Continued Dev Silence on Continued Dev Silence.

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But secrets can be exciting

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Not when they bite you in the [censored]. Secrets that lead to plot twists, interesting information, surprising battles and so forth can be exciting. Secrets that the costume pieces you were looking for you will probably just not get are usually more in the real of annoying.

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Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I wish we knew what reason number 7 was...I think we'll need to trick it out of him somehow

My personal opinion on the Secret 7th Reason:

"It's working as intended."

I haven't been following the discussions on I9 much (I'd rather be playing it) but from my own work I know it can be tiring trying to explain to people that what they 'expect' is not always what they'll get.

Oh...moo!

You want to know what reason number 7 is? It's that there is no reason number 7! That's why he can't give it out!

Yup.

It's the obligatory Cryptic response.

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Reasons why devs might be silent on an issue:

1) We didn't see the issue. There are a lot of threads out there.
2) We are in the middle of looking at an issue, and saying anything at the time might be invalidated. Even something like "we are looking into it" can be read as "we are going to change it" if we look at it and find it to be fine, we would get blasted for not changing it when we said we would.
3) The answer is already being given by a lot of players already
4) The answer is obvious (and thus will eventually be given out by a lot of players, see #3).
5) It involves talking about stuff we can't/shouldn't be talking about.
6) The question is a "when" question. We rarely answer these, because even when we put disclaimers on it, our answer becomes taken as gospel, and if we fail to deliver, we look bad.

There's a secret 7th reason that I am not going to give you because of reason #7.

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Regardless of your reasons I think that you should've told the player base before I9 hit that the dev team intended for costume recipes to be commodities that they would seek and pay top inf for. If you did then the player base would not have thought that they would've been able to get those new pieces easily for both their new toons as well as their older toons. It would not have caused sour grapes (so to speak) or bad blood. Players can take it better when they are told up front than when it is hidden from them.

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Well, let's see: The public and historical timelines suggest that we have 3-4 months between issues. We have a feature added in that issue that includes random costume drop rewards.

Now, since that's a feature that is expected to continue to be in use through the next issue, it makes sense that the random costume drops would be paced to remain desirable through that time period. That means they should remain somewhat in demand, which in turn means that they'll have value. Naturally, early adopters- those willing to pay more- will be satisfied first.

It's beyond common sense- it's downright BASIC that it would be ABSOLUTELY RIDICULOUS to have a system that satisfied demand in the first 2 weeks... only to have months of unsellable, no-demand rewards dropping. Heck, might as well make them basic costume options then.

Even if you missed that train of thought from the interviews (which did identify these costumes as rather rare rewarss) you could note the same thing on the test server or all the player forum posts on the subject preceding launch.

I don't think the devs were wrong in assuming that most rational people would understand that these would be infrequent drops that will remain in demand for AT LEAST the first month.

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6) The question is a "when" question. We rarely answer these, because even when we put disclaimers on it, our answer becomes taken as gospel, and if we fail to deliver, we look bad.

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Guess what... not saying anything when there is an outcry for developer response makes you look just as bad to the same people you are trying not to look bad in front of.

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Reasons why devs might be silent on an issue:

1) We didn't see the issue. There are a lot of threads out there.
2) We are in the middle of looking at an issue, and saying anything at the time might be invalidated. Even something like "we are looking into it" can be read as "we are going to change it" if we look at it and find it to be fine, we would get blasted for not changing it when we said we would.
3) The answer is already being given by a lot of players already
4) The answer is obvious (and thus will eventually be given out by a lot of players, see #3).
5) It involves talking about stuff we can't/shouldn't be talking about.
6) The question is a "when" question. We rarely answer these, because even when we put disclaimers on it, our answer becomes taken as gospel, and if we fail to deliver, we look bad.

There's a secret 7th reason that I am not going to give you because of reason #7.

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Regardless of your reasons I think that you should've told the player base before I9 hit that the dev team intended for costume recipes to be commodities that they would seek and pay top inf for. If you did then the player base would not have thought that they would've been able to get those new pieces easily for both their new toons as well as their older toons. It would not have caused sour grapes (so to speak) or bad blood. Players can take it better when they are told up front than when it is hidden from them.

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Well, let's see: The public and historical timelines suggest that we have 3-4 months between issues. We have a feature added in that issue that includes random costume drop rewards.

Now, since that's a feature that is expected to continue to be in use through the next issue, it makes sense that the random costume drops would be paced to remain desirable through that time period. That means they should remain somewhat in demand, which in turn means that they'll have value. Naturally, early adopters- those willing to pay more- will be satisfied first.

It's beyond common sense- it's downright BASIC that it would be ABSOLUTELY RIDICULOUS to have a system that satisfied demand in the first 2 weeks... only to have months of unsellable, no-demand rewards dropping. Heck, might as well make them basic costume options then.

Even if you missed that train of thought from the interviews (which did identify these costumes as rather rare rewarss) you could note the same thing on the test server or all the player forum posts on the subject preceding launch.

I don't think the devs were wrong in assuming that most rational people would understand that these would be infrequent drops that will remain in demand for AT LEAST the first month.

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I see you miss the point of my post. It had nothing to do with those pieces being desirable. No if those pieces remained exclusive only to the level 50's of the game had no bearing on my point (more later). Look everyone that wants them want to be able to complete their concept (whether you agree with that or understand it or not) before level 50. Maybe to keep them desirable they need to make it where you would have to play for about 5,000 hours with the toon you want it for then you would get it in a drop or have enough inf to buy it. Which means making impossible for anyone to get them. The players would think that they could get them but it would be impossible to do.

Seriously I was talking about the point of being told before the fact. In closed beta the devs took the common IO's off of the tables and made them recipes only attainable in drops. Next they put them back on the table along with drops. The devs must have known that those common IO's would cause the costume drop rate to be much lower than normal. Heck they decided long before Positron's post that they wanted costume pieces to be commodities that we would be willing to pay top inf. for. This was decided on before it was reality.

I am talking about being told way ahead of time before it is reality. I am talking about telling players that do not visit the forums or post. If you were one of these players and saw the videos of I9 before live you may have had your eye teeth on tech wings for one of your toons. Then on live you find out the drop rate is so low that you may not ever see them.

I will illustrate. Let's say you have a good friend and one night you let him use your car to go get something. He does not go anywhere else other than where you send him too. He gets in an accident that is not his fault. What would you do if he came in and did not tell you that your car was damaged but found out the next day as you were going to work? You might be mad at him. What if he told you that while his was coming home he got in an accident and it was not his fault, giving you all of the details. Hiding things from people (players) makes it worst than openly telling them. That is the point I am trying to make. I am not talking about learning something here on the forums after the fact.

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Reasons why devs might be silent on an issue:

1) We didn't see the issue. There are a lot of threads out there.
2) We are in the middle of looking at an issue, and saying anything at the time might be invalidated. Even something like "we are looking into it" can be read as "we are going to change it" if we look at it and find it to be fine, we would get blasted for not changing it when we said we would.
3) The answer is already being given by a lot of players already
4) The answer is obvious (and thus will eventually be given out by a lot of players, see #3).
5) It involves talking about stuff we can't/shouldn't be talking about.
6) The question is a "when" question. We rarely answer these, because even when we put disclaimers on it, our answer becomes taken as gospel, and if we fail to deliver, we look bad.

There's a secret 7th reason that I am not going to give you because of reason #7.

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I give you the 7th reason...

The 7th Reason

7th Reason Again

What?!?!? Come on... some on had to do it...

2nd Level Mind / Psi Dom. (something like this couldn't be a hero after all)

Mind was a good choice - the 7th Reason is Positron playing with our minds