Lost Ark coming to NA/EU! Smilegate to pair with Amazon Game Studios as Publisher!

[ldev]

It was just going bit faster than the non-paying losers how is that WINNING ???

Because you come first? That's... literally what winning is. Yea, we all eventually will reach 1600 ilvl, eventually make a million, etc - no one's arguing that you can't do it, wtf.

Did the olympic athletic commission make an award ceremony and gave you gold medals in celebration ?

So when you play cards with your friends, you never win, because olympic athletic commission doesn't give you a gold medal?

[Coldkil]

Oh look its that coping game when we say p2w design is not p2w. We selectively somehow try and take the word win from p2w to some hyper cringe literal sense just to pretend its not p2w garbage.
What ? Did you really WIN ? Did the olympic athletic commission make an award ceremony and gave you gold medals in celebration ?
It was just going bit faster than the non-paying losers how is that WINNING ???

Someone is hurt by the fact people enjoy playing a game he doesn't like.

P2W is shit, but tis here to stay. in Lost Ark, it's not as bad as people want it to be - meaning that people can throw a lot of money at it but the actual advantage they get is not great (you have to do the content to get the better gear base, upgrading it only makes you unlock the next content - overgearing is not really a thing).

[Ochinko]

I agree that the system in Lost Ark only hurts people who have an unhealthy need for instant gratification.
If you are a bit patient you can reach everything in the game without any hassle.
Especially the shop items aka cosmetics, which are usually for the paying customers only can all be obtained with ingame gold that you can farm (thats how I dress up my chars).
But if one always needs to have everything right away I can see people heading to the forums marking LA as the devil incarnate.

[Ophenia]

That's basically my point of view. And right now with the honing changes f2p has even less hurdles.

It's fun how they managed to use ilvl/character power and its classic tropes and make it a sort of unlock system where gear doesn't really matter because engravings/gems/etc are much more important and most of all, your hands

Fun story time. Was pugging first orhea dungeons, zerker just kept spamming "quit dungeon" because i don't have the right engravings (i know, my character is shit but i gave up when i knew Arcanist release, i stopped at 1370). Ended clearing it doing 30% of the damage.

Yeah there are some dudes like that. They've read build guides saying Engravings X, Y and Z are the best so if you don't have them, you automatically suck. They don't understand that most guides are for optimal builds, but using other engravings don't mean you'll do 0 DPS (well of course there are some engravings which are clearly useless but ok).

On my side I'm reading guide but then adjusting to what I feel is best in my case - I'm not a good-enough player to follow the standard Cursed Doll / Grudge build which is recommended for all classes, so I'm going other routes (Hit Master, Precise Dagger, etc depending on the class).

And on the P2W aspect... Yes it very strongly is, in the sense that gear, engravings, gems are either 1) you pay and you get them, or 2) you wait to loot good items with good engravings and stats, but 2) can very well never happen. So yeah, if you want to do "serious" content, you'll very likely either have to pay or play 20 alts every week to funnel to your main - or be exxxxtremely lucky.

On my side I still didn't pay for anything (will likely throw some $$ on some skin one day, but not for honing mats for sure), my main is at 1440 without even doing premade-group content (e.g my "endgame" activity is still Argos P1 in matchmaking haha), so I guess that's OK enough. 99% of the game content is accessible to me with that gear level, and I don't plan on doing Legion Raids anytime soon anyway so I'm cool with it.
I have three other chars at 1368 (gunslinger), 1340 (shadowhunter) and 1302 (sharpshooter), I'm only planning to bring my gunslinger to 1370, and the sharpshooter as I activated the Express Pass on this one.
The honing boost is great to speed up the "dead zones". My gunslinger was 1360 for the last week, as it had to pity two items from +12 to +13 and I kinda gave up at this point... Now I only have to craft some Oreha fusion mats and it should be 1370 in two or three taps

[Coldkil]

I agree that the system in Lost Ark only hurts people who have an unhealthy need for instant gratification.
If you are a bit patient you can reach everything in the game without any hassle.
Especially the shop items aka cosmetics, which are usually for the paying customers only can all be obtained with ingame gold that you can farm (thats how I dress up my chars).
But if one always needs to have everything right away I can see people heading to the forums marking LA as the devil incarnate.

I started playing again because i just really wanted to play Arcana as main and when i finished Punika on my Wardancer i felt done, and other classes didn't really appeal me.

Now i'm back and with the changes i can just zip through content and start doing some endgame stuff. Best time to get back in LA

[Aliven]

I agree that the system in Lost Ark only hurts people who have an unhealthy need for instant gratification.
If you are a bit patient you can reach everything in the game without any hassle.
Especially the shop items aka cosmetics, which are usually for the paying customers only can all be obtained with ingame gold that you can farm (thats how I dress up my chars).
But if one always needs to have everything right away I can see people heading to the forums marking LA as the devil incarnate.

Nice victim blaming. LA is blatant p2w.

[Coldkil]

Yeah there are some dudes like that. They've read build guides saying Engravings X, Y and Z are the best so if you don't have them, you automatically suck. They don't understand that most guides are for optimal builds, but using other engravings don't mean you'll do 0 DPS (well of course there are some engravings which are clearly useless but ok).

Main issue is that Cursed Doll and Grudge are that much stronger than the rest. I'm literally leaving them as last ones for when i'm reaching 3-3-3-1 or 3-3-3-3-1. And for those it means i'm doing legion raids which a) i don't see myself doing them soon and b) are needed there and not really before. Right now i'm 3-3-2 and it definitely improved my damage.

And on the P2W aspect... Yes it very strongly is, in the sense that gear, engravings, gems are either 1) you pay and you get them, or 2) you wait to loot good items with good engravings and stats, but 2) can very well never happen. So yeah, if you want to do "serious" content, you'll very likely either have to pay or play 20 alts every week to funnel to your main - or be exxxxtremely lucky.

I'm hunting the AH now. And it's tied to previous point, it's not even the gold needed (because once you have the right piece you're done) but the fact only a handful of combinations are worth investing in and the cost just skyrockets because everyone wants them. I'd like to see other engravings buffed (but still inferior to CD/Gr because if the tradeoff). Bringing stuff nearer is only a good thing - would make the market more varied.

[xenogear3]

I agree that the system in Lost Ark only hurts people who have an unhealthy need for instant gratification.
If you are a bit patient ...

You know the game is really grindy when people tell you to have patient in a MMORPG.

[Coldkil]

Nice victim blaming. LA is blatant p2w.

Expand your reasoning.

- - - Updated - - -

You know the game is really grindy when people tell you to have patient in a MMORPG.

And it's not really. Since you have literally 3 dailies and 2 chaos dungeons to do. Point is there are a lot of other things to do and all matter more or less, and it's all front-loaded. So the generic player expects to do everything immediatly when it's not going to work like that anyway.

But here we're going into "what i find fun" territory so plenty of reasons to dislike the current grind.

[Ophenia]

You know the game is really grindy when people tell you to have patient in a MMORPG.

Well, to be fair, most MMORPGs revolve around those mechanics. Otherwise you'd complete all in two days and be done. The timegating in LA is a bit extreme though, this is clear.

But it's nothing bad, nor illogic. It gives you long-term purposes, and it keeps the game afloat, otherwise the population would only be the hardcore players after 1 months and the game would be dead.
And if you're not patient ? Then there are two options ; swiping to accelerate your progression one billion-fold, or just find another game you'd enjoy more.

So yeah, basically LA is a regular MMORPG, but with everything pushed to the extreme due to the korean standards I suppose.

Nevertheless, as far as the strict P2W definition go, the only P2W aspect in LA is the Islands PvP, where gear is not normalized so you'll be roflstomped by 1500+ guys. But without paying, all the rest of the content is accessible to anyone, just... not right away, you'll have to suffer a lot for that!

So the generic player expects to do everything immediatly when it's not going to work like that anyway.

That's the main problem the players have with Lost Ark. They see the sheer amount of content that is available to them and think they absolutely have to do all. And as this game is also heavily oriented toward having alts, that multiplies the amount of stuff to do for every char you get.

But the truth is... The Rest system is very good in that game. You don't even need to do your Unas, Guardian Raids or Chaos Dungeons every day, you can skip it all week and only run them on weekends and you'll retrieve a good amount of mats from the rested bonus.
Plus, if those contents are really something you despise, there is also the option to send your Stronghold crew to do them instead.

That's where I'm finding my place in LA. Sometimes I just don't want to do something on an Alt because of time or motivation, I just don't have to. This rested bonus helps a lot in alleviating the "chore" aspect of repeatable content, that basically killed my motivation to play WoW back in WoD (fucking Garrisons).

[Coldkil]

The main "issue" is that the game shipped here woth three years worth of content all at once. Islanda, three tiers, dungeons, guardians etc.

Half the stuff could be just skipped. If it was released over time like KR the game pace would have been different but arguably worse. The game has improved a lot during that time and more casual content was added. With the last buffs the whole game looks much more like a wow expansion - level to the max and do endgame.

[Aliven]

Expand your reasoning.

Shifting the blame for systems designed to take advantage of people who are vulnerable (people with addictive personality, active addicts, people with depression, etc). The devs creating those systems, like honing, multiple currencies, systems upon systems used to confuse and make people numb to them are assholes but people who dont get a penny from it shifting the blame? Man, thats disgusting.

Why it is p2w? Because you can have unlimited tries to upgrade your gear, which makes you stronger.

[Coldkil]

Shifting the blame for systems designed to take advantage of people who are vulnerable (people with addictive personality, active addicts, people with depression, etc). The devs creating those systems, like honing, multiple currencies, systems upon systems used to confuse and make people numb to them are assholes but people who dont get a penny from it shifting the blame? Man, thats disgusting.

Why it is p2w? Because you can have unlimited tries to upgrade your gear, which makes you stronger.

It doesn't make you stronger though. It makes you in current content you are already cleaning/farming, or in pvp islands which are not needed for progression/character power, only for collectibles. PvP is normalized. Gear level only serves the purpose to unlock content you have to actually do and mechanics are basically "do the fight the right way or it's a wipe". Plus, there's a limit on how much you can spend daily IIRC.

I'm not saying you're wrong, because you're not. But people focus on the gear level and mari's shop when they are the least impactful thing. There's the nasty convolution in multiple currencies though.

Point is, the game is fun to play by itself. I can agree p2w is there and it's not a good thing. But i don't agree that devs have to do things in a way so the "poor weak people" are protected. Everyone can fall in traps - the difference is that you learn how a trap is made and then you pay more attention.

It's complicated, i'm not trying to justify p2w. But at the same time i like this game very much and i have bought already only a founder pack to get me some skins, but i found farming gold isn't hard so i can plan and buy the ones i like with it.

[Aliven]

Point is, the game is fun to play by itself. I can agree p2w is there and it's not a good thing. But i don't agree that devs have to do things in a way so the "poor weak people" are protected. Everyone can fall in traps - the difference is that you learn how a trap is made and then you pay more attention.

It's complicated, i'm not trying to justify p2w. But at the same time i like this game very much and i have bought already only a founder pack to get me some skins, but i found farming gold isn't hard so i can plan and buy the ones i like with it.

Why make boring trap? Why people NEED to research if this game is not made with psychologicall tricks in mind to fuck you over? Why should anybody be on guard? This is supposed to be entertainment.

You are actually justifing your spendings. I dont deny the gameplay, feel and mechanics - they are fun. They are. But fuck the devs, fuck the cult of piss river and everyone who implemented those tricks.

Devs should ABSOLUTELY make everything in their power to not implement tricks which prey on vulnerables. Look, if i know how manipulation and propaganda works, then are you saying im ok with using both to get what i want? Really? No tingle on moral compass?

[Ghost of Cow]

Devs should ABSOLUTELY make everything in their power to not implement tricks which prey on vulnerables. Look, if i know how manipulation and propaganda works, then are you saying im ok with using both to get what i want? Really? No tingle on moral compass?

Oh for fucks sake, not another, "They use MIND TRICKS!!!!" derailing of a thread.

You all sound like pre-teen youtube addicts that haven't seen the other 99.999% of the world when you parrot this stuff.

[KrayZ33]

I agree, it's a pretty shitty move.
All this "400 currencies" stuff and one is premium and one is not ,but also not really in-game gold and then there is another currency you need as well for exclusive items and you can buy currency A but not B and C is limited is simply dogshit.

I don't think anyone has to be protected from P2W mechanics (other than the fact that these kind of games are usually trash and simply less fun), but I'd probably "prefer" - if they feel like they have to include stuff like that - a honing button that says "honing for 1€" and another with "honing with ressources". It's fucking annoying and shady to have shop items cost 3000 crystals and then you have to check how much money that is. At the same time, you might have XY amounts lying around from your last purchase, because you never have the exact number.

It'd be more "honest" imho. Everyone can directly see how shitty the devs are... no hiding behind currencies and materials.

The only redeeming point about this game is that you can basically get what you want simply from playing.
And that's good enough.

[Coldkil]

Why make boring trap? Why people NEED to research if this game is not made with psychologicall tricks in mind to fuck you over? Why should anybody be on guard? This is supposed to be entertainment.

You are actually justifing your spendings. I dont deny the gameplay, feel and mechanics - they are fun. They are. But fuck the devs, fuck the cult of piss river and everyone who implemented those tricks.

Devs should ABSOLUTELY make everything in their power to not implement tricks which prey on vulnerables. Look, if i know how manipulation and propaganda works, then are you saying im ok with using both to get what i want? Really? No tingle on moral compass?

You're watching to many Asomngold/Bellular/Yongyea videos

Jokes aside, i agree it's a shit practice. Again, i'm not justifying p2w or better, i'm not justifying the fact they're trying to hide the p2w mechanics behind 1000 different currencies (it's only 4, but it's 3 too many).

You call for devs to act on this, but they simply won't. You're telling them to stop making that much money, and they obviously won't. But i fully agree the scope of concealments has reached a point where intervention is needed.

Personally i don't see any issue in making everything just straight $$$ priced, full disclosed and everything. If i want to spend money, i'll know exactly how much i've spent or need to and decide if i want to. Fortunately i have enough self control to not spend money on these kind of stuff (cosmetics are another thing) but i can see how many people gets hooked and is oblivious to the grand total of money they have actually spent.

[Aliven]

You call for devs to act on this, but they simply won't. You're telling them to stop making that much money, and they obviously won't. But i fully agree the scope of concealments has reached a point where intervention is needed.

I would like for them to act but i know they wont. The only power I have is over myself so i choose not to play those games, even if they are f2p or free to try at least.
There are more games than there is time left for me on this planet so will be picky

[xenogear3]

I quit after I hit the 1340 wall.
My wait paid off!

Now the Hyper Express Event will help me to reach 1370 without grind or spend real money.
LoL at the people who paid real money to reach 1370.

[Coldkil]

I quit after I hit the 1340 wall.
My wait paid off!

Now the Hyper Express Event will help me to reach 1370 without grind or spend real money.
LoL at the people who paid real money to reach 1370.

I didn't even use the event, it was doable without it Anyway i'm leveling my Arcanist, damn if she's fun to play.