Endeavors: Impossible "Limited Time Offers"

jle30303

So, there are "Limited Time Offers" in the Endeavor store. The Anka-Ra Sand-Camel, Anka-Ra Senche-Lion and Ebony Dwarven Spider, for 16000 Seals of Endeavor. The Bloodroot Spriggan, Bloodroot Wild Hunt Senche (7200 and 9600) and all the Baandari Pedlar Mounts (8000). All with 8 days left on them.

There's just one trouble with this:

Since the introduction of Endeavors, I don't think I've missed more than a day or two, if that - I've got my endeavors every day, and the weekly ones every week... And the total number of Seals of Endeavor that I have, is 3,165.

It is literally impossible to acquire the seals that are needed to take advantage of these "Limited Time Offers" before the limited time expires!

How is that, in any way, reasonable, ethical or even legal?

Sarannah

The offers will return again, and again, and again. Usually at about the same yearly events, as when they were available in the first place. Just hold on to your endeavours.

Endeavours are more of a longterm project.

FluffWit

They just put all the Elsweyr themed crate stuff up, they didnt take into account that it hasn't been possible to earn enough gems to purchase some of it yet.

Sephyr

It's intended to be a currency gained over time without immediate satisfaction, that's how. While one could argue the unreasonability or ethics around it, I'm pretty sure that ZoS has the legalities covered.

SeaGtGruff

I think they're just reflecting the limited-time offers that are available with gems, with the gem amounts converted to seals of endeavor amounts. The fact that an item is shown doesn't imply that you're expected to be able to afford to buy it yet. There's nothing unethical or illegal about it, even if it might leave a sour taste in people's mouths.

redlink1979

"Limited time offers" always come back, again and again, at some point. They are just presented this way so players stress out with FOMO and rush out to purchase them.
Just a marketing strategy, nothing else.

Lady_Galadhiel

Well you can rather choose if you want 3-4 apex mounts or one radiant apex a year.
Don't expect to be able to unlock big tier rewards from each crate season with seals.

Danikat

Sarannah wrote: »

The offers will return again, and again, and again. Usually at about the same yearly events, as when they were available in the first place. Just hold on to your endeavours.

Endeavours are more of a longterm project.

For now that seems likely, but I'm not sure what's going to happen long-term as they keep adding new kinds of crates.

I could see it being like the DLC events where we used to get ones for each DLC, then some were combined and now we don't necessarily get them at all because there's only so many events they can run in a year and they keep adding new DLC. As they add more kinds of crown crates it's going to get harder to make time to bring them all back each year.

Chaos2088

Think the end game with the Limited Time Offers is that once you get everything in those crates that they have to offer, you cant use your endeavor points on anything in them, they are alternatives to pick from.

Kiralyn2000

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

I think they're just reflecting the limited-time offers that are available with gems, with the gem amounts converted to seals of endeavor amounts. The fact that an item is shown doesn't imply that you're expected to be able to afford to buy it yet.

This.

Radiance

Ethical?! LOL where have you been the past 7 years?

The fact they introduced endeavors at all after years of exploiting Gambler's impulse control problems is quite frankly a miracle.

But don't give them too much credit. This was most-likely a loophole move to avoid any legal complications from future loot crate laws that may come to pass as they've done in other countries. That as well as increasing player attendance for better ratings like the Daily Login Rewards were supposed to before the rewards became decidedly less rewarding.

spartaxoxo

Radiance wrote: »

Ethical?! LOL where have you been the past 7 years?

The fact they introduced endeavors at all after years of exploiting Gambler's impulse control problems is quite frankly a miracle.

But don't give them too much credit. This was most-likely a loophole move to avoid any legal complications from future loot crate laws that may come to pass as they've done in other countries. That as well as increasing player attendance for better ratings like the Daily Login Rewards were supposed to before the rewards became decidedly less rewarding.

They were bought by Microsoft and Microsoft has a self-regulating policy on all it's property that lootboxes must be earnable in-game.

kmcaj

All you had to do was earn roughly 13000 more Seals of Endeavour for one of the expensive limited time only mounts. Hardly ZOS's fault.

Dagoth_Rac

Eventually, you will be able to afford limited-time offers. Programming the endeavor store to only show limited time offers once it is mathematically possible to buy them based on inception date of endeavors, the sum of the ever-changing daily/weekly possible maximum seal amounts, etc., etc., was likely just not worth the hassle.

This is one of those cases where a human brain will intuitively know that you cannot have earned enough seals yet, but the game cannot know anything intuitively. It needs a very exact, specific mathematical formula and access to historical endeavor data to know if a limited-time offer is attainable yet via seals. That is going to take more time and resources than, "Just take everything available for gems, and convert the gem value to seals."

Basically, do you put dev resources and time to a potential point of confusion that is not really breaking anything and will naturally resolve itself in a few months?

kmcaj

^^ This. That math is so complicated a computer could never do it.

Amottica

I was surprised Zenimax started this new system off to include an LTO. The only reason I can see for it is that they wanted players to know they need to bank those endeavor tokens for LTOs, just in case. Regardless, it seems odd since we really have no means to get extra endeavors on demand. (Oops, maybe this is coming to a crown store near you).

katanagirl1

Oh, there is only one mount that I want and it’s the Anka-Ra Senche.

I do hope it comes around again. I don’t have enough Seals or gems to get it.

AuraStorm43

Endeavor’s only reason for existence is to be there in case lootboxes get regulated

You aren’t meant to able to earn the rarer mounts quickly, that’d discourage people actually buyinh cratesc

Iluvrien

AuraStorm43 wrote: »

Endeavor’s only reason for existence is to be there in case lootboxes get regulated

You aren’t meant to able to earn the rarer mounts quickly, that’d discourage people actually buyinh cratesc

Well I'd also suggest that they exist for other (additional) reasons:

1. To drive daily engagement now that the daily login rewards are no longer the hot new thing.
2. To remind players, through the choices of endeavours, that they should pick up all DLC and Chapters.
3. To point the way to the Crown store should seals not be plentiful enough at any point.

All in all it seems to do take on about 4 jobs simultaneously. In its own utterly atrocious way, it appears to be very effective and well thought out.

agegarton

Endeavors are simply a means by which ZoS can continue to offer Crown Crates and not be adversely affected by current and projected gambling laws in the EU and UK. In short, everything in the game is potentially available to any player without having to purchase Crown Crates and "gambling".

By my calculation, most of the top tier rewards in the current Crown Crate cycle will be be available via Seals of Endeavor. At the current rate you simply won't be able to accrue enough Seals (currency) to buy this stuff before the next set of Crown Crates are released (assuming previous Crown Crate rewards are removed, of course).

We have to look at Endeavors as a longer term thing. You could buy low or mid-tier items this cycle, or save up for higher-tier items in the next cycles.

Personally, although I think ZoS has been a bit stingy with the value of daily and weekly rewards, on balance they're a good thing and they have breathed new life into some elements of the game.

jaws343

FluffWit wrote: »

They just put all the Elsweyr themed crate stuff up, they didnt take into account that it hasn't been possible to earn enough gems to purchase some of it yet.

It's also possible they are providing pricing details if/when the event returns next year. Providing players with a goal to work for with Endeavors if they want those items upon return to the store.

Kalik_Gold

Because next time it comes around, if you have saved up you can get it.

If I start the game with 0 gold, and a limited time house comes available. I can't buy it until I save the gold, and it shows up again correct?

Kiralyn2000

And also because it's easier to program a general system ("whatever is in the Crate Gem Store, put in the Endeavor store at <endeavor seal price>") rather than a specialized system ("because the maximum possible seals earned so far is X, only display items that cost X or less. Recalculate X every day.").

So when a limited time crate was added for the event, it was also automatically added to the Gem store and the Seal store. Regardless of whether you could have enough seals or not.

It's not some conspiracy, or insult. It's just an automated system doing it's thing. /shrug

Gaebriel0410

Iluvrien wrote: »

Well I'd also suggest that they exist for other (additional) reasons:

1. To drive daily engagement now that the daily login rewards are no longer the hot new thing.
2. To remind players, through the choices of endeavours, that they should pick up all DLC and Chapters.
3. To point the way to the Crown store should seals not be plentiful enough at any point.

All in all it seems to do take on about 4 jobs simultaneously. In its own utterly atrocious way, it appears to be very effective and well thought out.

Lol I don't think its purpose is that nefarious in the slightest, they could achieve point 1 simply by changing the login rewards to whatever they think would achieve that goal. And I strongly doubt that a handful of seals would be the thing that makes players interested in buying DLC, people buy that for.. well, the content?

To me it really doesn't seem to be some evil tin foil hat scheme to make money lmao, not everything in life is designed to fleece people.

I think that besides confirming to new lootbox policies, the main reason for endeavours is likely to give players more 'reasons' to spread out throughout the world, similar to how companions level their guild skill lines by doing those daily quests. ESO never suffered from dead zones on my server, but I can imagine that spreading out the playerbase is generally a good thing for an online game.

And finally, I think it's also just a little nice thing for the players. It allows frequent players, especially those who have more time than money, to buy stuff from crates. Sure if I want something from a crate, I can just buy a bunch of crates. But not everyone can, so I just think it's kinda considerate and well, nice. I'd be amongst the first to complain about sleazy retention mechanics, but I don't really think ESO has those (thankfully).

wishlist14

I choose not to focus on endeavors as that would frustrate me no end. I just play as always and now and then i see a message pop up on my screen that i completed one. It's just another grind but i do see the need for it....to keep players working towards bigger rewards.

Iluvrien

thrashtilldeath666cub18_ESO wrote: »

Lol I don't think its purpose is that nefarious in the slightest, they could achieve point 1 simply by changing the login rewards to whatever they think would achieve that goal. And I strongly doubt that a handful of seals would be the thing that makes players interested in buying DLC, people buy that for.. well, the content?

"nefarious" is an interesting choice. It's marketing, you don't really need any adjectives when you already know it is marketing.

Is the content why they buy them? All of them? I certainly can't speak to that. But I have noticed threads appearing now bemoaning the distribution of endeavours into DLC content, in addition to the threads in the past complaining that many of these mechanics have been paywalled behind Chapter purchases.

thrashtilldeath666cub18_ESO wrote: »

To me it really doesn't seem to be some evil tin foil hat scheme to make money lmao, not everything in life is designed to fleece people.

Oh, I agree. Not everything in life is designed to fleece people. Now, everything in this game? Ehhhh, I'm not so sure I would agree with you there.

thrashtilldeath666cub18_ESO wrote: »

<snip for brevity>
I'd be amongst the first to complain about sleazy retention mechanics, but I don't really think ESO has those (thankfully).

I disagree, and on that basis I have a bridge that I would like to sell you.