Brooch Jewel Discussion

[Infami]

So most of the posts and anger about these items end up being a flame fest. Im going to attempt to not do that and instead have a rational discussion about this. 

First major issue is simply the price structuring around the packs. We get bent over viciously compared to other regions of the game. Some of the jewels in other regions are either 1/2 price of ours, or they have the ability to purchase individual gems reasonably (reasonably compared to NCWest). Correctly fixing this issue from the top down ALMOST elminates the rest of the issues, but lets discuss anyway. The best fix would be allowing purchasing of individual stones instead of random packs, and pricing them reasonably. This still makes them reasonably difficult to obtain, but also vastly improves the hurt factor in getting 150 gem boxes, and only getting 9 boxes of the gem you need/want for your class. 

When these things came out, they were cheaper than the cheapest event we have in the past 2 years from this event. So if you made things back then, your odds on getting something for the money invested were better by a good amount then what we have had the past two years. Part of the issue with this as it sits currently, is that there are enough of these things floating around, that they break the game entirely. In a 15 year old game, you cannot afford to have a server dominated entirely, there has to be some level of parody, thats why you end up with dead servers. You can get all the gear you want in the world, but once you get to stacked with level 4 brooch jewels, you hit a very very hard and difficult to overcome wall. If the relative distance between Lv 4 brooch jewels and Lv 6 wasnt so great, this might not be an issue. However when your compounding all the multipliers on your high end character, this becomes very nearly insurmountable. I regularly fight people who have = gear except the brooch jewels, and the difference is astounding. There exists no competition what so ever between people with these items, and people without. 

If youre fighting 2 parties where 50% of the parties have high end brooch jewels and you are attacking them with 4-5 parties who max out at Lv 4 jewels, you're 70/30 to lose that fight. Small groups of people end up locking down the high end content in the game, which ends up further increasing the distance between them and everyone else (See dragons for easiest example). Once this is entirely established, your primary function to have a chance at beating them is to wait until enough of them quit the game that you can overwhelm them. This has been extremely evident on Freya, Naia, and Chronos over the past year that I have been back to the game. It is extremely difficult to outplay someone who you quite literally have a 5% chance of killing even under ideal circumstances. Further compounding this issue is there are STILL a large group of people using different scripting programs in PVP and Olympiad, just not for leveling purposes, making it extremely difficult to catch them. Im not sure NCWest is even doing anything to mitigate this. 

The final issue exists with the ability to trade these gems. The high end top gems are can be traded. The lower levels cannot. What this creates is one more way these gems break the game. Top clans stack several toons with level 5/6 gems and cycle them in olympiad. What ends up happening if you arent in those clans is everyone you run into in competition at the higher ends has high end brooch jewels, and you dont. ESPECIALLY in olympiad this destroys competition. In the past this was mainly a status thing. In todays game where clans can only be leveled reasonably by owning castles, obtaining heroes, and winning heroes, its one more way top clans pull ahead and leave the rest of the game behind. If we were playing on servers with 10,000 people and it were possible to simply overwhelm people with numbers, this might be mitigated heavily, however that is not the case. You have bottle-necked the players who use the lower level gems, and given free reign to players with the top level gems. This KILLS competition. 

These items need to be price adjusted, a function to buy individual gems needs to be implemented, and lastly, all gems need to be able to be traded.

Edit: One last thought. You can severely improve ALL of this by simply adding the ability to somehow slowly farm these items in game (Think something similar to the dim warp for the bracelets, it takes FOREVERRRR to farm it, but it is doable). I know this is the best and most complete fix, but also the least likely because these bleep gems in part support you guys even having a salary and us even having official servers to play on, and I doubt your going to potentially reduce your income, and I get that. However the handling of events in NCWest is horribly, obscenely, obnoxiously bad. 

I dont want to attack you guys, but if any of you are actually actively making these decisions, you should consider the fact that improving this ONE item/event/function of the game will ABSOLUTELY garner you larger NET income, due to the increased quantity of things being purchased, it will also provide people who would consider RETURNING to play with a smoother path back into competition, as there is not a Mount Everest standing between them and being able to enjoy the game at the high end. More players + more competition = more money for your company. That cant possibly be a bad thing?

If you poll your player base, more people quit, are angry, and disappointed constantly from this ONE event than EVERYTHING ELSE combined. 

The time has come to DO something about it, Neutron, Conguero, Hime, hell, ANY of your team reading this. Dont take my word for it, poll your community, improve the game. 

[Infami]

If you agree or disagree with what ive posted here, please comment, as I know im on the right track and the GM/Dev/Community managers need to see this. @Conguero @Neutron @Hime

I know that better can be done by you guys. We need only look as far as the version of the game in other regions. All the information is readily available. The gems in other regions are much easier to obtain, I cant ready korean and the one person who can translate isnt available for me, but the korean version and Innova servers provide better ways to obtain the jewels, or give a chance at receiving lv 1-5 boxes when opening the boxes. So we know that improvements can be made, as we have clear examples of better in other regions. Why is NCWest so much worse then everywhere else with these events.

https://eu.4gameforum.com/threads/614237/

https://eu.4gameforum.com/threads/649371/

https://eu.4gameforum.com/threads/652036/

[Infami]

Here is a breakdown of the pricing INCREASE we have seen over the last 2 years on this event item in particular. Incase any of you need a more visual representation of the fact that its harder to get these now, than it was 2 years ago.

Calculated markups based on "discounted" price per gem:

Valentine's Day 2015: Claimed the pack was 20% off

http://www.lineage2.com/en/news/store-promos/store-update-february-11th-2015.php

Ultimate La Vie en Rose's Jewelry Box (x80) - 7,680
Original Price: 9,600
Original Price Per Box: 120
Price Per Box After Discount: 96

Valentine's Day 2016: Claimed the pack was 25% off 

http://www.lineage2.com/en/news/store-promos/store-update-february-2016.php

Ultimate Shadai's Jewelry Box (x100) - 12,000 
Original Price: 16,000
Original Price Per Box: 160
Price Per Box After Discount: 120
36% markup from 2015

July Flash Sale 2016: Claimed the pack was 25% off

http://www.lineage2.com/en/news/store-promos/flash_sale_july_27-august_3.php

Ultimate Shadai's Jewelry Box (x100) - 12,000 
Original Price: 16,000
Original Price Per Box: 160
Price Per Box After Discount: 120
36% markup from 2015

January 2017: Claimed the pack was 25% off 
http://www.lineage2.com/en/news/store-promos/brooch-store-promo-01252017.php

Ultimate Jewelry Box (x75) - 9,000 
Original Price: 12,000
Original Price Per Box: 160
Price Per Box After Discount: 120
0% markup from 2016 / 36% markup from 2015

July Flash Sale 2017: Claimed the pack was 25% off 
http://www.lineage2.com/en/news/store-promos/brooch-store-promo-07102017.php

Ultimate Jewelry Box (x75) - 9,000 
Original Price: 12,000
Original Price Per Box: 160
Price Per Box After Discount: 120
0% markup from 2016 / 36% markup from 2015

Black Friday 2017: Claimed the pack was 33% off

Ultimate Jewelry Box (x150) - 16,000 
Original Price: 23,380
Original Price Per Box: 160
Price Per Box After Discount: 106
33% markdown from 2016 / 3% markup from 2015

Edit: Fixed the links

[HelminaThe2nd]

i do not normally take position on forums...but i consider my self an average player that's been playing this game since prelude. i totally agree with everything you mentioned above and at this pace there wont be anything to fix if no actions are taken. i am sure that making some kind of effort to rebalance items availability  would most likely make the game more enjoyable and rewarding, and would also make the player base go up or actually sell more if the pricing of the "event" is more accessible.

i really love this game and it saddens me to see the way it goes atm...cheers!

[Argus]

Very well said Sir, I agree with you and I have been sharing my opinion on the forum for a long time now! Because of the prices of promos and the randomness of enchanting/compounding.. etc etc of these items, the game is really broken. If they are non tradable is even worse ...

Mid Tier pvp/pve is nowhere to be found, people prefer not to pvp, because there is no balance whatsoever!  +10 dark/bloody set 90-100b, descent dark/bloody weapon 35-40b, good PVP weapon price - much more than 30-40b ( Prices atm on NAIA server), when you add the Brooche + jewels + Talismans + proper Epic Jewels + Radiant Circlet + Shirts + Ancient Cloaks ... it is getting insane! You need around ~ 650 Bil ++ to be competitive and not feel you are Trully outgeared by enemies ( correct me if I'm wrong ) 

I do not count the future Promos, where one should again ENCHANT some item to get descent bonus with Korean Chance

[Infami]

4 minutes ago, Argus said:

Very well said Sir, I agree with you and I have been sharing my opinion on the forum for a long time now! Because of the prices of promos and the randomness of enchanting/compounding.. etc etc of these items, the game is really broken. If they are non tradable is even worse ...

Mid Tier pvp/pve is nowhere to be found, people prefer not to pvp, because there is no balance whatsoever!  +10 dark/bloody set 90-100b, descent dark/bloody weapon 35-40b, good PVP weapon price - much more than 30-40b ( Prices atm on NAIA server), when you add the Brooche + jewels + Talismans + proper Epic Jewels + Radiant Circlet + Shirts + Ancient Cloaks ... it is getting insane! You need around ~ 650 Bil ++ to be competitive and not feel you are Trully outgeared by enemies ( correct me if I'm wrong ) 

I do not count the future Promos, where one should again ENCHANT some item to get descent bonus with Korean Chance

650b in equipment will not close the gap between lvl 4 and 5/6 gems. I have way more than 650b in gear, but no 5/6 brooch gems and experience this regularly.

[Truffle]

Don't buy.. Easiest way to enact change for consumers against any for profit company...

[Pw2infreya]

I really like Lineage II, but due to p2w it spoiled and a lot of the game ... if there were ways to get some of these items inside the game, I would not mind selling this ... but they decrease the game so that it is up to the player to have to invest to be able to equate affecting more in pvp and this makes it impossible for the community to grow. Many discourage and return to the privates of life ...

 

 

I.......

I.......

I.......Want....

I.......Want....

I.......Want....

I.......Want....Buy

I.......Want....Buy!

I.......Want....Buy!!

I.......Want....Buy!!!

[Quitted]

It's not so difficult to sum up how much a top dog gear is worth in here. 1 jewel lvl 6 = 2.500 to 5.000 us $. 6 greater jewels 30.000 us dollars.

I don't think many of you do understand the point. They can't lower the items' price because they have to balance their loss in players. Two years ago there were twice the players.

A second point you don't fully understand is the real chance to catch up with the top dogs. Lets say i have my 104 toon parked on chronos. Should i spend 30.000 $ to get 6 greater jewels in here or should i spend 2.000 $ elsewhere to have a full 105 geared toon with a dw stage 2. I don't get really why eu ppl like me are playing in here. And they are attracting other eu players as well.

Lets say the truth for 1 time.

The players in here are scared to loose evething rerolling elsewhere.

They don't get that with 1/10 the amount of money required in here in the next event they could have a 105 toon with everything on it in 30 days. Eventually they simply don't know what pa (premium account) is.

Another thing. How am i supposed to catch up while ncwest sells items when they want and not when i need them? Someone in the past talked about fomozon.

I say you are getting as players what you deserve. Such a corp would have been expelled from any marked 12 years ago.

Last thing. L2 future is in its past. The next patch will be the last one.

I'm in a server top clan and if we sum up all the top players in 3 servers we don't reach 150 units. Not enough to run a server.

I'll give you an advice go classic for 10 $ x month and enjoy l2 like you did in the past. This is the toxic version of l2.

[mixa]

The only discussion you can have about these things with NC is: Shut up and buy.

[Quitted]

So true mixa. The funniest thing is that elsewhere someone exploited water stance and got perma ista banned. In here players bought accounts two years ago and are still bragging around.

[Infami]

3 hours ago, Truffle said:

Don't buy.. Easiest way to enact change for consumers against any for profit company...

Would only work if it was organized =/

[AllCom]

7 hours ago, Truffle said:

Don't buy.. Easiest way to enact change for consumers against any for profit company...

Said the one that bought his wep for $$$. Do you know how many left server just from that action??? If some one build a skyscraper around your house and made it second basement will you still look for the sun???

[Jackl]

The major problem I have with jewels is the same issue I have with most of the NCstore items. They aren't really obtainable in-game. Combined with the continued pruning of drops and adena from hunting grounds makes earning items unrealistic for the average player.

Take a look at Twitch. You have thousands of players on private servers spending cash on DONATIONS instead of the official server GOODS because of this lopsided economy. You're leaving so much money on the table. You've backed yourselves into this position of constantly appeasing the whales in this game. As they make up the bulk of revenue due to player loss. If the whales leave L2NA is done. 

[Methodical]

1 hour ago, Jackl said:

The major problem I have with jewels is the same issue I have with most of the NCstore items. They aren't really obtainable in-game. Combined with the continued pruning of drops and adena from hunting grounds makes earning items unrealistic for the average player.

Take a look at Twitch. You have thousands of players on private servers spending cash on DONATIONS instead of the official server GOODS because of this lopsided economy. You're leaving so much money on the table. You've backed yourselves into this position of constantly appeasing the whales in this game. As they make up the bulk of revenue due to player loss. If the whales leave L2NA is done. 

 a whale leaves a whale comes dont worry 

[Quitted]

5 hours ago, AllCom said:

Said the one that bought his wep for $$$. Do you know how many left server just from that action??? If some one build a skyscraper around your house and made it second basement will you still look for the sun???

Can we please talk honestly for just one time? Antharas fists stage 2 = 30.000 us $ + 6 greater jewels lvl 6 = 30.000 us $ = 60.000 us $ for 7 pixels. And i'm not counting in all the other pixels.

You won't never ever be able to compete with ppl who has already spent more than 100.000 us dollars on pixels.

I say this for the very last time. It's not ncsoft fault. It was our fault to spend more than 1.000 $ on a videogame.

Personally i regret to have spent almost 2k us $ in 13 years.

If someone said to me back in 2004 that i would have to spend this amount of money on a videogame i would't never ever install this game.

Edit: i don't think you will never get it.

1 whale buys 100 packs = 100

100 average players buy 5 packs each= 500.

Actually there are 100 to 150 whales. The rest are normal players.

As soon as the average players will understand that they won't never ever be able to catch up with 110-150 whales there will be the end of this game. I think it's really near and it will hurt, a lot.

[OmenOfSteel]

I dont wanna defend NCWest, but I see it like this:

- New P2W Store-only items (Circlets, Cloaks, Zodiacs): Extremely damaging to the community, as these items widen the gap between normal players and whales each time.

- Old P2W Store-only items (like this Brooch Jewels now): Still bad, but not to the same extend. The whales have all these already anyway, so a flashsale or reaccurring "event" gives normal players a chance to catch up here and there.

 

I wouldn't mind a new item in store every 6 months, I think most ppl could live with that. 

 

What is a fcking joke though is pushing new items without any break one after the other: Cloaks, Circlets, Zodiacs.

 

Next probably those SAyha Talisman things. And again: If these come in 6 months from now, I won't mind it. If they bring it within the next few weeks, it is guaranteed that the next bunch of players will leave our already empty servers (Naia + Freya).

Balance is the key-word, and exactly this is where @Neutron totally fails.

 

[HiccUps]

This 'Forum' is nothing more than a dumb client 'Vent Blog'. There is never a time anything of substance relative to client posts are made - other than the once every six months someone feels the need to make the obligatory "it is beyond our control" post.

Forget involved topics : game balancing, item success rates, $ costs involved, etc....but the very simplest question of WHAT ATTRACTS ANY NEW PLAYER(S) AND OR BRINGS BACK THOSE WHO HAVE WALKED AWAY can't even be addressed.

The game is forever on: This is the next event cost and will start here (exception : ooops we started this already without notice). This will be the only interaction prior to : The Game is now offline.

Btw, your original post is commendable; however, you spent more time on the original post (void of follow-ups) than they have on responding to any issue.

[Draecke]

just walk away from it already, there's only going to be more money drain store promo's and in the mean time nothing get's done about the blatant adrenaline usage on the servers lmao

NCWest never fails to deliver on disappointing customers expectations - funny how they once upon a time did manage to get rid of l2tower & zRanger but now condone the usage of adrenaline lmao, way to go NC way to go!

don't believe me just google search the topic

oh and I'm not accusing anyone here in this topic of breaking any rules etc. besides NC for not dealing with the blatant cheating happening in their own game cause they are the ones that should be preventing any such abuse which as said above they claimed to have achieved with their currently non existent anti-bot/cheat system when taking out the old cheat progs - maybe that was just done by Juji as a final act before departing from the game and current staff just doesn't care anymore who knows..

[marw]

Don't worry, soon or later we will have Advanced Brooch Jewells 

 

Advanced Red Cat's Eye Lv1	Physical Critical Damage + 12%  Physical skill critical damage + 12%  Skill Power + 5%
Advanced Red Cat's Eye Lv2	Physical Critical Damage + 13%,  Physical skill critical damage + 13%,  Skill Power + 5%
Advanced Red Cat's Eye Lv3	Physical Critical Damage + 13%,  Physical skill critical damage + 13%,  Skill Power + 6%
Advanced Red Cat's Eye Lv4	Physical Critical Damage + 14%,  Physical skill critical damage + 14%,  Skill Power + 6%
Advanced Red Cat's Eye Lv5	Physical Critical Damage + 15%  Physical skill critical damage + 15%  Skill Power + 7%

etc...

http://lineage2.plaync.com/promo/lineage2/171115_quest

https://translate.google.com/translate?depth=1&hl=arb&rurl=translate.google.com&sl=ko&sp=nmt4&tl=en&u=http://lineage2.plaync.com/board/notice/view%3FarticleId%3D63218
8

[Morello]

It's all about money.

At the very moment when the game stops being lucrative because the average players are cancelling their subscriptions ( like I did after NCWest "fixed" the elcyum powder price when fishing ) I bet 100-150 will not be profitable enough to maintain the servers on.

The big problem with the game is that it is a casino: you don't buy items, you buy a small probability to receive an item when opening a pack or participating in an event. It's literally waste of money. The other option is to buy from other top players who will ask any price for an item.

I want to know what the whale players will do when the server closes. Because with the number of players quitting, that's the foreseeable future of this game.

For some people, this game may have become their only source of income, as they live through selling stuff for real money ( that's what people talk about top clans - it's business. )

We are in 2018. The millenials and younger people will not tolerate not being heard and having their demands supported.

The company that doesn't apply User Centric Design, User Experience Principles, or even Customer Experience Management on their products/services will be out of market soon.

 

[Truffle]

On 3/17/2018 at 7:12 PM, AllCom said:

Said the one that bought his wep for $$$. Do you know how many left server just from that action??? If some one build a skyscraper around your house and made it second basement will you still look for the sun???

Meth head I didnt spend 1 US dollar on my weapon, stop crying cause people are better than you at Lineage 2  

[Quitted]

10 minutes ago, Truffle said:

Meth head I didnt spend 1 US dollar on my weapon, stop crying cause people are better than you at Lineage 2  

I don't care what Truffle does with his money but the story is a little bit different.

Someone got his antharas fists stage 2 and posted them on the forum, causing a lot of flames, asking 3 trillions adena to whoever wanted to buy it.

1 billion adena = 10 $ - 1 trillion adena = 10.000 $ - 3 trillions adena = 30.000 $

In the transferring process even if you pay 50 $ to Neutron/Conguero you are allowed to transfer only 7 billions adena.

There was the merge, a forced transfer from zaken to chronos.

One week after the merge Truffle got his antharas fists stage 2.

So in one week Truffle managed to sell items that he got on zaken for 2.993.000.000.000 adena or to farm them on chronos.

There are tons of ss and some of them with tevas involved.

Well done. I have to try it by myself.

I would like Yidao, or others, explain to us all what those advanced jewels are supposed to be. Thank you.

[Truffle]

1 minute ago, Quitted said:

I don't care what Truffle does with his money but the story is a little bit different.

Someone got his antharas fists stage 2 and posted them on the forum, causing a lot of flames, asking 3 trillions adena to whoever wanted to buy it.

1 billion adena = 10 $ - 1 trillion adena = 10.000 $ - 3 trillions adena = 30.000 $

In the transferring process even if you pay 50 $ to Neutron/Conguero you are allowed to transfer only 7 billions adena.

There was the merge, a forced transfer from zaken to chronos.

One week after the merge Truffle got his antharas fists stage 2.

So in one week Truffle managed to sell items that he got on zaken for 2.993.000.000.000 adena or to farm them on chronos.

There are tons of ss and some of them with tevas involved.

Well done. I have to try it by myself.

I would like Yidao, or others, explain to us all what those advanced jewels are supposed to be. Thank you.

Dragon weapon+items (all things farmed on Zaken) for dragon weapon I know its hard for you.. Think a little harder!!

[Quitted]

8 minutes ago, Truffle said:

Dragon weapon+items (all things farmed on Zaken) for dragon weapon I know its hard for you.. Think a little harder!!

Imho your worst problem atm it isn't to explain how you get those pixels but on which players, from now untill june 2018, you will use them, if there still will be.

Listen, the ones who are still in here may be underleveled and undergeared but aren't n00bs and all are able to read and to watch.

Have fun.