Test Discussion Episode 30: Rewards Feedback

It should be both for members honestly or do away with the style feat on the event gear completely.

Now you are juat twisting words.
The grind is real and the expectations of higher players replaying more is too.

Put the JQuick as purple drops across all runs and you eliminate the assumption of money err replay grabs

Exactly

Oh my gosh, no. Anything but that.

You realize if these become purple drops they are going to be RNG Based across the board, and you'll end up spending more replays versus having it guaranteed in a vendor.

It's not gonna work out the way you plan it it to, knowing the devs and their trade off systems.

YES Please! This! I hate best gear on vendor and have since T1-4, and AFIII+. Please make this happen in future DLC's.

Seriously, You guys complain about how bad the RNG was surrounding the Gorgon Slayer Set from Amazon Fury Part 3; yet you don't realize the fact that if you Make the Johnny Quick Style available as Purple Drops only, you're basically giving yourselves Gorgon Slayer 2.0

Goodbye best gear or guaranteed gear being in the vendor, and hello formerly hated RNG system.

Not trying to suck anyone off here... but I have to say amongst all the hate on this thread, I am honestly happy with the direction the rewards are taking this episode. Am I the only one? Yeah sure, it’s a grind, but that’s what mmos are. And extra elite marks? That’s great. If you do the math 100-80 cost is a 25 percent increase, and the 13-10 marks drop is a 30 percent increase so someone who resets elite many times(we all know we are going to) is going to earn the elite set faster than someone grinding the regular version for the regular set. So stop ******* complaining. This is a step forward especially with the essence and op drop rates increasing. Thank you mepps.

You realize there is a Rare Style Vendor, which Gorgon Slayer should have been added to, right? If not at the launch of the Episode (as had been custom for a while), it should have been added shortly after. The Johnny Quick style could be both a Purple drop and a vendor item. If you don't get the purple drop, you can buy the remaining pieces to fill in the gaps.

There certainly is a precedence for this, or at least something similar. Back in WotL Pt 1, a vendor was introduced for the style only version of the vestments of rage set (which was the purple drop, best gear at the time). This was the start of the rare style vendor, and you used end game marks to work towards finishing off the style set. This could easily to the J Quick set. Make it the purple drop, and we use end game marks to finish off the style for things that don't drop. Because for end game players, the J Quick set is just a style feat anyways.

No...no....no....NONONONONONONONONNONONONONONONONONONONONONNOONONONNONONONNOONONONONONONONONONONONONONO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yep I know that. Which means newsflash, you're not avoiding the aforementioned "Grind" at all. You're potentially making it even more grindy, because that'll cost 70 marks a pop. (70 marks for one style.)

And since when was the last time the Rare Style Vendor Got Updated? There's still all the misplaced and missing styles. I heard that it was supposed to be updated every two tiers, but that's a long time to wait just to get a guaranteed style.

You're confusing the two vendors. Vendor 00 (the one that sells style only versions of vendor gear) was supposed to be updated every two tiers, but may not be anymore due to the current plan to go back to individual marks per tier. It was only added due to mark relevancy to begin with.

Vendor 22 (the rare style vendor) was being updated with the release of every episode to include that episode's rare style. Then monthly episodes started and Vestments of Proselyte (the vendor gear from the first 3 months) was added by mistake instead of the rare style from those 3 episodes. Then the idea of scraps and gear crafting happened, so if you were missing the style you were supposed to craft it... Then scraps got scrapped, and requests to update Vendor 22 have fallen on def ears since.

I dont think u can compare the grind to RNG. For example back in AF3 a league mate of mine finished the gorgon style in 3 weeks while it took me 4 months to finish it. He was simply lucky with the RNG for that style.

And the reason this topic about purple drops is even coming up is because with AF3 there was a purple drop style, gorgon, and then with AoJ the purple drop style was reused and the dlc had only 1 new style, blackhawk. And players were unhappy about the 1 style. And requested a new purple drop style again so there was 2 styles in the dlc. But instead they took the style and put it on the vendor.

This kinda stuff comes down to simple feedback from the players. And i dont remember a single player asking for the purple style to be on the vendor. It was also requested that the purple drop style be put on the rare style vendor so if players couldnt get that 1-2 pieces to drop they could get it there and finish their style feat. This was requested over and over by multiple players.

If the rare style vendor had been updated with the new styles, like gorgon, there most likely wouldnt even have been complaints about the purple drops because players could finish the style another way instead they had to keep running AF3 content on a daily basis for 1 style piece and nothing else.

Just had to pop in quick because bad math bugs me.

Equating the 25% increase from 80-100 for elite with the 30% increase from two pieces of content (6 marks total) doesn't add up, bro. Sorry.

It would be different if there were elite content everything that all granted elite players 30% more. But that's not the case. Take the total amount of monthly marks everyone gets, add 6 and then see how much of a percent increase that is.

Grind to RNG? I can sure compare them. It's the same principle, one's guaranteed and the other isn't. Both have feats, both require you to farm and possibly spend replay badges on them.

Now as far as player feedback goes: I'll admit nobody asked for the Purple Style to be on the gear vendor, but was this supposed to be the Purple Style? No. This episode was meant to be a combination of both a Major Event(Much Like Starro) and your traditional Episode.

And Even if It was the Purple Style: I still remember a ton of People complaining about how bad the drop rate was for the Gorgon Slayer set. For some weird reason, people in this thread think that making the Johnny Quick Style a Purple Drop in all instances is actually gonna reduce the grind.

No it's gonna take something that's already guaranteed and turn it into something with a Really Bad RNG drop rate; and there will still be a feat attached to that style set. I'm trying to prevent that from happening. People think having this thing as style drops will reduce the amount of time they expect to grind? Nope, being that this is the last episode of 2017 they're gonna make it last.

I'm trying to prevent a style like this from being nearly inaccessible, but I digress: If yall want this to be a Purple Drop and repeat the Gorgon Style problems; then I don't wanna hear no complaints about how bad the RNG is.

Just keep in mind: This choice boils down to either more Grind or Grind with RNG, becareful for what you wish for.

Exactly Vendor 22 has fallen on Deaf ears, so why are you suggesting that it's likely the developers will actually update it with the Johnny Quick style? That makes no sense.

Clearly the comparison cant be made because with the RNG element 1 person can finish the feat much faster then another. Like the example i gave. RNG is based on luck while best gear on the vendor is based on grinding for marks. Not the same thing at all. 2 different systems.

And again people wouldnt be complaining about bad drops with gorgon if the the style was on the rare style vendor. Also like i said. It should have been updated like the devs said it would. I basically repeated my post from before in this post because u seem to miss the point. Players were fine with best gear on the vendor and the 2nd best gear being the purple drops. What changed was the rare style vendor not being updated with the purple drop style.

I posted before how it took me 4 months to finish the gorgon style. If it was on the rare style vendor i would have finished it 2 months. The chest was all i was missing and i still had to keep running AF3 content until it finally dropped. The rare style vendors sole purpose was to let people finish the drop gear style if they were unlucky with RNG. The vendor hasnt been updated with the recent styles, like firestorm too, and thats why people have complained about drops. If they arent going to update the rare vendor what is the point of it?

Lastly i said this has come down to player feedback and many players have repeatedly asked why the rare style vendor hasnt been updated. The devs finally answered and said firestorm and gorgon would be added to it. But it still hasnt happened. All thats happened here with ep30 is the gear system has changed yet again. How many times is it gonna change? Consistency is needed. Because it seems like there is always a change to the gear system and most times its not even announced until the players see it on test.

Having 2 sets of gear to buy is something i dont like. I dont want to waste marks in something that im not gonna wear and gonna end up salvaging 10 seconds after i bought it.
Yes yes yes...cost is lower than the real gear. Yes yes yes...theres the discount. But still...those are wasted marks.

If the J.Quick gear is the "Event Gear" and its just to "catch up" for those that are lower than required for the End-Game content, then it should be treated like the gear drop in the Anniversary Event. That gear had a feat (it was an old style...but still) and it was spread across the 3 types of gear (Green, Blue and Purple).
50 feats points would be too much for a feat like that? We have been getting 50 pointers for way less than that. And you can always make it a 25 feat points.

I'm just going to chime in on this thread with some general concerns that appear to come up time and time again as we head in to new content.

Firstly, Mepps no one is asking for gear to be achieved through "random gear drops". People enjoy 'best gear being on the vendor' as long as it's reasonably priced and reasonably achieved within a set period of time that also allows the player time to enjoy their achievement without just having the process immediately repeated.

This is why this game is hazardous in the sense that it's only meaningful method of progression is through obtaining gear.

No on ever seems to know how long a DLC period is and I'm not saying you need to necessarily disclose episode release time frames, just be aware that the ambiguity that goes with not having one creates a level of frustration within the player base because no one has any idea how long they're going to get to enjoy their progression before just starting again.

if it starts again too soon the feeling of achievement moves from one of satisfaction to one of futility.

What also has me somewhat concerned Mepps, is that we're 7 years into this game come January and we're still rehauling the reward system every single DLC with no consistency.

I mean we're even going back to the part where "elite gear" is better than vendor gear again, which I'm not necessarily at all opposed too, however I have to ask the obvious question, it was like this during "Throne of the Dead" yet the superiority of elite gear was immediately dropped, supposedly due to negative feedback, so what's changed? Why are we going back to something that seemingly didn't work last time? Has feedback changed? Why has it changed? Have we lost the players that didn't like it last time?

It just confuses me and concerns me that we keep going back and forth between different reward systems like a yo yo.

it just leads to player discontent, distrust and disatisfaction when every single DLC they've got no idea what to expect next and a feeling that no matter what there's going to be some new "hook" in which we're going to be asked to spend more money, whether that's true or not is the inevitable perception, a perception hard to break when the movement between reward systems continue to happen from extreme to extreme every episode.

As for what, Jacob Dragonhunter said, no one, absolutely no one wants the purple drops to be based upon horrible RNG. people want a fair deal on the purple gear. I just don't see why the purple gear drops can't be more generous all round while at the same time having some form of redundancy in time like items being properly updated in the "rare style vendor" if they're not achieved.

Which honestly leads me to another frustration, we have all these perfect systems in the game that just get left to decay because they don't get updated at all period and then even get changed/removed.

As for the OP drops being doubled, I guess only time will tell in this regard, because these last ones in riddled with crime have been truly horrid, so I'm struggling to see how it's possible for that aspect to get any worse.

Nope but MAYBE,just maybe, Different Styles at the Drops. 3 Times the Same Style what 99,9% of all Players already finished?
If we can get JQ as ANY Drop,we can BUY the missing parts and be happy. Now we must farm 220 Ultra$ Extra.

I'm just gonna go out on a limb here and ask, is there a way that style can be on the vendor AND be a purple gear drop in end game content? That way subs and episode owners would be able to get a lot of the style just from running content, free players would still have something nice to grind for, and any leftover pieces that subs and episode owners can't get, they could purchase THOSE PIECES off the vendor.

I mention this because I think the dev team really doesn't understand the effect that uber-repetive grinding has on the player base. You don't just get burnt out. You come to detest it, and never, ever want to go back again. Think of what it would be like to eat oatmeal for breakfast for 2 months straight.

Week one: you're like "this is really great, I wonder why I never thought of it before."
Week two-three: "not really liking this, but it's good for me. Maybe I'll put some strawberries on the top."
Week four: "Ugh, I never want to see oatmeal again after this, but I'm going to reach my health goal."
Weeks five-eight: "OK, this is ridiculous. Oatmeal is so disgusting. I don't know how people can stand this. It's so squishy and blah, strawberries aren't helping, bananas aren't helping. I should just forget this and go back to McDonalds. Ah, I really want McDonalds."

This post isn't meant to be disrespectful or mocking, btw. Just trying to help the dev team to really understand players' emotional state after having gone through this ever since AF3.

Bottom line, best gear in vendor? Great idea.

Prices? Too much grinding, I'm sorry but it is. You don't give players a chance to enjoy the game, because you're so focused on netting replay badge sales. You literally can't have both. You can get the RB sales from the ones who spend, at the expense of losing other players through boredom. Or you can let players run more content (never should have left the unified mark, honestly, yeah, it means less replay badges, but players who actually want to play your game's various episodes) for end-game currency, have fun, but spend less on replay badges. In the end, RB might actually be doing more harm than good, though I don't have financials to use to check that.