'Marvel Puzzle Quest' 1-Year Anniversary Celebration!

Unknown

arktos1971 wrote:

One thing I've been asking myself in the last days (I'm obviously not the only one) : will there be sales during the Anniversary ?

They are offering the Anniversary Pack and there will be new characters. So people will be willing to spend on the new characters and Packs.

If they don't offer sales at this special moment they are real **** (please fill with whatever word you think would fit best).

I'd be very disapointed because I'd like to buy the Anniversary Pack (if it is worth something of course), but not at the 89.99 € for 20K HP.

So, the sales are here. 20 % is not the best they could make, but it's better than nothing...

NorthernPolarity

arktos1971 wrote:

NorthernPolarity wrote:

Lerysh wrote:

I'd love to see their actual numbers on this. Some basic math tells me they would have to sell quite a few 42 packs to equal the HP spent on shielding. The only difference I can see is you aren't going to save up enough to buy a 42 pack through regular gameplay where you can for casual shield use.

Take 1 20 man top 10 alliance. On average, each of them buys 5 shields in an event (probably an under esitmation) for 75 , total of 7,500 per event. In 5 days that alliance has spent 15,000 . That means to beat shield hopping in terms of HP expenditure, they have to sell a 42 pack every 5 days to at least one person per shield hopping heavy alliance. Lets call that the top 10. So you want me to believe they sell 2 42 packs a day? Really? Because I don't believe that. And this is a very conservative estimate on HP usage on shields that doesn't even count the people that use WAY more than 5, or the alliances outside the top 10. Or Health Packs, or AP Boosts.

Sentry, as he is built, makes D3 cash.

Lerysh, you have brownie points from me for your IM40 suggestion, but you are very off on your math. For starters, based off of the revenue numbers here (http://thinkgaming.com/app-sales-data/?page=2), you can see that MPQ makes a daily average revenue of $18745 a day. I think it's pretty absurd to say given this that they aren't selling at least 2 42 packs a day, I mean surely at least 200 dollars (used to buy 2 42 packs a day) must come from selling cover packs alone.

Lets base everything off your numbers and argue that the top 10 alliances spends 7500 HP per event, which is roughly 2500HP a day. Hell, lets say that every single person in the top 100 alliances does this, meaning that 25000HP is spent a day on shields. You know what, lets go even deeper and say that every single person in the top 100 alliances spends at least 500HP on shields per event (enough to hop for 2 days), which is 1 million HP spent on HP per event, or ~300k HP a day. Given that 20k HP = 100 dollars, this amounts to roughly $1500 a day spent on shields, which isn't even 10% of their total revenue.

TLDR: I think you guys are drastically overestimating the amount of money spent on shields based off of your own personal experience. MPQ has roughly 80k daily active users (http://thinkgaming.com/app-sales-data/4 ... ark-reign/). In order for them to have numbers like this, the only reason that even remotely makes sense is that you have hundreds-thousands of users a day buying cover packs and covers.

Think Gaming gives numbers for the iOS platform only. Android is not counted. So the daily gross is not that number.

Each shield hop costs 108 HP (75 shield + 33 rainbow). There must be around 10 hops / PvP (at least), that's 1080 HP / PvP / player. There must be around 300 players doing this per event. That's 324 000 HP. Health packs are not massively used IMO.

HP earned per Event is 200 HP per player.

Net gross : 324 000 - 60 000 : 264 000 HP : $ 1320 per event. 3 events a week, 52 weeks : $205 920

There are lots of companies which would be very happy to earn that amount of money each year on digital products...

Now, covers sold for a new 3* character. Same 300 players buying the missing covers. That's 5 (minimum) :

300 * 5 * 1250 = $9300, twice a month, 12 months : $ 223 000

Shield hopping and covers are about the same gross.

Disclaimer : if you think the calculation is wrong, please elaborate and avoid bashing

I'll bash all I want! You are a terrible human being, all your calculations are wrong and make absolutely no sense whatsoever! Joking aside, I never really understood why people put those disclaimers: you would think that if you present your argument in a logical fashion, then the people who try to bash you are going to look idiotic anyways, so whats the point of having the disclaimer in the first place?

Anyways,
1. Nice catch with the Think Gaming thing, so the actual gross is larger than this.

2. I'm not going to go into the numbers anymore because its all speculation at this point. None of our numbers account for what % of the HP is bought vs won from events, nor does it account for the other 79700 daily active players, some of which must spend money on shields. Just as an example, your numbers imply $500 demiurge earned from shielding a day, and 500/18000+ = at least 2.7%, which is exactly what the pie chart in the article shows, and contradicts your argument that shield hopping vs covers is the same gross (since covers = 15% in that pie chart). I just wanted to give a general sense of scale for what Demiurge is actually making.

3. Lets suppose that Sentry is gone, meaning that everyone has now moved onto X-Force. How much revenue do you think they're actually going to lose from this change? I think it's unlikely that the people who are using boosts / shields will all of the sudden stop, since boosting is still the way to go with X-Force and such as it lets you use his green after a single green match. Let's be generous and say that shielding + boosts = 15% of their revenue, which is equivalent to the cover upgrade revenue. Even if say 30% of this was caused solely by Sentry, that only accounts for under 5% of their revenue, which is hardly the large chunk of revenue that everyone here seems to think it is. Not to mention that the revenue lost by nerfing Sentry would probably be made up by people all of the sudden buying X-Force covers and buying other character covers now that the metagame has opened up.

Unknown

The pie chart was before the Boodtryop (Boost Hood Sentry Hop) so the sales must have evolved.

It was then Patchneto, but players were scoring far lower than now.

I've kept track of all scores from the Alliances in the Top 20, I will make some stats about the scoring increase since Season 1.

The small buff they applied to Sentry just shows they want him to be "only" fun to play. He's a scoring machine.

It took months before they nerfed cmag, so we should have some time ahead of us before they nerf sentry.

My idea is that they will do that when the biggest playerbase has maxed him and they are sure another duet can bring more cash.

We should start thinking about "how to maximize the profits" and we could foresee the future of MPQ better than "How to maximize pleasure playing MPQ".

Unknown

It's not like people weren't shield hopping prior to Sentry. It was just as intense maybe more so because there is a far smaller margin of error. If we look at purely from a profit point of view, replacing Sentry with X Force or maybe the new Thor and you have:

1. 4* costs more to max out than 3* = more money.
2. The high thresholds are much harder hit so people either need to spend more on shields/boosts, or more to buy the covers = more money.
3. Gaining less per shield hop means you may need to do more shield hops = more money. I said may here because other people could have less score too, though even before Sentry was out there was no shortage of guys with really high scores.

I can't even call this a conspiracy theory because if you actually believed in these conspiracy theories then the first thing they should do is immediately replace Sentry with any 4* as the powerhouse character. As we can see a ton of max level X Force popped up overnight the moment he was made to be roughly the #2 character in PvP, and that's for just #2! What if he's #1? That'd just be even more money!

D3 has posted numerous time that boosts/shields isn't something that's important for them to worry about in terms of bottom line. Clearly this must be some kind of ploy to trick people into thinking that covers/tokens is where the money is so they can err... continue to not buy tokens/covers? By the way every game I've played with some kind of cover pack there's always a conversation like this:

Me: These gamble pack have incredible low odds. Who would buy them?
Another guy: No kidding, I just opened (10/50/100) of them and didn't even get anything good!

The gamble packs accounts for an almost unimaginable amount of revenue in virtually every game that runs them. That's why they're all over the place. If this stuff doesn't sell they'd have stopped trying quite a while ago since the overhead for these games is not trivial. I remember reading EverQuest 2 they make a ton of money selling in game furniture. Why on earth would people spend $10-$20 monthly on in game furniture? I have no idea but I know they keep making new furniture to sell in that game so clearly someone must be buying them up. People buys all kinds of bizarre stuff in online games, but you can be pretty sure that the company selling such things clearly knows what's selling and what's not.

HailMary

arktos1971 wrote:

The pie chart was before the Boodtryop (Boost Hood Sentry Hop) so the sales must have evolved.

And now you're veering into pure speculation. Also, might I suggest an alt. name: BASH - Boost-All Sentry Hop?

Even if we generously assume that there are 15 entire alliances worth of players (300 players) who are BASHing 10 times per PVP, in every PVP (always with rainbow boosts + Sentry), your extrapolated $206K/year across all platforms is still only ~3% of the extrapolated $7 million/year that MPQ generates on iOS alone.

Moreover, not only do your calculations show that your theoretical shieldhop revenue is only comparable to (not significantly greater than) theoretical cover-buy revenue, but they only apply to this group of 300 incessant BASHers.

So, your numbers tell us that if we pretend the top 300 players are BASHing 10 times per PVP, motivated by nothing but cover-reward goals (which we know to be false), then they're doing the fiscal equivalent of buying the cover rewards outright. Where does that get you?

arktos1971 wrote:

We should start thinking about "how to maximize the profits" and we could foresee the future of MPQ better than "How to maximize pleasure playing MPQ".

And yet, they turned X-Force, a character that many elite players have already covermaxed or nearly covermaxed, into a top-tier character.

Unknown

HailMary wrote:

And yet, they turned X-Force, a character that many elite players have already covermaxed or nearly covermaxed, into a top-tier character.

All along I thought they were going to make Nick Fury of what X Force currently is since his covers would make way more money than X Force which an awful a lot of people have him max covered while competition for him was nonexistent. I remember plenty of posts in PvP event along the lines of "Oh it's just X Force so I'll coast and let another guy have a chance at getting X Force". Yes I'm sure they still made a lot of money back on the iso needed to level him (hard to imagine everyone did so without a mother lode or two infusion of iso) and HP for some of the missing covers but his potential to make money was nowhere as good as Nick Fury.

It'd be interesting to see how the new Thor turns out too. Making her the best character would be a very standard P2W by-the-book play, and I'm not even saying that's necessarily a bad thing even though it'd be much better for me if the new Thor turns out to suck since I gave up on PvP alliance play quite a while ago!

HailMary

Phantron wrote:

All along I thought they were going to make Nick Fury of what X Force currently is since his covers would make way more money than X Force which an awful a lot of people have him max covered while competition for him was nonexistent. I remember plenty of posts in PvP event along the lines of "Oh it's just X Force so I'll coast and let another guy have a chance at getting X Force". Yes I'm sure they still made a lot of money back on the iso needed to level him (hard to imagine everyone did so without a mother lode or two infusion of iso) and HP for some of the missing covers but his potential to make money was nowhere as good as Nick Fury.

It'd be interesting to see how the new Thor turns out too. Making her the best character would be a very standard P2W by-the-book play, and I'm not even saying that's necessarily a bad thing even though it'd be much better for me if the new Thor turns out to suck since I gave up on PvP alliance play quite a while ago!

I admittedly was very much in the "they'll never meaningfully buff X-Force, because so many of his covers have been given out already" camp. I doubt that the XF buff created a real spike in Iso sales. People who weren't already buying large amounts of Iso probably didn't see much purpose in buying a chunk of Iso to level XF, esp. since XF requires such a colossal amount of Iso. But, assumptions of rationality have generally failed to "explain" general purchase behavior, so whatevs.

Personally, I look forward to GT being at least Fury-strength, if not XF-strength, with a badass red ability to round out the 4 color wheel.

over_clocked

I'm all for Goddess being epically strong, more fun characters for the players to use and like, more ISO, HP and cover packs for Demiurge to sell, win-win. Besides she would be the first non 1*/2* female character worthy of everyday use, since oBW and cStorm do all the work here, while GSBW, Shulkie, Captain Marvel and Psylocke are relegated to PvE use only. Captain Marvel would be higher tier easily if her yellow threshold were a sliver lower and if her red did something more useful than destroying protect tiles. Shulkie, lost cause if she keeps fake healing/fake AP steal, which is a shame considering her champion health.

I'm surprised but the 3* > 4* transition started way earlier than I expected, judging by Ice's comments from spring/early summer, don't remember.

Lystrata

I swear these forums operate to a skewed Godwin's Law, wherein Hitler/Nazis are replaced with Sentry/Shield hopping.

(No, not comparing Sentry to Hitler here. )

Unknown

Im ok with Lady Thor having the same amount of hp as Xforce, almost 11k hp like hulk, but more than that its gamebreaker and way op. I hope she wont become another sentry char but with more hp. Even then i think its too much hp.
Imagine ppl going with lady Thor, sentry and hood...2 Chars with 11k hp, dishing out lots of damage. Worst nightmare coming true! Welcome to Elm street!

Unknown

HailMary wrote:

Phantron wrote:

All along I thought they were going to make Nick Fury of what X Force currently is since his covers would make way more money than X Force which an awful a lot of people have him max covered while competition for him was nonexistent. I remember plenty of posts in PvP event along the lines of "Oh it's just X Force so I'll coast and let another guy have a chance at getting X Force". Yes I'm sure they still made a lot of money back on the iso needed to level him (hard to imagine everyone did so without a mother lode or two infusion of iso) and HP for some of the missing covers but his potential to make money was nowhere as good as Nick Fury.

It'd be interesting to see how the new Thor turns out too. Making her the best character would be a very standard P2W by-the-book play, and I'm not even saying that's necessarily a bad thing even though it'd be much better for me if the new Thor turns out to suck since I gave up on PvP alliance play quite a while ago!

I admittedly was very much in the "they'll never meaningfully buff X-Force, because so many of his covers have been given out already" camp. I doubt that the XF buff created a real spike in Iso sales. People who weren't already buying large amounts of Iso probably didn't see much purpose in buying a chunk of Iso to level XF, esp. since XF requires such a colossal amount of Iso. But, assumptions of rationality have generally failed to "explain" general purchase behavior, so whatevs.

Personally, I look forward to GT being at least Fury-strength, if not XF-strength, with a badass red ability to round out the 4 color wheel.

Assumption : they wanted to drain a lot of players' Iso stock so they could release a character who would imply the purchase of Iso...

Many "wannabees" in unknown Alliances have a maxed XF. I was surprised. So it must have boosted sales.

Unknown

HailMary wrote:

arktos1971 wrote:

The pie chart was before the Boodtryop (Boost Hood Sentry Hop) so the sales must have evolved.

So, your numbers tell us that if we pretend the top 300 players are BASHing 10 times per PVP, motivated by nothing but cover-reward goals (which we know to be false), then they're doing the fiscal equivalent of buying the cover rewards outright. Where does that get you?

I don't understand what you mean there.

I did not mean to say that players were shield hopping just to save on covers

Quote : "motivated by nothing but cover-reward goals (which we know to be false)".

I was just comparing 2 sources of revenues.

atomzed

arktos1971 wrote:

Assumption : they wanted to drain a lot of players' Iso stock so they could release a character who would imply the purchase of Iso...

Many "wannabees" in unknown Alliances have a maxed XF. I was surprised. So it must have boosted sales.

I have an almost max Xforce even before they announced the buff.after which I only spend the iso I grind on him. Didn't buy any covers, and didn't buy any iso.

Unknown

arktos1971 wrote:

HailMary wrote:

arktos1971 wrote:

The pie chart was before the Boodtryop (Boost Hood Sentry Hop) so the sales must have evolved.

So, your numbers tell us that if we pretend the top 300 players are BASHing 10 times per PVP, motivated by nothing but cover-reward goals (which we know to be false), then they're doing the fiscal equivalent of buying the cover rewards outright. Where does that get you?

I don't understand what you mean there.

I did not mean to say that players were shield hopping just to save on covers

Quote : "motivated by nothing but cover-reward goals (which we know to be false)".

I was just comparing 2 sources of revenues.

But you are comparing the top 300 people to the top 300 people.

If we look at the lets say 100k players and say 1% of them like to buy 42 packs that can EASILY outpace the shield hoppers as far as spending goes. And they noticed they sold more of them with lower odds. Which seems to me like some people are willing to spend till they get what they want, every good pull validates the last 30 bad pulls and people keep putting money into the virtual slot machine. Seems a tiny bit like preying on the addictive tendencies of the player but no one seems to think companies ~shouldn't~ do that, so if it works carry on then.

SupahG1

I hope they'll release some more information soon.

HailMary

arktos1971 wrote:

I was just comparing 2 sources of revenues.

How is your specific comparison meaningful, though?

arktos1971 wrote:

Assumption : they wanted to drain a lot of players' Iso stock so they could release a character who would imply the purchase of Iso...

Many "wannabees" in unknown Alliances have a maxed XF. I was surprised. So it must have boosted sales.

This could literally "explain" every single possible character change they could ever make:
- Nerf an existing character (e.g. Spidey)? "They want people to waste the Iso they already invested just to make more $$$!"
- Buff an existing character (eg. BP)? "They want people to drain Iso into a character they might not have put Iso into before, just to make more $$$!"
- Add a third power to a two-power character? "They want people to spend HP on the new cover and Iso in the new level cap, just to make more $$$!"
- Release a **** new character? "They want people to waste HP and Iso on cover pulls and levels for featured tourneys/Essential nodes, just to make more $$$!"
- Release a middling new character? "They want people to drain/buy HP and Iso int this new character by making it not terrible, but also without changing the OP top-tier, just to make more $$$!"
- Release an awesome new character? "They want people to drain HP and Iso into covers and levels for a new character, just to make more $$$!"

An explanation that covers every possible base is no explanation at all.

Also, it comes as no surprise that many unknowns would have a bunch of XF covers. XF covers have only been given out in tokens since the Late Cretaceous. I rarely go for first place in events, and I've probably thrown away at least 5 XF covers after I covermaxed mine (in addition to 3 covers I threw away before I really started building him).

Unknown

It was not an explanation, it was an assumption.

You don't like it, that's fair enough.

You may bring more to the debate and enlighten the forumites with your own. That would be constructive.

Unknown

atomzed wrote:

arktos1971 wrote:

Assumption : they wanted to drain a lot of players' Iso stock so they could release a character who would imply the purchase of Iso...

Many "wannabees" in unknown Alliances have a maxed XF. I was surprised. So it must have boosted sales.

I have an almost max Xforce even before they announced the buff.after which I only spend the iso I grind on him. Didn't buy any covers, and didn't buy any iso.

You're not a wannabee, are you ?

HailMary

arktos1971 wrote:

It was not an explanation, it was an assumption.

You don't like it, that's fair enough.

My apologies. I thought you were actually attempting to add to the discussion.

arktos1971 wrote:

You may bring more to the debate and enlighten the forumites with your own. That would be constructive.

Indeed, and you've already quoted some of what I "brought to the debate." High-level shieldhopping HP is, at the very best, pocket change when compared to total MPQ revenue. The common forum myth that "it's silly to buy token packs, so obviously no one buys them because forumites competently represent the general playerbase, so D3 is bad and lying to our faces, and everything they do is totally about milking us for shields/health packs/chi no matter what!" is absurd.

But you're right, I only wish I could say something constructive, like sneering about "wannabees", idly declaring that "the managers" suck, and doing arithmetic based on made-up numbers surrounding a meaningless comparison.

Unknown

I've been missing you HM !