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Token Item Frequency Discussion

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4/21/2024 12:05:29   
Grace Xisthrith
Member
 

 I'm not sure if players are allowed to discuss topics like this or not. If not, please feel free to delete this thread.

That being said, I saw a lot of people complaining about the frequency of token items this year, so I collected some data on how many token items were released this year versus last year in the same time frame. This data ignores GGB frequency and package frequency, but I assume those would be the same each year because they're on a schedule. Could be worth including though. I actually don't feel too strongly about the issue either way, I don't really know what motivates the developers to make certain items tokens (although they have said stuff like tomes with higher work hours is more likely to be tokens), or certain items gold, so I'm going to try to refrain from judging the choices. I did think some data on the topic would be helpful for a discussion. Someone gave me the idea to also compare the total number of items released. The simplest reason is if we had a lot more items this year, of course it makes sense more of them were tokens. I've included those at the bottom, we had about 25% more items this year, very roughly.

For the data below, I didn't include items that are always tokens, like LTS paintings, or faces, since that didn't make sense. I did include the token option of the Frostvale Giftboxen set however, but I also included the total without it since it felt a bit strange including it. As well, it feels a bit strange including the token donation weapons, since those were a very special case, and they do make up almost a quarter of the token items released this year. That being said, it did take up a full release with only token items.
Token items until 3rd release of April in 2023:
Full Giftbox Set (8 Items)
Hammerfall Spell (1 Item)
Blazing Groundhog (1 Item)
Radiant Superb Owl (1 Item)
Shadow Hedgemog (1 Item)
Book of Love (1 Item)
Underworld Tome (1 Item)
April Fools LTS Blind Weapons (3 Items)
Total: 17 Items
Total without Giftbox Set: 9 Items


Token items until 3rd release of April 2024:
Full Giftbox Set (8 Items)
Custom Golden Ticket Weapons (5 Items)
Tribal Shaman Staff (1 Item)
Lunar Wood Dragon Ornament (1 Item)
Lovestruck Armor (1 Item)
ChronoCroaker Armor (1 Item)
Dreadstalker Call (1 Item)
Legion Aegis (1 Item)
Harrowing Dunes (1 Item)
Surtr's Promise (1 Item)
Mechwog Weapons (3 Items)
April Fools Weapons (3 Items)
Total: 27 Items
Total without Giftbox Set: 19 Items

So, the conclusion is we've received more than double the token items this year in the same time frame than we did last year, but there are some big caveats, which I go into below. It's very possible I've missed a few items, this is a list I made in like 20 minutes so it could be error prone. A few things jump out at me here

This year, we had the golden ticket weapons. Take away those weapons, and a lot of the gap disappears, particularly considering we've had 25% more items overall this year. Compare 9 to 14, and multiply 9 by 1.25x to account for the overall difference in item number, and it's very close to an equal proportion of token items to non token items. If you did that, and if the Lunar Hare Weapons had happened to be tokens, the releases would be almost identical (of course, the Lunar Hare Weapons were not tokens). I point out these weapons specifically because it's a change from last year to this year, and last year's weapons were certainly very well liked, since players love lucky strike support. That's not a fully complete thought, but the comparison interested me so I listed it.

Overall, I'm curious how peeople feel about this, obviously it would be nice if everything was gold cost, but the game is company, so that would obviously never happen. If I could ask the devs any questions, I'd like to ask, is there a definitive process for deciding whether an item will be gold or tokens? How well do token items sell, I'm told there's data on who buys token items, so I'd love to see how sales for Radiant Superb Owl were compared to something like the Chronocroaker Armor. I'd also be super curious if those sales are timestamped, and could be tracked to being purchased during black friday or not.

There's also some problems with this data. I'm counting the donation items in the total items, but obviously many players won't have access to the heroic titan nightfall gear, or the autumn gear. Same with the previous year. There may be a better way to analyze it with or without these factors, but I've already spent too much time on it, so I'll just list that it's probably a problem with the analysis, and leave it at that.

Total items released: Again, disclaimer that I collected this list on my own, so I may be missing a few
Total Items released 2023
FGGB Set (8)
Possessed Diabolical Blade (1)
Friday 13th Weapon Set (3)
Benthic Shank (1)
Queen's Crown (1)
Kindness Weapons (2/6)
Shadowstalker and Devoured Earth Sets (6/10)
Thunder Gown + Hammerfall (2)
Blazing Groundhog, Shadow Hedgemog, radiant Superb Owl (3)
Book of Love, Sweetheart Spear and Shield (3)
Legion Deery Pet and Guest (2)
Red Moondial (1)
Legion Fan and Underworld Tome (2)
April Fools Prankster Weapons (3)
Wyrd Ward (1)
Tarnished Garden Edge (1)
Fall Dryad (1)
Ring of Precision (1)
Ivory Power Strider Weapons (1/3)
Lunar Hare Weapons (2/3)
Total: 45 (not counting 1:1 clones, 56 counting clones)


GGB
Bone Chilling Mason Form, Deatharrows
Like ~16 GGBs Extravaganza
Legion Glaive Lanter and Ghoul
4 Magestaves + Neko Doll
Total: Can't really compare because the extravaganza happened

Package:
Legion Shieldcake
Sabre Toothed Grenwog
Burpsy's Weapons and Misc
Total: 3

Total Items Released 2024:
FGGB Set (8)
Hollowborn Frost Reaver (1)
Custom Donation Weapons (5)
Tribal Shaman Staff (1)
Aciel's Calamity Staff (1)
Lunar Wood Dragon and Ornament (2)
Heroic Titan Weapons, Shield, and Misc (5/10)
Autumn Weapons, Shield, and Misc (3/5)
Full Lovestruck Set (6)
Chronocroaker Gear (3)
Dreadstalker Weapons (1/3)
Dreadstalker Call (1)
Legion Aegis (1)
Rebirth Staff (1)
Old Glory + Harrowing Dunes (2)
4 Meter Blarney Skeleton Attack (1)
Surtr's Promise + Mark of Ruin (2)
Petrify Gear Grenwog (3)
Eclipse Weapons (1/3)
Grenwog Weapons and Shields (4)
April Fools Weapons and Shields (4)
Total: 56 (not counting 1:1 clones, 67 counting clones)

GGB
Nulgath Items (3)
Monsterlord Gear (4/5)
Hivedivers Gear (2/6)
Total: Can't really compare because no extravaganza

Package:
Calendar Items
Tribal Shaman Armor
Daishinshi Minor Update?
Doomlight
Total: 4

< Message edited by Grace Xisthrith -- 4/21/2024 14:37:11 >
AQ  Post #: 1
4/22/2024 6:31:21   
Sapphire
Member

Yeah, seen lots of complaints. People are ever more patient and will wait until BF to pick this stuff up.

But as for maybe a peak into the reason for the increased token items this year, well, I think it is because of 2, maybe 3 reasons.

First, I have a hunch the playerbase is dwindling. And I also have a hunch this began with the announcement of the Winter Gold contest being changed into a drive. That was the beginning. Several players were making it a habit and a priority to log in and gold cap. Some even would do this on multiple characters. If for nothing else, it was a reason to login and play. They may have been around to check out the weekly releases, etc. But over time, since there's now not a massive incen tive to farm gold anymore, they've begun to move on. In other words, the engagement level or willingness to log in and play is lower. Many players who gold farm, also whale. I can name several players that are rather big whales that simply have said they don't wish to play anymore.

Not only is this because of the thing I just outlined, there have been several other things so far this year that have rubbed people the wrong way. To name a few...

1. The Winter Warden stuff release and subsequent bugfixes/nerfs was viewed by some as a debacle
2. The GGB crossover event, one of the most anticipated events post BF (UR collecting), was postponed until April due to the stat revamp. While this is acceptable, it did push some excitement for the UR spending back and left several players unhappy.
3. The stat revamp may have left something to be desired. Guest upkeep went up. Some weren't too thrilled. FO Ranger gets almost no style bonus. Warrior Lean isn't supported with items. Counter-strike is terrible. (Needs to allow for damage buffs to increase it like other damage, or give warriors a toggle to lower damage but enhance counterstrike; should be both)
4. Several releases this year are just LTS and there's 'nothing to do'
5. Some nerfs to beastmaster items, such as Optico because of how it's paid for, pet hypercrit/pet/guest eleempower ticking down twice on celerity, etc. I'm not saying it wasn't necessary, just that this pissed people off.
6. Tribal Shaman's revamp , for those who owned it already, excitement was killed when they completely altered who it was intended for. Several spoke out about this.
7. The heal threads ticked some people off and now they fear a stat they like, or items they like will be altered in an unfavorable way.
8. Now the GGB crossover is pushed another 4 months.
9. Lazyquest bugged out, and many players excitement it was back just got quelled because there's no guarantee it will be fixed.

Then, throw on top that all of those legion packages that got brought back every year are all pretty much outdated and bad, you can't exactly expect a lot of those packages to sell. They need to ALL be overhauled. Essentially, why buy any token packages this year so far outside doomlights? Legion shogun has a FSB that makes everything auto hit, yet auto hit has a new standard. Was this buffed? Nope.

So when you combine the fact that many packages that are released are unattractive, players not playing anymore because of lack of quality releases, lack of incentive to login from previous years, and other aspects thrown in...this has lead to a likelihood of a much lower amount of token packages being bought...

The result might be...

Staff have decided to make more token items in an attempt to incentivize token buying....with these items.

I have no proof of some of this. Some of this is based on specific comments I've seen. Some of this is very recent. But collectively there's simply been some ...let's say unfavorable happenings thus far this year that's lead to less players playing and less players supporting the game. So some of this is trying to put together some logical conclusions with some of it being missing pieces.

But it's a hunch, nonetheless

< Message edited by Sapphire -- 4/22/2024 7:02:05 >
Post #: 2
4/22/2024 8:10:20   
ming shuen
Member

I am all for increasing the number of Z-Token items in the game.Many players have more Z-Tokens than they know what to do with. We need more Z-Token sinks. However, I think it needs to be spaced out better. Constant weekly Z-Token items in a LTS Shop would probably make players bored.

It can be something as simple as cleaning up the Z-Token Item Shop, fixing the weird levelling of some of the items, and then having that as a singular weekly release. Doing this for the armours alone, making them Level 143 - essentially puts in 12 new items into the Z-Token Item Pool. Seems more efficient work-wise as compared to making new items. And players won't face the frustration of seeing constant Z-Token releases.
AQ DF MQ  Post #: 3
4/22/2024 19:00:58   
CH4OT1C!
Member

Although this should go without saying, I nonetheless feel obligated to emphasise that it's extremely important to have a steady stream of token items to support the game.

Thanks @Grace Xisthrith for collating these figures. Off the bat:
  • I believe we should be discussing this taking into account the Golden Dev Ticket weapons. As unusual a case as they may be, a week was still ultimately dedicated to their release.
  • It's interesting that assuming the Lunar Hare Weapons were tokens (alongside the Dev Tickets above), the gap disappears. Ultimately though, that didn't happen.

    In general, I recognise the need to lock some things here and there behind a paywall. I don't take issue with this approach, just so long as the balance isn't too heavily skewed against non-token options. The problem I've had of late, is that the main story has been the token items, with the gold ones relegated to the sideline. Rather than Hammerfall being an excellent token spell released alongside the necessary gold support of Thunder Bride, for example, we instead have the Mechwog shield, which triggers with the effects from the token items. Of course, I recognise that this can be circumvented with other items. My point is that the Gold item is becoming the side story just a little too often, and therefore doesn't look great in terms of optics. Especially when there's been a high concentration of relatively light releases, as the problem appears more pronounced.

    Put simply, I'm not necessarily against the increased ratio of token items that we're currently seeing, but I'm also not a fan of how it's being executed. Also, too much Ice burn!

    There could be a number of reasons for this new balance of token/non-token gear. With that said, I can't help but feel like most of the reasons proposed by @Sapphire are wildly speculative. I could certainly understand disagreement or disappointment expressed for some of the changes. Some are controversial, after all. But to go as far as to suggest there was an exodus, and then further add the staff have already taken steps to address it? Aside from going against what is known about how long it takes to create an item, this method hardly seems like the most effective to solve the proposed problem in the first place...

    _____________________________


    		•
    AQ  Post #: 4
    4/22/2024 19:43:55   
    Sapphire
    Member

    		It's not as wildly speculative as you think. As referenced above, I know of several players, all of whom whale with some regularity, who've just stopped playing completely or have stated explicitly they do not plan on supporting AQ any longer. Their reasons vary, although there are some similarities. It's not really speculative if people outright tell you. Now, how much these small amount of players effect things, or if there's a greater number of players than what I personally know about is the only speculative part.

    Where there's smoke, there's fire.
    Post #: 5
    4/22/2024 20:39:39   
    Aura Knight
    Member

    		Gotta make up for the lower yield from the previous donation event somehow.
    AQ DF AQW  Post #: 6
    4/22/2024 21:32:36   
      Lorekeeper
    And Pun-isher

     

    		 In this case, rather than there being smoke or fire, the existing answer on why there have been so many light or item focused releases holds. As of the additional token items released of late, it's a standard matter of development costs.

    To clarify:

    The stat revamp, which couldn't under any stretch of reason have been released along with full support for every niche of design space that it introduced, was a massive project with extensive preparation, as well as a necessary follow-up period for fixes and adjustment. The scheduling ripples of a project with a year of preparation and several weeks of implementation work go well beyond just postponing something to clear the single week of its release. They constitute of a period of lighter releases spanning from well before to weeks after the project.

    It's not just the time for the revamp itself that was a factor, but the time for all the work that it displaced to other weeks and for some decompression after doing all of that. The amount of item releases isn't some attempt at winning an unspecified amount of big spenders over by having even less content for them to play, but a necessary decompression period to resume major updates.

    This has allowed us to rebuild the work buffer that usually comes from having all hands on deck rather than split between project prep and regular releases, meaning that exciting content is coming soon.
    Post #: 7
    4/22/2024 23:00:54   
    legendd
    Member
     

    		 You just love to see Mr. Right post. As a player, if I want the said item for the design/mechanic, I'll find a way (F2P through donations, P2W buying packages); if I see too many token priced that I want, I voice. One does not need to math all situations, you will not have information of the full population.

    And I appreciate Dev team to respond in detail rather than in general: pay to win is optional.

    < Message edited by legendd -- 4/22/2024 23:03:39 >
    Post #: 8
    4/23/2024 13:59:36   
    Sapphire
    Member

    		So if the item takes a bit longer or the items in general, there's a propensity to have it be tokens. Same argument that was laid out for the tomes being tokens.

    When will this terrible approach change? Because it is.


    Anyway, looking forward to the exciting releases.

    < Message edited by Sapphire -- 4/23/2024 15:32:21 >
    Post #: 9
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