Overall i really enjoy the Crown Crates. The mixture of new items, plus old items that are no longer available through the crown store is really nice. For me, the drop rates seem OK as well (though several crates now and no 'apex' reward; alas!)

There is one problem though.

When you get repeat items, or an item you already have, you get gems instead. That's cool! What ISN'T cool though is that the amount doesn't give you enough to pick a prize of the same rarity/level as what you just won, or even the level/rarity of the one beneath! For those of us that have purchased the item re got a duplicate of, this can be very frustrating, and leads to heavy feelings of bitterness/buyers remorse/feeling ripped off. I'm sure that's not the experience you want your users to experience!

Here's an example that happened to me:

Open a crate, get dealt a 4 card set of prizes. One of them is the Doom Wolf (yay!), however I -already have- the Doom Wolf, as I purchased it when it was in the crown store for the very short time it was available. So I get 33 gems. If I were to purchase the Doom Wolf with gems, it would cost 100. With those 33 gems, I cannot purchase an item of the tier below (40 gems) either. Not cool! When I realized this, I felt rather ripped off, and even kind of 'punished' for having purchased the Doom Wolf (what was it, 4000 crowns? it was a significantly large amount) before. It really turned me off of getting crown crates again, knowing that having directly bought several crown store items before is being punished. From speaking with other players in game, this seems to be a common place of issue.

So, let's solve this.

I see several solutions to this that would still result in a positive player experience, and maintain the random-grab-bag crown crate experience, as well as several very bad solutions. I'm listing them from best to worst.

1) I think this one is best. When a player receives a duplicate item (costume, mount, etc), they receive the same amount of gems as it costs to buy something of the level of the duplicate item they received (so getting a duplicate 16 crown hat would give 16 gems, a duplicate apex reward would give 400 gems, etc). The consumables can stay the same, really. This allows players to not feel punished for previously purchasing items through the crown store, or ripped off if they keep pulling duplicate items. Positive feelings = more crate sales.

2) This one still maintains the random component: When a duplicate item is received, the player has the choice of 'rerolling' for a guaranteed random item of that tier of rarity. This solution is if you really have an issue with player choice and want to make sure it's all 'random draw'. You could offer them half that tiers value in gems as well, in case someone has already filled out everything available of that tier/rarity level.

3) This one is similar to the one above, but also has its own problems: Players never receive duplicate items. Instead they will always get something they have not had before. Players receive half the amount of gems (200 for apex, for instance) only if they have received everything of that rarity level. Consumables (crown soul gems, crown potions and meals, mimic stones, crown poisons, crown experience scrolls) can still be exchanged for gems at the current rate. Problems in this one may result from tweaking the drop rates to be more heavy towards consumables, and the items becoming 'too rare' for people to want to try for.

4) This one is ok, but doesn't really solve the issue: Reduce Crown Crate costs by half, effectively allowing the purchase of twice the amount of crates for the same amount of crowns. Leave the drop rates alone. Adjust gem extraction to give 1/2 (instead of 1/3) of gems for items. This is really not an ideal choice.

5) (Sad Solution) Allow crown gems to be purchased directly with crowns. Say, 5 crowns to 1 gem. Allow gems to be traded for crowns as well - 1 gem to five crowns. Allow duplicate items to be actual items (containers that grant the item within) that can be bought/sold/traded for in game gold. This will wreck player economy. Don't do this one.

6) (Other Sad Solution) Remove Crown Crates entirely. Put everything that would be in them up for direct sale in the Crown Store at reasonable prices. Occasionally put the old items back in the crown store to appeal to new players or people that didn't get it before. Reasonable prices: 300 for a hat/hairstyle, 500 for a super special hat/hairstyle or a costume, 750 for a super special costume, 300 for a transform/aura, 400-750 for non-combat pet, 1000-2000 for a mount. This solution totally defeats the point of the 'grab bag' type Crown Crates. This one is super lame. Don't do this one.

Thanks for reading this. I really hope you consider changing the crown gem system to be more friendly to players... after all, if we didn't want to support you as a company, and ESO as a game, we wouldn't subscribe to ESO+ or buy Crown stuff at all. Please make it a very positive experience for both repeat and new customers to support you!

~Z