MA`s masterplan

[Witte]

I can be 100% certain that I do know. you just have to read the published annual report. it's all in there - exactly what they see as revenue, how much cash is held against the player liability (and, it's not all), and how much of that liabilty has been "converted".

I do agree that there are far too many of these thread speculating all sort of nonsense. in the past, I've gone so far as to actually provide a link to these reports so that people can read them and understand. it doesn't seem to do much good, though.

oh, and, I do think I get a lot of value for my money. I have a great time, most of the time. which is okay. nothing is perfect.

IMO there are two different angles on this subject. There is the legal part, the way MA actually handles deposits and withdraws, which results into their income and profit. And there is the game part, this is the method MA uses to make sure you keep those deposits coming. IMO these two things should be kept separate in discussions. The legal part is not really interesting for discussion as like you say it can be found in their annual reports. The game part however is, as it is unclear how this exactly works.

 

[voidtroid]

Says it all yeah

no actualy it doesnt...
im NOT saying MA deonst take parts from decay for them. what im saying is they take out money out of the game to make people deposit... and that this "new" loot destribution system supports their way haveing regular deposits!

I keep hearing this.

I played back then. I got similar or worse returns than now. It wasn't this mythical profit paradise people say it is.

then you did something wrong... its not like i kept profiting on everything. your comeback used to be more steady adn didnt had those big ups and downs.

if you check the old pioneers page you may even find some of the old hunting stats and see yourself

 

[SuperKanjo]

im NOT saying MA deonst take parts from decay for them. what im saying is they take out money out of the game to make people deposit... and that this "new" loot destribution system supports their way haveing regular deposits!

The first thing you said is that MA makes money on deposits players make, and thats not true

 

[kira-red]

The game part however is, as it is unclear how this exactly works.

that's true. we don't know how the loot algorithms work nor do we know what percentage of all "decay" is removed from the system.

I would be very insterest in the ratio of average (or typical) loot returned to that delivered through globals and whatnot.

 

[SpikeBlack]

all your stuff (ped on card and the terminal value of all your items) are considered a liability of sort by MA. as such, you're entitled to be paid for them, should MA go bankrupt. how much you get depends on swedish brankrupcy law and how the trustee handles the liquidation.

you might get all if the liability is considered to be a high enough priority. you might get 10 cents to the dollar. it's diffcult to say. I'm be inclined to think that it's a high priority. MA has said it's guaranteed, however, this only means something if there are enough assests to cover the debt, which appears to be the case.

Not true anymore, they changed it. They now only have to cover the value of the deposits for the last six months if they go bust.

 

[kira-red]

Not true anymore, they changed it. They now only have to cover the value of the deposits for the last six months if they go bust.

where did you find that piece of information? I be curious to read how that works.

 

[Thorn]

I can agree that the hills are alot higher and the valleys are alot deeper. Unfortunately I wait out the valleys by sweating, clearing out storage and cutting back on runs and play time. Depositing the equivalent of a tower to keep playing at a certain level for me is not an option.

 

[aridash]

Not true anymore, they changed it. They now only have to cover the value of the deposits for the last six months if they go bust.

that clause of the EULA is a limitation for legal liability* not anything relating to bankruptcy (which wouldnt be covered in the EULA anyway as state law would trump anything in there). As far as i can tell the protection of ped value is the same as it ever was.

* ie if you sue for MA software damaging you PC, or the game damaging your health.

 

[Iron Monkey]

I have been playing for some years now and i have never had 90% return on hunts. MA makes money from the game.... whats new in that?

 

[Spawn]

If 1 million people all deposit 500$ still no income for MA, they just "hold" the money, maybe they invest or pay bills with it. But when all those ppl withdraw it all again they all get their 500$ back (minus fee's ofc) so where is the part where MA makes money on the deposit ??

well the money doesnt go to your ped-card. Your ped-card fills up with ped, which is not money. The real money goes to the bank. The bank pays interest. if you withdraw the same day after your deposit, you still have to wait a while (weeks to months) before you get your money back. Also you pay some fees to mindark.
So Mindark make money off your deposit in the form of interest + fees.
Ofcourse they also make money from diminishing your ped-card when you do activities that cost money, like hunting, crafting, mining in the form of decay.

 

[Tree-doctor]

Legaly, peds dont exist. Only $ exist. So its easy to make some interests on ur deposited $, safely, and giving u peds, who are "free to create", and gambling a bit on the future. Anyway, in the way MA rules the economie and the game, and in all the way they possibly make money, they do it smartly and for now, nobody had to complain about this.

 

[Xandra]

Hi,

Ahhhhh - the "MA lives from decay fairy tale" again ...

Yes, Marco told us about - but he told us of a lot of things - vehicles, factories, improvements of MindForce and Melee professions and what else.
For sure, I believe every word of it.

What I see is MA's quarterly reports. They have been linked again and again. Get your consultant and have him analyze it.

But back to topic:

why does it work that way?

Answer is simple: It's part of MA's masterplan ;-)

MA found it suitable to invent items (L and UL) with crazy TT PED values - my UL Embra, more or less a newbie sword, has a non usable minimum value of 1486 PED (50%), close to 150 USD! As mentioned, this is a newbie weapon in fact. Check Wikipedia for weapons, and sort descending by max. TT - there's more than 100 weapons now with a max. TT above 100 USD (1K PED), quite some (L)'s among these (14).

For sure dropping of such items is creating stimuli for depositing - if you have a look you'll notice that quite many of these drop from mobs ways above the range where they'd be able to be used against ...
They are meant to be sold, and to create deposits.

We could now philosophize about the possibility for MA to ensure not to have to pay back the deposits ever, with wasting of deposited money due to decay, but this would go far off topic IMHO.

Fact is, MA has invented items with crazy min. TT PED values, meant to drop. Even my newbie Embra should drop with a value of at least 1486 PED, it would be pure TT fodder otherwise, because unusable.

So MA opened the roof of the "loot value limit", and for a nice amount. We might haven't even seen the actually possible max. loots yet - they're supposed to be extremely rare ...
But this opening to the top has broadened the range of possibilities for the formerly quite rare 5-digit loots too, you see a result here.

What does this mean?

Simply: every single 20K HoF is a loss of 40x 500 PED globals, or 200x 100 PED globals, or 400x 50 PEDders, or 1.000 of 20 PED minis.

Since this amount of potentially nice loots vanishes into thin air now with any of these now regular daily huge loots the situation for the overwhelming number of participants has drastically changed for the worse.

I'm in since late '05, and I do not believe the "90% return tales". I'm still in today, and should I go down to "50% return" I'd start to think about my own mental sanity. But things have changed:

• In the "old days" you'd not have to abandon all fun to ensure an acceptable loss - even fun hunts as newbie would have quite a good chance to hit a jackpot (a "welfare gift" compared to what we name "jackpot" today, but enough to motivate you).
  .
• "Eco hunting" as we know it today didn't exist - mindless grinding over hours on most boring, harmless "mobs in your range" wasn't needed - Amp on Opalo, and let's the party begin!
  .
• Even small mobs dropped something actually worth auctioning quite regularly - today all but the top 25% (or less?) are constantly receiving TT fodder or have to collect for ages to even be able to overcome an auction fee ...

This means:

• - that I have reduced my deposits significantly, and I know very well I'm not alone here
  .
• - that the number of second time depositors has gone close to zero - after they burn their first 50 USD in an unhappy afternoon without a "jackpot" they are frustrated. Remember, 1st time depositors rarely have 10/10, and rarely start with the gruesome "eco grind" ...
  .
• - that the top 25% (or less) of participants rarely deposit anymore, because it's them that are able to "eco grind" the juicy ones - I'm able to kill Argos up to Guardian without any armor, without big FAPping, with most eco weapons over and over, but there's ppl that are able to do similar with Trox, Hogglo, Phasm and such in an equivalent way. Question to the esteemed reader: Who'll loot the good MU stuff? I'm drowning in Kango Masks ...

Result:

Deposits have gone down the drain, MA's quarterly's clearly state. So less PED to distribute, so even less for the overwhelming number of participants, so even more to the top 25% (or less), so complete [censored].

MA's masterplan seems to be clear:

1. Get the most phat gun you can find
2. Load with most harming bullets you can find
3. Aim carefully
4. Aim more carefully
5. Fire at your own foot with all you have!

Have fun!

 

[aridash]

What I see is MA's quarterly reports. They have been linked again and again. Get your consultant and have him analyze it.
...

Result:

Deposits have gone down the drain, MA's quarterly's clearly state.

maybe you should link to the reports you are reading as the ones i've seen show still increasing deposits and revenue.

• "Eco hunting" as we know it today didn't exist - mindless grinding over hours on most boring, harmless "mobs in your range" wasn't needed - Amp on Opalo, and let's the party begin!
  
• Even small mobs dropped something actually worth auctioning quite regularly - today all but the top 25% (or less?) are constantly receiving TT fodder or have to collect for ages to even be able to overcome an auction fee

well some of your points about "how things were" are valid, except these.

eco hunting was running around with Opalo+A105/6, it was still grinding. i almost quit when i realised there was little chance of progression while everyone was doing the same, amp change was one of the best things that happened imo as it opened up the whole range of weaponry to all on a more equal footing. sadly this was then undone with widespread introduction of SIB across the whole skill range. And small mobs didnt drop anything they dont now (with exception of A10x amps) any more regularly, and it wasnt usually worth auctioning with the flat 1ped fee if you could wait to sell it on the street.

 

[EyesOfMadness]

If 1 million people all deposit 500$ still no income for MA, they just "hold" the money, maybe they invest or pay bills with it. But when all those ppl withdraw it all again they all get their 500$ back (minus fee's ofc) so where is the part where MA makes money on the deposit ??

Well firstly they take a % of each deposit or withdrawal or both I forget. But most importantly I think they make most of their money out of interest! MA make more money from every deposit and then continue to make money, even if we all quit and withdraw they can still be making money with the Interest off all the Interest made using our money/% of deposits etc. I think the main reason for the lower returns in game are down to MA. They have several incomes; 1. % of Deposits, 2. % of Withdrawals, 3. Decay/TT/Player Losses 4. Interest on all our money in their bank, probably spread over several accounts and maybe safe Investments/Shares they have made using our money, I bet there are more. Due to economic climate I expect income made on Deposits has gone down and income made on Withdrawals has gone up, this will affect their income on Interest because they have less money in the bank. MA don't want to start making less money all of a sudden so they will take the money from somewhere. They can use clever tricks on their statements to hide it, but I reckon MA CEO being taking a cut off the loot pool for quite some time now and that cut is only ever going to get bigger until they find themselves in same situation banks are in.

 

[Xandra]

maybe you should link to the reports you are reading as the ones i've seen show still increasing deposits and revenue.

Well, the latest report (find all here) available in other language but swedish says:

Net funds provided to EU: 112,672,000 PED in '08, compared to 113,539,000 PEDs in 2007. Loss in deposits, right?

They excuse it with the current crisis, prudently concealing that the on line gaming industry at the moment just cannot build up enough server space to meet the overwhelming demand - all but MA.

And I cannot remember ever to have talked about revenue - this would be ways beyond my knowledge.

eco hunting was running around with Opalo+A105/6, it was still grinding. i almost quit when i realised there was little chance of progression while everyone was doing the same, amp change was one of the best things that happened imo as it opened up the whole range of weaponry to all on a more equal footing.

Yep, it was grinding, too. A diminished version not to scare the early adaptors. But I'm quite sure you don't have any idea of what "eco hunting" or "grinding" means today - mindlessly slaughtering of gigazillions of poor, harmless, little Snables for instance, just to get the skills to use Breer M/P 1a ...
Then doing it again for the Breer M/P 2a - you should stay at mobs "in your reach" to not lose most badly ...
The way further just means "bigger maturities of these small, harmless, boring mobs".

You'd not believe me, I'm sure. So go out to sweat camp, offer "free hunting assistance", and talk to the ppl outside your ivory tower. FL just the few most dedicated, and only after they have deposited first. And watch them not ever coming on again very soon, close to all of them.

And small mobs didnt drop anything they dont now (with exception of A10x amps) any more regularly

They dropped armor than "then" had a value and could be sold. Pixie Harness M - TT fodder now. Not enough new participants that the demand would justify even the smallest of MU. They dropped weapons that "then" had a MU, but was replaced by (L) weapons dropping of mobs ways higher. And they dropped PED's, and even GSI's. Got quite some of the young Merp and Caudatergus I was actually "grinding" for some months - my available time was very short each day, so I parked at Jasons N outpost and did 20 - 30 min runs, day after day whenever I found time.

And got loot. Some of the best loot I ever got is from these days. Since actually some years the amount of average loot has decreased for me, my deposits have deceased accordingly, and, to cite Jim Morrison, "the whole s*******e is up in flames". Guess he didn't meant this way, but I really hope he got his kicks, in sufficient amounts.

Have fun!

 

[Lotte]

The Truth is very, very simple...

i know the loot has been discussed alot here... so i dont want to start another whine thread i just want to point out the way it is now and see what you got to say.

So you ask yourself why do i get 50% comebacks? why do noobs hit aths etc.

the answere is quite simple because MA need to earn money.
now there are many theories how they get there cash but the answere is they earn on DEPOSITS.

in the past( 3,4 years ago) you used to go on a hunt and you always came back with about 90% tt return. when you hit a hof it was alot more uncommon.
nowdays you loose alot more but also you hit alot BIGGER loots.
why does it work that way?
because when you have a lucky week or hit a real BIG one most of the players tend to upgrade equiment and go to higher level of gaming instead of saving in for the bad times... thats why ppl get forced to deposit regurarly.
This way MA get money into their pockets.

Again dont want to whine around here i just want to point out that propably after a year of gaming you still have the same 90% coomeback as you did before but the downs and ups are alot bigger.
AND youll see yourself on a lot higher lvl in your profession.

With every dollar, pound, yen, won, etc, MA makes money. Just that simple. If you put in 10 bucks or 1,000 bucks, its MA's money. They only have to worry when someone tries to take money out. With the CHANGES to loot, they can pick and choose their profit line, just that simple, OH...some guys is taking out 1,000 bucks, turn down the loot to match the withdrawl.

That is how it works...yep, you can get an ATH, but MA will be sure to lower the Loot to cover any outlay on their part..

Hell, its so simple, don't see why we see this question over and over.

Lotte...

 

[SpikeBlack]

maybe you should link to the reports you are reading as the ones i've seen show still increasing deposits and revenue.

Interim_Statement_for_Q4_and_2008

In the last report for Q4 2008 they introduced the 3x skilling event and congratulated themselves for it (page 3 paragraph 7) as deposits were falling and sure enough they had a depositing record that month where 100's reappeared and deposited purely for the skilling and then left again. The 2x skill events then happened a shortly after but fewer people went for it and then we have the mining 2x skilling fiasco. We're now seeing people who refuse to deposit unless there's a skilling event.

Without the skilling events MA would have been in a serious mess and then they changed the ped value they will honour if they go bust to the last 6 months of deposits, no longer the full tt value for everyone. Why do that unless they've spent the cash else where and had no chance of recouping it.

 

[aridash]

Well, the latest report (find all here) available in other language but swedish says:

Net funds provided to EU: 112,672,000 PED in '08, compared to 113,539,000 PEDs in 2007. Loss in deposits, right?

fair enough, not sure what i was remembering. possibly the total revenues (up) or the Q3 numbers.

...then they changed the ped value they will honour if they go bust to the last 6 months of deposits,

no they did not. they changed thier liabilty in the event of legal action, from the vague "the initial amount transfered" so an improvement.

 

[timmmers]

The loss in peds deposited, I wonder if that is somehow linked to the dollar dropping against other currencies so hugely...in my case it was almost 200 ped per £10 deposited last year and now it's around 150 ped (And has been lower)...the euro was strong against the pound and dollar...so maybe the numbers reflect simply us getting far less peds due to exchange rates, or us trying to wait for a better exchange rate ( I sure did ), which has now happened slightly.

The drop in peds deposited is nowhere near the drop in peds that would be easily accounted for by exchange rates alone...we probably deposited more in real hard currency which is what matters to MA most. There was a point that I would have almost halved the peds received for the same amount of pounds...yet the drop in peds deposited isn't even 10% in that same period. Big difference.

If MA make money only on decay, where do all the auction fees go then, and the other fees like TP from CP back down ?

MA has a masterplan for sure, it's to make a profit and survive at least, and at best to make enough to expand (and grow the universe and platform)...and I hope they do well with it because it's good for us too.

Wishing failure on them is really shooting yourself in the foot when you are involved financially as we all are to some extent.

If there is something really wrong or annoying or unfair, fair play complaining about it, but droning on about what is old news and isn't going to change is going to accomplish only one thing...discouraging new entrants without whom we'll all suffer eventually. People come here and decide if EU is for them sometimes, I'd personally prefer they spent a little time trying it (time not peds) than shy away ignorant never having set foot on Calypso.

t

 

[McCormick]

Incorrect, deposits go straight on to your ped card!!!

They earn from decay, this is widely known

Rgds

Ace

:Conspiracy mode on:
You deposit to their bank account, they get interest for it. You get pixel money.
:Conspiracy mode off:

 

[Deleted member 23278]

MA basicly earn money from decay (obviously and publicly known).... the money you spend is upto you.. your skills are worth money even if that sale amount is low or high ...it's still money back for what you spend...blah blah blah.....ummm blah blah and another blah.

loot return as a whole is bad at this time and i hate it but we don't know the future...it's a long term thing and i am a commited player but even then.. i hate whats happening where returns are concerned...blah blah blah.....ummmmmm blah

you say noobs hit ATHS ??... how many...one...two...out of over 500,000 players


i think this thread has an underlying motive of jealousy of those that do well for whatever reason.

 

[SpikeBlack]

you say noobs hit ATHS ??... how many...one...two...out of over 500,000 players

make that 20,000 - 30,000 active players (figures from MA). It's not jelousy but rather annoyance with MA that they've built a system where someone can play everyday for years and never hof only for someone who's barely been in the game more than a couple of weeks can get a one on a noob mob.

For years we've been told that skills matter and when people have queried support they've been told they're not balanced and thats a possible reason why they're loot sucks.

It took me 6 months to get my first solo global and many have gone years without getting one so its frustation with a system that was changed to allow big loots (for bigger L drops) that is causing many people to question why a Snable young should get a xk drop when MA have always tried to encourage people to move to higher mobs.

 

[timmmers]

make that 20,000 - 30,000 active players (figures from MA). It's not jelousy but rather annoyance with MA that they've built a system where someone can play everyday for years and never hof only for someone who's barely been in the game more than a couple of weeks can get a one on a noob mob.

For years we've been told that skills matter and when people have queried support they've been told they're not balanced and thats a possible reason why they're loot sucks.

It took me 6 months to get my first solo global and many have gone years without getting one so its frustation with a system that was changed to allow big loots (for bigger L drops) that is causing many people to question why a Snable young should get a xk drop when MA have always tried to encourage people to move to higher mobs.

Much truth there.

The Euromillions lottery always does best for sales when the thing isn't won and it rolls over, people see 50mill and get interested.thinking only of the prize and not of the chance of winning it. MA have a similar temptation for n00bs, they see massive loots that they can imagine themselves getting and jump in here until they realise they are likely to join the rest of us.

It's not only new guys that get insane and (TBH inexplicable) loots, there was an enormous run that filled the HOF list a few days back...the odds against which much be phenomenal. 20 people could have been more than happy with that.

The term "dynamic" is a coverall, it means we won't ever know the system or much about when or if it changes for sure. The basic as far as I'm concerned is that big HOFs advertise, and regular good loots for the mass playerbase is a stall for their deposits (also the fact that a lot of decent items are beyond the average player depositig to buy now)...better for MA that we run slowly out of peds than maintain a healthy ped card due to loot.

Someone go undercover and apply for a cleaner's job at MA and we'll find out all we keed to know

t