1.0.3.7 No More Gold for New Parties?

[jfjohnny5]

I noticed a really nasty change with the latest patch. I have an existing story mode campaign. I had two different groups of 3 that I would alternate as I take through the content. It used to be, as long as none of the party members in the current group had completed the scenario before, you got the gold reward (100, 150, or 200) at the end of the scenario. Now, if ANY of the characters completed the scenario, NONE of the other characters get gold; even if the whole group has never done it before. 

 

I'm really hoping this is a bug, because if that's intentional it's a really lousy change. I was enjoying myself, playing through the content over and over, but trying new groups because I was getting gold for it. If they took that incentive away, then that really takes away a lot of the fun. Why bother with different characters if they remove the gold incentive?

[Hannibal_PJV]

The dev is rebalancing the gold reward all the time. So far gold rewards have been very generous. Too generous has been the feedback From customers so far. I Expect that quest mode will remain the Main gold farming route, but as I said there has been constantly tinkering with gold rewards and it will change in the future too.

 

But not sure about what has happened now. There has not been announcement yet.

[Ripe]

They keep screwing up the gold farming with each new update... good thing I couldn't care less about gold or treasure chests.

Edited August 13, 2016 by Ripe

[jfjohnny5]

Yeah, I dunno. I still don't buy it. I was honestly enjoying seeing how different characters worked, AND I enjoyed doing so with a little bit of story. I understand that the fully randomized Quest mode allows you to try a lot of different groups, but why should the main game experienced be penalized just to make the alternate mode more attractive?

 

It really was fine the way it was - playing scenarios with character who haven't played them before got a gold reward at the end. That makes sense. To now say that you only get a gold reward the first time you play the scenario means players are forced to play the Quest mode (if they want any decent gold progression), instead of enjoying the main Story mode.

 

I guess it's just my opinion, and we'll see if they announce it as a change or a bug, but I doubt I'm alone in how I feel about it.

[Hannibal_PJV]

They try to get balance right before PC version can come out. That is what I think in anyway. So They try different posibilities and follow what happens. Good plan actually, because it is the harder to make changes, the more there Are players. We have enjoyed ingredible good gold rewards so far. And They Are trying to get best compromise They can get in the long run.

Edited August 13, 2016 by Hannibal_PJV

[Bullwinkle]

This "gold was too generous" bit has been claimed several times, and it doesn't make any more sense now than the first time it was said. It's no easier, nor quicker, to get gold with a new party in Story mode than it is to get gold with a new or experienced party in Quest mode. All removing gold from Story mode does is disincentivize players from playing the story again.

 

Why do this? It doesn't make any sense. It's fun to play the story with new and different parties. I can understand denying gold to a party if a character has completed the scenario before at that difficulty, but if this is their first time through it, then there's no attempt to farm gold. You're just playing the damn game like it was meant to be played. So if it's just as easy to complete a Quest, why deny the party the same amount of gold?

[Hannibal_PJV]

It all depends on what They Are trying to achieve.

A) if the plan is to allow players allmost to get enough gold by plaing the game to unlock everything so that They have to put at least some money to the game

B) allow full free to play

C) just lure players to the game and forse them to use some money after They have managed to get level X in the game.

 

We don't have the busines plans of Obsidian. How They Are planning to get back the money investment that They have put in this game, how They plan to make Profit with this game after development cost and salaries has been paid. We don't know exacly but we can make educated ques... One is balanging the gold rewards so that user Are gonna put money in this game in the long run.

So far it has been possible to buy allmost everything in this game without paying single penny. And that is not good busines in long run. They have to have system that allows people to try and play the game long enough to get hooked, but forse investments at some point.

Now there is that buy Bundle, and buy gold that pring some money to the company.

Everybody can think, what is the best way to get paying customers in this game on their own. I can not say, because I am not marketing nor finansial Expert, but I am not so dumb in those matters that I can not see that company has to have some strategy in that part.

Interesting to see what it is in the long run in this product.

 

For me personally as a customer, the choise was easy. Buy the Bundle and don't worry the gold. To Paizo as a company the choise is not so easy. I don't have faintest idea how They Are going to make this product profitable except making it so good that everybody just buy it. (Not a easy task...)

Edited August 13, 2016 by Hannibal_PJV

[firestormkirby]

I'm still getting the 350 gold from each story mode no matter what combination of characters I take into story mode. What do you mean you are losing gold?

 

EDIT: any 6 character party

Edited August 13, 2016 by firestormkirby

[Hannibal_PJV]

Interesting. Maybe the game has lost jfjohny5:s account. It would Also explain that behaviour. If so try to start the game From the google play app instead of normal way, to see if google play (or game Center) account is still active.

Have to find out time to play the game myself to if there Are any changes. Too busy in other stufff at this moment, so no time to try new patch

Maybe tomorrow...

 

But in anycase Expect to see some tinkering in the gold in the long run in anyway...

Edited August 13, 2016 by Hannibal_PJV

[Ripe]

I'm still getting the 350 gold from each story mode no matter what combination of characters I take into story mode. What do you mean you are losing gold?

 

EDIT: any 6 character party

Have you tried to start new party of 6 on difficulty other then Legendary?

[firestormkirby]

 

I'm still getting the 350 gold from each story mode no matter what combination of characters I take into story mode. What do you mean you are losing gold?

 

EDIT: any 6 character party

Have you tried to start new party of 6 on difficulty other then Legendary?

 

No, I don't see a point in playing below legendary. Much less gold for the time. And since the complaint is about how much gold is being earned, playing below legendary doesn't make much sense.

Edited August 13, 2016 by firestormkirby

[Ripe]

 

 

I'm still getting the 350 gold from each story mode no matter what combination of characters I take into story mode. What do you mean you are losing gold?

 

EDIT: any 6 character party

Have you tried to start new party of 6 on difficulty other then Legendary?

 

No, I don't see a point in playing below legendary. Much less gold for the time. And since the complaint is about how much gold is being earned, playing below legendary doesn't make much sense.

 

I don't see a point in playing a story mode on Legendary (other than to challenge myself, but I use solo character for that) but that is another discussion. And not really relevant for this particular issue.

 

OP's issue is that new parties no longer get gold for completing scenarios in story mode. Knowing we still get gold for Legendary is nice (and it would be beyond idiotic from Obsidian to remove that!) but potentially not getting it for Normal or Hard is an issue. But I guess the whole point is to make us "buy" gold...

Edited August 13, 2016 by Ripe

[Hannibal_PJV]

Well it has been so that you only get gold in legendary a long time. So it is not a new feature.

I did have time to try the game and I can confirm what firestormkirby said above. You still get gold by completing missions in legendary, just like before the last patch.

Every new player got gold Also at normal and heroic level, but when one party will complete the scenario at normal level, you don't get normal level gold. And when one party complete scenario at heroic level, that player does not get gold From that scenario at heroic level anymore. So it does not matter if you try them with old or new party. It depends on if any give scenario has been completed with any party before or not.

I am not sure if this is said anywhere in the game, so hopefully this is usefull information to the new players. You can Also check out the gold reward by clicking the difficulty icon in the game. If it does say that scenario has been completed before, you don't get gold. If there is the "Scenario rewar total is XXX gold" then you get that amounth of gold From completing the scenario.

Edited August 14, 2016 by Hannibal_PJV

[PRuano]

 

 

 

I'm still getting the 350 gold from each story mode no matter what combination of characters I take into story mode. What do you mean you are losing gold?

 

EDIT: any 6 character party

 

Have you tried to start new party of 6 on difficulty other then Legendary?

No, I don't see a point in playing below legendary. Much less gold for the time. And since the complaint is about how much gold is being earned, playing below legendary doesn't make much sense.

I don't see a point in playing a story mode on Legendary (other than to challenge myself, but I use solo character for that) but that is another discussion.

 

And not really relevant for this particular issue.

Get the scenario items and different kinds of play (with the limited movement) are two.

 

But yes, its irrelevant.

 

 

OP's issue is that new parties no longer get gold for completing scenarios in story mode. Knowing we still get gold for Legendary is nice (and it would be beyond idiotic from Obsidian to remove that!) but potentially not getting it for Normal or Hard is an issue. But I guess the whole point is to make us "buy" gold...

Its to make farming harder yes, and i for one applaud that.

 

If the OP real motive is indeed to experiment with new chars than creating several parties of different chars in each gives that and a different experience (new tactics, different cards to use).

 

But if it was just an excuse to easy farming just by swapping a char and gaining easy gold, tough.

 

Glad Osidian is adjusting their f2p model, so they can actually get something out from their hard work that also goes towards more resources for bug fixing and content, so that everybody wins

[Ripe]

Glad Osidian is adjusting their f2p model, so they can actually get something out from their hard work that also goes towards more resources for bug fixing and content, so that everybody wins

Not sure anyone wins with this model... it's more likely everyone loose with it.

 

Those who are willing to pay for this game most likely already bought the Bundle which give access to everything so the only use gold have for them is to buy treasure chests which not everyone might be interested in (speaking for myself the only reason I might get them is those extra dice skin, I could care less about cards).

 

Those who are not willing to pay for the game only find getting the gold to unlock extra characters and adventure packs more difficult which will most likely result in them loosing interest in the game and leaving for something else. Resulting in diminished player base...

[Borissimo]

I'm a bit confused by the OP -- hasn't it been the case for a while now, at least since July, that story mode scenarios award gold only once per account on Normal and Heroic difficulty? Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but if OP was getting gold for repeating story mode scenarios with new parties, then his game was bugged before the patch, not after -- he was getting tons of gold he shouldn't have been getting.

 

Much as it pains me to say this, because I agree with his conclusion, I don't really buy Bullwinkle's argument:

 

This "gold was too generous" bit has been claimed several times, and it doesn't make any more sense now than the first time it was said. 

 

How does it not make any sense? In the first version of the game, you could pretty easily unlock all of the characters and available adventures in a few weeks without spending a dime. The fact that "gold was too generous" was an observable, objective fact. There's nothing to argue about as far as that's concerned.

 

It's no easier, nor quicker, to get gold with a new party in Story mode than it is to get gold with a new or experienced party in Quest mode. 

 

What?! With respect, this is a transparently false assertion! You can take a high-level party through Brigandoom and experience no more challenge than what a fresh all-basic party would encounter. By contrast, a high-level party in Quest Mode would be drawing from a pool of harder villains and locations. Once you have an experienced party, if the rewards for scenario completion are the same, Story Mode is WAY easier and faster to grind than quest mode because you know exactly what to expect and you can continue to target the exact same low-difficulty challenges over and over. The only advantage of Quest Mode is that, because it's different every time, it's not technically "grinding." Many players don't like feeling like they're grinding for something. But in a purely mathematical sense, if you consider only the time and difficulty involved, Quest Mode IS CLEARLY harder to extract gold from than Story Mode, on average.

 

What's frustrating to me is that I actually agree with the OP's and Bullwinkle's conclusion, namely, that gold rewards for Story Mode should not be once-per-account. But if we argue for this conclusion by asserting things that are patently not true, like that the gold rewards system wasn't overly generous, then we won't have any credibility and Obsidian could easily justify dismissing everything we say.

 

We, as players, need to be honest about the fact that we A) want to make gold from repeated playthroughs of Story Mode, and B) this gold factors into our decision to want to keep playing Story Mode. There is a very simple solution to all of this: if any of the characters in a Story Mode party has completed that scenario at that particular difficulty before, then the scenario awards no gold. Otherwise, the scenario awards gold as normal.

 

In taking away repeated gold gains from Normal and Heroic, but keeping them on Legendary, Obsidian made the wrong restriction and threw the wrong bone. Gold grinders don't care about the restriction because Legendary is the only difficulty you'd want to grind gold on anyways, and casual players who just want to experiment with new parties don't care about the bone because they'd never want to play on Legendary on a first playthrough because of how difficult it is.

 

The suggestion I made above is simple, would stop abusive story mode gold grinding once and for all, and would allow players to start over as much as they want with new parties while continuing to be rewarded for playing the game.

 

[jfjohnny5]

This "gold was too generous" bit has been claimed several times, and it doesn't make any more sense now than the first time it was said. It's no easier, nor quicker, to get gold with a new party in Story mode than it is to get gold with a new or experienced party in Quest mode. All removing gold from Story mode does is disincentivize players from playing the story again.

 

Why do this? It doesn't make any sense. It's fun to play the story with new and different parties. I can understand denying gold to a party if a character has completed the scenario before at that difficulty, but if this is their first time through it, then there's no attempt to farm gold. You're just playing the damn game like it was meant to be played. So if it's just as easy to complete a Quest, why deny the party the same amount of gold?

 

110% agree. I've been grinding away on Quest mode. I really don't like it. Story mode is just more interesting. I really don't like that the games devs have effectively disincentiveized players from playing the main mode of the game more than once. I'd much rather try the story with different characters than a bunch of random Quest mode scenarios.

 

Interesting. Maybe the game has lost jfjohny5:s account. It would Also explain that behaviour. If so try to start the game From the google play app instead of normal way, to see if google play (or game Center) account is still active.

 

For unrelated reasons I had to install the app on a different tablet. I'm still seeing the same thing. I don't think it's an issue with my account. They took away gold rewards (for Normal and Heroic at least - haven't tried Legendary) if you've completed the scenario with anyone.

 

Interesting. Maybe the game has lost jfjohny5:s account. It would Also explain that behaviour. If so try to start the game From the google play app instead of normal way, to see if google play (or game Center) account is still active.

 

For unrelated reasons I had to install the app on a different tablet. I'm still seeing the same thing. I don't think it's an issue with my account. They took away gold rewards (for Normal and Heroic at least - haven't tried Legendary) if you've completed the scenario with anyone.

 

[Bullwinkle]

 

It's no easier, nor quicker, to get gold with a new party in Story mode than it is to get gold with a new or experienced party in Quest mode.

 

 

What?! With respect, this is a transparently false assertion! You can take a high-level party through Brigandoom and experience no more challenge than what a fresh all-basic party would encounter.

I said a NEW party in Story mode, not an experienced one, which expressly excludes what you're talking about. I also made it clear in the next paragraph that I'm advocating for a NEW party of characters, none of whom have completed that scenario before, should get gold as if it were the first time you're playing through it, which is the exact same thing you then agreed with.

 

And as for the gold, even if it was too generous: as you pointed out, the current system STILL doesn't make sense, because who would bother to farm gold on Normal? A high-level Merisiel can finish Legendary Poison Pill in the same amount of time as Normal, and get double the gold for it. (I've been able to do it in less than 2 minutes.)

[Fry]

I replayed an adventure on the middle difficulty last night, and was surprised to not receive any gold from it despite having been informed by the game ahead of time that it would be worth 150 gold.

 

Relatedly: I think it's weird that the middle difficulty actually pays out more gold than the hardest difficulty for low party sizes.

[PRuano]

 

Glad Osidian is adjusting their f2p model, so they can actually get something out from their hard work that also goes towards more resources for bug fixing and content, so that everybody wins

 

Not sure anyone wins with this model... it's more likely everyone loose with it.

 

Those who are willing to pay for this game most likely already bought the Bundle which give access to everything so the only use gold have for them is to buy treasure chests which not everyone might be interested in (speaking for myself the only reason I might get them is those extra dice skin, I could care less about cards).

A lot of the treasure cards are much better than the base ones (Favors for one, armors for another), and there are also the ppl who want to collect everything. I would say that you are in the minority if you stick to the base cards, paying players or not.

 

Those who are not willing to pay for the game only find getting the gold to unlock extra characters and adventure packs more difficult which will most likely result in them loosing interest in the game and leaving for something else. Resulting in diminished player base...

That MIGHT be valid for a game with true multiplayer (where the player base is a big factor), but for now, IMHO those "freeloaders" dont bring much value to the game, other than perhaps bug reporters (and for that, extra grinding DOES give extra value, since more playtime is done and more bugs are uncovered). Edited August 16, 2016 by PRuano

[Ripe]

 

 

Glad Osidian is adjusting their f2p model, so they can actually get something out from their hard work that also goes towards more resources for bug fixing and content, so that everybody wins

Not sure anyone wins with this model... it's more likely everyone loose with it.

 

Those who are willing to pay for this game most likely already bought the Bundle which give access to everything so the only use gold have for them is to buy treasure chests which not everyone might be interested in (speaking for myself the only reason I might get them is those extra dice skin, I could care less about cards).

 

A lot of the treasure cards are much better than the base ones (Favors for one, armors for another), and there are also the ppl who want to collect everything. I would say that you are in the minority if you stick to the base cards, paying players or not.

That may be but RotR is easy enough (some would say too easy!) as it is with just base cards when playing on Normal difficulty (especially when compared to later sets). Playing on Hard or Legendary... well, you don't really need them but they are useful since those are rather heavily luck based and your chance of winning or loosing depend on what RNG gods throw at you.

 

So if you want RotR to be challenging you don't really want those cards added to story mode anyway... Quest mode is another thing altogether (but RNG is an issue there... getting exactly same setup on three consecutive play-troughs is not something that should happen!).

 

Those who are not willing to pay for the game only find getting the gold to unlock extra characters and adventure packs more difficult which will most likely result in them loosing interest in the game and leaving for something else. Resulting in diminished player base...

That MIGHT be valid for a game with true multiplayer (where the player base is a big factor), but for now, IMHO those "freeloaders" dont bring much value to the game, other than perhaps bug reporters (and for that, extra grinding DOES give extra value, since more playtime is done and more bugs are uncovered).

Don't designers keep promising to add multiplayer component? So chasing off portion of your player base even before you managed to fully release your game is bad business decision.

 

Because it is really simple: People who are willing to pay for a game most likely already did, those who are not willing to pay never will. No matter what designers do in order to "force" them to pay for it (because that's what reducing gold gain is all about: forcing people to buy your product). And by making it harder for those who are not willing to pay to unlock further content you can only succeed in making them leave...

[PRuano]

A high-level Merisiel can finish Legendary Poison Pill in the same amount of time as Normal, and get double the gold for it. (I've been able to do it in less than 2 minutes.)

Which shows that Story mode IS much easier for farming than Quest Mode, both because of specific conditions on scenarios and because of the high possibility of creating a routine (party/scenario/strategy) to optimize going through a scenario, given the fixed conditions of Story Mode, which cannot be as easily achieved in the randomized and higher choice of Quest Mode.

 

That said, IMHO, they should make gold in Story Mode an one time thing, like the Legendary item unlocks and be done with it. People who want to try different team combinations would do so just for that and nothing more, and leave gold picking to the Quest Mode/Daily Challenges (where everyone can go for getting gold or farming).

 

(For daily challenges that use story mode scenarios, a special shortcut to a tailor made/not randomized quest mode scenario in the daily challenge window should be enough, as long as the scenario itself would have been unlocked in story mode).

[PRuano]

 

 

A lot of the treasure cards are much better than the base ones (Favors for one, armors for another), and there are also the ppl who want to collect everything. I would say that you are in the minority if you stick to the base cards, paying players or not.

That may be but RotR is easy enough (some would say too easy!) as it is with just base cards when playing on Normal difficulty (especially when compared to later sets). Playing on Hard or Legendary... well, you don't really need them but they are useful since those are rather heavily luck based and your chance of winning or loosing depend on what RNG gods throw at you.

 

So if you want RotR to be challenging you don't really want those cards added to story mode anyway...

Perhaps, but again thats a very personal choice (using or not using treasure cards), and again, still believe you are in the minority.

 

It IS an interesting challenge though, going through the set with only the base cards, and one that the devs could perhaps easily implement, an "Original" setting, like Permadeath.

 

 

 

 

 

Those who are not willing to pay for the game only find getting the gold to unlock extra characters and adventure packs more difficult which will most likely result in them loosing interest in the game and leaving for something else. Resulting in diminished player base...

 

That MIGHT be valid for a game with true multiplayer (where the player base is a big factor), but for now, IMHO those "freeloaders" dont bring much value to the game, other than perhaps bug reporters (and for that, extra grinding DOES give extra value, since more playtime is done and more bugs are uncovered).

Don't designers keep promising to add multiplayer component? So chasing off portion of your player base even before you managed to fully release your game is bad business decision.

 

Because it is really simple: People who are willing to pay for a game most likely already did, those who are not willing to pay never will. No matter what designers do in order to "force" them to pay for it (because that's what reducing gold gain is all about: forcing people to buy your product). And by making it harder for those who are not willing to pay to unlock further content you can only succeed in making them leave...

Not what f2p has been demonstrating; every successfull f2p has to constantly update their resource gathering ratio both to aquire and keep their userbase, and particularly the so called "whales" which are the ones that can keep the game afloat, the ones that actually spend money.

 

Make it too easy and theres no need to spend a dime, so no whales appear and quickly the game will dissapear, despite having a big user base (which are in that scenario only freeloaders sucking resources without any return), but not enough return.

 

And as for sending players away too soon, that can also easily be achieved by giving too much of the experience away that those players that dont pay get their fill and then move on to another new experience; they can be recovered much easier with the eventual release of multiplayer AND still having some content to go through that they didnt had the incentive to get to (but now do).

Edited August 16, 2016 by PRuano

[PRuano]

I replayed an adventure on the middle difficulty last night, and was surprised to not receive any gold from it despite having been informed by the game ahead of time that it would be worth 150 gold.

 

Relatedly: I think it's weird that the middle difficulty actually pays out more gold than the hardest difficulty for low party sizes.

If a scenario in story mode has been completed already in that difficult setting, the gold wont be given unless in Legendary Mode.

 

Theres already a "Scenario previously completed" point in the scenario conditions, but i agree that the "Dificult setting gold" point and the "Party size gold" point should be removed from the conditions window and just leave the "Scenario previously completed" point, less confusion.

[Ripe]

It IS an interesting challenge though, going through the set with only the base cards, and one that the devs could perhaps easily implement, an "Original" setting, like Permadeath.

Not that much of a challenge... for a challenge you need to use either a single character or rather unbalanced party (6 characters with either no spellcasters or all spellcasters). And even then you'll probably be able to complete the Adventure path (unless you choose solo Ezren... that's ultimate challenge and borderline impossible).

 

And you can choose to go through game with only base cards. In the settings menu you have an option to not include treasure cards in Story mode.