during beta, you were able to expand mining and cooking inventories etc using pebbles. now its all moonstones? was this intentional for full release from the start? because it's really disappointing to come back to after being able to use pebbles. feels like it'll slow things down a lot
We changed these expansions to be moonstones during our rebalancing efforts after early access. But I can understand your disappointment, we will take this under consideration!
thanks for the reply! now that i've sat on it, it doesn't seem as bad as my initial thoughts because of how many moonstone shards are obtainable during a day. i just wasn't expecting the change is all, so it caught me off guard. it's a bit more of a grind but not impossible! ^^
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Very surprised this topic has not gotten more attention.
@Alaunis Are you saying that the development team purposefully rebalanced the game to make it more heavily reliant on premium currency? Aspects of the game that would give other players an edge over the rest of the playerbase?
What went into the thought process of making the game more pay to win? If you wanted to gate these upgrades behind time, then why aren't upgrades related to space earnable through gameplay? Why does leveling up these professions not increase these? Why do players have to ONLY pay premium currency? When it's so slow to earn through gameplay?
We did purposefully rebalance these expansions, you are correct! We wanted expansions for moonstones to be tied to ease of use features or cosmetic content. Users can earn around 3-6 Moonstones per day on average through regular gameplay, so we felt that about a week of grinding was fair for the first Mining and Cooking upgrades. Thank you for your feedback, we will take this under consideration for the future!
@Alanuis
The problem is not that you wanted these features to take time to accomplish, the problem is that because you've made these features cost premium currency to upgrade, players who have more access to spending real life money will have a large advantage over players who cannot.
They can cook more food to either sell, or use more energy other places on the site, they can mine and smelt more at once, etc… Do you not see this a problem to both the fairness to your entire playerbase and the overall longevity of the game?
If you wanted these features to be locked behind a time gate, why didn't you do it elsewhere? Such as making these cost a different currency which can be gained through that week of grinding that you described. Or, again, making them locked behind profession level ups. This would greatly increase the justification behind having profession levels at all, as for many professions it seems pretty barren.
It's really concerning that it seems your goal continues to be finding ways to ease people into spending on this game. A lot of the monetization of the game feels very predatory in a very “mobile gaming” way. It's really disappointing to see that you're continuing this trend.
I can understand your frustration and your standpoint on this matter. I thank you for your feedback, and I will discuss this with our team!
@Alanuis
It would be really wonderful if this team was generally more communicating with the playerbase at large. I keep seeing “thanks for your feedback” and “we're discussing with the team” but those feel a bit hollow when communication was really rare in the beta about the feedback that was given at that time too.
As I pointed out in another topic, the game launched yesterday and it doesn't really feel like it has. The most recent news post is just an FAQ, and the last patch notes are from March.
What changed from the Beta? What are your current plans? What is the timeline for completing and adding features that were supposed to be included at launch or were otherwise advertised/mentioned? What is the overall roadmap for the site?
There wasn't even a ping on discord that the site was launched. I hope you understand that your actions as a development team are not giving the best of impressions to people who have already experienced poor launches and releases of pet sites in the recent years.
Alaunis
