Changes Coming to Packs with 4.1

[OranoQuanteras]

This is still not what we want dev's! Now the chance of getting an item from the current pack list is diminished with the stupid cube thing, we are still being forced into gambling on what type of item that cube is! If i want to gamble on armor BSG packs, I'm not going to go pickup mount BSG packs. Thats exactly what this is! I'm trying to throw my money at, gambling on what armor, mount, decoration, I was getting from the BSG packs, while not having to deal with the other stuff! Its a win for me trying to collect stuff, and a win for you because you now have money for one of the starving devs!

 

We want packs that introduce new stuff for a given term! we want the return of the BSG packs to get older stuff without the unneccessary super-gambling! Give us what we want, and stop yanking us around!

So much this!

I really liked the BSG packs, because I still needed some of the older armors, mounts....but what made them work for me @ least was buying a pack specifically for that type of item (armor, mount). This I am not a fan of.

[omaan]

I think i won't buy packs now, it is useless spare of my CC.I'll start to farm credits for what i really need and buy it on GTN.

[LordKygar]

CM devs: We've got this awesome new idea! They're going to love it!!!

*Eric passes the announcement along*

Forums: RAAAAAAGE!!! What do you idiots think you're doing?!?!

 

...

 

 

 

Yeah, kind of like the platinum pack that was included with hypercrates in one of the shipments. Although the design of the platinum packs was "guaranteed to drop one of the rarer items from this pack", not "completely random crapshoot on it being anything from any pack"... So, for the chance cubes, since the possibilities from them will be so wildly all over the place.... I'd expect to see something more like:

* bonus chance cube included with each purchase of a single pack (same way that buying a mount directly from the cartel market includes an unlock for speeder piloting I)

* the "superpack" includes 5 packs and 3 bonus chance cubes

* the "hypercrate" includes 30 packs and 10 bonus chance cubes

 

The packs themselves would include the new items, guaranteed. Not a chance that they'll be replaced by chance cubes. And then the standard extras like the Jawa scrap and whatever else. (Make sure that includes a chance to get a cartel certificate as well.)

 

This was an interesting idea too though:

 

 

Do something like that...

and/or...

Add a drop to the pack that is a claim certificate for that pack (each new pack would have its own claim certificate) and then add a vendor in the cartel bazaar that exchanges these pack claim certificates for your choice of a themed chance cube for that pack, with the types of cube themes including:

* weapons & armor ("arsenal chance cube")

* mounts

* decorations

* toys, emotes, etc. ("extras chance cube")

 

So each time a new pack is added, there would be a new claim certificate and there would be new chance cubes added to this vendor's stock.

 

You'd have to open a pack to get a claim certificate in the first place, but then you've got one more pack-specific drop coming and you get to select its category.

 

Edit: Maybe make it guaranteed that the pack will have a certificate but make it a chance whether it's a pack claim cert or a regular cartel cert (like 10% chance that it will be a cartel cert, maybe?) and then have this claims vendor also have a listing to exchange 1 cartel cert for 1 of these all-purpose (wild shot in the dark) chance cubes. (But also have the bonus chances cubes included with a pack purchase / in the superpack / hypercrate like I suggested.)

 

This is exactly what crossed my mind after reading about the upcoming changes. Just make it so you get a guaranteed 2 Items from the packs mounts, armor, decorations, plus a chance to receive a bonus cube. This way everyone is happy you still get items from the new pack but it also gives the new players and guys like me that took a couple years away to pickup some of the items we missed out on. Time will tell what items come in these cubes and the rarity of said items, I just hope if they do implement something similar to this suggestion it doesn't turn out that you open three or four hypercrates and never see a cube. In the end I think this could end up being a nice addition rather than substitution for how the packs work if they do it right that is.

[TyHeaton]

I'm excited for the random cube things. =D

[CAMELOTCRUSADE]

I like collecting bronze items because 60cc unlocks means fun and affordable options I can share with all my characters. I keep the 240 and 400 stuff exclusive to one character, and in reality too much of it stays in my bank while I worry about who "deserves" it.

 

How about a chance for an item that grants you a free unlock? That'd be worth more to me than most of the stuff in the box.

[Flying-Brian]

So is the next step, when you buy a pack, there will be a chance for a special pack that will cost 2x the amount of the pack you just bought. And when you buy that, you have a chance for anything... in this general area, right in here. Anything, below the stereo, and on this side of the Bicentennial glasses. Anything between the ashtray, and the thimbles. Anything in this three inches. Right in here, this area, that includes the Chiclets, but not the erasers. Edited January 27, 2016 by Flying-Brian

[Brayla_Sana]

Not a big fan of this.

 

When I buy a pack, I want an item from THAT pack, not a chance on something that I may or may not already have, even if it's a chance at the really rare stuff.

 

If you want to put a chance for one of these cubes in ADDITION to what should normally be in the pack, that'd be fine.

Replacing the content with a cube? Not so much.

 

I used to buy a hypercrate of every new shipment.

I stopped because:

- No reputation to earn

- No certificates

 

Granted, I like the change to armor boxes instead of the individual pieces, but without reputation and certificates, I'm content just to buy the stuff off the GTN and save my money.

 

Ultimately, it sounds to me like you had a good thing going with the way things worked pre-4.0 but you started messing with it and sales dropped off and now you're trying to scramble to boost it again.

 

 

I totally agree with this. I even liked the experience boosts we used to get. I could donate them to the guild when I didn't need them to help new players.

 

Why do we not get Cartel Certificates anymore?

[Callaron]

One of the things I do like about this new thing is that there won't be such a drought in old sets anymore. No more need to pray the old packs come back to avoid paying tens of millions for certain sets. Granted, it won't be -that- much better in all likelihood... but still...

[mrcheap]

I didn't read the whole thread but I read the first two pages.

 

Summary

0% of people liked this idea.

100% of people thought this was a bad idea.

 

Positives

None

 

Negatives

You buy a new pack and get stuff from an old pack.

No more bronze stuff which is cheap to unlock.

 

Overall a horrible decision which players don't like and I don't see how this will make BW more money. Rethink please.

[TX_Angel]

I cannot speak for anyone but myself, but when I buy packs and believe me I buy packs, I buy those packs in the hopes of getting something from that specific pack. If I wanted to try my luck at something else I'd browse the GTN or buy one of the great BSG Packs.

 

From watching the GTN, I think overall pack sales are down. This is part of a larger problem Bioware has, the CM could never sustain the rate of sales it had the first year and they are trying to make it do that.

 

They will fail.

 

Why do you think 4.0 brought about the removal of all the armor from the game's vendors? The fleet vendors, heroic drops, FP drops, etc. Lots and lots of armor is gone.

 

That was an attempt to boost CM sales, by reducing game choices outside of the CM.

 

There is now so much armor in the game from past CM packs, on the GTN, and from other places, that the need to get "more" is way down. I imagine Treek used to sell well, but 4.0 turned that upside down, since Treek stopped being special. Just as an example.

 

We all now have so many mounts, pets, titles, companions, armor, weapons, crystals, etc... what is the point of buying more?

 

YOU might have been buying packs, but I suspect a lot of other people weren't. Pre-4.0, I opened enough packs to get the max reputation for each shipment, then I sold off what I didn't want and bought off the GTN what I missed.

 

I suspect a lot of other people did the same thing, but that couldn't continue forever.

[TX_Angel]

I'd suggest telling the team to go back to the drawing board. I stopped buying packs with 4.0 and see no reason here to start again, which means no reason to buy cartel coins. No reason to waste my money and I expect BW is seeing the hit on their bottom line as it seems a lot of other people don't see a reason to buy the packs, either. (If they were buying them you wouldn't be making more stupid changes.)

 

^ This...

 

There was nothing wrong with the design of packs pre-4.0. I always opened a few hypercrates each shipment, to get cool stuff, to get scrap and cartel certs, and to get reputation.

 

I have no interest in the current packs. Anything I want I can buy off the GTN, even at the inflated prices we now have, because the packs themselves offer nothing special.

 

When there was scrap, reputation, and certificates, those could not be traded, so I had a reason to OPEN PACKs, rather than buy and sell packs.

[Mourkoth]

Everyone seemed to love the Bronze/Silver/Gold packs. I don't understand what was wrong with them.

 

They took them off of the GTN, and then became frightened when BSG pack sales began to drop, so now they're changing them rather than simply selling them again.

 

EAware logic, folks.

[JediMasterSarynn]

And yet another reason why I only use CC to change my character's looks or to unlock an outfit. You're making the gambling system even worse for your consumers, but I know that you know that. I'll keep staying away from the Cartel Market until you start putting better business practices in place. Just look at your competitors for a reference.

[Panegyrist]

The last thing I want is to buy a new hypercrate and end up with more Antique Socorro weapons and fewer chances at new stuff.

 

Looks like it might be time for me to stop buying hypercrates... I get many, many hypercrates over the lifespan of a pack - I used to do it for the rep/certificates (and new items of course), now it's just for the new items. I don't buy the Gold/Silver/Bronze packs; not interested in more old stuff that took over a year to sell off that last time I had it (even if there's a chance at something rare and valuable - I'd rather have a chance at the NEW rare/valuable things).

 

Why not go back to the way packs were? 2 (new) items, companion gift (since packs cost money, why not just grade 6?), jawa stuff, REP/CERTIFICATES... (don't need the random specific useless boost items, though Major/Minor XP/Valor boosts would be welcome).

 

Right now, I'm sitting on a bunch of cartel certificates because I don't know if I'll ever be able to get more, so when I spend them I have to be 100% sure I'll be using that item for a long time. It would be great to have a source of new ones so I can take advantage of the reputation vendors I bought a lot of packs/hypercrates to use.

 

I used to buy the decorations with certificates and sell them at reasonable prices on the GTN for people who didn't buy packs and never had certificates; definitely don't do that anymore - no one is going to pay enough for a dancing twi'lek to make up for the fact that I am losing one of the only cartel certificates left in the game.

 

Every pack since 4.0 has had changes, I'm assuming for some reason. Is there less interest in them? Every time I read a thread about them people are just asking for them to be how they were. Maybe there's something to that.

[aeterno]

Some major rose tinted glassery going on re the pre 4.0 setup.

 

The whole upper/lower/anciliary lootboxes thing that made getting a full set of armour a major pain in the toosh sucked to high heaven.

 

This may not be ideal, with old sets being included in new shipments thereby reducing the chance of getting new shipment items (witch the chance of very desireable old sets item being so low and inconsistent to probably not make up for that drawbak) and all, but the "good old days" of opening up a hypercrate and ending with half a bank tab's worth of braces and belts suuuuuuucked far more than this does.

 

If every pack had a chance to spawn the cube in addition to and not isntead of the 2 new item slots it'd be pretty darn epic.

 

 

 

As it stands, if this means I get 35 chances at a decent old pack item, I'll probably take that over 35 guarantees of the resident bronze quality fodder per pack that nobody will ever want because there are 500 others on the GTN at any given time for the next 6-9 months. I'm not picky that the vendor trash you can't actually vendor is old not new pack.

Edited January 27, 2016 by aeterno

[GuerillaTech]

Eric, I don't like this new change at all. You guys are saying you're improving the cartel packs for us, but from my point of view (and it sounds like a lot of other people as well) you guys are not. What you guys did is a step in the right direction though. I'd propose this change.

 

2 items- either a new item from the pack (Mounts, Decorations, etc)

1 possible Grand Chance Cube (more on this in a second) (50% chance or higher to get the Grand Chance Cube)

1 rank 5 or 6 Companion Gift

1 Scrap

Edited January 27, 2016 by GuerillaTech

[Ka-Shem]

What are you guys on? This is a terrible idea... do you even know why people spend REAL MONEY on GAMBLING in the hopes of getting VIRTUAL, COSMETIC items? Its because we want NEW things. Its bad enough that we we are not getting much in the way of new in-game systems or content & that much of the items from Cartel Packs are just re-skins... now you think its a great idea to old items to new Cartel Packs?

 

Do you guys even know how to MMO? Do you know what brings people into a game & keeps them there... because it certainly does not feel like it. Honestly... it feels like your drifting away from the Star Wars Mythology (breaking both Legends & established Cannon) & from the MMO genre as a whole. As a Star Wars & MMO fan... why should I keep paying my sub (which I have since launch), let alone dump even more money into the Cartel Market when when I'm not seeing a return on my investment?

 

It feels like you guys look at your precious metrics without looking at the bigger picture to make your decisions. Metrics say people want story... yes... that's true... you give us story (though we actually want Class Story... but hey... that's kinda of expensive for a small studio like EA-BioWare... we understand /s), but you give us story at the cost of EVERYTHING else we are looking for from this game. No PvP update, no group PvE update, no GSF update (btw... you cant release a half baked system & expect it to be successful without add & fixing whats wrong with it) no mini games, no graphical updates, no balance fixes... among other things.

 

I've been a defender of this game & your studio since it was announced... & while it has not lived up to my expectations I've stuck around, but you guys are making it harder & harder to do so. I've never been a big fan of letting the inmates run the asylum... fans can & do have unrealistic desires, but I feel confident that I could get applications from this community alone & create a team that could manage this game better.

 

Damn it... I hate writing negative posts like this... but things have to be said.

[fresnodog]

Even with the changes, it still sounds like a non-starter. I haven't bought any extra cartel coins since July, and it looks like that trend will continue.

 

I know the F2P formula says "string the audience along as much as you can," but I wonder how much money they could make if they just let people buy the exact items they wanted to buy.

[Souliena]

I'm really disappointed about this change because you are not interested in what people like or want!

I loved especially the decoration packs. I'm only interested in decoration if I buy cartell packs.

If there is to much random **** I dont want to have, I won't buy the packs.

And if someone buys NEW packs, he wants to have only NEW items.

Better bring the pack with old stuff in a pack you can choose and buy if you want old things.

Don't mix everything together, the random factor is even higher and I don't like this.

 

But I think the problem is the money.

With random packs there is more money to make than with special packs.

Difficult calculation but I think I have understand the real problem.

I know, noone will talk about this here because people shouldn't know why there really are changes.

But don't forget with your strange changes and strange reasons there will always be a bad image of your development.

[Talosred]

-gives a thumbs up- Grand work keep up EA

[TUXs]

Hey folks,

 

 

When you open the new Anarchist Pack in 4.1 you will receive the following:

• 2 items- either a new item from the pack (Mounts, Decorations, etc) or a Grand Chance Cube (more on this in a second)
  
• 1 rank 5 or 6 Companion Gift
  
• 1 Scrap
  

 

-eric

Wow...so now we get a chance to get nothing new. Brilliant idea eric...

 

Who comes up with these ideas? Are you guys so short staffed that you're literally unable to create new items for your #1 revenue source?!

[Darevsool]

Nothing with these changes is enticing me to spend RL money on coins to buy packs.

 

I don't need, or want, old stuff (at all) to come from new packs.

What I want is to be able to purchase packs from ANY of the old series via the cartel market, even at a slightly higher price than the new packs.

[XiamaraSimi]

I already have almost everything of old. If I buy a new pack I want new items. I understand that new players/casuals do not have much of the old. Then offer an old pack for them. DUH. Do not force old stuff for those wanting new stuff. DUH. Really who the f----- comes up with this s----!

 

BRING BACK THE F------- CERTS!

 

This to infinity

[Tulmara]

Sorry, I'm going to have to agree with most of the other players here, I want new stuff, not old stuff.

The only reasoning I can think of for these changes is that these are aimed at new players not old players eh ?

If you want to put old stuff in new packs at least put CM certificates, I'm too afraid to spend mine knowing that I will never get them back

[TX_Angel]

Wow...so now we get a chance to get nothing new. Brilliant idea eric...

 

Who comes up with these ideas? Are you guys so short staffed that you're literally unable to create new items for your #1 revenue source?!

 

It sure seems like they can't do anything these days without sticking a foot in their mouths... or both feet...

 

Or a Star Destroyer!