Heritage Crate Bundles (Guaranteed illusion and mount, legal cover).

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Benito, Mar 29, 2021.

  1. Benito EQ player since 2001.

    I think it is time to sell a Heritage Crate bundle with a guaranteed heritage illusion and mount in the same way you can buy a guaranteed Mithril/Premium familiar on EQ2 (Premium Gilded Familiar Cage). The EQ2 bundle offers the guaranteed top-tier item plus 15 crates for roughly 9899 DBC. Darkpaw could offer 7 Heritage Crates (of that race) plus the guaranteed heritage illusion and mount for something like 13999 DBC.

    Heritage illusions used to sell for 1-3 Krono for most people. People are now hoarding them server-wide and reselling for 5 to 25 Krono each. (I suspect this shift in the market is due to obsolescence of ToV chase loot).

    Additionally, Epic Games (Fortnite) recently settled a loot box class action lawsuit for $26 million. While I think loot boxes can be reasonable and legal revenue streams, perhaps there can be some legal cover with a bundle.

    Epic Games will settle Fortnite loot box lawsuits in V-Bucks - The Verge
  2. Tappin Augur

    Loot boxes in general, have no business being in video games with minors playing. They are gambling, and cannot be justified. The law is catching up overseas, it's just a matter of time before it catches up in the US.
    Fenthen, Tornat, Barraind and 4 others like this.
  3. Benito EQ player since 2001.

    First, they'll need to regulate Pokemon, Magic: The Gathering, and baseball cards.

    In my opinion, loot boxes (RNG) can exist (especially since it can be a free monthly claim for membership on EQ). However, gaming companies probably should offer a non-RNG (guaranteed) alternative for a higher price as legal cover.

    Edit: I'd like to limit the political dimension of this thread. The point about the Fortnite settlement is to reinforce the idea of legal cover. Otherwise, I am offering a tangible solution/compromise in a high-priced bundle with guaranteed top items (heritage illusion and mount).
    Fenthen likes this.
  4. Tappin Augur

    I don't care what they do with physical card games. Loot boxes are gambling, they have the same end result. This isn't a political statement - please read the research being conducted in various European countries.
    Tornat likes this.
  5. Benito EQ player since 2001.


    It's the same principle.

    The heritage crates offer an item. It may not be the rare item people want but it dispenses an item. (The idea of digital property is a new area of law; think cryptocurrency and blockchain art).

    Card packs offer around 10 cards. There may not be the rare card but you still get cards.

    I am not sure if the Fortnite crate was giving nothing or total fluff (or directly targeting minors; marketing evidence) if that's why the lawsuit was successfully lodged against them. (EQ, on the other hand, has a mostly adult demographic).
  6. Tappin Augur

    It's all good (not going to argue) Don't mean to derail thread. But yes, there should be an option to guarantee a rare. You do see this option in some of the physical toys on shelves these days.
  7. Benito EQ player since 2001.

    Thank you. The intent of this thread is not to turn this into a full defense of loot boxes.

    My thought is, "Hey, look at the Fortnite loot box settlement. Let's be pragmatic and adaptive, and get ourselves some legal cover through a crate bundle with guaranteed rare items."

    I also think Ngreth does not craft these illusions so that people can hoard them serverwide and expect to flip them for 25 Krono.
  8. Jhenna_BB Proudly Prestigious Pointed Purveyor of Pincusions

    The problem solves itself when the illusions,mounts, ports, pets and HF sets are just placed on the cash shop with their own price. I don't even want to hear partial gambling and guarantee of 1 rare. No. Screw that. Just sell the cosmetics in the cash shop like normal people, not casinos.

    Edit: and make them be in Prize: form. Then you can continue to make your oh so precious Krono off the items being sold in the cash shop. You know, like a bagillion other do.
    Yinla and Gyurika Godofwar like this.
  9. Benito EQ player since 2001.

    I can agree with this but you have to create scarcity (even if Darkpaw charges $200-300 per illusion).

    Fortnite creates scarcity by rotating items on a random basis. Items are only available in intervals of 3 months, 6 months, 1 year, 2 years, or once-in-a-lifetime.

    Edit: I am not sure if your last sentence was directed at me. If you read my OP, you would know my position is against re-sellers (which seems to be more common phenomena now than in the past). I've always paid 1-3 Krono for heritage illusions (which made EQ1 crates defensible and palatable for most) and claimed them.
  10. Koryu Professional Roadkill

    You really don't.
  11. Benito EQ player since 2001.

    I have to respectfully disagree.

    When Darkpaw vaulted shop items, I remember Ngreth, Absor, or Prathun explaining that many Polymorph Wands and other shop items did not move because they were static. In other words, because of the perception of constant availability (making them equivalent to common rarity), people did not purchase those items. He distinctly said shop illusions were the worst sellers compared to LoN, expansion, or crate illusions.
  12. Zamiam Augur

    you really do ..
    dont forget DPG makes money not only on the heritage crates , but also on the krono from what people use to buy the illusions and stuffz..

    like Benito , I myself only spend 1 -3 krono on illusions .. and I'm against sellers selling them for over that .. scarcity is nice to a point
  13. Niskin Clockwork Arguer

    Unfortunately, people are stupid, so yes, you have to use some form of marketing technique to get things to sell. How terrible of a technique is used depends on how terrible the company is. I used to think the Disney vault ("get it now before it goes back in the vault") was pretty shady, but compared to modern techniques, it's not that bad. Loot boxes are the worst, just completely terrible. They depend on people being completely ignorant of how odds and RNG work, which they are, so they do work.

    I've dealt with this in games like The Division and Rocket League. Both had some mitigating factor to the randomness of loot boxes, and both only used them for cosmetics. In The Division, if you got something in a crate that you already had, you got some currency back to speed your purchase of the next one. Not great, but better than nothing. In Rocket League you could trade in the item, along with 4 other of similar quality for chance at a random of higher quality. This was better because you were always trading up anyway.

    Now let's not base anything off of what Epic does, they are literally the soulless devil of the industry, taking EA's spot in recent years. When they bought Psyonix (dev of Rocket League) they actually did one positive thing, got rid of loot boxes in the game. In return they increased the prices of the shop items by a ridiculous amount. Resultingly, I went from spending some money on loot boxes, to no money on shop items. The mechanic I disliked at least showed me some value, the mechanic I like is priced outside of what I consider reasonable.

    So if you want to rotate items in the marketplace, go for it, it's not shady, it's just defending the value and increasing the fear of missing out. But loot boxes, lets keep that to a minimum, it's just a bad mechanic.
  14. ZenMaster formless, shapeless

  15. Barraind Grumpy Old Bastage


    And none of that has to do with the shissar model being one of the worst models in the first few years of the game or anything!


    There are subtle and extremely important differences.

    Trading cards and TCG's have rarities and odds determined by sheets and sorting methods.

    You know when you open a Magic the Gathering pack, of the latest expansion (this varies by set size as larger sets use different sheet runs), exactly the odds of opening any specific card.

    The explanations for this are longer than will fit in a post here, but you can check out https://www.lethe.xyz/mtg/collation/index.html for the distribution of every single product, including those with differences in runs based on printing locations (Belgium, Italy, Japan, China and the US have different sheet distribution, and sort in slightly different ways)


    Lootboxes have none of those protections, and are regularly tweaked after release if certain items are seen as too common or too rare.

    Additionally, physical cards have aftermarket value and permanence, where loot boxes in many cases have none. This heavily plays into regulation.

    I can buy and sell singles for most any non-LCG (and theres always special printings for those games, because its how you make money). Once ive opened a pack, and even after I've used my cards, maybe for decades, if someone wants to buy it, I can sell it.

    I cannot use my illusion whatever item until I am bored of it, and then sell it to someone for cash. I cannot transfer my $35 TLP bags to anyone I want, even myself, especially on another server (I can do that with a couple of them if pay for a server transfer though) or account. In most games, trying to sell things I've purchased to someone is bannable.

    This is why regulation is a thing thats happening, and will start hitting more digital aspects soon..
    Fenthen likes this.
  16. Benito EQ player since 2001.


    1. How does publishing the odds make it any better morally? It is still based on RNG. So the fact that the top foil card is 1 in 1000 print doesn't help the consumer. And it's not like the consumer has access to the factory to card count (to increase your odds) which is equivalent to trusting a card-maker's sorting process or trusting a gaming company's algorithm. Even if Darkpaw came out and said a crate illusion has a 1% drop rate, that fact won't help either side or address RNG.

    2. In terms of sorting, heritage crates are sorted by in-game race (like cards by expansion). It's not like they are selling an omnibus crate with all races (50+ items).

    3. In terms of fungibility, you can trade crate items (Prize iteration). Whether we agree with it or not, the nature of digital property is changing: see bitcoin, blockchain art, NFT. (I'm not putting EQ items on the level of cryptocurrency but simply making a point).
  17. Benito EQ player since 2001.


    People own digital content on iTunes/Apple TV or Apple Music, Audible, Amazon, and so on. In the same way, people own the digital medium instead of CD version of a music album or Blu-ray movie. It is encrypted in their system to your specific identity. That property being non-transferable is completely legal.


    Transferring to a free trade server such as Firiona Vie and selling your no trade illusions (for platinum or Krono) is not bannable AFAIK. (In theory, you can ask for PayPal, Venmo, or Cash App but you won't receive protection on the transaction).
  18. Barraind Grumpy Old Bastage

    Its not a moral issue, its the fact that once a print run is completed, you know the exact odds of opening any specific card, and this cannot be changed by the manufacturer.

    You know that every pack you open has a 1 in X odds of having the rare you want, and the bonus knowledge that if you purchase in bulk from the same print run, your odds of opening cards in a specific order actually increase but can never decrease, as X is determined ONLY by the size of the rare sheet (and manufacturer / distributor packaging tends to mean over a large purchase from the same print run, youll end up more likely opening boxes with the trailing/leading ends of other boxes in the same case than you are a truly random assortment).

    Lootboxes absolutely can be changed at any time. I've played a few games where the developer was caught changing horses mid-stream and had to issue mass refunds as a result.


    If you open an Iksar box, are you as likely to get a hero forge piece as you are a mount as you are a teleportation item?

    As likely to get something with mount/illusion blessing as you are one without? (I dont think thats an issue with heritage crates, but after... a lot... of LoN cards being opened on test, its certainly noticeable with those)
  19. Benito EQ player since 2001.


    Who is seriously going to buy thousands or tens of thousands of card packs?

    Putting serial numbers on packs or boxes would defeat the purpose of their business model (chase for rare cards).

    This is nice in theory but impractical.


    For my benefit, which game was that?

    Do we have independent monitors at card-maker factories?


    If I open a Pokemon card pack, am I getting a Basic Pokeball over a First Edition Charizard?

    See my first point. No one, and I mean no one, is buying thousands of card packs. Nice in theory but highly impractical; RNG still reigns supreme.
  20. Barraind Grumpy Old Bastage

    No. Charizard was on the rare sheet, basic pokeball was a common in a different set, so barring any massive printing errors, one would never replace the other.

    Now, buying a first edition box these days, you are absolutely capable of seeing it because people are repackaging them for the absurd amounts of cash they can scam.

    You -cant- say the same thing about a heritage crate. We dont know if there are tiered rarities (LoN cards absolutely did).


    Most Dena and Gumi mobile games have had this happen, Squeenix is horrifically bad at handling things on their end (they have final say over every aspect of those games). The only reason ff14 hasnt had problems is that they skipped lootboxes and just say "want this mount, pay us $30-50". The final Fantasy nostalgia cashgrabs are notorious for that, I think Brave Exvius did it three times when I was playing, and both Opera Omnia and Record Keeper had issues with datamined information being much different than their announced rates.

    Even Overwatch had to go "weeeeeellllll, we changed some stuff our bad" early on.


    The BEST example of lootboxes was Dawn of the Dragons (and the space version of the game I cant remember because it was less good). It released monthly or bi-monthly boxes, you'd get 1 item, but you wouldnt get anything you had already opened until you got everything. So get lucky and get the 4 things you wanted (usually a general, 3 armor pieces and maaaaaaayyyyyyybe a formation if it was one of the broken ones), great, you're done, but you WILL get them eventually.