Tennogen and plat

[LankesterMerrin]

So what's the deal with this Steam exclusivity? Why can't we buy Tennogen items with plat?

Instead of helping Valve further cement their monopoly, why doesn't DE encourage a more open Tennogen?

As it stands now, the Tennogen items go up to 600% of the usual plat prices. Yes, I know that Tennogen is primarily supporting the community artists who design the items - but even with that consideration, it's difficult to argue why the system should be locked to Steam, instead of being as open as DE can make it.

Take syandanas - their normal price in plat is between 50 - 100p. If you get one of the 75% discount coupons, you get a sweet deal of 1 euro / dollar buying you 95 plat. Tennogen syandanas cost six euros each. In plat that would cost you almost 600p.

It's certainly not a question of complicated payments back to the creators - DE offers an impressive amount of payment options for plat buyers, I'm sure they would be able to arrange a decent choice of payment methods back to Tennogen creators. And it's not like it would hurt the community creators either, as it would simply eliminate one completely unnecessary middleman - Valve - while keeping the funds flowing back to the creators, with DE's commission on top.

I'm genuinely puzzled as to why DE is continuing with this questionable approach of supporting Valve's unethical monopoly practices in digital gaming marketplace, instead of opening the system up as much as they can...

[tyranno66]

You're forgetting that this is done through the steam workshop. It already has the infrastructure needed for artists to create their submissions.

Also, iirc most of the cost goes towards the artist. Some tennogen creators do tennogen for a living and would most definitely quit were DE to lower prices whilst moving away from steam. Steam also makes it easier to actually get the money of your submissions and state it as your source of income.

All of this boils down to "I don't want to pay for tennogen wash"

[LankesterMerrin]

16 minutes ago, tyranno66 said:

You're forgetting that this is done through the steam workshop. It already has the infrastructure needed for artists to create their submissions.

Also, iirc most of the cost goes towards the artist. Some tennogen creators do tennogen for a living and would most definitely quit were DE to lower prices whilst moving away from steam. Steam also makes it easier to actually get the money of your submissions and state it as your source of income.

All of this boils down to "I don't want to pay for tennogen wash"

Not as far as I can see...

Steam workshop is mainly for modders, like the thousands of Skyrim modders, for instance. While Tennogen is an official initiative by DE. It's not like Steam offers some kind of exclusive 3D modeling suite and game import tools - all the assets created independently by the community still have to be imported in WF by DE. I see literally zero value of Valve's involvement here, beyond the ability to use Steam wallet for small purchases such as these. And therefore I see absolutely no technical reason why Valve should be involved at all.

All the while the handling of these transactions through Valve inflates the overall costs for the players to ridiculous levels and limits the use of platinum - I would see a convincing argument in claiming that removing the Valve middleman would actually help boost direct plat sales from DE (as opposed to help line Valve's pockets with their 30% - 50% or whatever it is commission).

Sure, back in 2015 when Tennogen started, it was a different situation - but now that WF has grown this much, isn't it time for DE to say good bye to Valve and take Tennogen its own independent way, with direct plat purchases?

Edit - forgot one more thing: it's not about lowering the payout to the artists, that is a complete misunderstanding of my point. DE could keep exactly the same levels of payouts to the artists and their own commission - and still lower the end price for the players, while integrating the system with the standard platinum purchases. Artists would get the same amount of money, DE would get the same amount of money, players would be able to pay less and they could do so with plat. Apart from Valve, who exactly would be losing here?

Edited August 26, 2018 by LankesterMerrin

[KGeddon]

This is impossible.  Tennogen creators are paid in real money, and therefore tennogen purchases are in real money.  Plat is not actually money, but an ingame item with no real world value.

 

/thread

[(XBOX)Ubern00ber88]

17 minutes ago, KGeddon said:

This is impossible.  Tennogen creators are paid in real money, and therefore tennogen purchases are in real money.  Plat is not actually money, but an ingame item with no real world value.

 

/thread

Console players can buy tennogen for plat but market discount coupons do not work on them. I always theorized this was a form of "sorry" from DE since they could not offer us direct off coupons on platinum purchasing like PC user sometimes get as a login.

[trst]

It's simply because of the legal agreements between DE and Steam.

I don't know exactly what their agreement is but I'd assume the major point is that DE pays a portion of tennogen sales directly to Steam (they also pay a portion to the creators themselves). Which due to plat being able to be discounted it might be possible for tennogen to be sold at a loss for DE.

Also due to the ease of acquiring plat in-game the chances of that being "discounted-plat" would likely mean that most tennogen sales would cost DE.

 

As for DE being able to sell tennogen on consoles for plat; it's simply not going through steam and console plat can't be directly discounted.

[Kai_Shiba]

Because

A. It's an easy to access platform that allows Content creators to easily place their showcasing.

B. Purchases are done automatically, giving the cut to DE, Steam and Content creators instead of doing it manually.

C. Obviously the contract.

 

3 hours ago, LankesterMerrin said:

Take syandanas - their normal price in plat is between 50 - 100p. If you get one of the 75% discount coupons, you get a sweet deal of 1 euro / dollar buying you 95 plat. Tennogen syandanas cost six euros each. In plat that would cost you almost 600p.

 

Remove that 75% discount and the plat price is the same as the Tennogen prices. Not whatever that 600% you pulled out of.

 

Also steam workshop is not mainly for modders. It's for both curated content and mods. Content creators aren't gonna get paid by plat.

Whenever a console player buys Tennogen for plat, Content creators get nothing

Edited August 26, 2018 by Kai_Shiba

[---Merchant---]

Would be nice to at least make original launcher work with steam instead of forcing ppl  to redownload whole game just to buy some shiny cosmetic item and i say BUY not get free.
If it was free,i would not mind but to pay both convenience and money is little too much.
I do not quite see why original launcher does not have something exclusive too,why even have it at that point.
And yes I 101% think steam is trash platform full of scams and every year it is worse and worse(I used to like steam in early years)
It is computer virus that you willingly install.

[[DE]Momaw]

1 hour ago, KGeddon said:

This is impossible.  Tennogen creators are paid in real money, and therefore tennogen purchases are in real money.  Plat is not actually money, but an ingame item with no real world value.

 

/thread

Tradeable platinum is money. There is no way to get tradeable platinum into the game except by paying for it.

The problem is....how MUCH money is it. Discounts and regional differences make it a difficult question to answer.

And yes, I would love Tennogen to be available through some other way. Warframe built a reputation as one of the fairest F2P games in the industry because you could grind or trade for basically everything. Free players were not excluded from having all the things in the game if they were willing to put in the time. Now...Tennogen breaks that. There is very definitely F2P cosmetics on one hand, and then Tennogen on the other hand.  However the fact that Steam doesn't exist in the consoles and they make Tennogen work just fine is proof that other solutions do exist.

Edited August 26, 2018 by Momaw

[peterc3]

55 minutes ago, ---Merchant--- said:

Would be nice to at least make original launcher work with steam instead of forcing ppl  to redownload whole game just to buy some shiny cosmetic item and i say BUY not get free.

Just move everything to Steam's Warframe folder, or is that not working?

56 minutes ago, ---Merchant--- said:

I do not quite see why original launcher does not have something exclusive too,why even have it at that point.

With the exclusion of TennoGen and old cosmetics, WF is not tied to Steam at all, the original launcher is what is started by Steam. Why not have it?

58 minutes ago, ---Merchant--- said:

And yes I 101% think steam is trash platform full of scams and every year it is worse and worse(I used to like steam in early years)
It is computer virus that you willingly install.

It doesn't install anything you don't tell it to, it has no pop-ups, does not alter system files, only runs when you want it to run. Anything on the platform is up to you to buy or not.

How is that a virus? Steam was objectively awful when it was first brought out.

4 hours ago, LankesterMerrin said:

Why can't we buy Tennogen items with plat?

Plat on PC has no fixed value. There's no way for DE to compensate creators with the equivalent of anywhere from full price to 75% off Plat. The cost for this would be the removal of Plat coupons, possibly even more. Is that worth it?

[tyranno66]

16 minutes ago, Momaw said:

Tradeable platinum is money. There is no way to get tradeable platinum into the game except by paying for it.

The problem is....how MUCH money is it. Discounts and regional differences make it a difficult question to answer.

And yes, I would love Tennogen to be available through some other way. Warframe built a reputation as one of the fairest F2P games in the industry because you could grind or trade for basically everything. Free players were not excluded from having all the things in the game if they were willing to put in the time. Now...Tennogen breaks that. There is very definitely F2P cosmetics on one hand, and then Tennogen on the other hand.  However the fact that Steam doesn't exist in the consoles and they make Tennogen work just fine is proof that other solutions do exist.

Sigh there should not be a F2P way to get tennogen cosmetics.

Some people's livelihoods depend on tennogen sales. The only reason consoles get tennogen is because DE pays a hefty sum to tennogen creators per item. And I'm talking in the thousands. The current system makes it so any people on the main platform (PC) that buy a tennogen item pay the creators directly.

That means both that DE wouldn't be screwed over by/screw over the tennogen creators by buying an item for too low/too high a sum and letting the creators see how a specific item fares in term of sales so that the price for consoles can be adjusted by them.

Stop being selfish. If tennogen isn't bought directly with money by everyone a lot of creators will just quit making content for WF and you'll have items that are nowhere near as good as the ones we have now.

Edited August 26, 2018 by tyranno66
Formatting

[KGeddon]

1 hour ago, Momaw said:

Tradeable platinum is money. There is no way to get tradeable platinum into the game except by paying for it.

The problem is....how MUCH money is it. Discounts and regional differences make it a difficult question to answer.

And yes, I would love Tennogen to be available through some other way. Warframe built a reputation as one of the fairest F2P games in the industry because you could grind or trade for basically everything. Free players were not excluded from having all the things in the game if they were willing to put in the time. Now...Tennogen breaks that. There is very definitely F2P cosmetics on one hand, and then Tennogen on the other hand.  However the fact that Steam doesn't exist in the consoles and they make Tennogen work just fine is proof that other solutions do exist.

Incorrect.  Platinum is an ingame item with no actual worth.  The perceived worth that people attach to it is irrelevant.  Real world fact.  You can't even burn it to keep yourself warm in a blizzard, much less use it as construction material to build shelter.  It is not legal tender, backed by a nation's GDP.  As DE has proven, they can simply take it away at any time if they feel like it, so it carries no guarantees(cryptocurrency at least has some legal basis/backing, if shaky).

[Yagamilight123]

hace 2 horas, Momaw dijo:

Tradeable platinum is money. There is no way to get tradeable platinum into the game except by paying for it.

The problem is....how MUCH money is it. Discounts and regional differences make it a difficult question to answer.

And yes, I would love Tennogen to be available through some other way. Warframe built a reputation as one of the fairest F2P games in the industry because you could grind or trade for basically everything. Free players were not excluded from having all the things in the game if they were willing to put in the time. Now...Tennogen breaks that. There is very definitely F2P cosmetics on one hand, and then Tennogen on the other hand.  However the fact that Steam doesn't exist in the consoles and they make Tennogen work just fine is proof that other solutions do exist.

There is an insane amount of plat in circulation .... in some far ago time maybe was equal to money ... now its not , 90% of the players can buy whatever they want without buying plat with no problem , so changing real $ price for plat its a big big big big lost for them  .

Edited August 26, 2018 by Yagamilight123

[vvhorus]

7 hours ago, LankesterMerrin said:

So what's the deal with this Steam exclusivity? Why can't we buy Tennogen items with plat?

Tell your boss to pay you with plat, and you will understand after your first paycheck...

[Gremlin]

I feel it'd be really tough to pay the creators with plat purchases anyways. Too many sales and shady plat traders that I'd feel it'd be very hard to gauge how much they should be paid. I'd prefer the creators be paid accordingly so that they continue creating such awesome pieces. I know through console they have it with plat, but as far as I know it isn't the whole tennogen catalog, and they're under a different contract altogether. Might be different with how steam chooses to run their stuff.

[Godzton]

 Just make all tennogen skins cost a dollar amount only, everyone wins?

[(PSN)robotwars7]

9 hours ago, LankesterMerrin said:

So what's the deal with this Steam exclusivity? Why can't we buy Tennogen items with plat?

because Steam wants their money. I'm sure if they could, the Devs and most of the Artists would be happy to make Tennogen available for everyone via plat, but sadly it can't happen, and even if it did, not all Tennogen creators would be on board. Tennogen via plat is one of the few advantages we have on consoles, and even then it's only a certain selection.

meanwhile PC gets more frequent updates, better performance, and you don't have to wait until your next update for bugs to be fixed. try to be happy with what you have, you'll feel better.

[(PSN)lokaspoka]

22 minutes ago, (PS4)robotwars7 said:

meanwhile PC gets more frequent updates, better performance, and you don't have to wait until your next update for bugs to be fixed. try to be happy with what you have, you'll feel better.

he is those payers that doesnt have a cent of idea how much effort goes into  making a tennogen item it takes months and its a living u cant afford to get cost cutted, he needs to buy what he likes and put his wallet away. Its a tactic to avoid paying for tennogen hes looking for a shortcut.making a thread and pretending that he's talking in the best interest of others 

Edited August 26, 2018 by (PS4)lokaspoka

[trst]

For people making comparisons of plat to real world currency; DE could easily pay creators in REAL MONEY over plat transactions if plat had a fixed price.

 

For simplicity imagine that you could only buy plat at the rate of 75p for $5 usd (ignoring tax and currency conversion). Now imagine that creators got an exact 20% cut on sales of their items. In the case of a 75p tennogen item the creator would recieve $1 usd per sale. Even though the 75p itself has no monetary value it still had the fixed value DE received of the original $5.

 

However plat does not have a fixed value due to the higher priced bundles with their bonus plat and the plat discounts. Because of this DE can't properly pay creators since plat can (roughly) range from the value of 15p per $1 usd to 86p per $1 usd. Thus DE would often be paying out of their own pockets if tennogen was sold for plat.

 

But yeah, DE could 100% sell tennogen for platinum and still be able to pay creators and steam with real money. Just that it would come at the cost of removing the plat bundles and all plat discounts which I don't think would go over well with the community or DE's income.

[aswitz87]

You really want DE to get rid of plat discounts? 

[vomder]

What if they placed a price on them equivalent to the largest plat discount. Sure it would make them cost a lot of plat per item, but the option would be there.

 

7 hours ago, ---Merchant--- said:

steam is trash platform full of scams and every year it is worse and worse(I used to like steam in early years)
It is computer virus that you willingly install.

No, it's really not. You are being ridiculous.

[ADM-Ntek]

but wouldn't tennogen for plat get more people to buy it. just look at steam sales the games are heavily discounted but the developers still make good money. there are plenty of tennogen items i would like but i simply cant afford to pay for it. 

Edited August 27, 2018 by ADM-Ntek

[trst]

28 minutes ago, vomder said:

What if they placed a price on them equivalent to the largest plat discount. Sure it would make them cost a lot of plat per item, but the option would be there.

 

9 minutes ago, ADM-Ntek said:

but wouldn't tennogen for plat get more people to buy it. just look at steam sales the games are heavily discounted but the developers still make good money. there are plenty of tennogen items i would like but i simply cant afford to pay for it. 

If my math earlier was correct and the "value" of plat ranges from 15-86p per $1 usd then you'd end up with most items costing a bit more than 500p each.

Considering that's about twice the value of a delux bundle I doubt a lot of people would want to buy tennogen at all unless there was a plat and cash option for buying them (plus if it was made plat only then it's really unfair to the people who can just pay real money for them). But them DE would get loads of complaints about how over priced tennogen items would be even though their "dollar value" remained the same.

[(XBOX)Dex Xean]

This is a major reason I'm happy on consoles xD

[LankesterMerrin]

The talk of this change requiring Tennogen artists to be paid in plat is a bit of a straw man, isn't it - I never suggested anything like that... DE already use a wide range of direct payment options for plat purchases and there's no reason to think they wouldn't be able to create a similar system for direct Tennogen pay outs. Transferring money to PayPal accounts or similar platforms - or even to Steam wallets for that matter - should not be too difficult to do.

The fluctuating cost of plat due to the occasional discounts would be the harder nut to crack. But even that could probably be handled by looking at the aggregate plat purchase statistics and locking the plat value for the sake of Tennogen payments to that. DE have an accurate view of their plat sales, including discount coupons, so it's not impossible to figure out which brackets the most sales come from and thus also what should the cash payments to Tennogen creators be.

Again, it's not like Valve brings anything to this system and judging by their efforts of two years ago to heavily monetise some of the previously free community creations together with Bethesda, and by articles like this one: https://www.extremetech.com/gaming/249519-valve-steam-helping-pc-gaming-hurting  I wouldn't be surprised if the major part of Tennogen payments actually went to Valve and not to the creators themselves (or to DE)...