Only time will tell if there will be new characters to buy in the shard shop. If not, then your opinion is valid. If there are then I'm not sure you will find many people agreeing with you.
Just to be clear, if my last post hurt anyone's feelings, I'm sorry, you're still a special snowflake.
Nobody cares man. Your post(s) have nothing to do with the OP and you're just posting nonsense. If you think I or anyone else in this thread need you preaching to us proper amounts to spend in a game, well, think again - we don't care. This post wasn't asking for your life advice.
Disclaimer: I'm a high spender and this entire post is geared towards the opinion of other like minded high spenders.
I've been eagerly awaiting the Shard Shop to "spend" bonus shards that have been sitting in my stash for a while now, as I'd opened a lot of packs in the beginning and I have many extra. I knew this when buying packs (they've said for a while now a shop was coming) and I was content on sitting on them in the meantime because I believed CG would inevitably incorporate something in to the game that I could spend them on.
Well, as I'd feared, the Shard Shop seemingly only sells more character shards.
My issue with this is simply that the shop does not offer any real utility to high spenders. If we have a lot of extra shards, it will be almost impossible to spend them now. I probably have more than I'll ever be able to use. Which means I still cannot warrant purchasing more packs - if there are new characters I'd like to collect some day, and I wanted to open some packs to try to get shards for them, the amount of surplus shards I would be collecting would be too high of a ratio to warrant making that purchase.
Without actually giving us ANYTHING else to spend our Shard Shop currency on, we are now locked in to only being able to stare at more shards for characters we already own.
Why is this shop only Character Shards? Why couldn't there be ANYTHING else for us to spend it on? Energy recharges? Credits? Gear? Ability Ups? AAAAAANYTHING else to use this on would give it some utility whatsoever.
As it is, this shop is basically useless for your high spenders. While it's GREAT for F2P and I'm really excited for them, it's a real disappointment that this feature only appeals to one demographic, and does not contain something everyone can be excited for, regardless of your spending bracket.
I had no idea the shard shop would only reset once a day!! I completely agree with you, though I am not the whale you are, I have spent a little bit of money into the game. I do this because I'm older chasing around three kids and a puppy. I don't have all day to farm chards for characters. I play when I can and I have no problem paying here or there to get me to the point of being able to enjoy the game. I also, have no problem F2P and I kinda of see both sides of the fence, its just as I said I don't have the time to Farm all day.
But Ya, I agree with you, having the chard shop reset once a day really sucks. For example I will only use two characters as examples, my cad bane and leia both have over 300 extra character shards each. Spending 5 shards per day that would take me 120 days to just spend those chards? That is not including the many other left over character shards I have. I have every character, thou only 16 at 7 stars. But Ya, You bring up a good point.
The shard shop cannot be refreshed and only fills once a day, meaning exclusive shards for "shop only" characters will be easily obtainable. I could probably keep up with a once a day purchase there from just buying shipments from GW/Squad, nevermind from packs.
I am saying I am a whale and Iam not crying about the shop because I've spent a fortune and demand extra stuff, Iam glad rewards might be naff because it makes it fair for everyone which is great.
You are clearly, obviously, not even close to a whale. There's nothing to be excited for here.
Rushing development doesn't excuse the fact that we are allowed to open "blanks" by purchasing packs once we have 7* characters. Making us limited in refreshes, and only selling things we can already max out of, means we're still "capped" in what we're purchasing.
Gear is, for the most part, a more never-ending thing to be buying. It IS finite, of course, but the reality of that is very broad. Obviously, we aren't at a place where we have every single character fully geared up, so gear will have purpose for a long, long time.
I have every single character at 7*. What am I supposed to do with the Shard Shop? Nothing? So that's it? Has CG truly designed a game where I'm now sitting on a currency I can never use by over supporting their game?
Out of curiosity, what would you want the shard shop to be and what were you hoping could be exchanged for shards?
If you didn't care, you wouldn't have made the original post, certainly wouldn't have responded. You weren't getting ANYTHING for duplicate shards. You wanted more for what you already spent, you got it, wasn't part of the deal but you got it, now you want something else and if they gave that to you anyway, you would get hurt in the pants about something else.
The whole concept of freemium gaming is to make money off p2w without alienating the ftp masses that won't who provide their content...diminishing rewards, disillusionment, and burn out is practically built in for big spenders.
Casual gaming probably isn't going to change because you got too serious about it...but at least you're having fun, right?
If you didn't care, you wouldn't have made the original post, certainly wouldn't have responded. You weren't getting ANYTHING for duplicate shards. You wanted more for what you already spent, you got it, wasn't part of the deal but you got it, now you want something else and if they gave that to you anyway, you would get hurt in the pants about something else.
The whole concept of freemium gaming is to make money off p2w without alienating the ftp masses that won't who provide their content...diminishing rewards, disillusionment, and burn out is practically built in for big spenders.
Casual gaming probably isn't going to change because you got too serious about it...but at least you're having fun, right?
How is it not part of the deal when the devs have said since November that we'd "eventually be able to redeem our extra shards"?
The shard shop cannot be refreshed and only fills once a day, meaning exclusive shards for "shop only" characters will be easily obtainable. I could probably keep up with a once a day purchase there from just buying shipments from GW/Squad, nevermind from packs.
I am saying I am a whale and Iam not crying about the shop because I've spent a fortune and demand extra stuff, Iam glad rewards might be naff because it makes it fair for everyone which is great.
You are clearly, obviously, not even close to a whale. There's nothing to be excited for here.
Rushing development doesn't excuse the fact that we are allowed to open "blanks" by purchasing packs once we have 7* characters. Making us limited in refreshes, and only selling things we can already max out of, means we're still "capped" in what we're purchasing.
Gear is, for the most part, a more never-ending thing to be buying. It IS finite, of course, but the reality of that is very broad. Obviously, we aren't at a place where we have every single character fully geared up, so gear will have purpose for a long, long time.
I have every single character at 7*. What am I supposed to do with the Shard Shop? Nothing? So that's it? Has CG truly designed a game where I'm now sitting on a currency I can never use by over supporting their game?
Out of curiosity, what would you want the shard shop to be and what were you hoping could be exchanged for shards?
I'd hoped the Shard Shop would be a place where we could buy cool stuff, and have it be more of a premium counterpart to the regular Shipments store. Shipments, as is, has Shards, Droids and Gear for sale... so I'd hoped a new Shard Shop would be this, just more exclusive and higher end. Instead of white/green/blue gear, blue/purple/orange. Instead of Mk1/2 Ability Ups like the Cantina Shipments, maybe Mk2/3. Instead of the dumpy characters we always get in the Shipments store, maybe some higher end ones with chromium exclusives and a Shard Shop exclusive.
They could also have added skins and stuff but we're obviously nowhere near that yet.
If it's only once a day that we get to buy from it, I don't see the harm in having it simply be a better Shipments store. If that can have shards, droids and gear... why can't this?
Make no mistake, the reason I'm upset is because I already know the answer to the question I just asked - we can't have a premium shipments store because obviously this would be too generous a move by EA. Clearly, they only want us gearing up by spending money on crystals for energy recharges. Clearly, we're only supposed to get shards for characters by opening chromiums. It's become obvious crossing the lines between the multiple cash sinks is taboo for this game, and I'd tried to avoid targeting this too heavily in my OP in trying to play dumb and make it seem like the shop was just an oversight, but since you've asked my expectations on this... there you go.
I want a Shard Shop that doesn't make me feel like this game really is a never ending cash grab. I'd hoped for more.
It's bad enough they pulled a Daniel Day Lewis on the GW Shipments and turned those refreshes to crystals too. ("What's this? Why don't I own this!? Why don't I own this!!" - CG/EA on realizing there was actually something in the game that was very useful that didn't require crystals to utilize) But now we see that they want to force "whales" in to purchasing all aspects of the game constantly with no breaks.
You see, the thing to consider is someone in my position, that's spent a lot of money on this game, that has 7* of every character, views this Shard Shop very differently. Every chromium I purchase is a minimum of X surplus shards, meaning they know we look at the costs of everything in the Shard Shop as a direct ratio to that pack cost. I can actually associate a cash value to everything in the Shard Shop. This clearly puts up red flags for EA because they then say, but wait a minute! That wasn't available for purchase via this cash method before! We need to keep that other cash soak in place too! We can't alleviate the cash burden and make multiple systems run off of the same cash grab! Jesus guys c'mon be reasonable, make sure we're sucking every penny 100% of the time!
The gross part is, even after spending as much as someone like me has, they still refuse to even consider cutting you breaks. It's really bad. And it's probably not even fully CG's fault - EA is the money behind the operation, they're the ones that twist every dollar out of us wherever they can.
Make no mistake, I haven't put a dime in to this game in quite a while. I cut all spending completely after realizing they were probably going to fall short of any reasonable expectations with the Shard Shop. I've stressed this multiple times before, but I'll say it again - my disappointment is that they have not given me a reason to continue supporting the game.
You've got a 7* Ugnaught and a 7* Mob Enforcer? Seriously?
Unbelievable. Why - if indeed this is the case - not to level them? ^)
[/quote]
Starring up requires no outside stuff, save for credits, so I do it when I have the credits available. Leveling up, however, uses training droids, and those are used over all characters, so it's different.
Since each character is responsible for his own shards, and I can't do anything with his shards until he's 7* anyway, there's no reason not to 7* him. I assumed they would have to be 7* before I could "sell" off the extra shards a long time ago, well before their announcements, and went ahead and did it in the meantime.
I have every single character at 7*. What am I supposed to do with the Shard Shop? Nothing? So that's it? Has CG truly designed a game where I'm now sitting on a currency I can never use by over supporting their game?
1 Person spending a couple thousand or a couple thousand spending $10-$50 bucks. Do the math, your happiness is nothing, if not the problem. Gratz on beating the game though.
We have seen statistics about this in other fremium models. The top 1% spenders ussually spend 50% of total revenue. So you are wrong. Stop fooling yourselves saying the whales don't matter.
... This thread is entering Youtube comments section level of intelligence. I have a headache now and wish I hadn't read some of these responses.
It truly boggles my mind how so many people on these forums try to write off legitimate concerns about the game as "crying", "entitlement" or "toxic" behavior.
The shard shop was specifically created for P2P players as a way for us to get value out of the extra, currently worthless shards we have. All that the OP is saying is that based upon today's description of the shard shop in the update notes, his extra shards are going to remain worthless after the shard shop launches.
This is a direct contradiction to what a developer told him in that he would be very pleased with the upcoming changes. The devs set themselves up for failure by stating that a solution is coming that the big spenders would be pleased with that isn't really a solution at all.
I can write a list right now of things they could do to ensure that the premium shard shop is beneficial to all player demographics (F2P, Dolphins & Whales):
Extra character shards can be traded into the shop in exchange for premium shop currency. How much currency an extra shard is converted into will be based upon the worth & difficulty of obtaining that shard. Shipment shards converting for the least, hard mission only shards converting in the middle and chromium exclusive shards converting for the most.
Premium shop currency can be used to buy 5x shards for any character in the game that you would like, with the shop refreshing once per day.
The premium shop is home to several shop-exclusive characters including Jedi Knight Luke, General Grievous & Jar Jar Binks.
Premium shop currency can be used to buy cosmetic character revisions, including custom character costumes, skill animations, and special Arena/GW nameplates / borders.
Premium shop currency can be used to buy credits, droids and ability materials
Premium shop currency can be used to purchase a daily/weekly/monthly lottery ticket, with a portion of the currency going into a pool, and the winner being selected from those who have purchased tickets to receive all of the premium currency winnings.
Premium shop currency can be used to open a special gold data card, which rewards the player with x10 character shards for a random character.
In this simple list that I just came up with off the top of my head, you give all player demographics the ability to derive value from the premium shop.
F2P players can use their premium currency to buy credits/droids/mats to improve their current characters or work on unlocking an exclusive. Or they could risk it all on a gold data card or lottery tickets.
Dolphins can use their premium currency to finish starring up the chromium exclusive characters they didn't get lucky enough to 7* with their data card spending. Or work towards unlocking the shop exclusive characters.
Whales can use their premium currency to unlock all of the shop exclusive characters, and once they everything in the game unlocked, they can spend their premium currency on cosmetic improvements to their characters or play the lottery to amass and show off their premium currency fortune.
If I can create this list of a fictional premium shop in a matter of minutes, there is no reason that an entire team of developers shouldn't have been able to create a shard shop which benefits all demographics. I have my assumptions about why they didn't create a better shard shop, but I will leave that for another day and another thread.
people just like to trash on whales just because they can. They like the drama and they like to tell big spenders they deserve to get ZILCH for some or all of their cash investment because it means nothing to the person being the ****.
But what amount is the average of the top 10%....I'm certain you fit in there Qeltar and you don't consider yourself a whale...a dolphin at most right? That graph is totally useless without more data.
Thing with this graphic is not detailed enough. But it's like any other similar graphic, it follows the 80/20 rule. It doesn't matter if it's money spent in a game, wealth distribution, income taxes, even things unrelated to money fit in.
Top 20% makes for 80% of total. Top 10% for 65% of total. Top 1% for 50% of total. Whales matter.
I read Naecabon made a boo boo by being impulsive and buying every toon on 7*. Have fun, no wonder you always complain about stuff here in the forum.
I'm getting so tired of these whine posts. Spending less time on forum because all I see is complaint after complaint.
You buying all toons 7* is your choice and pretty insane in my book but whatever makes you happy (this apparently did not, perhaps refrain yourself from your impulsiveness).
439-259-888 I have a bad habit of editing my typo's after posting
I thought as well that they would give whales the edge in the shard shop... but instead they give it to them with the new challenges e.g. the Jedi challenge. Every whale probably will be able to unlock and 7* the mysterious new char right after the update. Dolphins may unlock him but 7* a month later when the challenge comes back. And f2p most likely need another cycle to accomplish that.
Still I understand the frustration of people like you who have all chars unlocked and huge amounts of spare shards. From a Business point of view it makes sense though. Whales get the edge over everyone for a while if the New char is worth it and everyone else is tempted to spend money to win the race to 5 7* Jedis. If the new char would be introduced to the shard shop you would still have the edge but there would be no real incentive for anyone to spend more money.
Probably they will use this strategy repeatedly by similar challenges for other new chars which will always give whales a headstart and force everyone else to grind out chars which are not as useful in other game modes.
If they introduce a new set of chromium only chars at some point, I expect you to be able to use your excess shards on them as well.
I mean, I'm a whale and I look forward to it. I've got plenty of characters I want to 7* and try out that I didn't get through Chromium due to bad drops, and it makes it so the ridiculous amount of money I've already spent gets additional value (Lookin at you, Lando).
Makes sense. Not a whale here but as someone else has posted, the shard shop came in after the Chromiums were purchased. It's a free bonus and gets some utility out of the money otherwise wasted on the Chromiums.
Lol, and people complain that anyone saying anything against Poe is whining. Gentlemen, I present to you this thread as a true whine compared to the Poe threads! It's free, it's a bonus, it helps me use all those useless extra shards that I bought with hard earned currency... But... ! I'm so sad...
Let me make this simple. People like you ruin the game for the majority (where the actual money comes from.) Stop acting entitled to everything. Everyone knows if people can just buy the best at the start, those games never last. I applaud CG for keeping it healthy and long lasting. Don't get me wrong I spent enough to 7*/6* every toon and finish them up at my convenience, to keep the game lively for me. Sorry about your loss bro, keep the jimmies rustled. I wouldn't be surprised if CG made this move just to get rid of the toxic whales, they already got your money. HAHAHAH
@Naecabon
Totally Support your Points. I have the same Situation. All "exclusive" Chars at 7* only Lando at 6*. I am very courious if they manage to make us whales happy again - it doesnt look like after i read the Update announcement of the shard Shop but we will See when it actually Happens. Thanx for your post and that u have to deal with those toxic comments...
This entire thread, and the posts in it, are redundant until we actually know what the shard shop entails. I neither agree not disagree with any of the points made in here, I'll reserve that judgement until the shard shop is actually implemented.
This entire thread, and the posts in it, are redundant until we actually know what the shard shop entails. I neither agree not disagree with any of the points made in here, I'll reserve that judgement until the shard shop is actually implemented.
at what point are we considered "whales"??? i'm really curious. I've spent quite abit but i'm no where near naecabon in the 7* department as I still have quite abit of room for growth.
I'd love to be able to trade ability boosters for ability boosters.
I've put in only 40 bucks, so I'm not a huge player. I find my roster is limited to my set 5 arena team and a few other max level toons. I probably have 6-8 at any one time.
I find that outside of my core 5, my ability are too low making my secondary toons not really an option to use. It's great that I can see the arena team I'm going to face but I am unlikely to switch based on match up because the skills are too low.
I knew today would be tough in the forums. I can see Naecebon's argument and understand his dilemma. Many will not relate to his position because 99.9% of us do not have every character unlocked, so his view will be different from the "dolphins" who unlocked maybe 30% of the characters and have some room for expansion.
The real solution to this argument here is to realize that EA's solution to this debacle will not fit everyone's game situation. In my case, I have well under 10 extra shards, so the shop will mostly be useless to me unless I start buying shards for my 7* toons and convert them down to acquire something there and the conversion cost would probably kill that idea for me.
In the end, this argument is unwinnable since there are so many angles from a player's prospective. Sadly, there are not many easy solutions to these problems and all involve difficult choices. What I will be doing is watching the business end of this game, checking out Google Play reviews, looking for sales figures and other factual data on how these decisions have impacted this game so I can be prepared.
As I said to others, this update is kind of do or die for EA/CG here. If EA/CG made the right decisions, it will show in the numbers playing the game. If it doesn't, grab your life jacket....
There is really no need to allow payers to shortcut the second biggest grind in the game as well the first. Gear is a bit of a equaliser which means that even if someone like you has all the characters in the game they aren't going to have infinite choice in composition to use against you. This is actually more important going forward seeing as we'll now be able to see team composition before challenging a player. I do think that being able to buy gear like this will be too big a advantage.
I also think shard shop exclusive characters are a bad idea. They'll essentially become a second class of even harder to obtain premium characters and I don't think that would be healthy for the game.
Don't worry however. It's not like the current version of the shard shop gets you nothing. You'll just have to wait a few weeks. When the next character patch is released those new characters will likely be added to the shard shop allowing you to get future characters with your currency.
You think it's acceptable practice that someone can spend THOUSANDS, in a VIDEO GAME, and actually think they're going to just shrug at occasionally receiving NOTHING for some of that money?
To be frank you did pay for something based entirely on RNG with clear diminishing returns. You should have known what you were getting yourself into. And now they have added a system where you can get some of that value back when they release new characters. I do think that to ask for more is to ask for too much.
I will likely continue to play the game regardless but my contributions have been negligible since I decided I was just going to get gouged on value for my extra shard pulls from chromium packs. Sure I will still get the occasional crystal pack so I have crystals for some refreshes but I spend much less doing that then when I was pulling chromiums to improve character * level. My view is different then Naecebon's only in that I don't have all characters at 7*, quite a few at 7* and nearly all characters unlocked but I can see his problem he's just further along then I am in the getting next to nothing in return for crystal expenditures on chromium packs. If the exchange is sufficiently crummy enough I can tell you for a fact I will NEVER buy another chromium pack and just go the mostly f2p route. I already have enough characters unlocked that I can do quite well in the game. IF exchange rates are poor and not enough offered to actually convert those extra shards, time gated, then it'll simply DECREASE the spending ALOT. those of us that have opened quite a few chromiums which drives crystal purchases, at least for me, far more then refreshes. I"d rather have the permanent thing (character shards/equipment) then simply a chance to maybe get a few more pieces of gear on the refresh.
Replies
Nobody cares man. Your post(s) have nothing to do with the OP and you're just posting nonsense. If you think I or anyone else in this thread need you preaching to us proper amounts to spend in a game, well, think again - we don't care. This post wasn't asking for your life advice.
I had no idea the shard shop would only reset once a day!! I completely agree with you, though I am not the whale you are, I have spent a little bit of money into the game. I do this because I'm older chasing around three kids and a puppy. I don't have all day to farm chards for characters. I play when I can and I have no problem paying here or there to get me to the point of being able to enjoy the game. I also, have no problem F2P and I kinda of see both sides of the fence, its just as I said I don't have the time to Farm all day.
But Ya, I agree with you, having the chard shop reset once a day really sucks. For example I will only use two characters as examples, my cad bane and leia both have over 300 extra character shards each. Spending 5 shards per day that would take me 120 days to just spend those chards? That is not including the many other left over character shards I have. I have every character, thou only 16 at 7 stars. But Ya, You bring up a good point.
You've got a 7* Ugnaught and a 7* Mob Enforcer? Seriously?
If you didn't care, you wouldn't have made the original post, certainly wouldn't have responded. You weren't getting ANYTHING for duplicate shards. You wanted more for what you already spent, you got it, wasn't part of the deal but you got it, now you want something else and if they gave that to you anyway, you would get hurt in the pants about something else.
The whole concept of freemium gaming is to make money off p2w without alienating the ftp masses that won't who provide their content...diminishing rewards, disillusionment, and burn out is practically built in for big spenders.
Casual gaming probably isn't going to change because you got too serious about it...but at least you're having fun, right?
How is it not part of the deal when the devs have said since November that we'd "eventually be able to redeem our extra shards"?
I'd hoped the Shard Shop would be a place where we could buy cool stuff, and have it be more of a premium counterpart to the regular Shipments store. Shipments, as is, has Shards, Droids and Gear for sale... so I'd hoped a new Shard Shop would be this, just more exclusive and higher end. Instead of white/green/blue gear, blue/purple/orange. Instead of Mk1/2 Ability Ups like the Cantina Shipments, maybe Mk2/3. Instead of the dumpy characters we always get in the Shipments store, maybe some higher end ones with chromium exclusives and a Shard Shop exclusive.
They could also have added skins and stuff but we're obviously nowhere near that yet.
If it's only once a day that we get to buy from it, I don't see the harm in having it simply be a better Shipments store. If that can have shards, droids and gear... why can't this?
[/quote]
Unbelievable. Why - if indeed this is the case - not to level them? ^)
I want a Shard Shop that doesn't make me feel like this game really is a never ending cash grab. I'd hoped for more.
It's bad enough they pulled a Daniel Day Lewis on the GW Shipments and turned those refreshes to crystals too. ("What's this? Why don't I own this!? Why don't I own this!!" - CG/EA on realizing there was actually something in the game that was very useful that didn't require crystals to utilize) But now we see that they want to force "whales" in to purchasing all aspects of the game constantly with no breaks.
You see, the thing to consider is someone in my position, that's spent a lot of money on this game, that has 7* of every character, views this Shard Shop very differently. Every chromium I purchase is a minimum of X surplus shards, meaning they know we look at the costs of everything in the Shard Shop as a direct ratio to that pack cost. I can actually associate a cash value to everything in the Shard Shop. This clearly puts up red flags for EA because they then say, but wait a minute! That wasn't available for purchase via this cash method before! We need to keep that other cash soak in place too! We can't alleviate the cash burden and make multiple systems run off of the same cash grab! Jesus guys c'mon be reasonable, make sure we're sucking every penny 100% of the time!
The gross part is, even after spending as much as someone like me has, they still refuse to even consider cutting you breaks. It's really bad. And it's probably not even fully CG's fault - EA is the money behind the operation, they're the ones that twist every dollar out of us wherever they can.
Make no mistake, I haven't put a dime in to this game in quite a while. I cut all spending completely after realizing they were probably going to fall short of any reasonable expectations with the Shard Shop. I've stressed this multiple times before, but I'll say it again - my disappointment is that they have not given me a reason to continue supporting the game.
Unbelievable. Why - if indeed this is the case - not to level them? ^)
[/quote]
Starring up requires no outside stuff, save for credits, so I do it when I have the credits available. Leveling up, however, uses training droids, and those are used over all characters, so it's different.
Since each character is responsible for his own shards, and I can't do anything with his shards until he's 7* anyway, there's no reason not to 7* him. I assumed they would have to be 7* before I could "sell" off the extra shards a long time ago, well before their announcements, and went ahead and did it in the meantime.
We have seen statistics about this in other fremium models. The top 1% spenders ussually spend 50% of total revenue. So you are wrong. Stop fooling yourselves saying the whales don't matter.
EDIT: queltar beated me to it
It truly boggles my mind how so many people on these forums try to write off legitimate concerns about the game as "crying", "entitlement" or "toxic" behavior.
The shard shop was specifically created for P2P players as a way for us to get value out of the extra, currently worthless shards we have. All that the OP is saying is that based upon today's description of the shard shop in the update notes, his extra shards are going to remain worthless after the shard shop launches.
This is a direct contradiction to what a developer told him in that he would be very pleased with the upcoming changes. The devs set themselves up for failure by stating that a solution is coming that the big spenders would be pleased with that isn't really a solution at all.
I can write a list right now of things they could do to ensure that the premium shard shop is beneficial to all player demographics (F2P, Dolphins & Whales):
In this simple list that I just came up with off the top of my head, you give all player demographics the ability to derive value from the premium shop.
F2P players can use their premium currency to buy credits/droids/mats to improve their current characters or work on unlocking an exclusive. Or they could risk it all on a gold data card or lottery tickets.
Dolphins can use their premium currency to finish starring up the chromium exclusive characters they didn't get lucky enough to 7* with their data card spending. Or work towards unlocking the shop exclusive characters.
Whales can use their premium currency to unlock all of the shop exclusive characters, and once they everything in the game unlocked, they can spend their premium currency on cosmetic improvements to their characters or play the lottery to amass and show off their premium currency fortune.
If I can create this list of a fictional premium shop in a matter of minutes, there is no reason that an entire team of developers shouldn't have been able to create a shard shop which benefits all demographics. I have my assumptions about why they didn't create a better shard shop, but I will leave that for another day and another thread.
Thing with this graphic is not detailed enough. But it's like any other similar graphic, it follows the 80/20 rule. It doesn't matter if it's money spent in a game, wealth distribution, income taxes, even things unrelated to money fit in.
Top 20% makes for 80% of total. Top 10% for 65% of total. Top 1% for 50% of total. Whales matter.
I'm getting so tired of these whine posts. Spending less time on forum because all I see is complaint after complaint.
You buying all toons 7* is your choice and pretty insane in my book but whatever makes you happy (this apparently did not, perhaps refrain yourself from your impulsiveness).
I thought as well that they would give whales the edge in the shard shop... but instead they give it to them with the new challenges e.g. the Jedi challenge. Every whale probably will be able to unlock and 7* the mysterious new char right after the update. Dolphins may unlock him but 7* a month later when the challenge comes back. And f2p most likely need another cycle to accomplish that.
Still I understand the frustration of people like you who have all chars unlocked and huge amounts of spare shards. From a Business point of view it makes sense though. Whales get the edge over everyone for a while if the New char is worth it and everyone else is tempted to spend money to win the race to 5 7* Jedis. If the new char would be introduced to the shard shop you would still have the edge but there would be no real incentive for anyone to spend more money.
Probably they will use this strategy repeatedly by similar challenges for other new chars which will always give whales a headstart and force everyone else to grind out chars which are not as useful in other game modes.
If they introduce a new set of chromium only chars at some point, I expect you to be able to use your excess shards on them as well.
Makes sense. Not a whale here but as someone else has posted, the shard shop came in after the Chromiums were purchased. It's a free bonus and gets some utility out of the money otherwise wasted on the Chromiums.
Lol, and people complain that anyone saying anything against Poe is whining. Gentlemen, I present to you this thread as a true whine compared to the Poe threads! It's free, it's a bonus, it helps me use all those useless extra shards that I bought with hard earned currency... But...
Toxic you are.
Totally Support your Points. I have the same Situation. All "exclusive" Chars at 7* only Lando at 6*. I am very courious if they manage to make us whales happy again - it doesnt look like after i read the Update announcement of the shard Shop but we will See when it actually Happens. Thanx for your post and that u have to deal with those toxic comments...
But it's in the patch notes.
I've put in only 40 bucks, so I'm not a huge player. I find my roster is limited to my set 5 arena team and a few other max level toons. I probably have 6-8 at any one time.
I find that outside of my core 5, my ability are too low making my secondary toons not really an option to use. It's great that I can see the arena team I'm going to face but I am unlikely to switch based on match up because the skills are too low.
Just a thought. Lots of nice to haves I guess.
Ragin.
The real solution to this argument here is to realize that EA's solution to this debacle will not fit everyone's game situation. In my case, I have well under 10 extra shards, so the shop will mostly be useless to me unless I start buying shards for my 7* toons and convert them down to acquire something there and the conversion cost would probably kill that idea for me.
In the end, this argument is unwinnable since there are so many angles from a player's prospective. Sadly, there are not many easy solutions to these problems and all involve difficult choices. What I will be doing is watching the business end of this game, checking out Google Play reviews, looking for sales figures and other factual data on how these decisions have impacted this game so I can be prepared.
As I said to others, this update is kind of do or die for EA/CG here. If EA/CG made the right decisions, it will show in the numbers playing the game. If it doesn't, grab your life jacket....
I also think shard shop exclusive characters are a bad idea. They'll essentially become a second class of even harder to obtain premium characters and I don't think that would be healthy for the game.
Don't worry however. It's not like the current version of the shard shop gets you nothing. You'll just have to wait a few weeks. When the next character patch is released those new characters will likely be added to the shard shop allowing you to get future characters with your currency. To be frank you did pay for something based entirely on RNG with clear diminishing returns. You should have known what you were getting yourself into. And now they have added a system where you can get some of that value back when they release new characters. I do think that to ask for more is to ask for too much.