Conversion Rate Is King: Why These Market Changes Are A Terrible Idea

[MJ12]

The thing Battlefield:Heroes and its analysis of how to turn around a floundering free to play game into a financial success should teach two things:

 

1. "Pay to Win" is something people love to hate on but if it's not amazingly huge not that many people will quit over it

 

2. Conversion rate is king.

 

The second one is what I want to talk about right now, because #1 has little relevance to Warframe right now.

 

"Conversion rate" is the term EA used for taking a customer who didn't pay until that point and then getting them to pay money. Why was this important?

 

Because on average, someone who spent any money at all would end up spending 20+ dollars. However, initially, only something like 1% of all their players ever spent any money.

 

Conversion rate is king. When they figured this out, they implemented 'pay2win' systems as well as increasing non-cash prices and got a lot of anger, but that actually hides what they also did. They lowered prices for everything in cash. Pretty drastically, as I recall. Right now, the market changes essentially do #1 (ludicrously overprice everything in terms of non-real currency) and do the exact opposite of #2 (ludicrously overprice everything in cash money).

 

I made a thread a while ago about why everything was ludicrously overpriced, often by factors of 3 or more, and instead of having prices adjusted to be in line with microtransactions, what we ended up getting is the pricing guys you have doubling down and making everything even more ludicrously overpriced, then proceeding to add to their cost in game time. It's ludicrous.

 

Conversion rate is important, because someone who's already invested ten bucks in the game is more likely to invest another ten bucks later. It's how humans deal with sunk costs. If weapon plat prices are low, people are likely to want to buy them, which means they put in real money to the game and thus become a paying customer, increasing conversion rate. Pricing weapons like this may make you more money from the few people who buy them with Plat-but I doubt those people are buying them with Plat they just got from putting money in (i.e. DE getting money), but rather from plat they have from the reset.

 

Nobody has ever said the prices for things in plat were underpriced, everyone has stated repeatedly that these things were overpriced. There are topics on threads on other forums on Warframe telling everyone 'DO NOT BUY WEAPONS OR WARFRAMES WITH PLAT DAMMIT' and yet instead of recognizing that's a sign of bad value (i.e. CCP's "Monoclegate") the guys you have have doubled down on the high prices.

 

I really have no idea what the point of this exercise is. If it's to see if people pay attention to Plat prices, it's succeeded admirably. If it's to alienate the playerbase, it's succeeded. If it's because your competitors are sabotaging your game, congrats to them, they've done a good job.

 

If it's anything else, I really can't understand what led to the idea that increasing platinum prices and game-time prices simultaneously was a great idea.

[MrGrae]

So you work for DE's financial department? 

 

You know how much money they are losing and making on Warframe?

 

You know exactly how much they need to make to break even, or make a profit?

 

No? How shocking. 

 

Stop giving the Devs marketing advice, they seem to be doing alright to me.

 

This isn't about helping DE turn a profit, this is about you wanting more for less.

[Davoodoo]

Platinum prices remain same. At same time credit prices were increased cause most guns was too easy to get. We can argue about alloy plates but lets be honest 50k is matter of 2-3h farm.

[Kerrus]

But if they don't increase prices then they'll run out of the virtual items that aren't physically discretely produced, and aren't actually reduced in availability when a player buys them... oh wait.

Yeah, raising prices across the board with the intent to make more money is pretty goddamn stupid when you're dealing with a virtual product, because while such broad increases can be justified with a physical-real product that one actually has to manufacture, with a virtual item you're not paying any of those secondary costs, beyond the initial one-time cost to make the item. Copy-pasting the thing is so effectively free as to be a meaningless expenditure.

No offense intended to DE, but whoever thought that across the board sweeping cost increases were a good idea needs to be banned from the financing department, or at least forbidden from authorizing such changes without at least consulting a graduate level economics student first.

[Venarge]

Hmm. My idea for the shop would be that you could buy these weapons with credits, a higher amount of course, and the crafting would be slightly cheaper.

 

For example the Latron. Make it cost 75k with credits.

make it cost 45k with crafting materials

and the usual x plat

 

 

That would be my solution for this.

[MJ12]

So you work for DE's financial department? 

 

You know how much money they are losing and making on Warframe?

 

You know exactly how much they need to make to break even, or make a profit?

 

No? How shocking. 

 

Stop giving the Devs marketing advice, they seem to be doing alright to me.

 

This isn't about helping DE turn a profit, this is about you wanting more for less.

 

I do know that EA knows what the hell they're doing, SoE knows what the hell they're doing, and this is the exact opposite of what the hell they're doing.

 

Do you know anything about Warframe's conversion rate? No? I'm talking from actual, successful F2P games here. You're talking because you assume that 'wanting more for less' means 'lower platinum prices'. How would that be 'wanting more for less' when nobody is buying those guns with plat? The only weapon I've bought with Plat is the Glaive, which cost a 'mere' 150 and is reasonably rare.

 

See, a rare weapon with no guaranteed BP on the high end of the 'microtransaction' scale ($10)? That gets sales.

 

A $15 shotgun which you can grind for? Ahahaha no.

[matrixEXO]

I do know that EA knows what the hell they're doing, SoE knows what the hell they're doing, and this is the exact opposite of what the hell they're doing.

 

Do you know anything about Warframe's conversion rate? No? I'm talking from actual, successful F2P games here. You're talking because you assume that 'wanting more for less' means 'lower platinum prices'. How would that be 'wanting more for less' when nobody is buying those guns with plat? The only weapon I've bought with Plat is the Glaive, which cost a 'mere' 150 and is reasonably rare.

 

See, a rare weapon with no guaranteed BP on the high end of the 'microtransaction' scale ($10)? That gets sales.

 

A $15 shotgun which you can grind for? Ahahaha no.

I would prefer it if it were all cheaper than $20. In fact, $20 should be a taboo. It's too expensive in my part of the world, Malaysia. Currently, pricing model is somewhere along the lines of "how late do you get it? charge more plat!" where it should be "how difficult is it to obtain by farming? charge more plat!".

 

That and prices for weapons in the rank 1 and rank 2 tiers ought to be charged at 60 plat. Note that they always give it potatoed and with free slot so -26 plat out of it means you are getting it at 34 plat.

 

We all know the issue with cost. We just want it more reasonable. If having to remove the potato and free slot from the purchase will make it more reasonable, do so. At least, we have some balance plat in our pockets to decide if we want to put it in a potato and slot or not.

Edited May 19, 2013 by matrixEXO

[bluehawk1976]

I think you ignore another point of view - not a financial one - I came across more then one mention in the forums that stated that DE overpriced weapons on purpose - they don't want an inflation of available one ingame - you can get everything from the game itself - just have to work at it (personally - more satisfying), but they do give you another option - if you want.

 

That way, they maintain much more interest in the game - it's hard for me to see anyone who went and bought all the 'frames and weapon putting as much effort ingame as someone who is trying to get more.

 

As for finances - they want you to get more 'frames and weapons, and then you buy more slots for them. Also, even if you didn't plan on spending plat on color schemes at first, you just might get tired of the same colors and buy more. So I guess (underline "guess") that they are satisfied with it as is.

[Vyaldyn]

I would prefer it if it were all cheaper than $20. In fact, $20 should be a taboo. It's too expensive in my part of the world, Malaysia. Currently, pricing model is somewhere along the lines of "how late do you get it? charge more plat!" where it should be "how difficult is it to obtain by farming? charge more plat!".

That and prices for weapons in the rank 1 and rank 2 tiers ought to be charged at 60 plat. Note that they always give it potatoed and with free slot so -26 plat out of it means you are getting it at 34 plat.

We all know the issue with cost. We just want it more reasonable. If having to remove the potato and free slot from the purchase will make it more reasonable, do so. At least, we have some balance plat in our pockets to decide if we want to put it in a potato and slot or not.

Even $15 is too costly for one gun (Finland). I agree that a potatoed warframe can cost that, but for a single weapon? Hell no. Edited May 19, 2013 by 3ventic

[matrixEXO]

I think you ignore another point of view - not a financial one - I came across more then one mention in the forums that stated that DE overpriced weapons on purpose - they don't want an inflation of available one ingame - you can get everything from the game itself - just have to work at it (personally - more satisfying), but they do give you another option - if you want.

 

That way, they maintain much more interest in the game - it's hard for me to see anyone who went and bought all the 'frames and weapon putting as much effort ingame as someone who is trying to get more.

 

As for finances - they want you to get more 'frames and weapons, and then you buy more slots for them. Also, even if you didn't plan on spending plat on color schemes at first, you just might get tired of the same colors and buy more. So I guess (underline "guess") that they are satisfied with it as is.

Frames and weapons give free slots when purchased. What? Did you not hear me? FREE SLOTS! Nobody goes around buying slots if they bought frames and weapons, they do that for when they grind for them.

[bluehawk1976]

I do know that EA knows what the hell they're doing, SoE knows what the hell they're doing, and this is the exact opposite of what the hell they're doing.

 

Do you know anything about Warframe's conversion rate? No? I'm talking from actual, successful F2P games here. You're talking because you assume that 'wanting more for less' means 'lower platinum prices'. How would that be 'wanting more for less' when nobody is buying those guns with plat? The only weapon I've bought with Plat is the Glaive, which cost a 'mere' 150 and is reasonably rare.

 

See, a rare weapon with no guaranteed BP on the high end of the 'microtransaction' scale ($10)? That gets sales.

 

A $15 shotgun which you can grind for? Ahahaha no.

 

 

 

 

 

I got the Glaive the hard way, much more satisfying (to me). Basically, What you are aiming at will change this game for me from a real F2P to P2W - I don't play those - I prefer to just go and buy a whole game if I'm going to sink mony into it.I liked trying out Warframe as F2P. To use your term - I got converted pretty fast, and once I had funds available I put them in. I'll do so again if some personally right conditions apply.

 

To summarize - these are two opposite points of view - both legitimate - and I like DE to appear to be on the side I prefer :).

Edited May 19, 2013 by bluehawk1976

[matrixEXO]

Even $15 is too costly for one gun (Finland). I agree that a potatoed warframe can cost that, but for a single weapon? Hell no.

Huh, I prefer if it costs $10 max. Without potato or slots. That way, people can at least be satisfied that they GOT something, rather than see an overcharged pricing model driving their interest down. Sure, we spent some cash to support the game but what AM I doing with my Plat? Spending it on Alert weapons and frames only, apart from color/customization options.

 

What this game needs is actually 2 teams. One of them, larger than the other team, works on the main game itself and the updates. The other, small and maybe a group of 3 or 4 people, works on customization options like adding neon effects to energy or putting a metallic glow onto the frame parts or even have new frame looks (more helmets and body outfits; how about a no-coat Frost?). What this does is create a pool at which a player sees, likes and decides to spend some small change into the game for those cosmetics. Cosmetics doesn't increase a player's power nor does it do anything adversely against the game. It adds customization and people do pay for customization, if they like it.

Edited May 19, 2013 by matrixEXO

[bluehawk1976]

Frames and weapons give free slots when purchased. What? Did you not hear me? FREE SLOTS! Nobody goes around buying slots if they bought frames and weapons, they do that for when they grind for them.

Great, it's good for you, but if they aim for you to get the gear from ingame, they aim for you to buy the slots.

I find that with the prices in plat a "free" slot is the right thing.

What you don't get is what Robert A.Heinlein put down in "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" - TINSTAFL - There Is No Such Thing As Free Lunch - 

Meaning that even for those "free" things you pay. In your case - slots for weapons, so we take the Glaive - 150 plat - that is the price of 12 slots (and you got some change) - the item itself cost them nothing - you just got 1 slot for the price of 12 - and they didn't even force you to do it - you decided to do it all on your own because you wanted to - as far as economics go - they are your masters.

[Setesu]

I think you ignore another point of view - not a financial one - I came across more then one mention in the forums that stated that DE overpriced weapons on purpose - they don't want an inflation of available one ingame - you can get everything from the game itself - just have to work at it (personally - more satisfying), but they do give you another option - if you want.

 

That way, they maintain much more interest in the game - it's hard for me to see anyone who went and bought all the 'frames and weapon putting as much effort ingame as someone who is trying to get more.

 

As for finances - they want you to get more 'frames and weapons, and then you buy more slots for them. Also, even if you didn't plan on spending plat on color schemes at first, you just might get tired of the same colors and buy more. So I guess (underline "guess") that they are satisfied with it as is.

I don't recall perfectly, but I think it was mentioned in the livestream as well.

 

Personally, it's more satisfying to work for the weapons and warframes (and the grind is reasonable too).

 

OP's thoughts on conversation rate may be a better model financially, but I prefer the way it is right now (only spent $ on color palettes and slots).

[Ankath]

So you work for DE's financial department? 

 

You know how much money they are losing and making on Warframe?

 

You know exactly how much they need to make to break even, or make a profit?

 

No? How shocking. 

 

Stop giving the Devs marketing advice, they seem to be doing alright to me.

 

This isn't about helping DE turn a profit, this is about you wanting more for less.

You made my day. Thx!

 

It's really simple. Warframe is a really popular game right now. We have a big community. MJ12 said around 1% are paying players is maybe a little bit low. I don't know if it's true. Let's say it's less then 10% of the player. Cause you can farm every item for a moderade amount of credits and mats you don't need to pay for these items. Most of the players think exactly like that. So the only "viable" things to buy with plat are: slots (catch them all), buy cosmetics and maybe potatoes. 

What could DE do now? Rise the ingame prices (done, maybe not enough, but i know many people complaining it would be too much for new players). The other thing would be: reduce the price of a weapon or warframe! Maybe around 1 or 2$. It doesn't result in a complete loss, because it can result in more players buying an item for the first time! And we have a big community at the moment! Let's say for around 60-80% of the buyers it's a "one time action", for other people it will result in a reduced threshold to pay for more things too. Maybe it's low and will result only in 2% of players constantly pay for the game and some one-timers, but it would be more! Maybe a little bit less profit for every weapon but you compensate it with quantity.

Second option: Do it like League of legends or steam and offer weapons/warframes with reduced platprices. 20% discount on 1 weapon and/or 1 Frame for 1 weekend (Start Friday, end Monday 6 am?). You can do this one time every month maybe. 

Third option: Offer splitted prices. Right now you get 1slot,1 potatoe and the weapon. Offer people to buy the naked weapon without slot and potatoe (for slot it will reduce it maybe for 12 plat, cause you get normally 2 slots for that and -10 plat without potatoe)

[matrixEXO]

Great, it's good for you, but if they aim for you to get the gear from ingame, they aim for you to buy the slots.

I find that with the prices in plat a "free" slot is the right thing.

What you don't get is what Robert A.Heinlein put down in "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" - TINSTAFL - There Is No Such Thing As Free Lunch - 

Meaning that even for those "free" things you pay. In your case - slots for weapons, so we take the Glaive - 150 plat - that is the price of 12 slots (and you got some change) - the item itself cost them nothing - you just got 1 slot for the price of 12 - and they didn't even force you to do it - you decided to do it all on your own because you wanted to - as far as economics go - they are your masters.

As far as game design goes, people don't like gambling on dead weights. Obviously, there is no such thing as free lunch. Also, you forgot the cost of 1 potato, which is 20 plat. Given you never put a single cent down (sarcasm) for a weapon or frame or even did a research on it, this ought to wake you up.

 

The potato AND weapon itself is under the accursed RNG system that cannot be self-controlled in any way (like farming Alerts non-stop). This makes it less desirable to actually think of it as RNG but more of a "buy this or stay up every day for the rest of your life till you get it" system. If you are the kind of person who collects or is interested in it. Not to say that it isn't possible to even get it but it doesn't seem... what was the term? FAIR! RNG is RNG if a player actually can make an effort into causing the RNG to occur. Otherwise, it's called bullS#&$. And that is what the Alert system is, bullS#&$. What actually irritates me is that BECAUSE of the bullS#&$, you don't have any say in RNG. RNG is best left as RNG, not turned into bullS#&$.

 

Prices on the other hand, I feel that scaling it down by cutting off the potato and slot would appeal to customers more. They would want to put in some dough for a weapon or frame and feel like they actually got something worthwhile out of it rather than being an overcharge. If they wanted to promote obtaining gears by effort, remove the whole purchase with plat system. Overcharging for a weapon that can be grinded is just like saying that it's better to just grind it away, and a person's interest. Especially with the new Market change and all that Alloy Plates. I just said it so I will repeat my post: Just improve the choices of cosmetics to promote cash inflow. People are more than willing to pay for reasonably priced cosmetic items (75 plat) anyway.

[matrixEXO]

You made my day. Thx!

 

It's really simple. Warframe is a really popular game right now. We have a big community. MJ12 said around 1% are paying players is maybe a little bit low. I don't know if it's true. Let's say it's less then 10% of the player. Cause you can farm every item for a moderade amount of credits and mats you don't need to pay for these items. Most of the players think exactly like that. So the only "viable" things to buy with plat are: slots (catch them all), buy cosmetics and maybe potatoes. 

What could DE do now? Rise the ingame prices (done, maybe not enough, but i know many people complaining it would be too much for new players). The other thing would be: reduce the price of a weapon or warframe! Maybe around 1 or 2$. It doesn't result in a complete loss, because it can result in more players buying an item for the first time! And we have a big community at the moment! Let's say for around 60-80% of the buyers it's a "one time action", for other people it will result in a reduced threshold to pay for more things too. Maybe it's low and will result only in 2% of players constantly pay for the game and some one-timers, but it would be more! Maybe a little bit less profit for every weapon but you compensate it with quantity.

Second option: Do it like League of legends or steam and offer weapons/warframes with reduced platprices. 20% discount on 1 weapon and/or 1 Frame for 1 weekend (Start Friday, end Monday 6 am?). You can do this one time every month maybe. 

Third option: Offer splitted prices. Right now you get 1slot,1 potatoe and the weapon. Offer people to buy the naked weapon without slot and potatoe (for slot it will reduce it maybe for 12 plat, cause you get normally 2 slots for that and -10 plat without potatoe)

It's 1 and potato costs 20.

[Ankath]

It's 1 and potato costs 20.

Okay sorry for my fault with the weaponslots. So reduce it around 10-8 plat. Second thing: I know the potatoe costs 20, so i only want to reduce it for 10-15 plat. There still should be a reason to buy the full-set instead of everything solo.

[Gatanotoah]

I think the new pricing model is a deterrent for new players, since they cannot ease themselves into the game without having leveled their first frame to a point where farming credits specifically becomes an option. They will be stuck with their Skana and MK1-Braton for far longer than I was.

 

I can only talk about myself, but the reason I put down money was mostly that I found I invested enough time into this game to validate a purchase at the full price of a retail game. Now, as I cracked 100 hours of playtime, I will probably soon upgrade my founders package since this is the point that validates the purchase of a "Collectors Edition" retail game to me. But to have put this much time into the game, I needed to feel a sense of Video-game-reward that was given to me by acquiring my Braton, Cronus and some other weapons by dedicated playing. This reward translated to the motivation of investing more time.

 

My plat was spent on vanity items, such as colors and sentinel attachments. I also bought slots, which I consider a fair trade, and some potatoes for the frames I like. If anything, the amount of this kind of vanity items should be increased. Look at the TF2 trade with hats to get an impression of what amount of money purely cosmetical products can move.

 

Taking away from the feeling of IG-accomplishment by providing a shortcut at a high price is a strong demotivator for long time appeal.

As such I agree fully with the OP.

[NetDefault]

I agree with the OP

 

As it stands right now, I've yet to spend a single Platinum.

Yes, that's over 8000 plat just sitting there, because when I convert the plat prices in my head, I use the regular plat prices starting at 4€/75 Plat.

 

For small stuff like colors, Alt. Helmets, Sentinels and slots those prices are okay.

For Frames and Weapons they're terribly overpriced.

[TunaMayo]

I am happy I got founders as it is simply to support DE but prices are ludicrous in market. Imagine telling someone who didn't play warframe, "I just payed $20 for this in game weapon". They'd be like, "$20??? You can get a WHOLE GAME for that.".

Prices need a looksee.

[MasterLean]

A fool and his money.

[NotaCobra]

I love this forum

Hundreds and hundreds of people who claim to know more about economics than the people who are actually running the games marketing and finances.

 

OP, do you not think that the makers have looked at other cash shop succesful games?

TF2, League of legends, hell even WoW all have cash shops, and all are very different.

Yet, all are hugely successful

One; made a pay to play game free, and sent its profits through the roof by doing so.

The next; Primarily sells cosmetics, but allows those with cash to purchase every single item

and the latter; costs an absolute fortune to own and play, yet somehow manges to earn huge ammounts from it's cash shop too, not to mention the items from the cash shop are purely cosmetic.

 

Why do you believe the battlefield heros game is the only one worth looking at?

 

Moreover, why do you think, for a second, that DE hasn't already looked at it?

 

 

 

If you really think you can run a business better than them, go send them a few emails, see where you get.

If you end up on their marketing team, I will eat a chilli noodle and peanut butter sandwhich on webcam.

[TunaMayo]

I love this forum

Hundreds and hundreds of people who claim to know more about economics than the people who are actually running the games marketing and finances.

 

OP, do you not think that the makers have looked at other cash shop succesful games?

TF2, League of legends, hell even WoW all have cash shops, and all are very different.

Yet, all are hugely successful

One; made a pay to play game free, and sent its profits through the roof by doing so.

The next; Primarily sells cosmetics, but allows those with cash to purchase every single item

and the latter; costs an absolute fortune to own and play, yet somehow manges to earn huge ammounts from it's cash shop too, not to mention the items from the cash shop are purely cosmetic.

 

Why do you believe the battlefield heros game is the only one worth looking at?

 

Moreover, why do you think, for a second, that DE hasn't already looked at it?

 

 

 

If you really think you can run a business better than them, go send them a few emails, see where you get.

If you end up on their marketing team, I will eat a chilli noodle and peanut butter sandwhich on webcam.

The model is fine, the execution is not. How many people do you know that have purposefully bought 10-20 bucks worth of platinum to but a frame? It's just a bit too much. 5-10 bucks would be more acceptable

[Supern00b]

I love this forum

Hundreds and hundreds of people who claim to know more about economics than the people who are actually running the games marketing and finances.

I love this forum too. So many stupid people think they are smart and like to belittle other peoples opinions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

For you.