MerlinPendragon wrote: »

@heaven13
ZOS is running a business and has every right to increase prices and increase their profit margin by way of pulling more money from their consumers. While not offering a large enough discount created some unhappy customers, there were plenty like myself that spent $500+ dollars on this sale. ZOS has a responsibility to their owners and their investors to make money for them. That responsibility is greater than their need to please every forums poster with a gripe.

Further, if you look at any other MMO or most any game for that matter, we're seeing a major move to the monetization of more items in separate game stores and other types of methods to get their players to spend money after their initial purchase. This is a smart business practice. It's not just ESO. Take a look at EA's most recent financial statements as an example of this. They've made hundreds of millions of dollars from these types of stores.

So I don't disagree with you that we're seeing the Crown Store in our face more and more - but I view that as a good sign that business for ZOS is doing good and they're giving us plenty of options to make our ESO experience truly unique - even if it does mean shelling out additional dollars.

My problem is that in a number of these threads on this topic, the outrage is palpable and people are throwing around terms like 'evil' and 'greedy' far too easily simply because they're not getting as large of a discount as they wanted. That is simply a step too far, in my humble opinion.

I don't know that EA is really the model to hold up for emulation, though they had a good balance sheet, their unchecked monetization and utilization of loot boxes became so abusive that it has now brought the attention of several governmental agencies to begin the work of regulating how they do business and have been banned from distributing game utilizing those monetization methods in several countries. It is a good example of short term goals over long term viability.

I agree that evil is unwarranted. obviously it's greedy, but that cuts both ways, customers are being greedy by wanting to spend less and companies are being greedy for wanting customers to spend more, throwing that into the mix is pointless and evil...well evil is relative but I still reserve that for things that are truly malicious and I though I find some of ZOS tactics abusive, I don't see them as intentionally malicious.

MerlinPendragon wrote: »

Offering a discount of 20% instead of 50% is not abusive.

Not sure if you're trolling or seriously talking anymore. It hasn't anything to do with a single sale. It is motivations, trends, and the big picture. You can make it an isolated issue and defend that, but you're not adding to the conversation at all because you've missed the point entirely.

KivakWolf wrote: »

MerlinPendragon wrote: »

Offering a discount of 20% instead of 50% is not abusive.

Not sure if you're trolling or seriously talking anymore. It hasn't anything to do with a single sale. It is motivations, trends, and the big picture. You can make it an isolated issue and defend that, but you're not adding to the conversation at all because you've missed the point entirely.

I have read and been following this thread from the start and I honestly don't understand the big picture issue some of you have raised.

Yes, crown store prices have raised and it seems that enough are accepting of that for ZOS to maintain the higher rates.

The price to purchase crowns increased once in some countries due to conversion rates. ZOS is a US based company. That was done many months before this 20% sale. And they have had a 50% sale since then.

I am not trying to be argumentative. I just honestly don't understand the issue.

Didn't buy any crowns this sale either, discount way too small and crown store prices becoming way too ridiculous too

Cpt_Teemo wrote: »

Apache_Kid wrote: »

josiahva wrote: »

Apache_Kid wrote: »

The whole "well they are a business so they have to make profits" is funny to me.

Do y'all really think this game doesn't make profits in the hundreds of %?

Everything they sell is pixels. Once they design something to sell in the store, they can sell an infinite amount of it with no added manufacturing costs or hours or anything of the sort.

This goes for all the houses, mounts, costumes, etc.

Now, go look at the prices of the big homes. Look at how many of these pixels are over $100. Now, clearly the homes and mounts sell at these prices, if they didn't they would be lower than they are.

So now tell me that this game and it's studio are hurting for profits when they are selling items at a fraction of the manufacturing cost that another company in another industry has to spend to re-sell their goods and they can charge these absurd prices.

I have always said that if we could see the financial revenue this game generates we would all be sick to our stomachs.

Oh, you poor deluded person...you think ESO's prices are bad and their practices are predatory, you really need to play a true P2W game....and then come back and complain about ESO. Not to say I agree with ESO's prices by any means, but they are angelic in comparison with a lot of games, if only you really knew...at least in ESO its only cosmetics that you can buy.

Lmao wtf? How am i deluded? Where did i mention p2w or any other game?

Just becuase the crown-store is only cosmetic they should be able to charge over 100$ for a private instance that doesn't even have its own wayshrine?

You brought up something completely off topic..

Yeah each house now a days is about 120$ each with no sale and no gold option to buy it, why bother playing the game then

For the same reasons we played in the years before housing.

was a bit sad when they were supposed to be sales in the in game shop and instead of 50 % for items it was 20 % .... i was thinking that s maybe only this time. But they keep doing it .
i wanted to buy the wedding dress at 375 crowns;.. with sales it was 525 . so i did not buy it .
i hoped that i could purchase 21 k crowns for 60 euros... now they did the same with crowns sales .
Damn. i think i won t buy anymore crown ( only with eso+ at least ) and the in game shop is too much expensive .
120 € for a house x)...
40 € for a deer .
it s only cosmetics but still.

i have the feeling that ZOS is getting greedier even if they have more players everyday. i Realy like TESO, but zos is a bit like the new EA to me this times XD hope they will lower prices or do bigger sales.

luton0watford4 wrote: »

One of the reasons why crown store prices go up is the free crowns given away with plus. I don't know how many people subscribe, but it is likely a lot. As a result, they are flooding the market with crowns, thus deflating the value of the items in the crown store.

This leads to the increase in prices; it is the non subscribers who suffer as we don't get the free crowns. Economics 101 really; supply and demand. The best solution would be to either remove or reduce the crowns given with plus.

I don't subscribe to plus myself.

Subscription crowns are not free because subscription is not free, it is a package deal. I subscribe cherry picked months when the whole package is worth the money to me (crowns included). And there been months when it totally was worth it to me, but not without the crowns. So I do pay for the crowns as well.

luton0watford4 wrote: »

One of the reasons why crown store prices go up is the free crowns given away with plus. I don't know how many people subscribe, but it is likely a lot. As a result, they are flooding the market with crowns, thus deflating the value of the items in the crown store.

This leads to the increase in prices; it is the non subscribers who suffer as we don't get the free crowns. Economics 101 really; supply and demand.

Firstly, the Crowns in ESO+ aren't free. They are paid for as part of the subscription, so they have value.

Secondly, I don't know much about economics so could be wrong, but whilst what you say is true of "real world" economics, I don't think it applies here.

If you have an increase money supply in a real world economy, consumers buy more. Because more items are being bought, manufacturers have to increase supply. To increase supply they hire more workers, and buy more materials. The greater the demand of materials, the greater they cost. The more workers employed, the greater the shortage of workers there are, so wages go up. Because wages go up, there is more money into the hands of the consumer. ...And repeat. It's this cycle that causes inflation. (Demand Pull Inflation)

In the case of the Crown Store. There are no wage costs or material costs involved beyond the initial creation of the item. Once those costs have been covered, everything else is just profit. So even if ESO+ Crowns were free, Subscribers buying Crown items with that excess of Crowns is not costing ZOS a thing. There is no reason to push up the price of items to cover any increased manufacturing costs/wages because there are none. Hence there can be no inflation cycle.

Another form of inflation is when you have more money flooding a market that has a limited amount of goods. But again, the Crown Store items aren't limited goods. They can be duplicated instantly for free.

Now, if you want to argue that an excess of ESO+ Crowns costs ZOS 'potential' profit, then you might have a point. But that is a pretty nebulous argument to define. How much profit is the right amount of profit? Would those subscribers who used their ESO+ Crowns to buy a mount, buy that same mount if they were using full priced Crowns, etc?

This 'potential 'profit' argument is muddied even more by the fact that the Crown Store is effectively now acting as a push for the Crown Crates. Like that Senche you bought in the Crown Store? Guess what, the only way to get the pet that goes with it is to buy Crown Crates!. Miss that item that was only sold for 4 days? Guess what, the only way to get it now is in next season's Crown Crates! So the Crown Store items have a value beyond just how much profit, they themselves make.

SosRuvaak wrote: »

Aliyavana wrote: »

They are just testing the waters to see if enough players buy at lower discounts, they will probably keep or revert back to old prices depending on their success

yea but these tests shouldn't be happening in the first place.

Why? Last I checked they are a business and not a charity