Will not be paying for an expansion

General
62

Reduced, but kinda a bit? Has more impact perception-wise at least.

Yeah, absolutely fitting there as a comparison, also true. They worked well for people overall though.

Yeah, but you got max 6 evolutions and a sinle ancestry line.
If you increase that to ‘3’ you can for example focus on 3 different rewards heavily rather then having to enforce a spread of all potentially.

It simply provides a longer-term option for grinding and perfecting it without enforcing a need to do so.

In comparison we could take Heist equipment in PoE… you can focus on a single person and shove everything into them for specific contracts with specific rewards… or you can min-max all of them gradually.

It’s mostly about longevity here which is the issue, and the more replayability the more longevity the systems have… wouldn’t be a problem if LE had much longevity in their content but it sadly doesn’t all too much.

1 Like
63

Yeah, I’d forgotten that 1.0 was Feb 24.

Neither, Judd was talking about seasons 1, 2 & 3 but not season “0” (1.0). So overall 2024 was profitable but only because of the launch.

64

I have a solution for this problem… make MTX that isn’t looking like ass and you’ll sell it.

2 Likes
65

Also use proper sales techniques. ‘We did it like our competitors do and realized this doesn’t work for us’.

Nah… EHG did it half-assed without realizing why the methods of competitors actually work and that’s a big reason as to why it doesn’t work… not for them… but overall.

The supporter packs from GGG provide the full range of points related to the cost of the pack. That means if you buy a 30€ pack you get 30€ points. The MTX is the cream on top basically.
This way people look at it and say ‘what a deal!’, buying in even if the MTX is only barely something they personally want… after all you still got the points and can use em to buy MTX you actually want a lot and got the stuff on top!

And the ‘it looks like ass’ part, absolutely so.

I still remember the absolute baller looking supporter pack back when Abyss came out in PoE 1, that one was amazing! And what do we have here at LE? A slot back attachment… ok, fine. A toucan… ok, fine. An axe and a sceptre skins.
Yay? The chance someone wants those specific things is not all too high now, is it?

But a fair comparison is only available when we look at what the 30€ and 60€ supporter packs provide comparatively.

LE:
30€:
150 points (15€ value, so you basically pay 15€ for the MTX)
The included MTX are: 2 back attachments (wonderful, so we get double slotted stuff… great…), a pet, a portal, an axe skin, a scepter skin, a one-handed skin, one armor, a evade effect and a footprint effect.
The footprints by the way are absolute ass. The cloak is mid, as are the weapon skins.
60€:
300 points (so now the MTX costs 30€ already)
Another cape, another portal, a two-handed staff, another armor, another evade, another footprint for the 40 upgrade
And then another back attachment, another portal, another one-handed sword (now we even double up on weapon skins!), 2 more pets (which makes a total of 3, so 1 unusable), a shield skin, another armor, another evade and another footprint.

It’s plainly spoken shit, utter and absolute shit. Stuff is either extremely specific (weapon skins being for weapon type rather then generic melee/caster/ranged ones)

The result is you pay 15 or 30€ and have to like the specific stuff in those packs to have gotten the value out of em.

Now for PoE:
30€:
300 points (which means all MTX is free on top, you already got your value. Kinda… ya know… supporting the company with it rather then simply buying points normally)
The extended digital soundtrack
a character effect
a weapon effect.

Now… that doesn’t look like much, LE’s looks like it provides vastly more. But for a price-tag of effectively ‘0’ it’s quite the massive value, right? :stuck_out_tongue:

60€:
600 points (So still the MTX is absolutely free)
A full armor pack with hood and helmet for small variety of choice… and a pet! Also the pet looks really nice. Animated, has a ongoing effect, despite that being one of the worse ones overall available.

Also another thing EHG utterly failed to provide which is a massive money making machine for GGG in comparison: A social space you own. In PoE it’s the hideout… and that has decorations. People buy decoration stuff like mad, after all it’s a massive aspect to show off your stuff to other people. LE lacks basically all methods to make that a actual thing. It would’ve sufficed to make the mechanic which PoE 2 has (buying stuff remotely and then simply picking it up at the Hideout) to make that a valuable and viable thing.

But nah… they ignored massive incentives and now they’re all pikachu faced wondering why their MTX fail.

66

I just want to point out that this isn’t really true. You can only use 2 per character, not total. You can equip 2 with one character and 2 different ones in another character.

67

The majority of players are generally single-character players, that’s universally true for all ARPGs… and all games even. The replay value is just higher for ARPGs and hence we see a higher prevalence.

And that still doesn’t mean you’ll use the third one. Heck… the vast majority of people doesn’t use the MTX from the supporter packs in PoE neither. They use whatever they think looks best, the majority has ‘1 set’ or switches every so often around to another style at best. Pets included.

I’m a prime example even of the ‘what’s done is done’ one. The best thing GGG ever implemented was the ‘random portal effect’ option so I actually see them all rather then only having my dragonhunter portal effect which I used since it came into the shop and never switched for anything else :stuck_out_tongue:

It’s just not good value for the customer. Packs commonly have 1-2 things you like inside and everything else is perceived as ‘worthless’, so that’s why GGG for example makes their supporter packs have the full point value attached, to give extra incentive.
The EHG packs are basically full-priced MTX with some extra garbage (for you personally, one person’s trash is another’s treasure) tacked on.
And worst-case? It comes more expensive to acquire then similar items in the MTX shop. A situation which should never happen.

68

I am not oppose to charging for expansion if the expansion is beefy.

The issue, and DHG isn’t the only one guilty of this, is making promise and not delivering. It is especially bad if its related to cost.

Under EU regulation, I think this is not okay. You cannot charge membership for a gym, tell customer that the gym is basic, but there will add More machines and classes and you do not have to pay extra for at least 2 years. Then after paying the fee, they said you have to pay for the extra.

I knew it was a red flag when they said only MTX will be extra. Expension and Qol will be free. We all know the finanziell situation changes, then well, they will have to pull back some promises.
The honest and correct thing is NOT to made promise you know you may not keep.
There is a big difference in setting some targets (which is usually not binding) , vs making financial (which is often binding) base promise under most law.

69

POE/POE2 has one of the worst and extortionary pricing in MTX Outside of mobile games.

No game should use the GGG games as example. That is coming from someone who spent over half a grand on the game. Bad is bad.

The only way I feel less bad was convince myself the thousand of hours I spend on the game.
I think I have like 5-8x the amount of mtxs for the same amount I spent on fortnite.

70

It’s though what keeps it going to be fair. So business-wise it’s not bad.
I would also enjoy if the prices are cheaper though, but given EHG’s situation… well… there clearly is a problem existing and higher prices at least make up for the reduced turnover rate in total.

They still have no clue as to what exactly is actually causing their downfall… and that’s kinda sad when it’s rather clear-cut and explained over and over and over for the myriad of small things they did wrong.

Exactly! 100% with you there.

71

Weren’t you the one that said that players shouldn’t support poor business practices? Unless it’s GGG?

72

Yes, and the price-range for MTX is not a decent range… but it’s also not predatory.
You can try and provide your product for 5€ or 5000€ and you’re golden, as long as people are willing to buy it’s fine.
The second you use predatory tactics to cause people to either have buyers-remorse or to cause undue stress which leads to a payment otherwise not done then it’s not fine.

The market decides the value of your product, you don’t.

73

This isn’t the absolute, clearly delineated standard you seem to think it is. Some societies appear to be relatively happy with things that “some/most of us” (in the west) think are predatory.

74

You mean things like having MTX available for a limited time only? Or locked behind a season pass? Those kinds of predatory tactics which you ranted against in the past?

75

Yes, and formerly people thought cigarettes are healthy.
What’s your point?

The moment you find out something inclines people to use money they need for important stuff at a significantly heightened rate you stop it, optimally legally. That’s the definition of ‘predatory’, to make use of psychological mechanics our brain has which causes negative outcomes with a significantly heightened chance in the favor of a company.

‘Being fine with it’ has exactly nothing to do with it.

Yes… and what does that have to do with MTX pricing in a permanent shop?
:confused:

76

Everything? You accept the atrocious prices for MTX in PoE because it’s what keeps PoE going but hey, at least they don’t have predatory tactics. Except they do.

You have a sort of double standard regarding PoE which I’m not sure you’re actually aware of, though I believe you do. Maybe it’s sunk cost falacy, but you’ve often cried out against things in LE that PoE also does, even to the point of saying you would quit (like saying you would leave if LE implemented any sort of season pass), when you’re clearly still playing despite PoE having a season pass.

You’re much more forgiving towards the predatory practices GGG does than you are of other companies.

3 Likes
77

And I call those out, don’t I?

Once more:
What does it have to do with the permanent MTX of the shop? Is that exact thing predatory? No? So what’s the point?

As if actions don’t stand separate to each other. One thing can be shit and another can be fine… just because aspects are crap and have to be called out doesn’t mean that now 100% of the product are now crap. ‘This got a great mechanic there… ah no… we can’t look at that, it got P2W mechanics! Abort! All flee!’ :joy:

Well, I’ll speak about that then:

Imagine - yes, it seems really hard to do but try! :stuck_out_tongue: - someone actually using a product, or furthering a notion which they are not 100% on board with! I know… it’s baffling, isn’t it? But ‘perfection’ is the enemy of ‘good’ after all.

It’s a scale. Imagine it starting at 50 points out of 100. Really good mechanic? Add 5 pooints! Season pass? Remove 15! Lootboxes? Remove 40! A top end-game? Add 20! And so on and so forth.
At 0 points you leave.
At 100 you can’t get enough of it, more simply!

EHG promised a specific payment model and never rescinded that, no notion was given that this would change. No gradual change there, no preparation… just a sudden ‘yeah, we sold out!’. Which influences the point scale substantially when taking that into consideration. We started at 50… that would easily dish out… let’s say a 30 point deduction at the best of days. But given the overall situation it dishes out 80 points deduction. It’s a massive hit. If the game would be in absolutely magnificent shape then it would be stomachable, not really enticing to play… but maybe in the future.
But the issue is EHG already lost another 10 over there for the end-game progression, another 5 for MG being broken, another 20 for failing to fix the factions in nearly 2 years, gained a few for the potential of the mechanic… you see… the balance is already not great, it’ll simply go below the ‘0’ easily.

LE with a great communication and no financial stuff at all is at roughly a 20/100 for long-term usage as it’s supposed to be set up.
PoE is at a 80/100 instead. They can have paid tabs, they can have their mystery boxes and they can have their season pass… it’s still at 30/100, playable hence… not happy… but playable.

78

You do, but much more strongly for LE than for PoE. After all, you didn’t quit PoE when they added the Kirac Pass, which is something you said you would do if EHG would do the same thing in LE.

It has to do with the premise you set that it’s fine if the MTX prices are very bloated (like PoE’s are) as long as they don’t have predatory practices because that’s what keeps the game going. This is what you said up there and that started this particular chain of discussion.
So since PoE does have predatory practices (not as bad as P2W games have, like TLI or Undecember, but they still have them), I guess their bloated prices isn’t acceptable? In contradiction to what you said up there that it’s fine?

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Time-limited cosmetics are a predatory tactic. (FOMO)
Mystery Boxes are a predatory tactic. (gambling itch)

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This is a forum about LE, isn’t it? So obviously, as the first one.
Secondly… unlike GGG which didn’t promise stuff and then went back on it EHG did exactly that, a 180. So obviously here as well.

Because the game is not good enough to warrant staying if anything of the sort comes?

I didn’t make that random point system example without a reason.
LE has no leeway, PoE does.

Yes?
Not predatory.

It’s like ‘AAA’ games setting their shelf-prices to 80€ or 100€ even… what’s the issue? They’ll simply fail because people are not willing to buy it.

As said, the market decides on the value of your product, not you do. Make it too expensive and nobody pays for it.

I can order an artist for 30€ and get a picture… or I can order another one and pay 1000€ for a single picture.
Quality matters as well. Speed matters. Brand matters too because people perceive it as more valuable. Scarcity does too.

Does LE have the quality?
Does LE have the brand power?

No to both?
Obviously the stuff is cheaper. Heck… the first weapon I look at in PoE which is on the lower end (10€ compared to LE’s 5€) is like LE a simple reskin without anything else… and even that is more detailed then what EHG provides us with. So more expensive, sure!
And then I look at everything else on the first page and each single weapon reskin provides a effect on top for interacting with enemies when you kill something. So obviously it’s more valuable comparatively to what EHG provides, it’s a given.

Then I look at Portals for example. LE’s cost 100-150, PoE’s 150-200.
In LE I see the portal when I open it in the map to click on it, for a second… wow!
In PoE I open a map and have several in front of me, staying there. And when I get back too! Obviously they’re more valuable as well!

And that’s without taking the bigger brand into consideration, GGG simply can afford higher prices because they are perceived as the top. You think ‘Adidas’ shoes are any better then off-brand ones quality wise? Your off-brand shoe costs 20² and Adidas costs 80€… and they’re basically the same low-quality crap nowadays. One’s a brand, the other is simply ‘something’.

What? You’re reaching into the heavens and beyond there with that.

Predatory business practice → one thing.
Fixed pricing of a fixed product without predatory measures → another thing.

GGG shouldn’t have their season pass, their mystery boxes and the tabs, with the last being the least problematic one at least, but still problematic as it enforces buying in to play properly. But first off… it’s not a game with a shelf-price, so that limited functionality of tabs is acceptable to a degree again because that’s their equivalent of the shelf-price. The first 2? Not acceptable, never were, never will be.

What the heck are you even going on about? It’s fairly clear-cut there.
If someone asks me ‘should I buy LE or play PoE?’ I’ll gladly gesture towards PoE as it’s simply a better quality game and say ‘the 30€ pack is your shelf price, buy tabs when they’re off on the weekend, every second week that happens’ and they’ll have all they need to play.
If someone asks me though ‘should I play PoE?’ I’ll tell them that the game has a mild season pass, lootboxes which aren’t fully outrageous as the content comes into the store afterwards at least, and you need to buy tabs to have a comfortable time, so it’s not comfortable to play without and it’ll come to a full-priced game likely at the end for functionality.

Also for other games… while for example ‘Warframe’ has timed paid stuff and functional things as well… the miniscule timeframe needed to acquire the core items you can get in-game is alleviating that. But overall it’s still not a ‘great’ system. And the stuff should stay permanently. So I’ll tell any collector to stay the heck away from that game as it’ll be detrimental to them.
Someone who doesn’t care about collecting though I’ll tell ‘good game, go in and have fun, stay away from the platinum market and only use in-game trading to acquire stuff’.

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And a permanent MTX store which the direct mention is about in this case is not.