[Petition] Price of the starting packs

Discussion in 'Miscellaneous Discussion' started by Kiddoo, May 2, 2015.

  1. Kiddoo

    Kiddoo Deactivated User

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    Hyellow,

    As you probably know, MA decided a few days ago to (drastically) raise the price of the starting packs:
    - bronze one from $5 to $10
    - silver one from $15 to $20
    - gold one from $40 to $60

    While the change itself was a quiet one (which I call a bad business by itself - most companies respecting their customers usually announce a steep price increase a bit ahead, giving time to existing loyal customers to still take advantage of the old price for a short while), the claimed reasons seem to be related with some "abuses" as in people buying the packages over and over again.

    Now I can totally understand how this was counter productive for MA, since after counting off the cost for the 200 PED cash (+deposit fees) and 85 PED UA, the whole gold package (including the 30 skill pills) ended up costing only like $10, and they didn't agreed people abusing what it was meant to be a discount meant to attract new players.

    Yet, in the process, those new players were affected too (and probably even more than the "abusers"). I really can't imagine how many new players that are just discovering the game (guess that's the target group of a STARTING package) will be willing to buy the gold package and spend more than on an AAA game.

    That's why I suggest that for the very first purchase of a starting package, to be applied a discount down to the old price. Eventually, if it really feels that the content values much more than the price, even for a new player, just reduce the number of the skill pills - while definitely nice, they don't represent the main attraction for a new player, but the gear inside does.

    The easiest practical way to achieve that would be to just duplicate the packages and have starting packages and goodies packages separated - the starting packages can be set to "one purchase only" (as they apparently were at some point in the past) and have the old prices, while the goodies packages to have identical content and retain the new, higher, prices. Or, alternative, simply a "skill pills packages".

    If this "petition" will be signed up (guess any positive replay or like/agree rating would count for that), I would just print it, add a link and mail it (yeah, postal mail so I make sure it does reach MA offices) to MindArk. I know they have all rights to set whatever prices they feel right and change them at any time and they have no obligations towards us, but I'm quite sure they would at least consider some feedback coming from an important part of the community (if that would be the case, of course; I'm also prepared to get no support but just a STFU noob :p).

    Cheers,
    Alex
     
    Last edited: May 2, 2015
  2. T79x

    T79x Adviser Arkadia Adviser

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    Skill pills can be obtained in game , calypso have those at vendor for tokens
    original prize and each pack can be bouth only once should come back
    if they wana make money for skill pills they can make "skill pill pack"
     
  3. KikkiJikki

    KikkiJikki Well-Known Member Pro Users

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    A better nerf would have been one time purchase of starter pack.
     
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  4. Lizzy

    Lizzy Deactivated User

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    *deleted*

    Because reasons that... never mind.
     
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    Last edited: May 3, 2015
  5. WhiningSkeptic

    WhiningSkeptic Active Member

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    The RT pack is pretty much the silver pack, but with less bang for the buck.

    I like the skill pills and eaten enough of them to feed a small village for a year. I find it stupid to raise the price for many different reasons;

    MA will lose a shitton of money. 5$ himself used up four packs worth of it during April if I read his log correctly. That's 160$ from one player in one month. I myself used up two packs, and I know there are plenty of people out there who likes them who will skip them now.

    The skill market is at the bottom already anyhow, and raising the price on the pack won't have any effect on it. What we need here is ESIs in every global.

    Another downside is less sales will yield more competition over the already pricy A101s.

    Hopefully they change it back. Any restrictions to it like suggested would just cost them money and in the long run hurt everyone in game.
     
  6. Kiddoo

    Kiddoo Deactivated User

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    First of all, I didn't sweared to never deposit; even my signatures and description says "MOSTLY a free player". Yes ATM I can't afford to deposit (or at least not more than a couple of bucks here and there) and I like the idea of a challenge where to treat the game as a game, not as a RCE - as in not think that PED have RL$ value or RL$ have PED value - so not deposit or withdraw. But words like "never" or "none" are really big ones, and as JR Ewing used to say "never say never". And TBH, right now I actually had $5 saved and was just looking for a friend with credit cart, so I can buy myself the bronze package.

    Anyway, even presuming I would be a totally free player, that shouldn't prevent me for lobbying/militate/protest for a thing I believe in, even if I wouldn't have any personal benefit from it. It's about fighting for a cause you consider right, no matter if that affects you (directly) or not. Following the same principle you suggested that only people directly affected by a thing should fight/lobby for it, but obviously exaggerating a bit, one could say that no man should have ever supported woman rights or no white people should have ever supported the black people rights. I just think that we should see further than our direct interests and when we have an idea which we think could benefit others, we should supported it, even if we would not directly benefit from it.
     
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    Last edited: May 2, 2015
  7. Murkalael

    Murkalael Active Member

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    Well, Depo or not Depo is not a religion. I have gold starter pack, the armor is a total trash, only thing that was worth was the car, the gun, the ammo and the fap. I don't care for skill pills h-dna so too late for them. Other thing is seems this is a world wide inflation, Dollar value seems to be increasing in comparison with other countries currencies. I think MA is trying to bite more that they can chew, since there are a lot of issues to be fixed and poops to be cleaned
     
  8. Jod

    Jod Well-Known Member

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    Agree with the suggested one time only purchase and the addition of Skill Pill Packs.Tthats all the experienced players are buying them for anyway and that woould also mean I don't have a heap if crap that is harder to get rid of then herpes.

    And yeah your right Murk...
    At the moment I'm getting around 75c on the dollar or closer to 70c after transaction fees etc for my depo's so add this price increase to it and its a double whammy.
     
  9. Oleg

    Oleg Active Member

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    As I've said elsewhere, it shouldn't be possible to buy skill pills. If you want to pay to get more skills you can buy skill implants from players. Having skill pill packages available for sale in the web shop would hugely undermine one of the most fundamental elements of EU.

    The best solution would be to make the starter packages available as a one-time-only purchase at the old prices, as they were when first introduced.
     
    • Agree Agree x 3