Arnwald
Alchemist
The beginning of Chapter 19 was very fast, but at the moment I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel. I do not believe that I can complete this chapter in less than a year on the EN3 server, unless something changes.
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Frustration (ch. 19)
- Thread starter Arnwald
- Start date
The beginning of Chapter 19 was very fast, but at the moment I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel. I do not believe that I can complete this chapter in less than a year on the EN3 server, unless something changes.
Gargon667
Mentor
I would say nobody needs garbage chapters like these... I may be a minority, but I am certainly not the only one who has stopped playing chapters altogether. If chapters were better I would play them and supposedly so would others... To me it does not matter if I play the chapter now, in half a year, in 3 years or never at all. It does matter that it is worthwhile, which it is not currently.
So I fully agree, nobody needs this.
DeletedUser6472
Guest
To this I can only reply that it's really unfortunate that we have such an oblivious team of developers. Playing game to me, means getting all the latest gaming context, progressing through the chapters and upgrading my city to the latest levels available. Without this - I might as well play some other game, there are so many on the market.
The solution would be simple, increase merchant offers, give Ultimate Power tech tournament and spire squad reduction by good % and I'm sure that many people will start playing chapters again.
CrazyWizard
Shaman
I got bored and deceided to go for the nr1 spot.
With 250K+ tourney rank points it should be just a matter of finishing the chapters to get there.
But that will take a while since I need to do 3 chapters and first need to finish this event. before I can nuke my town for guest crap.
By the time I reach chapter 19 all problems should be gone.
Gargon667
Mentor
I wouldn´t blame the devs, they only program what they are told to program. I´d rather blame Inno for their policies, but honestly I am not sure they are doing anything wrong there either. Whatever the game means to you or to me or to anyone else is rather irrelevant for the game.
Inno is a company like any other and a companies´ job is not to make people happy, but to earn money, as long as that happens everybody is doing a good job. And I am afraid that may be the case.
I guess my minority is small enough for Inno to ignore as is the number of people quitting the game. As long as everybody else keeps playing and complaining why would they change anything? They don´t care if you complain as long as you play
And yes there are many other games out there, I play several of them to varying degrees of time investment
I have to admit I have stopped playing one where progress stopped, so the same might happen here eventually. But in general it´s all about the masses, not the minorities. Inno doesn´t care if I stay or quit, they don´t even know I exist. Since the majority keeps playing one way or another, the game is working as intended.Would a game that did everything it´s players ask for earn more money? I kind of doubt it. We´d all just want to get everything and we´d give it to ourselves for free. The game has to walk the line between making the game very difficult, so people start to pay money to overcome those difficulties, and too difficult, where people don´t bother anymore and quit.
Especially the latest chapters is a common area where you will find people that don´t mind spending money, so that is a place Inno will tease them into spending by creating bottlenecks.
I suppose the intermediate chapters are not good for making money, so they created PP spells for people to bypass them and move into an area of spending faster, for those people the incentive is even bigger as they are used to extra simple chapters (up to 14) and suddenly are hit by a much more difficult one in 15. I guess 15 is the gateway. You either start paying or you quit the game, Inno prefers spenders, but I guess they care rather little if non-spenders quit. F2P players only claim to importance is to create a scenery for the paying customers so they don´t get bored as easily and stay longer to pay the game for all the freebiees.
Anyway just some speculations on my part as to why things are the way they are, when it seems illogical at first glance.
As to changing games:
yes of course you can change games, but that isn´t going to change much for you. I do play other games and the discussions there are basically the same as here. The wording and the examples change, but the "problems" don´t. Companies offering free games still need to earn money, if they don´t force it, they don´t get anything and they disappear. The ones that stay are the ones that are good at forcing players into spending money.
And to be perfectly honest: Elvenar is MUCH less money grabbing than the other games I play. I couldn´t give you any example of a game where you can compete at the absolute top level without spending any money at all, simply by putting in an extra effort and jumping through 17 silly hoops. people we call whales in elvenar for their spending habits would be considered small fish in other games. I haven´t donated money to elvenar in 2 or 3 years now, because Inno makes it so incredibly easy to gain premium currency ingame without spending real money (maybe 30 Euro total before that) and I am still competing at the highest possible level in all the competitions that I care about. In other games I spent double as much (I do try to keep it to the level of say a board game) and can´t be considered more than a casual player without any ambitions to even make the last place of any ranking list. So what i am trying to say with this is, you´ll have a hard time finding games that make it cheaper than elvenar, if you find one that offers as complex a game for as little money, let me know, I´ll be on my way shortly
Stucon
Illusionist
My point was very much tongue in cheek. If no one starts the chapter until most people have finished it ...
DeletedUser6472
Guest
@Gargon667 , you went completely off the topic here with this essay . You are not even in ch 19, so forgive me for saying this, but there are things in this game that you are not qualified to talk about at this point. Start progressing, doing chapters and then you might have something of value to contribute. As to Inno earning money, I'm sure that with intelligent approach to business strategy, there are many ways of getting even more money and keeping us all happy. People don't spend money, when they are angry and frustrated. I also know everything about other games out there and I am also playing a few and played a few in the past, so I know for a fact that there are games that don't employ such aggressive money grubbing techniques and prosper and have long-standing loyal customers.
. You are not even in ch 19, so forgive me for saying this, but there are things in this game that you are not qualified to talk about at this point. Start progressing, doing chapters and then you might have something of value to contribute. As to Inno earning money, I'm sure that with intelligent approach to business strategy, there are many ways of getting even more money and keeping us all happy. People don't spend money, when they are angry and frustrated. I also know everything about other games out there and I am also playing a few and played a few in the past, so I know for a fact that there are games that don't employ such aggressive money grubbing techniques and prosper and have long-standing loyal customers.Far Reach
Conjurer
I'm less concerned about the ascended good trading than some here appear to be. Yes it poses challenges, but the later chapters are intended to be challenging. I think that Inno has made a good decision in ensuring that each C19 player requires large amounts of all four of their unboosted ascended goods. Over the longer term that should provide lots of trading opportunities. (In the short term, a high spending player can swamp the market, but as soon as they've finished their settlement, the market should readjust.)
Inno have already increased the merchant offer significantly relative to C18 (once the Main Hall is upgraded). They could go further of course, but they seem to want to extend the chapters. As it is there are a still a few strategies to increase supply of ascended goods.
As far as the tourney formula is concerned, Inno have provided a small but definite boost (10-15% say) to C19 players. I don't know how many have stopped playing chapters because of the formula, but my suspicion is that it is just a handful of players striving for top tournament positions on their server. Personally I would suggest that Inno should first address how the tourney has become pure pay to win. (I recognise that Inno have to make money, but I think that the current tourney balance is off.)
Inno have already increased the merchant offer significantly relative to C18 (once the Main Hall is upgraded). They could go further of course, but they seem to want to extend the chapters. As it is there are a still a few strategies to increase supply of ascended goods.
As far as the tourney formula is concerned, Inno have provided a small but definite boost (10-15% say) to C19 players. I don't know how many have stopped playing chapters because of the formula, but my suspicion is that it is just a handful of players striving for top tournament positions on their server. Personally I would suggest that Inno should first address how the tourney has become pure pay to win. (I recognise that Inno have to make money, but I think that the current tourney balance is off.)
Paladestar
Enchanter
Strange, I have Sprouts and Powder as my boosted goods on my EN3 city (Achasson) and I have a MM buff on each sentient and ascended manufactory 24/7 and for the last few days my merchants have spent a lot of time sitting around with nothing to do - I ran out of ascended goods to trade. No, I'm not time boosting my merchants. People are taking my merchant trades and I'm taking theirs.
DeletedUser6472
Guest
I'm boosted in minerals and aerosols, both are the most abundant on EN3. I'm getting wax only by sending my merchants and waiting for them to return in 6 hours. None of my trades ever get picked up.
DeletedUser6472
Guest
Inno is determined that formula is working as intended and we were not able to influence their decision on this, no matter how hard we tried. Many players quit because of it and still nothing has been changed. Many players stopped progressing in the game because of it and nothing will be changed. Giving us reduction of t/s squad size with Ultimate Power tech would make us excited and they wouldn't need to hear us complain about formula.
Silly Bubbles
Necromancer
It can be done in less than 3 months per chapter and yes, the more space, the faster you'll get there. There're also couple of tricks to make it faster if you're into analysing the numbers.
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DeletedUser501
Enchanter
For real we need this, I would love to advance through chapters again if this happened, now I´m being forced to stayed in the beginning of Embassies so I don´t be penalized in spire and tourney.
Skallywag
Spellcaster
Same here, I'm on EN1 and there are 15 pages of demands for Wax. 0 pages of demands for Aerosols or Powder. Once in a while I see demands for Powder. I'm boosted on Aerosols, so it's nothing but 6 hour waits for merchants for me.
I don't see how this is an early-adopter issue with the chapter. Assuming we are evenly distributed on boosted goods, the requirements for building upgrades are "Your boosted+1" so there theoretically would be even demand for all. Are there just fewer people boosting wax?
cwgiii
Shaman
That might or might not be the fact. But, another possibility is that a disproportionate number of folks that would have been boosted in wax may not have actually survived through the game based on lower level boosts. I know that there have been folks (based on previous posts) that have created new profiles in order to select the T1 boosts that they preferred, abandoning/deleting cities with unwanted boosts.
Skallywag
Spellcaster
Possibly. I've heard that as well, and that's the scrolls boost which got screwed over when the Spire started. But that would imply there were a lot of people who gave up at that point, because their scrolls were worth much less. Who knows. But having that scroll boost obviously is a bummer man.
DeletedUser6472
Guest
I'm boosted in scrolls.... wait for it...and gum, and bismuth lol. I survived all this time, only to struggle now with abundant minerals and aerosols. Is there any end to this vicious circle?
Maillie
Spellcaster
In the first place, people that "complain" that they have finished the chapter in a few weeks and have nothing more to do are not really complaining at all. They have spent a LOT of money to be able to race to the Forums and brag about it. The devs have difficulty seeing the difference between bragging and complaining. I, personally, am so burned out from spending forever collecting badges in Chapter 18 that I am in no hurry at all to see my way into another chapter for a while. With the tournament punishments I don't see a benefit yet to do so.
Silly Bubbles
Necromancer
Wow, that's impressive. I got gum and scrolls. Without the new version of cross trading and giving a discount on my goods there's no way I would've been able to play. I nearly quit three months into playing because of that. It's surprising that it took them that long to fix it.