Purchasing shard packs with gems?

Did I understand this right at yesterday's devstream? They are going to add a possibility to basically purchase loot upgrades for real money?

At the price they put them at, I don't think it'll be a problem. Who in their right mind would pay that much for 1 of something you can get 2 of every 10-20 minutes just by AFK'ing?

It's not like C5 packs are included anyway, and now that each pack only drops shards from that Chaos difficulty there's even less reason to buy them with gems.

I have a feeling that, despite the limitations, there will be enough ppl to buy those packs... ^^

@calmchaos quote:

At the price they put them at, I don't think it'll be a problem. Who in their right mind would pay that much for 1 of something you can get 2 of every 10-20 minutes just by AFK'ing?

It's not like C5 packs are included anyway, and now that each pack only drops shards from that Chaos difficulty there's even less reason to buy them with gems.

its shards after all, it's not gear... so it's not p2w in any way.

it's just as they said once there is 10 chaos and more in the future, it'll be a good way for people to catch up fast, instead of playing every chaos difficulty to collect all the shards.

also you get 5 shards pack for buying it ( if i'm not mistaken) instead of 1 pack as you mentioned 

@trshy quote:

@calmchaos quote:

At the price they put them at, I don't think it'll be a problem. Who in their right mind would pay that much for 1 of something you can get 2 of every 10-20 minutes just by AFK'ing?

It's not like C5 packs are included anyway, and now that each pack only drops shards from that Chaos difficulty there's even less reason to buy them with gems.

its shards after all, it's not gear... so it's not p2w in any way.

it's just as they said once there is 10 chaos and more in the future, it'll be a good way for people to catch up fast, instead of playing every chaos difficulty to collect all the shards.

also you get 5 shards pack for buying it ( if i'm not mistaken) instead of 1 pack as you mentioned 

thought i heard this on my 1 minute on the dev stream.

while its not p2w in the sense of being the best, it is paying for better gear.

"it'll be a good way for people to catch up fast,"    - then why have so many fricking number variants for a difficulty!!!!!

@trshy quote:

@calmchaos quote:

At the price they put them at, I don't think it'll be a problem. Who in their right mind would pay that much for 1 of something you can get 2 of every 10-20 minutes just by AFK'ing?

It's not like C5 packs are included anyway, and now that each pack only drops shards from that Chaos difficulty there's even less reason to buy them with gems.

its shards after all, it's not gear... so it's not p2w in any way.

it's just as they said once there is 10 chaos and more in the future, it'll be a good way for people to catch up fast, instead of playing every chaos difficulty to collect all the shards.

also you get 5 shards pack for buying it ( if i'm not mistaken) instead of 1 pack as you mentioned 

Ah, yeah you're right. It is 5 after all.

Hm... that puts them at 25 gems / 100 DM per pack. I guess that's not as expensive as I initially thought, $1.25 for an hour's worth of work.

And yes, I agree that it's not p2w. Campaign shards are still vastly superior to the majority of C2+ shards. There are only a handful of Chaos shards that are worth taking in place of a campaign shard, and most of those are in C1.

Charging for shards absolutely is p2w.  Do we not already have enough things they charge gems for?  For christ's sake even resetting ascension levels costs gems.  Shards represent SIGNIFICANT increases to tower effectiveness.  There should not in any way be a means to pay real money for these items.

I expected there to be a lot of new stuff coming but not the possibility to purchase loot/victory chest content with gems. That's why I was not sure if I understood that statement from the devstream right. Thank you for confirming. ^^

I totally understand the need to earn money. Since the costumes are - in my opinion - totally linear (no possibility to mix different costume pieces) I would pay a huge lot of money to look like a few hundred others. Well... that discussion ended a long time ago and the devs had already made it clear they don't want to change how costumes are implemented.

Only they know if this was intended anyway or if costumes are not selling so great. ^^ I'm sure a lot of players won't be bothered by this. I think this will make any highscore boards (if I remember correctly they mentioned they want to implement this some time later) obsolete.

@Valthejean quote:

Charging for shards absolutely is p2w.  Do we not already have enough things they charge gems for?  For christ's sake even resetting ascension levels costs gems.  Shards represent SIGNIFICANT increases to tower effectiveness.  There should not in any way be a means to pay real money for these items.

I am not sure the shard purchase is much different than paying for the new heroes for me.

What is kind of sad about the shard purchase is if a new player buys a big bag of shards, they will need to grind an awful long time to actually get the medals/gold to upgrade them to make them at all effective. It probably makes more sense to forget shard upgrades (except for a couple of key builder ones) and focus on upgrading gear to get to the hidden item power caps.

Without being able to spam run Demon's Lair and with no real gold spheres, the grind for medals/gold is brutal. As it will keep requiring more and more time to get to the higher levels, they will need to figure out ways to get some new blood in to the higher levels.

I am much more offended by the Ascension reset costs - it is frustrating to know everything may change each patch, and we will be expected to pay 200 medals/50 cents per hero to adjust things accordingly. I am more than willing to spend money on the game, but this feels like extortion.

@Dreizehn quote:

Did I understand this right at yesterday's devstream? They are going to add a possibility to basically purchase loot upgrades for real money?

yes they add the option to buy shards for gems\medals

but only shards from lower chaos tiers than you are

if youre c5 player you can buy campaign to c4 shards but not c5

I see buying shards with gems as holding 2 potential customer types.

1. People buying Shards who have an odd amount of gems unable to buy anything of use, bags/skins and just want to get rid of their remaining gems.
2. People with more money then sense.

Either option gives Trendy much needed capital, which hopefully will translate into a better gaming experience for the rest of us. 

As long as they focus on the game being fun and rewarding for players not willing to spend gems to progress it will remain a great game and get better.

I was just watching the Devstream and noticed this as well. Guess they ran out of ideas.

I don't know why anyone cares about C5 shards ? Most C5 shards are utterly useless. I have no idea why they wouldn't just throw them in too ?  

From a builder perspective, pretty much only frosty power is useful. 

Doesn't matter what excuse they come up with, this is definitely pay to win.  Shards improve defenses, buying shards means buying defense improvement. 

Even if C5 shards are useless now (except frosty), they will surely rework them to make them relevant again (I hope so). That's not the issue here.

my first thought when they talked about that implementation was buying them for gold (and maybe medals). since the system seemed like a same setup like spheres before. the gems came as a surprise to me. as many pointed out you buy into power...please do not do this trendy. it is a slippery slope...

I would be fine for buying shards with gold or medals, but not with gems.

It really is P2W in the end... To get shards normally you have to beat levels.. now i can just pay cash to get them... sure you dont get the top chaos gems.. but still Chaos 1 - 4 people stuck on C1 can buy C3 shards possibly get that Rate shard i still dont have for cash ;)... im 330+ ascension btw...

Really not a Fan of P2W in games.. i undestand Trendy need to make money somehow but i dont think this is the right way to do it... Give us expansions that cost money.. continue the story what happens to that freaky dude that jumped off the ship at the end of the Harbinger fight ??.. this is stuff im willing to pay for.. keep the base game F2P.. but want more of the story sell it to us.. not shortcuts....

I think this all comes down to pricing, if its design is to use up unwanted gems fair enough, but if the price is low enough that you can almost guarantee the shard you want for a few hundred gems, then I am utterly against it.

So with that said, my previous comment is kind of dependent on the estimated price per shard.

I think it is good they sell them, for the time they introduce more chaos tiers, because new players will otherwise find it so hard to catch up and this gives them a chance to get a headstart for catching up. Right now it does not change anything for us anyway. If I may compare this to the most popular F2P game in the world: LoL - This is like buying an exp boost in lol, except it just helps you gearing up, not actually getting an EXP boost for higher Ascension levels, which outscales shards anyway. I do not see a problem, I see an additional revenue chance for Trendy that can help them make the game better.

Oh no people can spend money for no advantage over what you can get by playing the game. What will we ever do?

@Hom-Sha-Bom quote:

Oh no people can spend money for no advantage over what you can get by playing the game. What will we ever do?

The point PPL are making is that Trendy has just turned this into a P2W game, even if just a small amount, when they have always said they want this F2P. They have never indicated they want a P2W style.

That said... maybe I should just drop $5k into gems this week so I can get plenty of deadly strikes and defense rate shards. Although...that would stink if the RNG gods hate me when I buy all those shards and give me 0 Deadly Strikes and Defense Rate shards...

@SpiderDanX quote:

@Hom-Sha-Bom quote:

Oh no people can spend money for no advantage over what you can get by playing the game. What will we ever do?

The point PPL are making is that Trendy has just turned this into a P2W game, even if just a small amount, when they have always said they want this F2P. They have never indicated they want a P2W style.

That said... maybe I should just drop $5k into gems this week so I can get plenty of deadly strikes and defense rate shards. Although...that would stink if the RNG gods hate me when I buy all those shards and give me 0 Deadly Strikes and Defense Rate shards...

I know what point people are trying to make, but they're wrong. It's clearly NOT pay to win when you can still earn everything through game play and defender medals. Maybe you can say its pay to save time but so the *** what?

But if you insist to use that faulty logic then the day the Abyss Lord was released the game went P2W so there's nothing new here, move along.

There's nothing pay2win about DD2 YET. If I'd call something p2w is that idea I saw about having to continue the story only by paying. Something you can obtain by farming OR by paying is not pay2win. -> If you insist otherwise okay... Hero slots are p2w, Heroes are p2w. And thats a stupid logic to follow. 

If you could buy the exact shard you want then it might be a bit p2w. But still the game is still win-able without that shard that "player" wants to buy. I don't really ever see p2w be something someone should be concerned about in a PVE game, else you are just butthurt... The only things currently only obtainable by gems are special skins and bags. 

Paying to obtain a godly weapon only obtainable by paying that is indeed p2w.

my opinion...

be able to buy C4 "Defense Rate" shard = pay2win !

sad to see, :-(

@Haui quote:

my opinion...

be able to buy C4 "Defense Rate" shard = pay2win !

sad to see, :-(

Was that not c3 though?