Loot

[San]

It is a friggin' game and 1000 PED (or $100) are a chunk to spend on a game. If you don't get a decent time out of it then nobody can blame you for calling it quits and give the whole product a bad rep any time you can bring it up in a conversation. Big bankrollers are a small minority, they are just the most visible ones. I'm also getting tired of the pontificating sometimes.

While most can probably accept that activities with a high cost per click without a budget to match are high risk, the swings of average returns for totally appropriate behaviour with periods of weeks up to many months can dry almost anyone out. How many of these players stay on? I don't know, but I don't think it is a very smart strategy to push them to the brink. A mass of casual players should produce more turnover than a small group of those with a high throughput. If this is not the case as seen from the other side, then the thing to do would be striving to make it so. Which way does a pyramid stand better, on its broad base or the small tip.

 

[trance]

Everyone is too hung up on the % of their returns, that's not what OP is concerned about.

The issue is that if you for example do 10 runs with 65% returns and and 300ped ammo you will have lost 1000ish ped in just 10 runs. if 1000ped is all you had then you're now broke.

This is the part where everyone like clockwork point out that 1000ped is too little to cycle and that your loot will average out with a bigger sample which is probably all correct.

BUT should you really expect all players to have 10000ped on their account just to manage loot swings(or hoard stacks worth selling due to acu fee for the matter) for 10 measly 300ped hunts?

Those 300ped runs could for example have been done by some dedicated noob doing iron on corn in pixie and vivo s10.
How would he view the game when 1000ped isn't enough to kill a mob with 300hp?

now these are all extreme cases but my last hunts before profit came at like 7 or 8 negative runs and the positive ones are usually at like 102% and the negative ones anything between 45-99%.

TLDR: I don't care that after 100000peds I'll have 95% when you can have weeks where you're getting pissed on with 65% returns because that kills all the fun

Thanks +rep, exactly what i feel, too many bad runs kill the fun.

 

[ZPF]

I did a short run with the TT finder in Arkadia Underground recently, 0.30 PED to search for ore/treasure, and enmatter. It was kinda fun and I actually made a slight profit

If returns are 50-60% in the short term and you want to make your PED last, you've got to choose cheap activities.

Yes - hunting punies is not fun, but you can always team hunt slightly bigger mobs. Grab a few friends, everyone uses Onyxo's or TT melee weapons, and just have some fun hunting some medium size mobs ^^

Or grab a dozen people and hunt proterons!

 

[Fifth]

I did a short run with the TT finder in Arkadia Underground recently, 0.30 PED to search for ore/treasure, and enmatter. It was kinda fun and I actually made a slight profit

If returns are 50-60% in the short term and you want to make your PED last, you've got to choose cheap activities.

Yes - hunting punies is not fun, but you can always team hunt slightly bigger mobs. Grab a few friends, everyone uses Onyxo's or TT melee weapons, and just have some fun hunting some medium size mobs ^^

Or grab a dozen people and hunt proterons!

Very true. That's why I believe the future of the game is in developing activities for a group of people. Or groups, several.
Give ppl the positive experience, entertainment and they are happy. Even if it's only a "fallback feature", not the main theme. Happy ppl bring in more happy ppl.

 

[trance]

The problem i see, I play since more as 10years. I have 242k total skills. Why i should continue skilling, if i need to kill punys and use rocky, after 10 years of invest in hand made skills? Everyone want grow up. But if i need to kill puny, then i don't need to have 240K skills. Maybe time to sell out the skills, so i really only can hunt verry small. But i'm sure thats not the way i want go.

At least, i really hope to find back my fun. I love this game, but the loot should not give a looser feeling, for such long times, how it is now. Would be nice do see also loot swings with longer times of plus, if bad runs last such long.

I'm sure it could be a bit better balanced, so we don't get that much a looser feeling. I also hope, that i dont must go back to be a beginner and just kill punys. I killed so much small mobs in the 10years, i'm tired of it, and i just kill those on the mining way, if they save my claims.

 

[ZPF]

The problem i see, I play since more as 10years. I have 242k total skills. Why i should continue skilling, if i need to kill punys

So you want to have it both ways? First you were taking the "I just want to play for fun" approach, and now you're giving us the logical side of things. I already gave you suggestions on how to have fun for cheap.

But now you're saying you want to be able to spend larger amounts of money with a guaranteed stable return. I don't know what to tell you at this point. Except that if TT returns were any more stable, markup would be too easy to farm and the economy would be destroyed.

We need new players and action from MA to bring the economy back to a healthy place. EU is starting to grow on Twitch, the best thing we can do is support MA's initiatives to grow the game.

I miss the old days too. We all do. But as other people have said, we either adapt or leave and sell out.

Maybe time to sell out the skills, so i really only can hunt verry small. But i'm sure thats not the way i want go.

Would this really be so bad? Keep the useful skills like evade and sell the rest. And just play for fun like you said you wanted to do.

 

[Evey]

Less loot volatility would be the way to go, IMHO. It will result in less quitters long term. Less quitters = bigger playerbase which is what we all want (or we should, at least).
If people would track it would be even better, even less quitters (I think) since the long term return tends to even out at a more normal value, 95%+. Hint for MA to introduce a way of tracking return ingame, like the one on crafting, but with the possibility of logging it. It wil give players more confidence to keep pushing, that's if the volatility is lower too.

I did get 60% return in a few rns but that's very rare occurance and it's on mobs bigger than I should hunt, I think. I did get crap returns on mobs my sizes too lately, past month has been horrible, but overall, 90% is too low, I think the average hunter can go higher than that (track and you wil see)

As for OP's question, 6 out of 10 are loss, in my case. My sample is not 10, but 500 runs tracked this year, with an average cost per run of 775 ped. (309 runs were loss). The past month has a big negative impact on that ratio, but I hope it will pass before I go completly broke (out of the 10k loss this year, ~8k were lost past month; now I wish I didn't get that 4k hof, it was payback but I payed for it twice afterwards).

Trance, you should track, you'll get a better overview of your returns which will(hopefully) look better on paper than it actually feels
gl.

 

[trance]

Ok, did a rocky run test last night, after 6days break: 250 drops (ores,enmatter,tresoure) all 3 together.
return was again only 60%.

I dont think i need to track my runs, if 9 of 10 runs are less as 70%, then the average will not be much higher.
this hapen since weeks at me.. so i can say after 100 runs i may got about 10 runs with small profit. Average loot will be about 70%, of all the 100 runs.

The only good thing, if loot is that bad at me, i more work at game developing and don't play entropia. So my products i bee at developing grow up much faster now. And it don't feels like been a looser like here.. I just miss the chat, while developing games

One more, next depo for month juny is cancled, about bad loot! Thanks to MA, this way i save some cash for RL.