Is fair play important in F2P by Developers?

IFORANI

Eddiemon wrote:

IFORANI wrote:

I agree that everything you said it's correct 100%. There is or might be an existing separation of two terms. If this is the view of the developers then fair play doesn't matter, correct? Just want clarification if that's what your saying.

I don't understand this 'fair play' you go on about. The game itself doesn't change regardless. Access to customer services is different to 'fair play', just liek having more characters slots, covers, ISO or covers because you paid doesn't affect 'fair play'. If they dissect a duplicate for you because you are a good payer that just gave you more covers for your dollars, it still doesn't change the game.

What about in the view of fair play within a product such as this which does not separate its user's and customers equally in competition? Would you not separate them in competition if they are in services available that affect fairness?

No, why would I? Users only cost money so why would I be giving them any advantage by separating them from customers? You like to throw the word 'fair' around but people who play the game for over a year and give nothing back to the developer for a year of entertainment have a strange sense of 'fair'.

Sure it's a 'free to play' model, but at some point most people think they should give something in return. But if you're happy to live off the whales funding the game then you shouldn't also be unhappy that the whales get better service.

Also would you not state this separation of user's and costumer's openly in services such as there costumer service? You obiviously have nothing to hide if that's your view or is there a reason to not publicly divulge this information?

No, that way just leads to more issues for the company. What advantage do they gain from any of this? It's not about having 'anything to hide', it's about having to commit to things that may get abused.

Also what are the side effects of this knowledge publicly. By own admission. Here are some I thought of quickly maybe you can think of others.

1)You are having to up keep to separate areas of game which doubles some overhead and employee cost.

If they were to do that then one section of the game, the 'users' is just a cost. And if you pay then you get to join the customer section that is tougher competition. So that business model shoots itself in the foot.

2) There would need to be a financial standard set to reach this status which could limit profitability over longevity of game.

Exactly. Or you would get people paying only when they needed a specific service and then overloading customer service and running up your costs.

3) Your games competition has become deluded with disadvantaged competition which could deter whales also due to legitimacy of games credibility.

I don't even understand that one.

Those were just real quick. Again in a business sense I can't disagree with any statement you make. If view strictly of developers okay I will not argue that either. However, but in a game of competition such as MPQ does it matter in the sense of fair play to both developers and players?

So what was the point of the exercise? If you're proposing a different system then you need to point out how it is better than the current system. I've been playing the game for over 2 years now and I'm happy enough with it. I don't agree with everything taht has been done and not everything has made me happy, but given that I am still playing they have done more right than wrong.

Also there are reports this deconstructing of duplicates is not financially directed. Users and Costumers should both then be receiving deconstructiin if true based on other criteria. Correct? Then wouldn't your costumers deserve the eligibility requirements at a minimum? Remember we are not aware of critiera used here and it being non universally given through costumer service on reported non financial criteria.

Maybe. But 'other criteria' is vague. Maybe customer service perform deconstructions when there are no other more pressing issues in their queue so it doesn't inflict any cost on them. Possibly they prioritise whales over other customers when they do have bandwidth.

This is why not telling people works. Because you can speculate and complain all you want and it isn't their problem. If they are prioritising whales then people will demand on knowing what dollar value is the cutoff. Whereas if all they say is they do it at their discretion then they can use whatever process they like. If they are deconstructing whales and deny it, what difference does it make to anyone? Some peopel will get deconstructed, some won't. Nothing changes.

Letting you know their systems so you can criticise them and hold them potentially legally liable, or not letting you know their systems and just letting you criticise anyway, I can see only one difference between those two.

I apologize that nothing I said makes any sense to you. Also I apologize that the term "Fair Play" I'm referring to you are having trouble understanding. I wish I could explain it better for you but I'm trying to really. I'm starting to figure out the answer to my questions by the community answering. Thank you for your insightful opinion I'm sure many other feel the same way you do and that's my goal to understanding if the players care of not about this and their opinions. Once again thank you for voicing yours.

Eddiemon

IFORANI wrote:

I apologize that nothing I said makes any sense to you. Also I apologize that the term "Fair Play" I'm referring to you are having trouble understanding. I wish I could explain it better for you but I'm trying to really. I'm starting to figure out the answer to my questions by the community answering. Thank you for your insightful opinion I'm sure many other feel the same way you do and that's my goal to understanding if the players care of not about this and their opinions. Once again thank you for voicing yours.

It's not that nothing makes sense, I suspect English isn't your primary language so when I don't understand what you are trying to convey I let you know. There's no need to apologise for anything.

IFORANI

Eddiemon wrote:

IFORANI wrote:

I apologize that nothing I said makes any sense to you. Also I apologize that the term "Fair Play" I'm referring to you are having trouble understanding. I wish I could explain it better for you but I'm trying to really. I'm starting to figure out the answer to my questions by the community answering. Thank you for your insightful opinion I'm sure many other feel the same way you do and that's my goal to understanding if the players care of not about this and their opinions. Once again thank you for voicing yours.

It's not that nothing makes sense, I suspect English isn't your primary language so when I don't understand what you are trying to convey I let you know. There's no need to apologise for anything.

Thank you for that and I'm glad your understanding of my unfortunate issue of the English language and my difficulty conveying ideas to you. I'm glad that the fact I am not a primary English speaker is your assumption for the cause in difficulty understanding me. Cause I don't feel so bad now in assuming before that your not strong in Reading Comprehension or that you just only read the title before posting earlier. Glad we could both find comforts in our assumptions.

However, I am just a polite individual who just wishes that I would receive the same courtesy in return. So now that this pleasant exchange of assumptions is done, I will thank you for your opinion of the discussion topic again and I'm sorry we don't share similar opinions completely cause you seem real nice.

I will also inform you this will end my engagement with you but by all means continue to post in this discussion. I'm sure your excellent English skills will provide a valuable insight of how you feel. Thank you once again.

Cypr3ss

Eddiemon wrote:

But customer service is an operational cost, and you want to scale it to match your customers, as you are spending a percentage of your revenue on them. While you may be able to service a number of user calls without increasing headcount, if you need extra resources you are making losses.

I agree with the above, but isn't it in the companys best interests to reduce the amount of customer service required, thus reducing their overheads and converting more of the customers money into profit?

I'd think that having open communication with your customers (which would also include users) would be one way of reducing the number of 'incoming calls' to customer support... especially in instances like this one. I also think that given proper communication to start with it becomes a lot simpler to produce the 'line responses' that CS are so well known for, further reducing your support costs.

Edit: I voted yes, no reason to not let everyone know the reasoning behind doing X. If you've not done that, its more than likely that each individual Customer Service member is treating the reoccurring tickets however they think it should be handled... which is not good.

Regards,
Cypr3ss.

Cypr3ss

Eddiemon wrote:

<snip> but people who play the game for over a year and give nothing back to the developer for a year of entertainment have a strange sense of 'fair'.
Sure it's a 'free to play' model, but at some point most people think they should give something in return.

I'm curious about the logic behind this... company releases a product which is Free to Play... you play, for free, cause that's the the name of the game... then after X amount of time has passed you should feel like you owe the company something?

That's an interesting theory.

Regards,
Cypr3ss.

beyonderbub

Cypr3ss wrote:

Eddiemon wrote:

<snip> but people who play the game for over a year and give nothing back to the developer for a year of entertainment have a strange sense of 'fair'.
Sure it's a 'free to play' model, but at some point most people think they should give something in return.

I'm curious about the logic behind this...

TINSTAAFL

Eddiemon

Cypr3ss wrote:

Eddiemon wrote:

<snip> but people who play the game for over a year and give nothing back to the developer for a year of entertainment have a strange sense of 'fair'.
Sure it's a 'free to play' model, but at some point most people think they should give something in return.

I'm curious about the logic behind this... company releases a product which is Free to Play... you play, for free, cause that's the the name of the game... then after X amount of time has passed you should feel like you owe the company something?

That's an interesting theory.

Regards,
Cypr3ss.

It goes in line with throwing around the word 'fair'. I have no issue with people saying essentially 'The game is using a free model so I will take full advantage and owe no reciprocity'. If that's your logic then fine.

But then when people want the company to be 'fair' to them in regards to customer service, communications etc, that's where it becomes hypocritical. If you're playing the 'I owe you nothing because F2P' card then you can't really complain that 'You owe me something not stipulated because fairness'.

And reciprocity is a normal human response. Though even without that response, having played the game for a long time you might logically consider putting in some money so the lights stay on and the game stays running so your entertainment continues.

IFORANI

I will for everyone that didn't read the first couple of post prior to posting. I will clarify the context of how the term "Fair Play" is used in relation to MPQ and costumer service.

NOTE: This does NOT matter finically or not.
This does also not include cheating by players. However, everyone seems to have problems with that but not with the following.

The term is used in relation to a competition. Yes, in MPQ you are participating indirect competition with all other available MPQ players. This is why there are placement rewards and brackets in both PVE and PVP events. This is also why roster spots are important to have in order to collect certain characters especially for use in PvE and especially with essentials and PvP. Can we agree this is a true statement?

The term Fair Play here is that if everyone receives the same item or capability and then a select group gets to use it in a manner differently not by any means of either purchase or equal availablilty and opportunity to receive capability. But instead by the developer selectively choosing either by undisclosed criteria Edited:or publicly available Criteriathat is discriminating and excludes those other players the equal capabilities. This now has given one group has a competitive advantage against another with an unequal opportunitues. Because they can now do something those they compete against can't by nothing that is attainable equally Edited: and selected by Developers discreation with or with out a reason. Can we agree on this?

Some may ask in this certain topic how is this a competitive advantage Some may already unstand the view of how. Upon releaseing CHAMPIONING which allows extra covers to be added to 2 star levels and above maxed characters. Each extra cover boost character one extra level and a reward. All levels are capped and this capability is attainable by all players. Can we agree on this?

Now an already existing feature was being able to roster duplicate characters. This was a equal feature available to all players. The idea began of the deconstruction of these duplicate characters with the intent to use them with the new championing feature. The selective process carried out by the developers through players using customer service and not by creating in game feature to allow players the ability on there own. The guidelines or criteria for this process to occur was not disclosed and some where approved while others were denied. This is the creation of unfair play since those that received this service were able to level and max champion characters and opened up available roster spots previously being used by the duplicates before those others who had denied with duplicates couldn't do the same instead only left with covers on duplicate characters that could be only sold our keep. Since those that receive this selective service still competed with those that were denied this is an unfair advantage and in the sense of competition it is not fair play. Can we agree on this?

Now if those who had received selective deconstruction of duplicates were separately competeing against only each other then no unfair play occurs. Can we agree on this?

So with this selectivness and remaing in competition with those that didn't recieve equal unfair play within competition. Now if you disagree but that's just personally i.e it just don't matter to you. Please say so.

Does this fit your belief of fair play in the sense of morality of a fair competition? yes or no?

If not what is in your belief just Fair Play in sense of morality of in competition? and please feel free to state this your reasons why

If this to you just does not apply in competitive parts of Marvel Puzzle Quest then please state so and a why?

Yes the knowledge that they didn't receive anything materialistically new is understood. However, they were able to do something with a feature that is available to everyone with no standard set forth. Can we agree on this?

The intent of duplicate characters feature was not intended with Championing as a consideration for reason to have available to players. Can we agree on this?

And the use of an area that generally speaking carries a sense of not changing or affecting games existing features for other game uses outside intended purpose such as customer service. That ability is usually given to or controlled by technical support or designated other group with or by developers pre-approved implementation of or authorization. Can we agree on this?
Will conceded to having an generalisation of CS and can do so if company tasks them responsibility. I have never seen our even noticed it and that is why I use generalisation of responsibility.

I hope I was able to thoroughly explain the term fair play as it relates to the topic being discussed in free to play.

tiomono

A lot of the points you just made iforani are up for dispute still.

We do not not know what the criteria they have set for whether or not to deconstruct a character, therefore you cannot claim it's unfair when they do.

They have, to my knowledge, never come out and said "With the feature of championing now available players with duplicate characters may break them down to receive the extra covers."

There is no responsibility on their part to do this. They made a change to the game. Which the vast majority of the players think is a huge improvement.

Is it fair to allow some players the opportunity to break down duplicate characters and others not? We have no idea, because we do not know the criteria they have for doing so.

They also have no obligation to fully release the inner workings of their CS, regardless of whether or not they are free to play or a one time fee game.

Can it be frustrating? Sure. Is it an issue that the company should have to address? No.

The reason I say no is for the fact that players made the choice to keep dupes because it brought them perceived benefits prior to championing being introduced. Now they feel there are different benefits to be gained by changing the decisions they made.

I am beginning to feel nobody should be allowed to break down champs. You made a choice to open a roster slot for a character you already had and now want the company to fix what you feel is an error. But it's not the company's error it's yours (in your view).

The bottom line is we still do not know why they allowed some players to do this and not others, and we likely never will. We have no way to say whether or not it is fair or not because we do not have all the information.

IFORANI

tiomono wrote:

A lot of the points you just made iforani are up for dispute still.

We do not not know what the criteria they have set for whether or not to deconstruct a character, therefore you cannot claim it's unfair when they do.

They have, to my knowledge, never come out and said "With the feature of championing now available players with duplicate characters may break them down to receive the extra covers."

There is no responsibility on their part to do this. They made a change to the game. Which the vast majority of the players think is a huge improvement.

Is it fair to allow some players the opportunity to break down duplicate characters and others not? We have no idea, because we do not know the criteria they have for doing so.

They also have no obligation to fully release the inner workings of their CS, regardless of whether or not they are free to play or a one time fee game.

Can it be frustrating? Sure. Is it an issue that the company should have to address? No.

The reason I say no is for the fact that players made the choice to keep dupes because it brought them perceived benefits prior to championing being introduced. Now they feel there are different benefits to be gained by changing the decisions they made.

I am beginning to feel nobody should be allowed to break down champs. You made a choice to open a roster slot for a character you already had and now want the company to fix what you feel is an error. But it's not the company's error it's yours (in your view).

The bottom line is we still do not know why they allowed some players to do this and not others, and we likely never will. We have no way to say whether or not it is fair or not because we do not have all the information.

I respect your opinions and I'm glad you addressed other questions related to specfic issue also. I can see the views one might have on all the questions you choose to answer and newly asked questions as will.

Some I agree with completely and i have previously stated before.

I ask you the following questions just so I can confirm I understand your stance on the issue with of deconstruction of dups.

It is the criteria in which this is done that plays most importance to you in this specific situation?

If so the fact it's not available to all doesn't create an sense of unfairness to you as a player?

Hope these questions are the correct ones to ask. Just looking to get a clear answer with confirmation. Because I know you've answered these mostly but just looking for clarification.

Also if you could please lend your opinion specifically to the matter of, if MPQ is a indirect competition to you?

If yes, should it follow the morality we have of fairness in competition?

IFORANI

ATTENTION: I edited information to previous Fair Play explanation post after discussed about. New added information is marked and also in bold.


Also please remember I am not here to fudge but Trying allow this discuss.

If I questioned anything it was not meant with intent change an answer but I'm trying to accomplish many different answers about the issue in multitude of facets that are geared specifically to F2P developer environment and the game style that is MPQ and players of the game.

I understand other environments are subject to different rules in areas of fairness, costumer service, inherent standards and business structure of what makes profitable and expense.

I'm trying to weed those out of thinking and focus on specifically the above mention criteria of focus.

I also am not trying to say any wrong in about anyone's opinions. They are based on not my beliefs but yours therefore they can not wrong just different is my view of opinions. Sure others want black and white, right and wrong view. I can not control those.

Heartburn

well let me start of and say that communication was never this companies strong suit and they have many mistakes, and continue to do so, by staying too long in their cave before releasing details, often days before implementation, were even if potential problems come up their is virtually no time to fix them before launch. Some more dedicated conversations with their target community could help them flush out potential problems with their product. it would be amazing if they had some sort website or "forum" where these targeted conversations could take place.

For this issue, i think handling this issue with customer service was not the way to go i think it should of been a patch that allows a feature for player to disassemble themselves and leave CS for bugs and other issues. if they did it should of be announced in game for a limited amount of time with a qualification list. Ideally, it should of been flushed out as a consequence of developing champions, since it is a fairly common practice and is often mention on this forum itself. it begs the question how could they not foresee this issue coming up? they always assure us they they play test the kitties out of their changes but they miss so much. they may want to revamp their protocols, if they exist. one thing to help would be to include some members of the top 20 alliances who clearly understand high level playing( maybe from some from pvp and some from story) so they can flush out their designs better and anticipate problems better with upcoming changes or features.

For the discussion of user vs customer, i feel that CS should not be able to tell these apart for what it is intended for resolving in game issue or concerns(most of these can be resolved by directing to the forum). if there were clear VIP system i would be fine with VIP status to get a front of the line pass, but users should never be ignored. These users while they may not contribute financially to the game they do contribute by generating in game date, and can contribute by recruiting other players to the game, offering feedback whether prompted or unprompted, and provide a lush, healthy hunting ground for the big spenders to play. They should not ever be a group to left and ignored because they can hurt the companies growth by not recommending their product to friends family and acquaintances, posting about their inferior treatment discouraging others, simply stop playing the game, basically all qualities that can be given to that of a spurned customer. For these reasons, they should not be treated differently from other "customers".

IFORANI

As OP I am done discussing this topic as it relates to replying to new post. I hope this Topic maintains the integrity of only it terms of F2P and MPQ strictly.

I appreciate everyone who decided to join this discussion and provided a opinion of insight on this topic to give others a different insights.

Please reframe from posting costumer support response on any topic that may deal with Posts Title could be violation terms of use.

I would like to say thank you for providing the opportunity for me to understand and gain knowledge of expectations of individuals involved in MPQ in terms of players expectations. With of areas such as the developer, customer service, and game rules of MPQ and F2P. I now have a better understanding of the world I am involved in and for that I extremely grateful.

Thank you again and hope this Topic was/is helpful in any facet to MPQ players.

Buret0

Eddiemon wrote:

It goes in line with throwing around the word 'fair'. I have no issue with people saying essentially 'The game is using a free model so I will take full advantage and owe no reciprocity'. If that's your logic then fine.
[snip]
And reciprocity is a normal human response. Though even without that response, having played the game for a long time you might logically consider putting in some money so the lights stay on and the game stays running so your entertainment continues.

I throw some money at games I like playing for the same reason I throw money at movies, music, and even television shows that I enjoy: partly because I want to reward excellence, partly because I want the product to continue to be provided. Yes, I've even paid $35+ dollars to stream a season of a TV show on iTunes.

There's so much garbage out there because marketing effort is now rewarded more than product quality. When people who get paid to make money for other people are making the decisions, they are going to tend to throw their money into projects that will provide a return on investment. My consumerism supports quality. However, just because a TV show is good for a couple of seasons, it doesn't mean that I'm going to support the seasons that suck (I'm looking at you season 3 of House of Cards). Same goes for online gaming.

If the game sucks, I just delete it. If the game was good and I spent money on it, and then starts to suck, I'll stop spending money and give them a chance to turn their game around. If they don't, I give the game a **** rating for a few updates and then delete it forever.

I'm currently in the stop spending money phase. It isn't that I don't like the game, it is that I don't support the direction this game has gone starting with 5*s. Before they were released we begged the developers to reconsider, because we knew they were game-breakingly powerful. Instead they said, "we will release OP 5*s and then buff the 4*s." At the time, the gap between 3*s and 4*s wasn't so bad, you could easily get away with using a boosted 3* to fight off a 4*. The direction since Surfer has only widened the gap between the top and the bottom players in the game and made P2W a reality.

The intention was to make 5*s hard to get and that you couldn't 'whale' a 5* because you could only get them from LTs, which could only be won. Then at launch they decided that LTs would also drop from 40 packs and from vaults, which could be whaled (and there were superwhaled Surfers before the first month was out). Then they introduced CP, which would be earned by daily participation, CP would be used to buy LTs, but you couldn't buy CP. Then CP immediately became a buyer's club alliance tool where people who spent money on the game (and who profited from it, as they always had) suddenly were opening 28-50 more LTs than anyone else in a season.

A good season for a F2P or low spending player in a F2P or low spending alliance would net about 35-50 CP. The alliances dropping a lot of money were getting about 700+ CP in a season just from alliance spending bonuses. Now that CP can be spent on 20 CP packs, so instead of getting 28-50 more LTs, these whale clubs can open between 35 and 63 more LTs (and duplicates can now be championed, giving those super whales an even bigger advantage, as champion 5*s scale FAST).

So while there has been more money spent by the biggest spenders, those who aren't willing to pay a subscription fee of $350 a month are starting to cut off their spending. Because what drives the changes made in MPQ? Short-term increases in spending that accompany a change. They keep the lights on by keeping whales hooked on spending to keep up. As a smaller group of people make up a larger and larger part of MPQ revenues, all of the future changes are going to be targeted at keeping these players on the hook. So when you talk about fair play and who should get priority CS treatment, you know it is in MPQ's best interests to keep a whale and to piss off the minnows, because that whale throws in every single month what those minnows throw at the game in 2 years. If priority treatment from CS is the straw that broke the camels back, then fine... but understand, the advantages these whales have in this game before any CS priority is a ton of freaking straw.

So why should you throw money at a game you like when they're doing good work and keeping the game balanced? So that they don't end up having to cater exclusively to the interests of the top paying players. If MPQ's financial people were looking at the revenue stream and seeing that 30% of their revenues were coming from people spending $500 or more a year and 55% of their revenues from people spending $50 to $275 a year, they wouldn't have made the same decisions about how to implement 5*s.

When you play a game that you like and you fail to support that game, you eventually stop being included in the decisions about what is best for the future of the game. Because F2P is a marketing campaign to get you in. Employees and servers and advertising and trade shows and what not aren't free. The game stops when the people who invested in it stop seeing a return on that investment.

Why do we get new characters instead of new bosses, new events, or new battle styles? Because new characters are cheap and drive spending. It drives a wedge deeper and deeper between F2P and P2P players. 1% of people will spend $100s of dollars to max a new character ASAP. But there would be too much backlash if not everyone had a chance to play a new boss, new event, or new battle style... so they can't charge $5 for a new feature because the F2P people won't participate (and be mad about it) and for the amount of time it takes to code, the return on investment is so much lower than a new playable character.

It is a F2P game, but because of that fact, the content is going to be driven by what will encourage early adoption of spending by the F2P players, what will get a player to buy successively larger amounts, and what will keep the whales on the hook? Fair play isn't good for business.

Cypr3ss

Eddiemon wrote:

It goes in line with throwing around the word 'fair'. I have no issue with people saying essentially 'The game is using a free model so I will take full advantage and owe no reciprocity'. If that's your logic then fine.
But then when people want the company to be 'fair' to them in regards to customer service, communications etc, that's where it becomes hypocritical.

So you don't think (especially with a F2P game, where 'users' could potentially become 'customers') that treating everyone equally (with regards to customer service/support/etc) is good for business? I would expect that any business would want everyone that deals with it to have the 'best experience', not to be told "you haven't given us any money, so you don't count".

tiomono wrote:

We do not not know what the criteria they have set for whether or not to deconstruct a character, therefore you cannot claim it's unfair when they do.

Do you need to know the criteria before deciding its fair or not, I think not.

Put another way, is it fair to allow some players the opportunity to break down duplicate characters based on random criteria and others not? I would say no, if you're going to allow a section of the player base to accomplish something you should state why (or why not) this is the case for all players.

tiomono wrote:

The bottom line is we still do not know why they allowed some players to do this and not others, and we likely never will.

And that right there is the problem. We don't even know if it was due to players with large amounts of money invested, or large amounts of time invested, or none of the above.

Regards,
Cypr3ss.

Linkster79

Money talks. In all industries bigger spending customers get preferential treatment compared to lower spending customers. In an ideal world everybody should receive the same level of service, however since when has the world ever been ideal?

Arondite

Allow me to preface this by saying I feel fairly sure that D3 places a degree of emphasis on fair CS treatment across all ranges of players, whether they are F2P or Mega-Whales.

That said, I wouldn't fault them at all if they went the exact opposite direction. It is perfectly acceptable to prioritize your highest tiers of revenue. It's common practice in every other field of business. The important thing is, if you go that route, maintain the illusion of fairness to your lower tier spenders and non-spenders, while emphasizing to your high-spenders that their preferential treatment is a result of their continued patronage.