]

Not really. I've been here through this entire conversation since the release. I find it ironic that these same credits that were last week so easy to obtain by doing dailies as if growing on trees, is now such a disastrous loss needing to be refunded w//the fate of the galaxy depending on it.

 

The issue was a forced respec that we were having to pay to retrain. A free respec w/refund for spent was the request, but instead they went the additional mile and will be removing training costs permanently, forever!!! I call that a fair trade and for whatever I did already spend I will definitely break even in the very near future, and profit exponentially w/55-60 and all our Alts. I realize Spock is from another universe, but it's using something called logic.

 

And I agree, credits are easily made, and I for one have already made back what I have spent on the two toons I have leveled to 60 already. But the point is we have paid $20 to basically beta test this expansion, between all the bugs, the lag, and now this late change with the ability training costs. It is the principle of the matter, not so much the credits.

[Frybert]

I have a suggestion to add to the list.

 

Modify the game in such a way that, via the forum software, BioWare admins / mods can set a "chronic whiner" flag on an account. Once that flag is set, it lasts for 30 days. The flag would be invisible to everyone but admins / mods.

 

The ingame effect of this flag would be a disadvantageous pressure on all ingame die rolls. The player's characters would hit less often for less damage. They would be hit more often for more damage. They would have less of a chance to win loot rolls. Nodes they harvest would grant fewer items. Crafting missions would fail more often and crit less often.

 

The only benefit to this would be to make the developers feel better, of course, but it's still more productive and rational than anything else suggested except "do nothing".

 

Combat whining by giving them something else to whine about? I like it!

[DarthTHC]

Combat whining by giving them something else to whine about? I like it!

 

But they won't know it's being done to them! Nobody will know. That's the beauty of it.

 

The game will simply be silently meaner to them for 30 days. If they notice, they'll come here to complain that the game is hard and everyone will tell them they're nuts.

 

It's the ultimate in recurring entertainment!

[Deewe]

I have a suggestion to add to the list.

 

Modify the game in such a way that, via the forum software, BioWare admins / mods can set a "chronic whiner" flag on an account. Once that flag is set, it lasts for 30 days. The flag would be invisible to everyone but admins / mods.

 

The ingame effect of this flag would be a disadvantageous pressure on all ingame die rolls. The player's characters would hit less often for less damage. They would be hit more often for more damage. They would have less of a chance to win loot rolls. Nodes they harvest would grant fewer items. Crafting missions would fail more often and crit less often.

 

The only benefit to this would be to make the developers feel better, of course, but it's still more productive and rational than anything else suggested except "do nothing".

You know they can't do that, cause somehow it would be leaked and a nasty lawsuit could be made on that.

 

But I see where you are going, you want bonuses for people like you that eats everything that BioWares throw at them. Smart

[DarthTHC]

You know they can't do that, cause somehow it would be leaked and a nasty lawsuit could be made on that.

 

But I see where you are going, you want bonuses for people like you that eats everything that BioWares throw at them. Smart

 

Where did I say bonuses? Besides, I've made plenty of suggestions to improve the game. And way back when the game was very rough around the edges, I complained, too. I simply temper my expectations with reason.

 

Perpetual complainers are at their happiest when they are complaining. I just want them to be happy.

Edited December 8, 2014 by DarthTHC

[Andryah]

I'm quoting LA because he has cataloged all the "bright ideas" expressed, and embedded my thoughts on each idea for remedy. I'm not picking on him, he is just the messenger.

 

1) Full refund of all ability training that has been purchased since the start of Early Access (Dec 2nd)

Unrealistic actually. People seem to think this is a simple as running a script and issuing a credit. It's not. They can certainly write a script to look up the training costs on a player character. Of course it would take time. But that's the easy part. The hard part is converting that into credits in the mail to the proper character. AND.. you can bet it will generate more complaints.... where people claim they got an incorrect refund amount, yada, yada. This one is snowball waiting to happen.

2) 5 days of subscription time

This one would be fairly easy.... but the problem is some players would love it....others would complain that this is not what they want and demand more. This one is a snowball waiting to happen.

3) 7 days of subscription time

Rinse and repeat my comment on number 2

4) One time stipend of 200CC

Rinse and repeat my comment on number 2

5) One time stipend of 500CC

Rinse and repeat my comment on number 2

6) A special mount or weapon

Rinse and repeat my comment on number 2 and add steroids... because this one would surely get many complaints about what they got is not what they like. Does NOBODY recall all the complaints about every free celebration award ever given out over the last three years???

7) Return of 12XP, even if just for early access

A) too late for early access. B) makes no sense at all...since it simply encourage players to speed level through the new content and then come back and complain there is now nothing to do.

8) Free legacy unlocks for a short period

In no way does this correlate fairly to what a player may have incurred in costs.

9) Free legacy unlock for Field Respecialization

rinse and repeat my comment on 8.

10) Reduction of mod extraction costs

rinse and repeat my comment on 8

11) Reduction of "death tax" in story mode flashpoints and operations

Oh please.

12) Addition of 3 more tabs to Legacy Storage, paid or unpaid

Absolutely zero correlation to the problem. This is a special agenda request.

14) Additional speeder speed tier of 120%

rinse and repeat my comment on 12

15) Free Priority Transport terminal for Strongholds

rinse and repeat my comment on 12

16) A one time stipend of credits..50-70k for characters below 56, 500-600k for characters at 60

No way to do this fairly and effectively. It will likely introduce more errors, complaints and anxieties in the player base. In other words.. this will make matters worse in many cases.

17) 50k per character awarded to all early access players

Does not fairly cover the real retraining costs by players. Free training for life is much more powerful to the collective player base from an economic perspective.

18) 24X hyperpack

ABSURD.... absurdly absurd... and a special agenda solution. Not all players are into cartel packs, and if you dump one on every character it will literally saturate server economies overnight.

 

If I have missed any, or need to add any new suggestions let me know. I will expand the list and repost it when needed.

Admirable effort on your part LA, but it's a waste of time. This is an MMO, not a representative democracy. Devs take player feedback for sure, but ultimately they must do what is best in the long term for the collective player base.... NOT serve special interests.

 

Anyone that thinks that free training for every character for life moving forward is not a globally effective compensation to players (except players who quit) is not dealing with reality. The only players that will not benefit greatly by it are the quitters and the transients. Anyone that does not consider zeroing out training costs as an apology for borking up retraining is not dealing with reality. There are a million active players, and most of these were likely impacted by retraining costs in the last week (since it was tied to 3.0, NOT the expac people have to purchase). When dealing with a million different customers.. a business has to create and implement a remedy to players that works essentially like a class action payout.

 

This nonsense about additional apologies and special perks or refunds for ruffled feathers needs to stop IMO. Discussion and disagreement is fine.. but most suggestions/demands for what would make any given player happy with remedy is nothing more then a chaotic collective of special interests.

 

The free training for life is something that they can easily implement (we already had it during 12x so everyone knows it works). Which means they can do it quickly... rather then taking weeks to build/debug/manage some giant scripted refund of actual training costs effort. It's good business.. and it will save the collective player base billions and billions of credits moving forward.

Edited December 8, 2014 by Andryah

[Andryah]

I simply temper my expectations with reason.

 

Same here. If only this could be a prerequisite to playing an MMO.

 

Perpetual complainers are at their happiest when they are complaining.

 

True true. I honestly don't know how these folks get through life... but they seem to manage....albeit on a constant tidal wave of dissatisfaction with everything.

[DarthTHC]

Same here. If only this could be a prerequisite to playing an MMO.

 

Can't. All MMO's would go out of business instantly.

[DOHboy]

SO if they had taken half the skills we pay for at 60 and instead applied them at 59 (since I never had any skills to train at 59) would people still complain?

 

 

For those in Rio Linda

That is a rhetorical question, which means it doesn't need answering...

 

 

[worsin]

Its not hard to understand how this is a slap in the face to the most dedicated players. Those are the players that pre-paid and leveled to 60 first. All of these people paid 5-700k per character to get their new skills and then 2 days later they announce free training.

 

So in the end the dedicated players get screwed and the casual players dont.

[Hotte]

So in the end the dedicated players get screwed and the casual players dont.

 

You do realize that the only difference between early access and no early access is the date when the purchase was made, don't you?

I'm not argueing that early access made it happen that you had the Chance to Level up and had to Train those abilities. That is not in question here.

 

I'm asking you what exactly makes you more dedicated than someone else who just missed the day to pre-order in time to get early access. Can't be the price of the expac.

So, what exactly is it that makes you feel more dedicated than Fred Casual who didn't preorder in time but has never missed a single day of subscription since launch?

[Trevor_the_Bruce]

I'm quoting LA because he has cataloged all the "bright ideas" expressed, and embedded my thoughts on each idea for remedy. I'm not picking on him, he is just the messenger.

 

 

 

Anyone that thinks that free training for every character for life moving forward is not a globally effective compensation to players (except players who quit) is not dealing with reality. The only players that will not benefit greatly by it are the quitters and the transients. Anyone that does not consider zeroing out training costs as an apology for borking up retraining is not dealing with reality. There are a million active players, and most of these were likely impacted by retraining costs in the last week (since it was tied to 3.0, NOT the expac people have to purchase). When dealing with a million different customers.. a business has to create and implement a remedy to players that works essentially like a class action payout.

 

This nonsense about additional apologies and special perks or refunds for ruffled feathers needs to stop IMO. Discussion and disagreement is fine.. but most suggestions/demands for what would make any given player happy with remedy is nothing more then a chaotic collective of special interests.

 

The free training for life is something that they can easily implement (we already had it during 12x so everyone knows it works). Which means they can do it quickly... rather then taking weeks to build/debug/manage some giant scripted refund of actual training costs effort. It's good business.. and it will save the collective player base billions and billions of credits moving forward.

 

Good points. I completely agree with you. People need to realize that what BW has doen is good for the future of the game and that BW can't meet every little demand that they post on the foums because of some precieved slight. To me, all the people complaining about credit costs for training skills from 56-60 sounds to me like they are complaining about having to spend credits for training costs from level 1 and that they deserve a refund for all the skills they've paid for since 1.1. This is ridiculous and unreasonable. The free training costs in the future is more than enough of an apology and is going to net them more customers in the long run IMO from a business standpoint.

[Taramayne]

Eh. This is an annoyance to those who spent a bunch of credits but hardly breaks the game. Those same people can go run through a set of level 50 dailys on Ilum, Belsavis,and Corellia, then toss in CZ198 and Oricon and make that 500-700k back in an hour or three.

 

At 60 those missions will be a cakewalk to finish quickly.

 

It's really time to stop whining and suck it up people. I paid training costs for 3 characters already, and I'm dealing with it just fine. All the rest of my alts will benefit, just as everyone else's alts will.

 

Let's move on.

[Aldael]

First of all, getting rid of training costs, great idea.

 

But the timing, wrong execution.

Timing was awful, as a few days earlier you said costs of retraining skill you already had, was working as intented, and then you change saying that you are going back on your word, people feel betrayed (I leveled 1 toon to 60 already and paid for it, but others had leveled a few more)

 

Costs of retraining 55 lvl skils (i mean the ones you have to relearn, being that lvl from 1-55) was not much (but if u retrained all your alts it could be a lot), but the "new" ranks from there were very expensive (around to 1 million credit total in leveling to 60).

 

This, united with all other bugs, lag, and situations from the past days, makes the preorder buyers very sensitive. A gesture about it, getting some kind of compensation, be that money (unlikely), title, decoration, free time (unlikely), crystal... would make up it a little more (although you would have detractors whatever you do).

 

 

On other subject, getting money (credits)in this game is easy, but it takes time (unless you have a lot of luck with a drop from packs or get a lucky buy from GTN to sell afterward), and for people with little time to play ( work, family, and another issues are priority to the game) takes a lot of effort to gain it.

[DarthTHC]

Its not hard to understand how this is a slap in the face to the most dedicated players. Those are the players that pre-paid and leveled to 60 first. All of these people paid 5-700k per character to get their new skills and then 2 days later they announce free training.

 

So in the end the dedicated players get screwed and the casual players dont.

 

Actually, it is pretty hard to understand. I would classify myself as one of the game's most dedicated players. Been here non-stop since about midway through game test. Pre-ordered each expac. I play at least a few days every week that I'm not traveling for business.

 

I do not feel slapped in the face. Heck, I even trained 58-60 after I learned they were removing the training fees on Tuesday.

 

I didn't get slapped in the face. I didn't get screwed. I got to play the expac early, and as designed, except for one quest that didn't work. Overall, heck of a good release.

Edited December 8, 2014 by DarthTHC

[Frybert]

Its not hard to understand how this is a slap in the face to the most dedicated players. Those are the players that pre-paid and leveled to 60 first. All of these people paid 5-700k per character to get their new skills and then 2 days later they announce free training.

 

So in the end the dedicated players get screwed and the casual players dont.

Assuming you are right, this may be the reason some of us former dedicated players have turned casual.