Being unable to pay directly for Crown Store items is making me lost interest in the game

Apollosipod · September 12

Why are so many items being put behind crown gem pay walls these days? ZOS, I'm sure you have some MBA behind the crown store saying people will gamble to get more gems, but please just let me buy things without having the play the capitalism mini-game

Ishtarknows · September 13

At least you can buy them with seals of endeavour too. Recent additions - the Seabloom Villa and the 10 year anniversary costume were not available to buy with either crowns or gems/endeavours. They were a cash only purchase which was unheard of before, and I hope won't become the norm going forward.

Danikat · September 13

Apollosipod wrote: »

Why are so many items being put behind crown gem pay walls these days? ZOS, I'm sure you have some MBA behind the crown store saying people will gamble to get more gems, but please just let me buy things without having the play the capitalism mini-game

I don't think they're putting more things into crown crates than they used to, but I don't remember them putting so many of them on the crown store's front page, even when a new crate was released. It caught me out too, I started looking through the featured items then realised they were all priced in gems, not crowns and had to hunt through the individual tabs for stuff I could actually buy.

Yes I know they can be bought with seals, but it still caught me out when I was looking at things to spend crowns on and realised that's not an option with all the featured items.

CalamityCat · September 13

There have been many times I've wanted to get something but it's not available for seals and prohibitively expensive if I need to buy the crowns. I've seen a few mounts recently that look nice, but they are so overpriced I wouldn't even consider getting one. It's one thing to pay a lot for a physical item you can actually own, but these items aren't really ours when they're only accessible inside an online game.

I want to give ZOS support when they get it right and make something that looks great, but seeing things like mounts at 2,500 gems and costumes at 400 gems is infuriating. It's predatory pricing. As is hiding the price behind made-up game currencies. But players will still encourage and reward it by buying these items. So the prices are going to stay high and probably increase to whatever it takes before those players have the sense to say "no".

Apollosipod · September 14

Danikat wrote: »

Apollosipod wrote: »

Why are so many items being put behind crown gem pay walls these days? ZOS, I'm sure you have some MBA behind the crown store saying people will gamble to get more gems, but please just let me buy things without having the play the capitalism mini-game

I don't think they're putting more things into crown crates than they used to, but I don't remember them putting so many of them on the crown store's front page, even when a new crate was released. It caught me out too, I started looking through the featured items then realised they were all priced in gems, not crowns and had to hunt through the individual tabs for stuff I could actually buy.

Yes I know they can be bought with seals, but it still caught me out when I was looking at things to spend crowns on and realised that's not an option with all the featured items.

That's my frustration as well. There have definitely been items I wanted to buy, but then I realized all of them were priced in gems. I have crowns. I bought crowns with the intent of buying things. But when everything I would LIKE to buy is locked behind only being able to buy in gems? Yeah...

I've been a subscriber on this game for years, but I turned off my sub the other day. Once my little stockpile of crowns is gone I don't see myself buying anymore and it really bums me out

Apollosipod · September 14

CalamityCat wrote: »

There have been many times I've wanted to get something but it's not available for seals and prohibitively expensive if I need to buy the crowns. I've seen a few mounts recently that look nice, but they are so overpriced I wouldn't even consider getting one. It's one thing to pay a lot for a physical item you can actually own, but these items aren't really ours when they're only accessible inside an online game.

I want to give ZOS support when they get it right and make something that looks great, but seeing things like mounts at 2,500 gems and costumes at 400 gems is infuriating. It's predatory pricing. As is hiding the price behind made-up game currencies. But players will still encourage and reward it by buying these items. So the prices are going to stay high and probably increase to whatever it takes before those players have the sense to say "no".

It also really says a lot that the 2,500 crowns price is honestly a discount compared to most of the mounts that come in at 4,000. I want to support ZOD too, but lately they've made it where not only can you not do much with crowns, everything that seems cool comes in under the gems lockdown. So I can really ONLY buy crowns in order to buy crown crates and have to roll the dice on getting items I can then "sell back" to ZOS with the bain hope of earning enough gems.

At what point will the combination of an overall drop in writing quality and increase in monetization make ZOS realize the only thing standing in their way to making this a 30-year game is their own business practices?

meekmiko · September 14

Ishtarknows wrote: »

At least you can buy them with seals of endeavour too. Recent additions - the Seabloom Villa and the 10 year anniversary costume were not available to buy with either crowns or gems/endeavours. They were a cash only purchase which was unheard of before, and I hope won't become the norm going forward.

It's not unheard of actually.

header.jpg?t=1725546950

The Elder Scrolls Online - The Hailcinder Mount Pack (from 2020):

Exclusive Mount: Hailcinder Vale Elk
3000 Crowns
Pledge of Mara Scroll

The Elder Scrolls Online - Newcomer Pack (from 2020):

Exclusive Pet: Flame Skin Salamander
1,500 Crowns
150% Experience Scroll

They were just like the pack with the Seabloom Villa (from 2024) and the 10-Year Anniversary pack (from 2025).
header.jpg?t=1725458572

Also, the Salamander from the Newcomer pack's appearance was exclusive to whatever you bought the pack on.

Exclusive Salamander Pet depending on platform:
PC: Flame Skin Salamander
Xbox: Toxin Skin Salamander
PlayStation: Shock Skin Salamander

- Source: https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/#en/answer/46736

Flame Skin:

Shock Skin:

Toxin Skin:

(Which isn't even the first time they've done exclusive pets)

Just to be clear: I am not defending ZOS doing this. It sucks, but yeah.. 🥴