In the CEO Livestream, he talked a little about the blowback from the drop rates in time capsules and related feats. Now, many people have brought up TCs before, myself included, but I wanted to start a post for collecting positive time capsule suggestions. Since you can't go into the solutions without at least discussing some of the issues, I will start with those. In brief, the main probelms are below. I tried to keep it to a minimum, but I wanted them out there so people don't feel some drive to add every last gripe to this post. I know these are not all the issues or complains about TCs, but I do not want this to devolve into "lets bash TCs!" Instead, the later content is the real part. What could be done to help TCs, from the player's perspective.
vvvvvv BEGIN ISSUES SECTION vvvvvv One big complaint is that it can take 400 to 600 TCs for one person to complete the feats related to the TCs. This has to do with the drop rates and huge assortment of items in the TCs. Now, a subscriber can get about 150 Stabilizers a year by doing the event every day. That adds up to taking three to four years of subscription to complete a single TC series. Now that there are 3 sets of TCs, that is roughly 9 years if you do not plan to buy extra stabilizers. That is a lot for a person that can pay for the game but does not want to pay extra. Another money issues the 400 to 600 TCs causes to explode is that DCUO seem to think, "It is just a dollar per stabilizer!" If 150 would get most of a TC set but 200 would absolutely, that would be $50 for one TC set. $50 is NOT $1, and it is more like $150 to $200 per TC set or over $500 to not have to sit around for 9 years. So please, DCUO CEO and developers, don't even think about saying it is just $1. If EVERY TC got something good, then it would be $1 for something good. If the average was 1 in 10 for something good, then it would be $10 for something good. As it stands, it is a lot more than that. So, think of it like this: It is just $150 to complete a feat! And suddenly you see why people are angry about the cost. The 9 years ballpark also shows a trend of unrealistic time frames. Another time frame example is how the Qwardian Event is structured to be completed in more than one years worth of participation. Well, they also plan to add to it. So a dedicated player with no extra cash will have a hard time completing it because as it stands it will take 2 to 3 years to get everything from the event and TCs and next year it will take more... So, what positive suggestions can be made to help drop those time frames? And please, don't give us the line about in game trading for solving the real money and time issues. The only way to get up in the multi-millions was to be a long term player OR to harvest exobytes. The exobyte market was destroyed by TCs, OK, so now only long term players have the in game cash to do this. This leaves people buying with real money through other means, which is not good for the game and does not drop the real money cost. So now that the major issues have been reviewed in brief, what can be done? Many people have suggested that drop rates for rare items in TCs be changed. That is one possibility I see a lot. But what else can we toss out there? ^^^^^^^ END ISSUES SECTION ^^^^^^^
Here are a few thoughts. Not all of them are mine. I don't necessarily agree with all of these, but I have seen them tossed out there. Some are mine, I agree with those, but I think more input is needed than just me... and then we can see if the new CEO is really serious about rebalancing TCs and dealing with how "the feats were an afterthought" in TCs, or if his comments were more fluff and posturing. SUGESTION: Change the Stabilizer Fragment Event (SFE) to some sort of ticket or counter system. Every day the counter goes up one. Every time the event is run, the counter goes down one. Or, every day a person gets a ticket and only the ticket can be used to open the queue. Why? If people are busy, miss a day, have limited time only on the weekend, they are automatically excluded form a ton of stabilizers. Causal players simply can't get the majority of free stabilizers so they get cut out of TCs by default. This would help people do it on their schedule and increase stabilizers without changing any rates. It is a minimalist idea and may work well with other changes. SUGESTION: Increase fragments or decrease number needed to make a stabilizer. 150 a year, with the present "value" inside TCs is really low. 200 to 300 stabilizers a year would not greatly impact sales because, as it is, these things are not worth $1. And remember, this is paying subscribers that get 150... the free players get FAR less than that and even if they got 2x as many it would not be much lost value. SUGGESTION: Change TCs radically so that every last one is worth $1! Every one should have a rare item! This is a maximalist idea, but I have seen it out there. (I doubt they will go for this with "free" stabilizers out there.) SUGGESTION: Change the drop table to increase worth of the TC. This is not as radical a suggestion. Do things like make rares come up a lot more, multiple emblem caches per, multiple armor caches per, etc. Basically make everyone one 2x as big as it is and then half the issue goes away. Sure, it is still pay to win (because the armor can radically change CR) but it is not highway robbery and regular players will still get some benefit. SUGESTION: Find other ways to drop/sell the feat related items. For example, AF3 has a rare feat drop built into it. Increase the drop rate by about 20% to 40%. Then, add in the Amazon Logo Caches as drops to that table. That would solve one of the feats. For example, AF3 could have a few vendors added. Have the vendors take 10 AC for a style only item that gives the ones out of the capsule styles. Not the armor, not the crafted, but just the base styles related to feats. Then use drops for the plans to keep the upgraded available because things like the Hades Trial drop TONS of plans which everyone already has. For example, add the TC styles to the 10 MoV Vendor 0. There are tons of comparable feats on that vendor as it is. SUGGESTION: Drop the price of stabilizers. If you are not going to make the items in the TC worth $1 and the existing ones can't be fixed, make stabilizers $0.10 each. Then it will be $15 to complete a feat. Note: The already depressed price of exobytes will be imploded because then a ton more will hit the market. (Not all suggestions are equal or will be popular... I am sure someone will gripe about this changing exos and others will say it should only be $0.01 per stabilizer because the TCs are worthless... etc.) SUGGESTION: Change the Mainframe Bot to add some worth. Right now people use Mainframe Bots for entertainment "value" and little else. They stack up 40 or 50 of them in a row along the popular areas of the HQs. Why? Because it can only be used to pay the Lair generator bill, which will be up anyway if you visit your lair once a week for the League Walkin. So change them. Add a new tab. On that tab put the 4 armories that are in the generator down the left side. To the right of each armory icon, put a set of imprint buttons. So a person can then use a Mainframe Bot next to the respec station to update their imprints. Or, they could do some feats, get some SP, and not need to stop playing to update their armories because a bot could let them do so quickly. Personally, I think it will take a combination of things. The worth of the TCs needs to go up or the cost down or a bit of both. Otherwise, people will complain a lot. The TCs are, right now, a way to buy into higher CRs without earning any of that. That causes a lot of argument over their validity because of PtW abuse. So how can you make a TC worth $1 without having it be a PtW tool that irritates the people that worked hard to get to upper CRs? The Mainframe Bot idea is mine because, as it is, the bots are effectively worthless and clutter up the drop table. The CEO clearly likes them (he mentioned it in his video) so they are here to stay. OK. So please make them better! Players, please add to or comment on these suggestions. Yes, I know it has been done before, but our illustrious CEO asked for some new suggestion posts to rehash things. OK, he asked for it, so here it is!
Suggestion. Subscribers should get free stabalizers the way we get free replay badges. Say 40 a month. Each event should grant one stabilizer for members. Dramatically increase the rare drops. If you want insane rare drops do not attach a feat point to it. Title is ok. Slow down the rate of new time capsules. We are already at three. How many are planed for this year? One a month??? Remove pointless drops from TC. Apply rare loot system idea to TC. Meaning every 10 TC or something you are guaranteed a rare drop. Consider just removing TC all together and just sale the styles on the market place.
