Worrysome: Korean game centers to receive MF/GF buffs during gameplay

Inethil wrote: 2 years ago

...There is no pay to win element here, as you are being rewarded for [..] spending [..]...

Necromancy aside, that's quite literally the definition of pay to win.

Personally, I don't mind some (short term!) temporary event-boost much (did this ever actually happen? and does it still last?), so long as it doesn't offer any otherwise unobtainable permanent benefit. Much the same way I don't mind them throwing even more random stuff at streamers to hand out to people for free views yesterday since the stuff their followers already throw at them to do the exact same thing every day apparently somehow isn't sufficient.

Meh, considering diminished returns on mf, I wouldn't even bother driving 1 min away to receive this bonus. Also, I don't really care if they offer this incentive anywhere bc I think some people would be happy just playing with others in the same room as them and this gives them 'incentive' to do so.

It is super cheesy though, I will admit that. And also, yeah hopefully they wouldn't go further than that. Imagine them increasing HR drop rates at one of these locations... >.>

Its going to be a nice experiment to see what the internal community reaction is. The boosts dont seem like too much, but 25% MF for a starting player is HUGE, as for low amounts of MF it increases all drop chances (magic, rare, unique) almost equally, which is substantial.

I dont know what to think of it yet, as it seems to be a localized event.

Going to be? This is months old.

I dont like this. By itself i can see why some might think its not a big deal, just consider that if they do this it opens the door for them to implement even more pay to win mechanics. This game was remade because the original was still fairly popular for over 2 decades, a rare thing for any video game. I would argue the biggest reason we all have been playing this game for this long is because of the item system and how rare everything truly is and how satisfying it is to find these rare items...paying or giving a boost to finding this gear in anyway other than what is already in game is wrong

And they, also, are alowed to use loot filters

Y'know what? This is p2w, but I think it's actually a positive form of it. Getting people to go to a physical place makes it a community-building thing. Since it's MF/GF, it'll also Wind up dropping the prices of stuff, so people who don't even go will see some benefit.

Compare this to promo cards at M:tG events or something. It's fine.

Reading things like this definitely gives conspiracy theorists more ammo that Blizzard can/will tune the drop rates based on certain metrics to boost or nerf player participation...

I wasn't aware of this, but yeah, it's garbage.

I don't care if it's 'just 25% MF' or even just 1%...

If "25% MF literally doesn't matter", then they should offer a bonus 0% MF, and it would be the same, right?

25% MF matters. If you find just 1 more item, then you got a free item just by doing something that not only isn't really linked to playing the game, but also, something that most people just can't do.

And as others mentioned, the slippery slope is scary as hell.
If they can add a +25% MF bonus and no one really cares, then what's the limit? What if they added 50 MF then? 100 MF? What if they added 5% more rune drops ("It doesn't matter, the odds are very low anyway so it doesn't really change much!")
What if they added 1% DPS? What if they gave Maphack? What if they gave them 2x mob/champion density?

Where do you draw the line?

I think for a LOT of players, you draw the line at "Literally no one should ever receive ANY unfair advantage that others don't get".

007Bistromath wrote: 2 years ago

it'll also Wind up dropping the prices of stuff, so people who don't even go will see some benefit.

Prices dropping doesn't benefit everyone; It's an equilibrium.

Obviously, if the price of an item drops, it benefits those who wants to buy the item... And hurts those who want to sell it.

But even if we only consider the buy: Between you being able to save 1

Ist out of a 10

Ist item, vs the guy who found the 10

Ist item (which resulted in the price dropping), it's not really close who got the best deal out of this.

snorlaxing wrote: 2 years ago

Reading things like this definitely gives conspiracy theorists more ammo that Blizzard can/will tune the drop rates based on certain metrics to boost or nerf player participation...

Of course they can. Calling that a "conspiracy theory" is ridiculous. It's something many games have done. For all we know it's already happening on D2R, just not enough that anyone has noticed. Every AAA and mobile dev has a Black hat psychologist on staff these days. Immortal made $24 million in two weeks. This event is a baby fart compared to that. We have lost that fight almost as hard as we possibly can, and if we take an absolutist stance on these practices, the only thing we'll succeed at is removing ourselves from their audience.

I don't like these practices overall. I feel like even relatively small developers are being encouraged to make gaming into a job, which the liches who ruin the world hope will culminate in some kind of nearly-mandatory "game" in the metaverse that drip feeds you social credit as a form of freelance worker management and a method of privatizing unemployment benefits.

However, even in mobile games, there are some winning value propositions. Making grind-reduction mechanics that aren't offensively expensive is a matter of calibration that some devs actually do okay with. I'm not saying this as a whale; I'd estimate that in the years I've been playing phone trash, I've spent less than $150 in total, and I can think of two games ever that I've spent more than $20 on individual. I try dozens of these things occasionally, and for the most part, they're lucky if I even let ads play. Plenty of them manage to hold my attention for a couple weeks without me spending a dime.

The difference is pretty simple, really: these are actually two different business models that happen to use the same pricing mechanics, but with different numbers.

In the good examples, devs consider this a way to let different people figure out how much the game is worth to them, essentially giving everyone a relatively generous demo and an a la carte price structure for those who decide they actually like it.

In the bad examples, the devs are running a casino with no payouts. That's what Diablo: Immortal is, probably worse than any other game I've ever seen, and Blizzard absolutely deserves to be savaged for it. They won't care, though, because they made $24 million in two weeks. None of us gave them that money, so evidently we already aren't the target audience. You can't boycott something you don't buy.

The correct thing to do about this is to start writing letters to senators. They won't make the problem go away, but they will want to tax it, and they're likely to make the pricing and probabilities more fair in the process, as they do with actual casinos.

And this particular thing? It's still fine. A modest boost for a modest price, tied to a real world community building event. That was already normal, just not in this market.

mishabg wrote: 2 years ago

Prices dropping doesn't benefit everyone; It's an equilibrium.

Obviously, if the price of an item drops, it benefits those who wants to buy the item... And hurts those who want to sell it.

The prices are dropping because of an MF increase. That means sellers are going to make it up in volume because they're selling more stuff.

007Bistromath wrote: 2 years ago

The correct thing to do about this is to start writing letters to senators. They won't make the problem go away, but they will want to tax it, and they're likely to make the pricing and probabilities more fair in the process, as they do with actual casinos.

Funny you mention this because Asmongold published similar arguments and mentioned Ted Cruz in one of them, sort of as a meme.

Day or two later the US senator actually ended up responding to him on a podcast and speaking openly about it.

He was actually quite up to speed with the situation, and agreed with asmon, laying criticism on loot boxes and other gambling mechanics.

PS for new readers, this topic/the OP is almost 10 months old, please bear that in mind.

No politician ever wastes an opportunity to turn outrage into a bargaining chip with the huge businesses that bankroll their career. Occasionally that process accidentally produces positive results.

007Bistromath wrote: 2 years ago

snorlaxing wrote: 2 years ago

Reading things like this definitely gives conspiracy theorists more ammo that Blizzard can/will tune the drop rates based on certain metrics to boost or nerf player participation...

Of course they can. Calling that a "conspiracy theory" is ridiculous. It's something many games have done. For all we know it's already happening on D2R, just not enough that anyone has noticed.

Unless someone has come out and say Blizzard did that or some mass study to verify the altered drop rates, it is still a theory based on personal experience. I don't believe Blizzard had the ability to do this on the original D2 release. I agree this kind of community building event isn't a huge deal, unless they got some GG item and had to pay big dollars to attend.

edit: Looks like the patch on June 29 will ABSOLUTELY do this.

I would like it on record that I was right about that mere minutes before reading the thread about the patch.

More to the point, yes, they're absolutely going to use this system to try to sell something at some point. They wouldn't build it otherwise.

As crappy as Blizzard can be though, I have a feeling we're not going to get hit with anything too nasty. My understanding is that compared to the rest of their business, D2R is practically a little side project. They know it's for a different market niche, composed almost entirely of old guard. My bet is that future ladder seasons will eventually incorporate new content that is slightly more interesting than just new runewords, though almost certainly nothing as far reaching as an Act VI, and they'll want a $5-10 per season buy-in for it. If they're smart they might also try selling stash tabs like PoE. I doubt they're going to try to do battlepasses or something stupid like that in D2R, and probably nothing $20 or above unless there's actual blow-your-pants-off new content with new assets and everything.

007Bistromath wrote: 2 years ago

[...] More to the point, yes, they're absolutely going to use this system to try to sell something at some point. They wouldn't build it otherwise. [...]

This MF boost ends on the 4th of July, which is the same end date as the current sales on the shop. I wonder if they're trying to draw new players into the game in the wake of the vast popularity of MF videos and streams.

It's also racist to give one country one people a special privilege's and not the rest of the world. It violates laws in several countries too. But it's "just a game" so they know no one would ever take it to a court.