Lower tier Seal rewards are extremely overpriced and indirectly devalues Apex/Radiant Apex

xgoku1

The current pricing structure is as follows:

• Radiant Apex - 1600/16000 SoE - 1:10 (mid)
• Apex - 400 CG/8000 SoE - 1:20
• Legendary - 100 CG/3600 SoE - 1:36
• Epic - 40 CG/2000 SoE - 1:50
• Superior - 16 CG/1000 SoE - 1:62.5
• Fine - 5 CG/360 SoE - 1:72
• Common - 3 CG/360 SoE - 1:90

The decreasing ratio as you go higher in Rewards is a baffling design decision. Clearly it looks like ZOS wants to de-value Radiant Apex and Apex mounts.

Assuming you get 10-12 gems from duplicates while opening crates en masse, the lowest priced Radiant Apex would roughly take about 105 crates opened. That's 15x7 crate packs, or 35000 crowns' worth.

By current USD rates, that would mean each player buying a Radiant Apex with SoE is a loss of at least 250$ for ZOS.

For Apex, similarly, the loss would be 70$ per Apex mount.

This does not account for the perceived value these mounts had from their exclusivity, which will most definitely decrease as people buy Radiants/Apex mounts with saved SoE in the future.

On the other hand, the items that are commonly deconned for gems in the Superior-Fine-Common category, are extremely overpriced, further encouraging people to save for Radiant Apex/Apex/Legendary items, further devaluing them.

As things stand, the pricing structure incentivizes buying cosmetics above Epic/Legendary with the FREE currency and the lower rewards with crown gems.

This just feels like ZOS shooting itself in the foot. Yet again...

Goregrinder

xgoku1 wrote: »

The current pricing structure is as follows:

• Radiant Apex - 1600/16000 SoE - 1:10 (mid)
• Apex - 400 CG/8000 SoE - 1:20
• Legendary - 100 CG/3600 SoE - 1:36
• Epic - 40 CG/2000 SoE - 1:50
• Superior - 16 CG/1000 SoE - 1:62.5
• Fine - 5 CG/360 SoE - 1:72
• Common - 3 CG/360 SoE - 1:90

The decreasing ratio as you go higher in Rewards is a baffling design decision. Clearly it looks like ZOS wants to de-value Radiant Apex and Apex mounts.

Assuming you get 10-12 gems from duplicates while opening crates en masse, the lowest priced Radiant Apex would roughly take about 105 crates opened. That's 15x7 crate packs, or 35000 crowns' worth.

By current USD rates, that would mean each player buying a Radiant Apex with SoE is a loss of at least 250$ for ZOS.

For Apex, similarly, the loss would be 70$ per Apex mount.

This does not account for the perceived value these mounts had from their exclusivity, which will most definitely decrease as people buy Radiants/Apex mounts with saved SoE in the future.

On the other hand, the items that are commonly deconned for gems in the Superior-Fine-Common category, are extremely overpriced, further encouraging people to save for Radiant Apex/Apex/Legendary items, further devaluing them.

As things stand, the pricing structure incentivizes buying cosmetics above Epic/Legendary with the FREE currency and the lower rewards with crown gems.

This just feels like ZOS shooting itself in the foot. Yet again...

Yeah I know, but people are still complaining the seal requirements are too high, even though it devalues their own product/service. But I guess that is a loss ZOS is willing to take in the short term, so people should consider it a gift instead of complain about having to grind seals since it's now at a discount already!

six2fall

They designed it that way on purpose to get people to spend gems on that stuff. Imo its shady as **** but pretty much what everyone should have expected with how the crown store has been handled.

Amottica

Doesn't the entire new system devalue the apex mounts, to begin with?

Jaimeh

The only way I can reason it is that since SoE will take ages for radiant mounts, people who want them ''now'' will buy crates or spend gems on then, and then be temped to use their SoE for other items, thus spend them. When the next round of radiant mounts come, rinse and repeat. But it's kinda puzzling, since like you said OP, it makes mroe sense to save up the seals for the pricier items, given the exchange rate.

Curtdogg47

I think it’s nice they put the system in! I also get they aren’t looking to give the stuff away to! It would be nice if you could combine both gems and seals to make purchases!

Or just have a standard conversation rate of seals into gems! And simplify the process!
So like 1000 seals could be converted to 100 gems or something.

xgoku1

Goregrinder wrote: »

xgoku1 wrote: »

The current pricing structure is as follows:

• Radiant Apex - 1600/16000 SoE - 1:10 (mid)
• Apex - 400 CG/8000 SoE - 1:20
• Legendary - 100 CG/3600 SoE - 1:36
• Epic - 40 CG/2000 SoE - 1:50
• Superior - 16 CG/1000 SoE - 1:62.5
• Fine - 5 CG/360 SoE - 1:72
• Common - 3 CG/360 SoE - 1:90

The decreasing ratio as you go higher in Rewards is a baffling design decision. Clearly it looks like ZOS wants to de-value Radiant Apex and Apex mounts.

Assuming you get 10-12 gems from duplicates while opening crates en masse, the lowest priced Radiant Apex would roughly take about 105 crates opened. That's 15x7 crate packs, or 35000 crowns' worth.

By current USD rates, that would mean each player buying a Radiant Apex with SoE is a loss of at least 250$ for ZOS.

For Apex, similarly, the loss would be 70$ per Apex mount.

This does not account for the perceived value these mounts had from their exclusivity, which will most definitely decrease as people buy Radiants/Apex mounts with saved SoE in the future.

On the other hand, the items that are commonly deconned for gems in the Superior-Fine-Common category, are extremely overpriced, further encouraging people to save for Radiant Apex/Apex/Legendary items, further devaluing them.

As things stand, the pricing structure incentivizes buying cosmetics above Epic/Legendary with the FREE currency and the lower rewards with crown gems.

This just feels like ZOS shooting itself in the foot. Yet again...

Yeah I know, but people are still complaining the seal requirements are too high, even though it devalues their own product/service. But I guess that is a loss ZOS is willing to take in the short term, so people should consider it a gift instead of complain about having to grind seals since it's now at a discount already!

They devalue their most sought after items, sure. I just don't understand the business decision behind it.

I get what you mean, objectively speaking it is a net positive addition to the game. But I feel this is a bit too punishing for the casual player who may want a few 16/40 gem items. A less drastic jump between tiers would probably be better for player choice.

Dagoth_Rac

I am guessing it is like a casino. The guy who spends $10,000 per night is important to them. They want to treat him well and keep his business. But for every guy who spends $10,000 in a night, there are 1000 regular players spending $200 during their night at the casino, which comes to a lot more in aggregate than the whale spending $10,000.

With crown crates, it might be the same. There are a few whales who spend thousands and must have every possible item. But there are also probably lots of people who impulse buy a pack of 5 crates. They will never get a radiant Apex that way, but they will likely get a few lower level things they enjoy: a pet, an outfit, a common mount, etc.

I think the overpriced lower-level stuff is to avoid making endeavors completely take the place of impulse buying a handful of crates. ZOS would love it if people were like, "I like that bear cub pet. I could afford to buy it with endeavors, but it would really set me back on my goal of a fancy mount. Maybe I'll just buy a few crates."

redspecter23

When the system was announced I was actually looking forward to using seals on some of the lower tier items. The apex and radiant apex were not something I was really interested in. After seeing the pricing, I don't consider the lower tier items as viable purchases for seals. The whole system is just a daily login counter with a mount awarded a couple times a year. It's not worth it at all for lower tier items with the current price structure. I'm sure that's by design and I'm cool with it. I just changed my goal and expectations to match what ZOS wants.

bluebird

redspecter23 wrote: »

When the system was announced I was actually looking forward to using seals on some of the lower tier items. The apex and radiant apex were not something I was really interested in. After seeing the pricing, I don't consider the lower tier items as viable purchases for seals. The whole system is just a daily login counter with a mount awarded a couple times a year. It's not worth it at all for lower tier items with the current price structure. I'm sure that's by design and I'm cool with it. I just changed my goal and expectations to match what ZOS wants.

Yeah! I also look at the Endeavour system as Login Rewards 2.0. Every month or so, we get a free cosmetic tattoo or headband or pet or something that we can actually choose from a pool of current offerings, as opposed to it being a pre-determined login reward we may not even want. Though I totally understand if people were hoping to use the Endeavours as a Crate/gem replacement system, or a Mount farm, then the system immediately looks less appealing since it won't really be able to to that.

Fischblut

Doesn't the entire new system devalue the apex mounts, to begin with?

Radiant Apex mounts were devalued starting with Ayleid crate season, when they got gem price tag Adding ability to get such mounts for free in future is unusual decision...

xgoku1

redspecter23 wrote: »

When the system was announced I was actually looking forward to using seals on some of the lower tier items. The apex and radiant apex were not something I was really interested in. After seeing the pricing, I don't consider the lower tier items as viable purchases for seals. The whole system is just a daily login counter with a mount awarded a couple times a year. It's not worth it at all for lower tier items with the current price structure. I'm sure that's by design and I'm cool with it. I just changed my goal and expectations to match what ZOS wants.

That's an interesting way to look at it as a login counter. For me, the 3600 SoE rewards seem like the sweet spot.

Goregrinder

xgoku1 wrote: »

Goregrinder wrote: »

xgoku1 wrote: »

The current pricing structure is as follows:

• Radiant Apex - 1600/16000 SoE - 1:10 (mid)
• Apex - 400 CG/8000 SoE - 1:20
• Legendary - 100 CG/3600 SoE - 1:36
• Epic - 40 CG/2000 SoE - 1:50
• Superior - 16 CG/1000 SoE - 1:62.5
• Fine - 5 CG/360 SoE - 1:72
• Common - 3 CG/360 SoE - 1:90

The decreasing ratio as you go higher in Rewards is a baffling design decision. Clearly it looks like ZOS wants to de-value Radiant Apex and Apex mounts.

Assuming you get 10-12 gems from duplicates while opening crates en masse, the lowest priced Radiant Apex would roughly take about 105 crates opened. That's 15x7 crate packs, or 35000 crowns' worth.

By current USD rates, that would mean each player buying a Radiant Apex with SoE is a loss of at least 250$ for ZOS.

For Apex, similarly, the loss would be 70$ per Apex mount.

This does not account for the perceived value these mounts had from their exclusivity, which will most definitely decrease as people buy Radiants/Apex mounts with saved SoE in the future.

On the other hand, the items that are commonly deconned for gems in the Superior-Fine-Common category, are extremely overpriced, further encouraging people to save for Radiant Apex/Apex/Legendary items, further devaluing them.

As things stand, the pricing structure incentivizes buying cosmetics above Epic/Legendary with the FREE currency and the lower rewards with crown gems.

This just feels like ZOS shooting itself in the foot. Yet again...

Yeah I know, but people are still complaining the seal requirements are too high, even though it devalues their own product/service. But I guess that is a loss ZOS is willing to take in the short term, so people should consider it a gift instead of complain about having to grind seals since it's now at a discount already!

They devalue their most sought after items, sure. I just don't understand the business decision behind it.

I get what you mean, objectively speaking it is a net positive addition to the game. But I feel this is a bit too punishing for the casual player who may want a few 16/40 gem items. A less drastic jump between tiers would probably be better for player choice.

I think the plan was to not devalue their high ticket items too much. Why spend $500 to get a radiant mount when I can just grind out Seals over a 3 day weekend and get the same mount? But if it takes 3 months, well now I may want to just spend $500 to unlock that mount right now.

Milli_Rabbit

They shpuld have just made 10 endeavors worth 1 crown gem. Easy.

Lerozain

The endeavor pricing of the lower tier items is... questionable, to say the least. The lower the tier, the more inflated the Endeavor price becomes.
-

• 1600 gems mount
• 5 gem riding lesson

A riding lesson costs 0.3% of the mount using gems.

• 16000 endeavor mount
• 360 endeavor riding lesson

A riding lesson costs 2.2% of the mount using endeavors.

The price of an endeavor riding lesson is more than 7 times greater then a gem riding lesson, relatively speaking.
If the ratios were the same, an endeavor riding lesson should cost closer to 50 endeavors.

Linaleah

six2fall wrote: »

They designed it that way on purpose to get people to spend gems on that stuff. Imo its shady as **** but pretty much what everyone should have expected with how the crown store has been handled.

this. they didn't do it to devalue apex mounts. those are still fairly lengthy. they did it to make more common items more desirable for purchase, vs seal grinding.

its about getting you to buy crates one way or another.

Linaleah

redspecter23 wrote: »

When the system was announced I was actually looking forward to using seals on some of the lower tier items. The apex and radiant apex were not something I was really interested in. After seeing the pricing, I don't consider the lower tier items as viable purchases for seals. The whole system is just a daily login counter with a mount awarded a couple times a year. It's not worth it at all for lower tier items with the current price structure. I'm sure that's by design and I'm cool with it. I just changed my goal and expectations to match what ZOS wants.

more or less for me as well..

and I'm pretty sure its becasue ZoS wants us to keep buying crates while placating Microsoft's cash shop crate rule at least nominally. perversely. it just makes me want to be crates less and less.

my expectation adjustment was even further diminished investment into cash shop fluff.