Crown Crate Changes

Sigtric

While I'd rather not have the crates in this otherwise great game at all, there are a few changes that could be made that would turn my opinion on them to where I'd consider buying. Some of these items have been mentioned elsewhere by others, whether here in forums, on social media or in game chat.

1.Cards added that are nothing but gems. 10, 25, 50 gem card possibilities perhaps. Drop with a frequency somewhere between the high end consumeables and the low end mounts.
2. The ability to convert anything and everything. Get some weird lizard feather thing for Argonians and don't need it because you don't partake in lizard stuff? Convert it to gems.
3. There needs to be a guarantee you will get something desirable that is NOT a consumable, especially if you throw down for a crate pack.
4. Gotten Battlemage costume 3.. 4...5 times in a row? Each duplicate of the same exact card that pops in the same batch of crate opens (entered pacrooti's drug deal screen and have not closed it) is worth slightly more gems than the last.

AzraelKrieg

Sigtric wrote: »

While I'd rather not have the crates in this otherwise great game at all, there are a few changes that could be made that would turn my opinion on them to where I'd consider buying. Some of these items have been mentioned elsewhere by others, whether here in forums, on social media or in game chat.

1.Cards added that are nothing but gems. 10, 25, 50 gem card possibilities perhaps. Drop with a frequency somewhere between the high end consumeables and the low end mounts.
2. The ability to convert anything and everything. Get some weird lizard feather thing for Argonians and don't need it because you don't partake in lizard stuff? Convert it to gems.
3. There needs to be a guarantee you will get something desirable that is NOT a consumable, especially if you throw down for a crate pack.
4. Gotten Battlemage costume 3.. 4...5 times in a row? Each duplicate of the same exact card that pops in the same batch of crate opens (entered pacrooti's drug deal screen and have not closed it) is worth slightly more gems than the last.

Yes to these. Especially the Cards with Gems and guarantee of something desirable. At most I think that each pack should always contain a blue level card at all times. Purple and gold should appear slightly more frequently but not to the point where it becomes meaningless.

stevepdodson_ESO888

Yes to these. Especially the Cards with Gems and guarantee of something desirable. At most I think that each pack should always contain a blue level card at all times. Purple and gold should appear slightly more frequently but not to the point where it becomes meaningless.[/quote]

uhh...it's ALL meaningless and will never be anything else

Riga_Mortis

Points 1 and 2 are fantastic ideas.

stevepdodson_ESO888

Sigtric wrote: »

While I'd rather not have the crates in this otherwise great game at all, there are a few changes that could be made that would turn my opinion on them to where I'd consider buying. Some of these items have been mentioned elsewhere by others, whether here in forums, on social media or in game chat.

1.Cards added that are nothing but gems. 10, 25, 50 gem card possibilities perhaps. Drop with a frequency somewhere between the high end consumeables and the low end mounts.
2. The ability to convert anything and everything. Get some weird lizard feather thing for Argonians and don't need it because you don't partake in lizard stuff? Convert it to gems.
3. There needs to be a guarantee you will get something desirable that is NOT a consumable, especially if you throw down for a crate pack.
4. Gotten Battlemage costume 3.. 4...5 times in a row? Each duplicate of the same exact card that pops in the same batch of crate opens (entered pacrooti's drug deal screen and have not closed it) is worth slightly more gems than the last.

Hey Sig, you kind of dropped your profile a bit...was there a falling out between you and Deltia and Elloa?

On to the points you raised...although I am never going to buy a crate I can see that card that are just Gems would be a useful addition, as people could at least get enough Gems to swap for what they actually want without spending as much (which I realise is the opposite of what ZOS wants to happen, but in the interests of the community is something that might soften the blow)
Converting anything is a must have
Guaranteeing a "desirable" item is subjective depending on people's desires, so ZOS can legitimately claim that anything could be classed as desirable
Nice idea about the increase in "Gem value" of repeated items, but I doubt they have written the code in such a way as to be keeping track of anything obtain, with each throw of the cards starting from scratch

Keep enjoying the game

Faunter

Sigtric wrote: »

(entered pacrooti's drug deal screen)

LOL

Sigtric

stevepdodson_ESO888 wrote: »

Sigtric wrote: »

While I'd rather not have the crates in this otherwise great game at all, there are a few changes that could be made that would turn my opinion on them to where I'd consider buying. Some of these items have been mentioned elsewhere by others, whether here in forums, on social media or in game chat.

1.Cards added that are nothing but gems. 10, 25, 50 gem card possibilities perhaps. Drop with a frequency somewhere between the high end consumeables and the low end mounts.
2. The ability to convert anything and everything. Get some weird lizard feather thing for Argonians and don't need it because you don't partake in lizard stuff? Convert it to gems.
3. There needs to be a guarantee you will get something desirable that is NOT a consumable, especially if you throw down for a crate pack.
4. Gotten Battlemage costume 3.. 4...5 times in a row? Each duplicate of the same exact card that pops in the same batch of crate opens (entered pacrooti's drug deal screen and have not closed it) is worth slightly more gems than the last.

Hey Sig, you kind of dropped your profile a bit...was there a falling out between you and Deltia and Elloa?

On to the points you raised...although I am never going to buy a crate I can see that card that are just Gems would be a useful addition, as people could at least get enough Gems to swap for what they actually want without spending as much (which I realise is the opposite of what ZOS wants to happen, but in the interests of the community is something that might soften the blow)
Converting anything is a must have
Guaranteeing a "desirable" item is subjective depending on people's desires, so ZOS can legitimately claim that anything could be classed as desirable
Nice idea about the increase in "Gem value" of repeated items, but I doubt they have written the code in such a way as to be keeping track of anything obtain, with each throw of the cards starting from scratch

Keep enjoying the game

Hey @stevepdodson_ESO888 Nope, no falling out, we just kind of went separate ways for various reasons, as far as that show went. I still talk to both of them Even got a chance to play a little with Elloa a few nights ago. I also stepped away from the game for a time shortly after IC released. I was very burned out.

Agree, desirable is subjective, but the amount of times I've watch a youtube or heard someone got nothing but pots in a draw.. no go! I'll let the folks who get paid to code the game figure how that works exactly, but probably a guaranteed 100gem worth card in each 4+ packs opened?

NativeJoe

I've played cryptic/perfect world games. The crates get worse lol... I payed 100 dollars for a race, another 300-700 in keys for "crates" and 200 or so on various what would be considered "mounts" . Just saying I've seen how this goes... Enjoy your *high* odds now... cuz it's going to get more convoluted over time, and your chances of getting something desirable even less so.

JimT722

NativeJoe wrote: »

I've played cryptic/perfect world games. The crates get worse lol... I payed 100 dollars for a race, another 300-700 in keys for "crates" and 200 or so on various what would be considered "mounts" . Just saying I've seen how this goes... Enjoy your *high* odds now... cuz it's going to get more convoluted over time, and your chances of getting something desirable even less so.

They will find out how bad these are eventually. I played cryptic and Perfect World games myself. I realized these sucked and got out. It's not until SWTOR went f2p that I almost fell into the trap, but i loved KOTOR. Now same thing is happening with Elder Scrolls. ZOS hired a Marketing Director recently that specializes in micro transaction strategy and F2P transitions. Also the Marketing director worked on Perfect World. After all the negative feedback from pts and the changes after live, I am sure things will get worse. Just wait for housing.

Wreuntzylla

NativeJoe wrote: »

I've played cryptic/perfect world games. The crates get worse lol... I payed 100 dollars for a race, another 300-700 in keys for "crates" and 200 or so on various what would be considered "mounts" . Just saying I've seen how this goes... Enjoy your *high* odds now... cuz it's going to get more convoluted over time, and your chances of getting something desirable even less so.

How did you feel about spending that money?

AzraelKrieg

NativeJoe wrote: »

I've played cryptic/perfect world games. The crates get worse lol... I payed 100 dollars for a race, another 300-700 in keys for "crates" and 200 or so on various what would be considered "mounts" . Just saying I've seen how this goes... Enjoy your *high* odds now... cuz it's going to get more convoluted over time, and your chances of getting something desirable even less so.

To be fair, Perfect World is a Chinese company so no surprise they would pull that crap.

JimT722 wrote: »

NativeJoe wrote: »

I've played cryptic/perfect world games. The crates get worse lol... I payed 100 dollars for a race, another 300-700 in keys for "crates" and 200 or so on various what would be considered "mounts" . Just saying I've seen how this goes... Enjoy your *high* odds now... cuz it's going to get more convoluted over time, and your chances of getting something desirable even less so.

They will find out how bad these are eventually. I played cryptic and Perfect World games myself. I realized these sucked and got out. It's not until SWTOR went f2p that I almost fell into the trap, but i loved KOTOR. Now same thing is happening with Elder Scrolls. ZOS hired a Marketing Director recently that specializes in micro transaction strategy and F2P transitions. Also the Marketing director worked on Perfect World. After all the negative feedback from pts and the changes after live, I am sure things will get worse. Just wait for housing.

SWTOR being published by EA probably didn't help matters considering the track record of them and MMOs. And LOTRO is now published by Warner Bros. so there is that. Seeing a pattern?

alexkdd99

Or they could leave it as is. I am just fine with my purchase. I may have come off better by using the crates. For sure if we count the astro mounts at around 4k+ crowns. I say that much since I think they are better than the most expensive mount I have ever seen in crown store.

Yes I get that not everyone will get lucky, that is why it is called random. Also people are not taking into account the rate at which you get gems goes up a ton the more crates you buy.

First 15 crates I ended with around 40 to 50 gems, bot 15 more and ended with 244 gems. That is roughly 200 gems after the second set of 15 crates. I can only imagine the rate will only go higher. The crates in eso are far more generous than any other game I have bought similar crates from.

Don't want to buy them? Don't!

And don't start with the nonsense about gambling addicts. If there are gambling addicts playing eso they won't be spending their money on crown crates, they will be at a gaming site/casino where there gambling nets them REAL money.

[Edit to remove baiting]

JimT722

alexkdd99 wrote: »

Or they could leave it as is. I am just fine with my purchase. I may have come off better by using the crates. For sure if we count the astro mounts at around 4k+ crowns. I say that much since I think they are better than the most expensive mount I have ever seen in crown store.

Yes I get that not everyone will get lucky, that is why it is called random. Also people are not taking into account the rate at which you get gems goes up a ton the more crates you buy.

First 15 crates I ended with around 40 to 50 gems, bot 15 more and ended with 244 gems. That is roughly 200 gems after the second set of 15 crates. I can only imagine the rate will only go higher. The crates in eso are far more generous than any other game I have bought similar crates from.

Don't want to buy them? Don't!

And don't start with the nonsense about gambling addicts. If there are gambling addicts playing eso they won't be spending their money on crown crates, they will be at a gaming site/casino where there gambling nets them REAL money.

Yet there are posts that said they meant to stop at $40, yet that cat kept taunting them. These are designed to be manipulative. Everything about what you see and hear is to try and keep you opening crates. People who may not know they have addictive tendencies will fall for this. Watch the South Park freemium episode. They touch on this, and they aren't making it up.

mistermacintosh

I don't like the crates... but I had a stack of useless consumables from the Black Friday deal and the reduced price starter pack, so when I found out you could convert consumables into gems I thought that might be incentive enough to get into the crates a little. Unfortunately those items do not register with the crate system. Apparently, only useless consumables you acquire in the crate-looting system are allowed to be converted to gems.

So not only can you not vendor these worthless items in game, you can't even sell them back to the crown store to get items you actually want. Why ZOS? Why?

Oh well. I'll just save my crowns for the nice wolf and stag mounts.


P.S. The atronach bear looks like a giant hamster.

fr33r4ng3r

I made a different thread about this, thanks @ZOS_GregoryV for point me at this one. I'll repost my ideas here to keep the suggestions together as per your suggestion.

So after saying that I felt cheated last night, I went to bed thinking about how I would improve crown crates if I were working for ZOS. I am a software engineer by trade and spend a fair amount of my time thinking about user experience, so this sort of thinking is in my DNA. So, I’d like to focus on what could be done to make crown crates work for ZOS without sacrificing the goodwill of their players.

I bought another 15 crates this morning to check my results and got 15 duplicate collectables (including 1 purple and 1 yellow duplicate - yup that’s right, all but one of the crates was a duplicate and I got 2 duplicates in my 5 card crate). Still no Apex or Legendary (except for the dup) rewards after 30 crates now and 24 of the 30 were dups, not a great experience).

Here are my ideas:

1. Bundles MUST guarantee card drops as follows:
   1. 4 crate bundle guarantees 1 purple (Epic) or better card
   2. 15 crate bundle guarantees 1 yellow (Legendary) or better card
   3. (New 12,000cr) 40 crate bundle guarantees 1 Apex card or better.
2. Gem return for duplicate collectables is too low. If I get only duplicates and trade in all my consumables for gems I should be able to “buy” an apex mount within 45 crates.
3. Include 40 crown gems with eso plus each month. No free crates though.
4. Completely revamp Pacrooti’s dialog. It’s obnoxious in the extreme. Let’s have him talk about his experiences as a hireling again. Give him back his personality please.
5. Award a small number of gems for the completion of in game group content (e.g. remove the XP reward for completing a random veteran dungeon and instead reward crown gems).
6. Publish drop rates and apex reward schedule in advance.
7. Keep the previous season’s apex rewards in the gem store at half price.
8. Add a 2nd tier ($30?) of eso-plus subscription which includes enough gems to purchase a single apex mount in each season.
9. Add mythic legendary drops (e.g a card that lets you choose an apex mount which could be saved and used in any season.)
10. I really like OP's suggestion of including cards that award gems directly too.
11. Allow account wide opt out of crate purchases, but leave the gem store available to incentivise eso plus.

I know this feature has garnered a lot of ill-will and with good reason. In my view it’s unlikely we’ll see this feature removed, so let’s try to stay focused on what can be done to make it fun (in this thread as least)...

Thanks for reading.

Revenant_Spartan

Maybe something that would work for the crates would be this:

The items for the season (we use the storm atronach) can be bought directly with crown coins during this time. Then when the next season releases (say flame atronach) then the flame stuff is directly on sale and all the old stuff goes into the crates.
Combined with the trading system people can directly buy what they want, and those that could not at the time has a chance later to obtain that item without that item losing its "rarity".

But technically just having everything available for purchase all the time would probably be best.

elven.were_wolf

I have an idea, for improving Crown Crates. To be Honest I was completely against the idea and after it launched I was even more heartbroken as making my characters be as I imagine them to be is the biggest reason I play. And now some stuff is locked behind Crown Crates.

Anyways, on to my suggestions!
I suggest removing consumables from the Crown Crates all together. This allows for duplicate items accuring more frequently, narrows down the loottable and thus if preople get duplicate things they have a bigger chance of getting to buy what they want with the crown gems.

JKorr

Far from being jealous of the costumes I don't use and the atronach mounts I really dislike; I'd be perfectly happy if they kept the themed items exclusive for the crates. From the datamined information I'll never consider bothering with them.

However I would not only appreciate but *buy* the consolation prizes; the NON-themed items in the crates. If i was ever foolish enough to buy a crate after doing the pts trial with them, I'd cheerfully trade any of the atronach mounts for the lion, maybe for the red wolf, but definitely for the lion.

Btw, on the pts I got two of the atronach mounts; the bear and the camel. Guess which mounts I really dislike and wouldn't buy? Yep. Bear and camel. If someone is willing to settle for any item, then they might not have too much of a problem with the crates. If you do want a particular costume or mount, you will very probably be disappointed, or spend a few hundred dollars to get what you want, or enough duplicates to trade in for gems to :gasp: buy what you want.

What a novel concept.

JKorr

elven.were_wolf wrote: »

I have an idea, for improving Crown Crates. To be Honest I was completely against the idea and after it launched I was even more heartbroken as making my characters be as I imagine them to be is the biggest reason I play. And now some stuff is locked behind Crown Crates.

Anyways, on to my suggestions!
I suggest removing consumables from the Crown Crates all together. This allows for duplicate items accuring more frequently, narrows down the loottable and thus if preople get duplicate things they have a bigger chance of getting to buy what they want with the crown gems.

They won't do that; the whole point of the exercise is to get people to buy more crates, not allow you to accumulate enough gems to outright buy what you want.

dodgehopper_ESO

The post on the topic that I originally posted on got shut down in favor of this one, so I'll just repost what I said there:

I don't gamble. The amount of crates you would have to open to 'buy' what you want is so high I will -never- purchase crown crates. Its not worth spending $150/mount worth of crates to get what you want. The Crates are a great idea for ZoS, but its horrible for players. Nothing they can do would change my opinion on that apart from fundamentally redesigning what they're doing. Philosophically speaking though, even if they had a decent drop rate on good items, I am very much against the notion of these gambling boxes on any game period.

JimT722

dodgehopper_ESO wrote: »

The post on the topic that I originally posted on got shut down in favor of this one, so I'll just repost what I said there:

I don't gamble. The amount of crates you would have to open to 'buy' what you want is so high I will -never- purchase crown crates. Its not worth spending $150/mount worth of crates to get what you want. The Crates are a great idea for ZoS, but its horrible for players. Nothing they can do would change my opinion on that apart from fundamentally redesigning what they're doing. Philosophically speaking though, even if they had a decent drop rate on good items, I am very much against the notion of these gambling boxes on any game period.

I hate these crates so much. I would have kept playing but they have included items known to be coming well before crates were announced. They should have had new, never before seen items in the crates. Items I had been waiting to buy and hyped myself up for are in the crates. I can't be tempted to buy them if I delete the game. I can't believe ZOS is this stupid.

Sigtric

JimT722 wrote: »

dodgehopper_ESO wrote: »

The post on the topic that I originally posted on got shut down in favor of this one, so I'll just repost what I said there:

I don't gamble. The amount of crates you would have to open to 'buy' what you want is so high I will -never- purchase crown crates. Its not worth spending $150/mount worth of crates to get what you want. The Crates are a great idea for ZoS, but its horrible for players. Nothing they can do would change my opinion on that apart from fundamentally redesigning what they're doing. Philosophically speaking though, even if they had a decent drop rate on good items, I am very much against the notion of these gambling boxes on any game period.

I hate these crates so much. I would have kept playing but they have included items known to be coming well before crates were announced. They should have had new, never before seen items in the crates. Items I had been waiting to buy and hyped myself up for are in the crates. I can't be tempted to buy them if I delete the game. I can't believe ZOS is this stupid.

That is one of the things that irked me, knowing the red wolf was going to come because it had to. It was slipped in as a NPC standing near the stablemaster in... Anvil, if I recall correctly. It had to be an upcoming option.

Then it was thrown in a crate behind a horrid RNG.

As with my original post however, I am not absolutely opposed to the notion of crates, just this particular implementation. It is not customer friendly at all, in my opinion.

Waffennacht

I'll be honest, have problems at all with the crates, however I was taken back by what was scripted for the khajiit's voice actor.

He actually does say, "I guarantee you'll get something good." And somethings like, "just buy another"

I did say out loud, "you lie cat, you lie like a dog." When said I would guaranteed something good and I got 4 boxes of a buzz cut I already had, a argonian hair cut, mimic stone and riding lessons.

Of course im not sore at the boxes, I just was surprised by his lines.

Over all bought 10 boxes, I like my red wolf pup.

As far as I know, several of the items are going nowhere, meaning future seasonal items should be far easier to get. (As you start completely owning the non seasonal items)

JimT722

Sigtric wrote: »

JimT722 wrote: »

dodgehopper_ESO wrote: »

The post on the topic that I originally posted on got shut down in favor of this one, so I'll just repost what I said there:

I don't gamble. The amount of crates you would have to open to 'buy' what you want is so high I will -never- purchase crown crates. Its not worth spending $150/mount worth of crates to get what you want. The Crates are a great idea for ZoS, but its horrible for players. Nothing they can do would change my opinion on that apart from fundamentally redesigning what they're doing. Philosophically speaking though, even if they had a decent drop rate on good items, I am very much against the notion of these gambling boxes on any game period.

I hate these crates so much. I would have kept playing but they have included items known to be coming well before crates were announced. They should have had new, never before seen items in the crates. Items I had been waiting to buy and hyped myself up for are in the crates. I can't be tempted to buy them if I delete the game. I can't believe ZOS is this stupid.

That is one of the things that irked me, knowing the red wolf was going to come because it had to. It was slipped in as a NPC standing near the stablemaster in... Anvil, if I recall correctly. It had to be an upcoming option.

Then it was thrown in a crate behind a horrid RNG.

As with my original post however, I am not absolutely opposed to the notion of crates, just this particular implementation. It is not customer friendly at all, in my opinion.

Not just the red wolf irked me. That website article, come check out Shadows of the Hist and Style Parlor on the pts? So I did. Got incredibly excited for a few of those. Both are now in crates. They have completely destroyed my consumer confidence.

I am left thinking the people in charge of this game are brain dead. Is it too much work to create new items people would want? Items people were not expecting to be able to buy.