Super Packs Update - 12/2/2011

There's no snap judgment here. Many people do not want to be forced to gamble in order to obtain what they want in this game. End of story. Yes, it's "only a game", but it's a thing I happen to enjoy and when someone takes something I enjoy and turns it into something I don't enjoy, well, then I get a little cranky.

Stop discounting people's opinions just because you disagree with them. It's obnoxious.

Those arguments *were* brought up in other parts of the game. This is why we now have a deterministic option to spend merits for selected IO recipes instead of only random end-of-TF drops (Crap of the Hunter, anyone?). This is why we have Empyrean merits instead of having to rely solely on random salvage drops for Incarnate progress.

Yes, the primary reason people dislike this one is because it's random. That's the entire argument. "We don't want forced random item purchases without an included deterministic option; please include a direct purchase option." You keep trying to blow off the fact that it's random and focusing on other aspects that you *think* they're objecting to, when the crux of the matter is that people don't want a random option to be the only way to get these items.

It's not preposterous. It's a preference. People might not like all the costume items in other sets, but they have the option of deciding whether or not to purchase based on what they know will be in the pack. It's not like there's some surprise (except if people haven't done their due diligence, in which case caveat emptor). There's no roll of the dice; the pieces are predetermined.

With the Super Packs, you can't be sure at all what's going to be in the pack. Many people prefer not to spend money on a *chance* to get the pieces they want; they would rather purchase the pieces outright, knowing exactly what they'll get.

And for both the consumer and Paragon Studios, this is a bad thing. The player ends up not getting what (s)he wants, and Paragon ends up not getting money. Lose-lose.

They have been. See above.

Boosters were NOT rolls of the dice; they were predetermined items in a set, packaged together. Players had the option to research the contents of the pack before making the decision whether or not to purchase. The packs are not comparable. Nobody can research the contents of the Super Packs, determine what exactly will be in any given pack, and decide whether or not to purchase based on that information.

First of all, given the sheer number of different items reasonably expected to be in the packs, it's not going to be anywhere near a 50/50 chance. There have been posts detailing how, in other games with similar "CCG" mechanisms, some players have spent as much as $70 or even $250 to complete their sets.

Second, the fact that people prefer a "sure thing" isn't a fallacy. It can't be, as it's a purely subjective preference. And people who don't want random packs and would prefer to simply purchase the pieces they want are arguing that the devs should include a deterministic option, because it gets both the players and the company what they want.

At least part of that argument must have been compelling, because they *are* adding deterministic options for at least some items.

So you've defined the essence of life as gambling, so anyone who hates gambling hates life? What if I define the essence of life as pie? After all, pie is a large slice of life (horrible pun intended). Clearly, then, anyone who hates pie hates life.

I certainly don't want you to get hit by a bus. This isn't personal. What I take issue with is in your trying to take a preconceived notion you have ("People are being dishonest about why they dislike the packs") and using all kinds of convoluted leaps of logic in order to make it seem true in your mind.

I don't think people are being dishonest about why they don't like the packs: They simply don't like spending money on a random option. In fact, it seems that many of these people don't even have a problem with the packs per se, but the fact that they were originally introduced without an additional deterministic option to purchase.

As a final note, I regret to inform you that trying to get people to be better people by making posts on an Internet forum may not have the degree of success you're hoping for. But I get the feeling you already know that.

Once they do the same for the costume pieces, then they'll once more be my fave dev team in the world.

Right now though they've dropped to below EA/Activision levels, which is a very bad thing.

My feedback about this is as follows:
If the costume items are exclusive to the packs, and there is no gauretee of getting one in a pack, I will not be spending money to obtain them (will not buying the packs at all).

If, however, the costume parts are avaliable via a differnet means I will almost certainly spend money on them.

Alternativly, if each pack gaurenteed at least one costume item 'card' (of no specific rarity), I would strongly consider buying the packs themselves (depending on total number required to get all the costume pieces, and how much that would cost me).

(it is worthy to note that I am one of those people to whom the consumables and reward merits are not worth real money under any circumstances)

This kind of sales technique is nothing new, either in the real world - from baseball cards to CCGs - or in MMOs, especially F2P ones. Anyone paying attention to such things has already got a good idea whether or not they're acceptable to them. To judge from the swift wave of informed and well articulated responses here on the forums, many players do not like the concept of the Super Packs in general, based on review or experience elsewhere. To discount what they've had to say, often at length, as "snap-judgments" seems like a precipitous response in itself.

In any case, Paragon Studios has been paying attention to the feedback on the forums and seems willing to work with the playerbase to find a broadly acceptable way of implementing the Super Packs. We shall see how it goes.

I played a few CCGs back in the day myself, and utterly despise the 'spend hundred of dollars until you collect what you want' aspect of them. That is the reason I vowed never to play any again, and do not want 'collectible' swag added to CoH.

To put it aside would be to not mention it, which would be much more consistent with a "high-road" approach to this dialogue. Mentioning it seems designed to incite guilt or otherwise create emotions that are inconsistent with your following statement:

I think that - and I say this with all sincerity - if your vision of how to accomplish the mission of getting people to be "better people" involves repeatedly telling them that they're being dishonest (with themselves and with others), and somehow likening the psychology of buying a pack of cards to get a random reward with the psychology of breathing, you might re-evaluate how you're trying to accomplish your goals. I don't recall coming across your postings prior to this thread, but the impression I take away from what you're saying here is very much NOT someone who wants to help other people improve themselves.

Life is risky. Every decision has consequences. I don't disagree with those points. But what you have done is made that idea a reductio ad absurdum of the concept of "gambling" which, in the context of the super packs, had a very specific and measurable meaning that is distinct from the risk-taking that we must naturally engage in if we're to continue existing in our shared world.

*raises brows* Condescending little thing, ain'tcha?

Its ok, Selina has already schooled you so I won't pick this apart sentence by sentence. Suffice it to say I find your logic to be BEYOND hugely faulty, and your attitude non-conducive to changing minds.

Purchase all of these pestiferous Packs that you please; myself and many others are going to decline. Why? Because sometimes, you got to vote with your wallet, and this is definitely one of those times. If we let this get by, EVERYTHING will be up for a roll of the dice and HOW ABOUT NO THANK YOU.

Yeah, one. Is condescension inversely proportional to math skills?

Coupon Collector's Problem

If the Super Packs were the only source of the costume set, and,

If the Costume Pieces were not tradable, and,

If, for the sake of argument, let's say there were 20 pieces in the set,

And, if each pack were about a dollar (US),

Then... It would take at least about $75 to get the set.

That's gouging.

And that's not even taking into account you might not have a costume piece in a pack at all.

The Celestial Set cost 3 Tokens representing only $45, but, you get either 3 months sub time or 3,600 Points to spend elsewhere with that which is what $45 is worth in sub time or Points making the Celestial Set de facto free... it's a free reward for subbing or buying points. Let me repeat that. The Celestial Sets were FREE. They're a reward, not something you buy on top of other purchases.

Other actually purchasable costume sets have been $10 or less.

Now, with ATOs, you'd be trying to get sets of 6 out of 48 possibles, leading to spending over $100 just for your 3 main alts. Which is still pretty gougey.

Do you have any questions?

This is exactly why I was so against the Super Packs from the start. Thank you, Zombie Man, for clearly articulating the nature of the problem with this style of marketing from a consumer perspective.

I do feel like I should point out for the sake of the discussion that the demonstration is a mathematical model that assumes each pack will contain at least one piece out of 20, as you mentioned once. If that is not true, and we don't know the probability of getting a costume piece in each pack, those dollar values will increase with inverse proportion to the rarity of the costume pieces.

That means that Zombie Man's model predicts a best-case average cost per customer.

If the costume pieces are rare, expect the average cost per customer to increase significantly. If there are more than 20 pieces, expect the cost to increase significantly. If both of those possibilities turn out to be true, the actual experienced cost per customer will be astronomical.

The other thing that needs to be mentioned is that, if there is not a guaranteed chance to get a costume piece in each pack bought, there will be a chance, albeit an increasingly small one per pack bought, that a given user will never get the full costume set. There is no such thing as a sure bet with random chance. Yes, as the number of packs bought by a user approaches infinity, the chance of not getting the last piece they don't have approaches zero, but it never reaches zero.

In a player base with hundreds of thousands of participants, it will take someone thousands of trials to collect every piece of the set if they aren't guaranteed drops. I don't want to be that guy.

I24 Proc Chance = (Enhanced Recharge + Activation Time) * (Current PPM * 1.25) / 60*(1 + .75*(.15*Radius - 0.011*Radius*(360-Arc)/30))
Single Target Radius = 0. AoE Non-Cone Arc = 360.

It wasn't a snap judgement. It was a judgment based on plenty of in game and out of game data.

The random reward table at the end of task forces were removed due to the exact same mechanic, and those didn't even involve real money. Now if you want to do random rolls, you can make the decision to get the rolls. However most players buy specific items. This lesson was ignored by the development team. Apparently by yourself as well.
After spending thousands of dollars on collectible card games, finally walking away from anything similar, it comes down to the fact that this would cost Paragon Studios more money than it would make as less people would want to subscribe. In other words, the company didn't do its due diligence and forgot lessons learned in the past.
We already had that. You choose to ignore why people are complaining. They don't want to gamble in this game with their money. Given the global economic realities, it isn't hard to see why. Even Las Vegas is suffering from a decline in revenue.

Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters

Thank you for the clarification. VIP-only benefits would surely be a sufficiently worthwhile longterm investment for both players and Paragon Studios to make such a code-change advantageous. CoH Freedom was a significant enough change in the business model that such considerations will naturally arise.

Why would that be an argument? Players were able to keep their assorted pre-Freedom benefits, after all. In principle, this is the same.

People don't want to pay real money for a gamble on virtual items. However it goes deeper than that. The packs were made to prey on their VIPs for more money than their subscription. They were designed to make players buy what they weren't buying before: consumable items. Zwillinger said as much:
The problem is that the consumables aren't incentive enough for players to buy them. So they targeted VIPs with items they wanted to get (ATOs and costumes) and put them in with the consumables. Players called them out on it.

I didn't. Even if I had not spent $15 on buying 1,320 points, I'd be completing the Celestial Set this month. Also one side of your argument doesn't match the other, because people are willing to pay more doesn't mean that they are gambling.

Except that anyone could research what was included in a booster pack. Heck, Paragon Studios and NCsoft put out breakdowns of what exactly were in the boosters so players could make an informed choice.

You have no clue about the math involved, huh?

Yes, do you realize how you are coming across to those reading your posts? I can tell you that you are showing yourself to be someone that I will not take seriously.

Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters

Is this really an issue?

What currently happens if a VIP using the IDF, Alpha or Omega sets drops to Premium and doesn't bother purchasing them again?

Or the Celestial armor, which is supposed to be VIP-only?

I don't see the problem.

Premiums that were T9 VIPs keep their Celestial sets right? The precedent is there and it certainly doesn't bother me any.

Edit: Alternatively, what she *points up* said. ><;

I24 Proc Chance = (Enhanced Recharge + Activation Time) * (Current PPM * 1.25) / 60*(1 + .75*(.15*Radius - 0.011*Radius*(360-Arc)/30))
Single Target Radius = 0. AoE Non-Cone Arc = 360.

If these costume parts were made free for VIPs, then down the road when say, 5 sets had been released, someone could buy a sub for one month, then unsubscribe, and get all of the parts, forever. That's not going to be a good return on investment for costume development in the long run.

However, if the costume parts were available for purchase for VIPs, then you'd basically be charging Premiums 15 dollars to get them (because they'd buy the packs with the 400 point stipend) for a flat cost instead of having to gamble for them, while charging VIPs the established 400 point cost. I'm not sure if that's still something Positron would view as a problem or not.

I think those come with Going Rogue, right? Not VIP status? (Edit: looks like the IDF and Defense sets were free for VIPs, so your question is still relevant.)

They had to spend tokens on those, though, so it's a little different from getting a whole bunch of sets that only VIPs are supposed to have (with no additional expenditures) for a one-time $15 sub fee.

Thanks for the information, Positron.

What about costume parts for purchase for VIPs? Could you restrict the purchase of certain items in the Paragon Market to only be for VIPs, with a worst case scenario being Premiums subbing for a single month 3 years from now and then buying enough points to get all the VIP costume packs they missed?

That's the kind of deal Paragon Studios should be advertising to promote VIP subscriptions. The opportunity to buy costume packs would of course be only one of the many benefits VIPers receive. If subscription marketing tells us anything, when someone signs up, even for the minimum length, there's a psychological propensity to stay subscribed after the initial period expires. And as the devs assured us numerous times before CoH Freedom launched, VIPers are the ultimate focus for the game, and their preferred outcome for the hyrbid F2P-MTX-subscription model is for Preems to convert to VIPers.

Besides, at 80 PP a throw, what's the betting that $15+the costume set price would be the better deal for someone who wanted a complete costume set? (Spoiler: Very good odds.)

I'm pretty sure that GR is free with VIP now so they should still count.

Thanks for this. Placate indeed.

It sounds like this opens both grades of AO through in-game sources? (mentioned somewhere upthread)

Are yours?

The "Coupon Collector's Problem" only applies when you can potentially collect the same piece twice, and further, that every piece is desired precisely once.

Neither of those things are true of the super packs.
a) Costume pieces can never be repeated, if you get one, you will never get it again.
b) Other items in the packs may be desired more than once, or not at all.

This is a completely different issue to the "Coupon Collector's Problem" so I really don't understand why you brought it up.

Er... no.
The least is would take is $4. 20 costume pieces, 5 cards per pack, $1 per pack.
$1 * 20/5 = $4

I suspect what you mean is that the mean cost of collecting all the pieces would be $75. But that's completely unknowable without knowing the probabilities of each individual piece of the set. So even if you were claiming that, it would still be completely unfounded.

You're quoting to what was revealed and what was changed *after* we complained. The original complaint and original maths involved was valid which is what RavenSoul was mocking as hysterical ado about nothing.

Since the original announcement and changes have been made, most of us have withdrawn our fierce opposition to it.

Reading comprehension is as important as math skills.