Cartel Pack Changes Coming with Steadfast Champion Pack on 5/16

[Theeko]

Yes... the handful of platinum and gold items they've put up for direct sale in the 6 years this game has been running has totally killed the rarity of the dozens and dozens of rare items from all the packs ever issued....

 

Really now, you're just being hyperbolic at this point. I get you like flipping items for big virtual money profits, but not everyone likes either being price-gouged on the GTN or buying gamble packs with crap drop rates to get stuff.

 

I not only have just resold but I also used tons of stuff which I bought with real $ on gambling packs or with credits. People that have spent tons of real $ are pissed off at these direct sales which they used good $ for trying to get them in packs.

[DarthSpuds]

People that have spent tons of real $ are pissed off at these direct sales which they used good $ for trying to get them in packs.

 

And...?

 

There's nothing in the Game' T&Cs that says Bioware can't change how they deliver content? The level of player dissatisfaction with gambling-crates (in this game and others that use them) has only ever increased as games try to milk more money for less content.

 

It was pretty much a given that at some point some of what you gambled a LOT for would be available as a direct sale.

 

Now if you got lucky you may have spent less on (for example) Satele's Armour than I did buying it via direct sales. If you were unlucky I probably got it cheaper than you. That was part of the gamble.

 

All The Best

[RaiderMid]

They'd make money by selling a value for money product that people are happy to spend their leisure funds on.

 

Increasing the chances of getting ripped off by a Cartel Crate, and then upscaling the "color" quality of items so players get ripped off a bit more on Unlock prices will do more harm than good if the intent is to increase revenue streams.

 

Everything in the Gambling Crates should be on the Cartel Market at a fixed price.

 

I'll pay a reasonable amount of RL cash to buy what I want from the Cartel Market.

I'll not pay an unreasonable amount of RL cash to buy a 95% chance of NOT getting what I want - I ain't that daft.

 

This last week I bought Cartel Coins to buy Satele Shan's Armour - I had one piece from a Crate (purchased with the CC I got from being subbed) months ago, but saw no hope of completing the set so gave up, until this week.

In the same week I have bough a Mount (Ashfall Tauntaun), and spent close on 1000 Crowns buying specific decorations I wanted for my Stronghold.

 

I would have spent Zero CC for those things had they only been available via Gambling Crates.

 

All The Best

 

I wouldn't have a problem if the packs die and everything went direct purchase. I've always thought that would be the best approach for the customers but it probably isn't favorable to business. With these changes to the packs, direct purchase might be the better business move. Will have to wait and see how the packs sell I guess.

[DarthSpuds]

I wouldn't have a problem if the packs die and everything went direct purchase. I've always thought that would be the best approach for the customers but it probably isn't favorable to business. With these changes to the packs, direct purchase might be the better business move. Will have to wait and see how the packs sell I guess.

 

I think revenues would go up if they put everything on as direct sales.

 

I know of almost no one happy to spend RL money on a 99% chance of getting nothing they want.

I know of loads of people just dying of impatience to buy what they do want.

 

All The Best

[AscendingSky]

I not only have just resold but I also used tons of stuff which I bought with real $ on gambling packs or with credits. People that have spent tons of real $ are pissed off at these direct sales which they used good $ for trying to get them in packs.

 

Do you go back to Best Buy over a year after you purchased something and throw a huge fit because they reduced the price on the item you bought too?

 

EAWare never promised you they'd never change their pricing structure on their virtual items. And it's not like anyone's retroactively going back and taking away the virtual items you already bought with your real world money. Suck it up, buttercup.

[Echuu-Shen-Jon]

Hey folks,

 

Currently, when you open a pack you will receive:

• Two items – New pack item(s) and/or Grand Chance Cube(s)
  
• Two misc. – Jawa Scraps and Companion Gifts

 

Starting with the Steadfast Champion pack on May 16th, you will now receive the following:

• One new pack item
  
• One Grand Chance Cube
  
• Two misc. – Jawa Scraps and Companion Gifts

 

Additionally, packs will now only contain Silver, Gold, and Platinum rarity items. What this change means is that you will more consistently get new pack items (since one is guaranteed in each pack) and you will have a much greater chance of getting Silver, Gold, and Platinum items than you did previously. Our plan moving forward is that we are not going to be making Bronze quality armor sets, decorations, etc. any longer. Our focus is to ensure the new items in each pack are of the highest quality, giving you greater value for your investment.

 

Let us know what you think! Thanks everyone.

 

-eric

 

Hi Eric thank you for this post just a question you imply that the quality of the work detirmines the tier or rank of the item. My question is are there going to be any fixes done to errors that can ruin an entire set because it wasn't picked up.

 

An example being the Malgus armour set whilst i believe it is gold tier and i do own the set i have noticed a small but very glaring error for non alien races with head tendrils.

 

When a helmet is equiped that removes the hood the collar behind the hood is see through so you can see straight into the characters neck its a graphical bug because i believe a collapsed hood is meant to be present. I have posted this several times in feedback and there does not to have been any correction to this item. For humans or other characters this is more obvious a error on the model which could simply be fixed by completing the collar or just adding the collapsed hood you already have the model it is present on Malgus himself in the Flashpoint where you fight him.

 

I hope you can pass this onto your departments to correct as it really undermines your hole statement about getting more value for money and the rank of item indicating the time and effort to create.

[Andryah]

Hey folks,

 

The team is aware of the concern regarding collection unlock prices and will be talking about options. No changes are currently planned, but we are looking at what we can do in the future. I will pass on any updates I receive from the team!

 

-eric

 

This appears to be an effort that will drain more CCs from the float across the player base through unlock fees.

 

More Silver and Gold items drop = more unlock fees for silver and gold items likely to happen. Since these fees are higher then bronze items... it's pretty clear what is going on here.

 

As for the allegation that silver and gold items take more effort to produce, I honestly do not buy it. There are bronze items in game from prior packs that clearly have more attention to detail as well as desire by players then many silver and even gold/platinum items.

 

I appreciate that as time goes on, the studio makes adjustments to how pack contents are setup in your pack loot tables.... but I think it would be better to increase the number of useful items from a pack rather then reducing the total number of actual armor/weapon drops.

 

While I am not a pack buyer, I do work the pack contents in the economy on the GTN ... so I see this as an unneeded adjustment by the studio.

Edited May 13, 2017 by Andryah

[Andryah]

I would much rather have completely separate decoration packs because as it is, so many deco items are just stupidly rare and expensive for no good reason.

 

This is a good suggestion I think.

[Andryah]

They already killed the rarity in game with direct sales

 

Not they did not. Direct sales are short term and hence only cause temporary drops in rarity and hence sales prices.

 

Same with the Chance Cubes, as these inject some refresh of older items into the economy, which generally drives prices down for a time, but they eventually return to previous market rates. I know this because this is a particular segment of the market I work.... as fresh drops in many cases get dumped at low prices from these since players tend to only pay attention to gold/platinum items from the cubes.

[Andryah]

A decrease in appeal for the random crates, right after they start introducing direct buy items? Maybe it's just coincidence, or maybe they actually do have some very clever people working there. You know, the kind of people who know how to squeeze every last cent out of a player. Business people.

 

I honestly do not blame them for being good at extracting CCs from the player base. That is what they are supposed to do.

 

But every time they make a change to pack drop mechanics, it gets the player base worked up and that is not needed with the game right now. They should be reducing triggers for drama right now, not adding them.

 

I collect a copy of most things from the packs and store it. I do not unlock them until they have a sale, unless I really really need the item immediately on multiple characters. It's good that they have toned down unlock prices on many items over time, but there is a pattern here... they lower unlock prices and work to harmonize them across the drops for consistency.... then they tinker with pack drops and drop rates. It's now become a repeat pattern with this latest announcement. Since I buy from the GTN and do not buy packs, it does not directly impact me, but I still think it creates unnecessary drama with the player base.

Edited May 13, 2017 by Andryah

[AdharaKyleth]

Well at least it makes it easier to get good armour sets... Even though there is going to downgrade their value. I think it's mostly for the new players of the game.

[Theeko]

Well at least it makes it easier to get good armour sets... Even though there is going to downgrade their value. I think it's mostly for the new players of the game.

 

Yeah they **** on veterans but cater to new players that haven't been around as does most MMO's

[Andryah]

Well at least it makes it easier to get good armour sets... Even though there is going to downgrade their value. I think it's mostly for the new players of the game.

 

I'm not so sure about that. There are some gold armor sets though that are so ugly or strange that you can barely give them away to other players.

 

And since there is actually a range of drop rate % in each range (silver, gold, platinum), I would be willing to bet that after people start opening these crates there are going to be complaints about "junk" drops of some unpopular gold and silver items.

Edited May 13, 2017 by Andryah

[RaiderMid]

I'm not so sure about that. There are some gold armor sets though that are so ugly or strange that you can barely give them away to other players.

 

And since there is actually a range of drop rate % in each range (silver, gold, platinum), I would be willing to bet that after people start opening these crates there are going to be complaints about "junk" drops of some unpopular gold and silver items.

 

That has been an ongoing problem since release, nevermind the pack drops.

[Andryah]

That has been an ongoing problem since release, nevermind the pack drops.

 

No disagreement. Though as more packs are released, naturally we accumulate more ugly and unpopular gold items.

 

And that fact largely undermines the rationale Eric shared with us earlier, in my view.

[AxtonTredway]

What's really saddening about this is I've personally found that some Bronze-tier items looked better than some Gold tier... Of course, like Eric said, personal interest but I wish for more bronze pack or bring back some of the older gear as platinums (dark reaver, columni, tionese)

[Hasisiyun]

First of all I want to say thank you, such a huge boon.

 

If there are no Bronze items in the drop tables, won't that mean Silver items are now effectively Bronze rarity, just with a different colored icon?

 

Not exactly.

There were 4 grades of items originally, where Bronze had an extremely high chance to drop with a lot of sets inbetween.

 

So say there were 20 possible items and 10 were bronze.

Which meant the chance of getting one of the rare items were extremely minuscule less than 1%

Now you cut out the fat - and remove 10 items from the drop tables - the other chances increase exponentially.

 

Do you go back to Best Buy over a year after you purchased something and throw a huge fit because they reduced the price on the item you bought too?

 

EAWare never promised you they'd never change their pricing structure on their virtual items. And it's not like anyone's retroactively going back and taking away the virtual items you already bought with your real world money. Suck it up, buttercup.

 

I know you are joking but I literally saw some one do that maybe 6 months ago.

They bought some item during black friday weekend and it was cheaper during Christmas sale and they were screaming at the poor support girl who was trying to runaway.

Edited May 13, 2017 by Hasisiyun

[DarthSpuds]

Anyone who thinks a Gold or Platinum Item gets more "development resources" than a Bronze is, frankly, being extremely naive.

 

All Cartel Items are made with the minimum possible development resources. They probably have summer interns making them for free.

 

Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum has no correlation to the resources used to create them and only has correlation to the number of CC Bioware thinks it can scam out of you to unlock something you already own.

 

Collections is a Legacy wide pool - once I have an item in my Collection there is no justification for charging me to use it on more than one toon. No further development resources are used in my doing so. Its a CC Sink Scam.

 

All The Best

[LDaria]

No, just no.

 

I was ok with getting 5-10 chance cubes from 1 hypercrate but 26? Its so wrong in so many levels, at this rate I will never get decorations I like from packs...

[docbenwayddo]

...

There were 4 grades of items originally, where Bronze had an extremely high chance to drop with a lot of sets inbetween.

 

So say there were 20 possible items and 10 were bronze.

Which meant the chance of getting one of the rare items were extremely minuscule less than 1%

Now you cut out the fat - and remove 10 items from the drop tables - the other chances increase exponentially...

 

What is much more likely is the fat doesn't get trimmed at all, but restamped with a Silver icon and no chances change at all, just a different coloured symbol on trash and higher Collections unlock price per pixel.

[AscendingSky]

What is much more likely is the fat doesn't get trimmed at all, but restamped with a Silver icon and no chances change at all, just a different coloured symbol on trash and higher Collections unlock price per pixel.

 

This is exactly what I expect. Why should they spend more effort? They have no incentive to when people are stuck getting those items as drops from packs whether they like them or not.

[saberscreen]

Eric,

 

I think direct sales are the way to go, regardless of how that might or might not affect the in-game economy. I can't speak for everyone, but I myself will never walk into a store and buy a box at the counter because something I'm looking for might be in there. So why would I do that online? Aside from complimentary cartel coins that come with our subscriptions it's real money we're talking about. I don't gamble.

 

I applaud your attempt to give your customers more bang for their buck but as I stated in my opening, I think direct sales are the way to go.

 

With direct sales you'll avoid customers getting copies of items and the GTN will be less clogged with these, which means you'll increase your chances of attracting customers to the Cartel Market if they can't get these items in-game. In the long-run, you could also determine which items are in popular demand and which are basically a waste of time to create, as you'll be looking at your Cartel Market sales. This could save your team time, money and resources working on items or decorations which aren't in demand.

 

And we'll be spending our money on something we actually want. Hey, it's real money. Can we expect to get what we want for our money? Would you go into a store every week and buy a box not knowing what it contains? Would you spend money on that? I'm sure some people would, but most people wouldn't. If I'm looking for headphones I'm going to buy headphones. Not a box containing random stuff.

 

I hope this helps. It'll probably make your Cartel Market a whole lot more interesting to look at as well when there are thousands of items on display. In any case, I don't think I'm the only person who refuses to gamble. When I spend money I spend it on something I want in particular.

[tummiswtor]

Thanks got i there's no difference for me, more Chance cubes or not, no bronze items, and all this stuff...

Last year haven't seen any pack worth to buy.

[DarthSpuds]

No, just no.

 

I was ok with getting 5-10 chance cubes from 1 hypercrate but 26? Its so wrong in so many levels, at this rate I will never get decorations I like from packs...

 

Precisely.

 

And the chance cubes have a much higher than 50% chance of giving you total rubbish.

 

All The Best

[DarthSpuds]

Eric,

 

I think direct sales are the way to go, regardless of how that might or might not affect the in-game economy. I can't speak for everyone, but I myself will never walk into a store and buy a box at the counter because something I'm looking for might be in there. So why would I do that online? Aside from complimentary cartel coins that come with our subscriptions it's real money we're talking about. I don't gamble.

 

I applaud your attempt to give your customers more bang for their buck but as I stated in my opening, I think direct sales are the way to go.

 

With direct sales you'll avoid customers getting copies of items and the GTN will be less clogged with these, which means you'll increase your chances of attracting customers to the Cartel Market if they can't get these items in-game. In the long-run, you could also determine which items are in popular demand and which are basically a waste of time to create, as you'll be looking at your Cartel Market sales. This could save your team time, money and resources working on items or decorations which aren't in demand.

 

And we'll be spending our money on something we actually want. Hey, it's real money. Can we expect to get what we want for our money? Would you go into a store every week and buy a box not knowing what it contains? Would you spend money on that? I'm sure some people would, but most people wouldn't. If I'm looking for headphones I'm going to buy headphones. Not a box containing random stuff.

 

I hope this helps. It'll probably make your Cartel Market a whole lot more interesting to look at as well when there are thousands of items on display. In any case, I don't think I'm the only person who refuses to gamble. When I spend money I spend it on something I want in particular.

 

^ This.

 

And if it does depress values in the in-game economy that will be a good, long over due, thing. The wealth disparity is - whether we like it or not - a significant hurdle for new players to get over. Especially with the F2P Credit Cap being so abysmally low.

 

All The Best