Stagnation and super duper lame October promotion
There is a raging error on the website right now that lists all but one crate package at $35, but even at the 1 crate price of $20.. you guys are out of your minds.
1. These fragments are old and recycled. There is nothing new there.
2. Why would we pay $20 for 5 fragment pieces of old and recycled items when we bought.. phylacteries at $5(on the expensive end, but still worth $5) a pop? Each phylactery had: gold, 1 fragment, either credits/tickets/or artifact?
You're asking way too much for way too little. 5 recycled and old fragment pieces != $20. The rare pieces from a promo way back when aren't even offered now, such as wings, transmute, veil, quicksilver armor/weapon.
What is the incentive in paying $20 for 5 fragment pieces that the market is flooded with? I personally myself have 250+ fragment pieces. And it isn't because I'm not trying to get rid of them, I actively try to sell them. Please see PROMO MARKET FRAGMENT and be amazed at the plethora that is on offer to the game already.
While $20 gets you 5 fragments, which each have a min. tradein value of 10 per fragment.. $20 gets you 50 credits on the website and with IRE Elite you'll get 5 extra and they'd be unbound, allowing you to wheel and deal.
I feel like not much thought was put into this promotion, considering we had a promotion in August that flooded the game with fragments(aka phylacteries). I honestly wouldn't be surprised if you guys see minimal to no biters this month, because this promo/deal is just awful beyond belief.
Moving on to stagnation..
It's Halloween. Why do we not have any events for Halloween? Why have we not had events for the past several months? I've spoken to a handful of players who log in every single day and we all share the same sentiment.. the game is stagnant and it isn't moving. Since I have came back in February, we've not had an event for ANY Holiday. The last one was Ironbeard giving out gifts during December.
Holidays are the best tie in for IG events that correlate with the RL in a fun way, WoW has these for example.. but we haven't this year at all. I know they've been done in the past, but why is this year so empty of events?
1. These fragments are old and recycled. There is nothing new there.
2. Why would we pay $20 for 5 fragment pieces of old and recycled items when we bought.. phylacteries at $5(on the expensive end, but still worth $5) a pop? Each phylactery had: gold, 1 fragment, either credits/tickets/or artifact?
You're asking way too much for way too little. 5 recycled and old fragment pieces != $20. The rare pieces from a promo way back when aren't even offered now, such as wings, transmute, veil, quicksilver armor/weapon.
What is the incentive in paying $20 for 5 fragment pieces that the market is flooded with? I personally myself have 250+ fragment pieces. And it isn't because I'm not trying to get rid of them, I actively try to sell them. Please see PROMO MARKET FRAGMENT and be amazed at the plethora that is on offer to the game already.
While $20 gets you 5 fragments, which each have a min. tradein value of 10 per fragment.. $20 gets you 50 credits on the website and with IRE Elite you'll get 5 extra and they'd be unbound, allowing you to wheel and deal.
I feel like not much thought was put into this promotion, considering we had a promotion in August that flooded the game with fragments(aka phylacteries). I honestly wouldn't be surprised if you guys see minimal to no biters this month, because this promo/deal is just awful beyond belief.
Moving on to stagnation..
It's Halloween. Why do we not have any events for Halloween? Why have we not had events for the past several months? I've spoken to a handful of players who log in every single day and we all share the same sentiment.. the game is stagnant and it isn't moving. Since I have came back in February, we've not had an event for ANY Holiday. The last one was Ironbeard giving out gifts during December.
Holidays are the best tie in for IG events that correlate with the RL in a fun way, WoW has these for example.. but we haven't this year at all. I know they've been done in the past, but why is this year so empty of events?
You say, "Oh crap."
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.
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I obviously appreciate this shot at a few artifacts I have not be able to collect pieces for - namely the signet ring and the circumwhozzit. I don't know how I feel about the pricing, frankly. Seems like a less 'obvious' value on crates, which makes me less likely to buy. The value is surely lower than September's promotion and I did not buy then, either.
While you have a chance at a fragment worth more than 10 tradein, there are so many worth that much that you're going to see the 10 tradein value ones more common. And understandably so. My initial post may have come off as more critical than I intended, but this is blatantly a bad deal.
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.
And assuming the 20 USD per 1 crate is right, that's a terrible value when compared to phylacteries and other sales. I'm hoping all the prices are bugged, though - it's obvious some are, so badly that the 5+ packages are insanely good credit-to-dollar value such that there's no way it's intended, so maybe the 20 USD for 1 crate is wrong, too.
My only complaint is that it's something of a repeat, and I wanted different promo items - but that's a personal quibble and I'm sure some people are happy to be able to finish fragment things off!
My original post was with the crate price at $20 per. Even at the biggest discount of 20 crates at $15 per, this is still a horrible deal.
$20 for 50 unbound, or 55 if you have Elite.. or $20 for 50 bound credits with a minimal chance at more than 50 if you luck out and pull a better than 10 credit tradein fragment. Want to try to sell the fragments? Good luck with the saturated market on a low pop game. Personal use? Sure.. you're going to have to buy more than 1 crate.. or 20 to get a few complete pieces.
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.
I will change up the items in the sale as well if you are unhappy with them.
I feel like whilst this sale is ok value in terms of money:credits, it's just missing the appeal of stuff like phylacteries and past promos, whether that was the chance at a rarer item like an arti drop, or the fun stuff like gladiator tickets, or even just new items. Fragment items can be fun, but we had those as part of phylacteries pretty recently and only a few of them feel like must-haves for me, such as the pet license.
The catch with fragments is that the rarer ones, even if they do drop, are hard to finish an item with - I missed the promos that had stuff like phoenix wing fragments in, but I imagine those were so rare that actually completing the items was prohibitively difficult.
What changes would be possible, for the crates?
Idea 1: I would have been cool with halloween-themed mini phylacteries. I know this risks burning us out on a classic, strong revenue generator, but I'd have gladly taken a 'phylactery' full of Oktoberfest?-themed promo stuff ('ghastly brews' that provide some kind of quirky thing, whatever, I'll get over it, nothing is as bad as old shackles), costume vouchers, superduper costume vouchers (to buy new 2017 costumes!?), some theme friendly artifacts and maybe some writs, etc. Hell, each one could contain a spooky raffle ticket and you give away exclusive Halloween toys from said raffle.. I think these seasonal events being a place where people own 'exclusive' pieces of Imperian event history is pretty cool, so them not necessarily 'repeating' (sans costumes, which could expand) is fine in a way.
Idea 2 : I'd have even taken some kind of new theme-friendly assembly artifacts.. or perhaps assembly costumes?!
Idea 3 : I'd have taken a flat artifact sale to go with the healthy serving of credits you were heaping up last month.. this idea coming from somebody that is essentially asking you to smash him in the face with non-buyer's remorse ("shhiii, I should have bought 2k".)
1. Won't force new work on your already heaping workload(appreciate everything you do, btw, can't say this enough)
2. Won't contribute to power-creep issue.
3. Stick to theme of fragments(kind of)
Here are my ideas..
Phylacteries
1. Bring back phylacteries and swap out the current fragments with old assembly pieces to the warhorn, compass, lasso, statue, brush, phial, meteor, and glasses. Check out HELP ASSEMBLY. From my sleuthing, it seems these pieces have not been offered for sale for RL years.
But please do not put in the stupid pieces for the crowns, cloaks, blah blah. Those are so saturated in the market from the last wheel and the wheel before that, and probably the wheel before that one too.
Crates
1. Remove the current fragments from the crates and put in old assembly pieces as listed above.
2. Give a small chance at each opening to get a fully assembled item.
3. Lower the price.
$20 for 5 fragment pieces or 5 assembly pieces is too much to ask for, imo. $20 as a buy-in to a promo is a bit too much to ask for. $5 for phylacteries is sort of a sweet spot, with descending price discounts for bigger purchases. My reasoning behind this is, you satisfy all buyers by offering bundled discounts and also smaller micro-transaction type of buys at $5 each.
After speaking to other players who buy-in in smaller amounts, they'd likely not pause over $5 as they would over $20.
Since the price is lowered, offer either 3 assembly pieces or 2 assembly pieces + random lesser valued item or a chance at another assembly. Ideas for items can be 1-5 gladiator tickets, atlas pages, beans, etc.
4. Rename it Junk Crate and offer us 2-3(at $5) random things from all the past promos. Earrings, map fragments, scepter gems, random costumes, costume voucher?, crystal apples, crystal apple bags, writs, and assembly piece as listed above(PLEASE NO CROWNS, CLOAKS, ETC).
This suggestion address the idea that was floated around during the stream about bringing back past promos. So, if this is taken into consideration, junk crates could be offered once or twice a year, and include all the year's past promos for players who may have missed out.
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.
Phylacteries had something 'for everyone', with the chance of an artifact, credits, fragments, tickets. Some people may have been buying them primarily for gladiator tickets, some may have been buying them mainly for the fragments, some for the arti chance.
My suggestion is this:
Change the current crates to have more fragments in, so they're more in line with past promo values - 1 crate costs what 50cr does, but past promos tended to be better value for money than just buying credits. Or lower the price and leave it at 5 fragments.
Offer a 2nd kind of crate - an old, dusty crate - That contains a mix of things, like a phylactery. The focus of the dusty crates would be past promos. They could contain 2-3 past promo items, and 1-2 consumable items, like tonics and gladiator tickets. I'm not sure how you'd handle which past promo items they dropped - Having everything on the drop table might make them a pain, because then you'd have a low, low chance of getting the specific promo items you wanted and offering a crate variant tied to each past promo might get messy!
Though that might be the answer - have a few kinds of dusty old crate, each with 2-3 promos tied to it, so people could narrow down the odds a little. Then have the consumables be the common denominator between dusty crates, with tonics, gladiator tickets, map pages and maybe tokens on the table. I suggest this because it's clear from peoples posts that different people want different things. I'm mainly chasing scepter gems, for example, but others might really want assembly items like the warhorn, or the diadems/cloaks/cosmetic things.
1. Phylacteries
2. 40%-50%(Elite) sale on credits
(I don't like flat sales, but this is the best flat sale you're ever going to get)
Earrings wasn't even that great and it especially wasn't great with the end of the month refresh when there was like 10 worthless earrings added to the earring pool, making your chance of earning ruby, diaspore, spinel, etc lower. The only difference there is, people got a chance at earrings with IG credit spins.
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.
Prior promos have actually been pretty good value in terms of money to credit value, especially the big sale and phylacteries. This current one is bad in comparison, because it 'just' offers the same tradein value as you'd get buying credits.
Nevermind the prettty much same tradein value, but it is items that our market/game is already saturated with.
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.
I have almost zero desire to play any of the other IRE games, though some of them do have a couple of particular charms. Imperian is the package, for me, or could be, and was for awhile. But it's either going to keep dying, or IRE will save it. It really is up to them. The players have been almost rabidly devoted, some still are. It's not a lack of player attention span. When a game like this is humming along, players are essentially addicted, and if they're not addicted, they're close to it.
EDIT: a side note for a direction Imperian could take that is absolutely, positively not for me, but could allow the game to fulfill a unique niche, is to go pretty "hard core". Think sort of a cross between old school MUDs and League of Legends (less of the grind of ye olden days, probably, but very elitist, and very, very PK focused).
I don't think going hardcore in one direction or another is going to solve any problems and it will certainly alienate one group or another. You need a diverse group of players for a game to hum along. Admittedly, I'm quite bored right now, but I'm not going to leave the game and I don't see myself leaving anytime soon. I really do want to see more events with rewards/incentives to participate. I'm even trying Aetolia at the moment, but I don't like it enough to truly leave here.
Out of all the IRE games, Imperian is my absolute favorite. In many ways, I enjoy the small close knit community. I use to see it as a con, but it certainly is a pro now in my eyes. I say this because I've had spats with pretty much 80% of our active population and come the next day or week, or however, we're back to business. I'm not sure if this were a more populated game, we'd be back to normal with each other if we truly got into it.
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.
You really can't argue that phylacteries aren't a great value when they absolutely are. Regardless of whether or not you get one every month with or without a promotion. Strictly speaking on value, they are one of, if not the best in terms of promotions. And say what you will, but if you got a veil out of one, you'd be excited. That's a 2K artifact and even if you don't care, you can trade in. And even if you want to pack your bags and move, that's a 1K towards your retire value.
I'm all for bringing up issues the game has with the genuine intent and feeling to fix them, which is why I bring up how horrible/unvaluable this promo is, but past promos(some, but hey, like Eliondra says, you can't win them all) have been pretty legit and fun.
You say, "My bottle is empty."
Jeremy raises an eyebrow questioningly.
Jeremy slaps you on the cheek.