This is not meant to be an offensive in any way. I understand the need for Kixeye to make money. I spend to have fun, not out of a necessity to play the game. I left the game once before because greed got in the way of a good game, I am seeing the same pattern of greed once again. I got 4 friends back into the game this year, they are like me and spend a bit as well, but they are saying the same things I am and I can see them leaving again.
When upgrades were introduced they were to make fleets more viable to harder targets, to give a player a leg up. I was totally on board when this idea was introduced. I had the choice to either spend time or money on this. At first a ship was introduced and a month or so later the upgrade came out. Fine, it gave me time to finish what I had going on and start working on them, or in my case, coin it. Now, a ship comes out and the upgrade comes out at the same time. Still, not so bad if it is just to get a leg up on the targets. That is not the case any more. A player HAS to have the upgrades because targets are designed around them. I try to play fairly cheap, I don't see the sense in spending the price of a new XBox game every month just to do a chore that I actually hate doing.
I could comment on quite a few areas in the game where it has become a costly chore to play but I feel the upgrades are by far the most ridiculously overpriced, in time and coin, in the game
I know there are many in the game who will disagree with what I have said and their opinion is theirs and I will not debate them. But the truth is I don't want to play a game that requires me to sit in front of a screen for hours every day or coin like I am a billionaire. I just want a game to have fun on, to get on when he kids are in school or have gone to bed. So many like me have lives, and tbh this game really isn't good enough to spend that much money on.
I came back to this game because I love the game. I stayed because I seen improvements in the pricing. I hate to say, I will end up leaving again if the cost of playing the game continues to soar.
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Upgrade to X1 nearly 15 days x 4 = 60 days...Don't forget to have the kits on hand if possible/available.
And don't forget that one week before the next raid there will be the flagship. Longer build time/More Kits/Longer Upgrade time.
Also don't forget if you didn't get your previous hulls up to top spec they also require work in dock.
Time pressure? Simple.... insert your CC and Spend Spend Spend.
The only Fun is trying to get your next raid fleet ready for the next raid and the one after....a total of 12 days use before rinse and repeat. Not Fun.
The only strategy is trying to manage your dock time efficiently and limit your CC input. Not Fun.
Non of this would matter if the targets were tuned so that upgrades actually mean't you managed better/spent less/enjoyed the raids more.
This game is so unbalanced and unhealthy in so many ways I quite understand why so many players walked away.......
I cannot understand why they didn't keep walking but I guess "Seven Steps" has many answers that I can relate to.
When i started the game, i was bringing friends, and recommended it to everyone i knew.
Now, no way!
It is too greedy and no fun anymore.
And the upgrades are NOT optional. You MUST do them or take insane damage from a target.
Anyway the problem isn't the upgrade or the cost, the problem is the requirement to have them to advance, even slowly, in the game. The targets should be balanced to allow fleets that are not upgraded to be able to participate for more than 20 minutes before having to repair. Nothing pushes customers away faster than feeling unsatisfied.
Seems a bit out of context don't you think ???
When in actuality this is what was said...
"I don't want to play a game that requires me to sit in front of a screen for hours every day" OR "coin like I am a billionaire."
In Battle Pirates, you stay "caught up" with some combination of time and money, on a spectrum. Some will spend a ton of money and hardly any time grinding. Others (such as myself) will spend very little money and a ton of time grinding. I've hit 150 targets this raid, and spent about 15 coins. Others hit two targets, and blitz x100 each one.
You don't need to spend hundreds of dollars per month or 12 hours a day every day, but you do need to contribute some. 10 hours of play time a week and 50 coins a month, as an example.
Now, it is possible to play the game and get all the PvE stuff *nearly* fully upgraded with no coins. To do that you need good planning and yes sometimes play this a few hours a day. And, if you fall behind in a few certain events it sets you back further.
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Now let's talk about upgrades. Upgrades are not required, but they help. By my estinames, the X1 hull is generally about twice as good (you take around half the damage) as a U0 fleet. I am sure that Kixeye tests both a U0 and an X1 fleet in the targets (do I have proof? no. Do I think they do a enough testing? no. Do I have any data to back that up? no).
We see that without upgrades you can still do the targets for the months to come, my U0 mutineer fleet is still useful. For a while (Pegasus) I didn't do a single upgrade even when I had tokens because I was tired of people saying UpGrAdEs ArE rEqUiReD, so I used U0 fleets and played the game fine. People still complained...so I have been doing what upgrades I can for free which is generally half X1/U3 for the second raid and full X1 a month or two later.
Now, the purpose of upgrades is to give us something to do in between the first and second raids of the cycle. I know i have my ships 100% built by the time the first raid ends (for free). So...if you did not have upgrades what would you build in the second month? Kixeye needs to give you something, so they make money. Upgrades allow them to keep your shipyard busy longer, and if we didn't have them they would release a bunch of tech you needed to refit...another better flagship....something (Kix, don't get any ideas).
If you are willing to put in a combination of time and money, the game is actually very well paced on the PvE side. Just get it out of your head that you need a U3 fleet a week after it comes out. Upgrades are optional and you could play and progress in the game fine without them. In my experience, players fall behind because they keep upgrading the old (now much less useful) hull instead of building the new one.
TL:DR: Upgrades are not actually required, and you can get a full fleet done for PvE in the current system if you are already caught up.
https://www.youtube.com/c/DerpyTheCow47?sub_confirmation=1
The majority of players have lives. They work, they take care of their children, they spend time with their wife/husband/family, they take care of their homes, etc. When once upon a time we could find a couple hours here and there to grind our points, we are now watching a timer for when our fleet is repaired so we can grind another 10-20 minutes only to have to do it again and again and again- and that is only if you have nothing to do that day. Once again, we have lives and this is just a game.
Upgrades are the only way to do events any more- this has nothing to do with being able to do something- this has to do with being able to do something AND have fun- which is what playing a game is all about.
You are right though, it is possible to remain current if you want to watch a clock for your next repair time to be done. Personally I believe a GAME shouldn't require a person to use a timer so they can be on the game every 3-5 hours. Personally I would prefer playing a game and having fun. But you are right, you don't need to upgrades to be current, only an alarm clock.
Kixeye and people will always state what they like, the hard truth is that this game is going SOUTH so far that it back to north and nobody wants to know the truth. the COVID19 like a lot of problems comes at the right time to gouge money out of idiots (we all know who these people are). the game would be better if there was restrictions on coining etc. having a CC gives a few people a leg up but ruins the game for all, even the the company will lose out via people dropping away.
there is no way to disguise the truth, but it is there for all to see, but ignore it.
i have been playing for a long time and i can see the problems, but no fixes. i havent bothered with the raid at all this month, though i did it last month with better success. so it looks like, like the bounty i will be priced and out of doing the raids, so that will be 2 weeks less of doing anything grindy. FM will no doubt be dumb and hard for the point/damage ratio.
i haven't coined for a while which will hurt the company, but it seems money talks more than action. now if everybody was on the same page then it might get better. but i have no qualms about walking away.
now you might say 'who the fk cares?'
well think back a few years when we had a massive 100 sectors per world knocked down to 20 sectors per world. that shows how bad it can get.
now Upgrades are good if they work. problem is they are restrictive. who knows the next thing we will call this upgrade pirates.
It seems what I’m saying isn’t getting through.
Upgrades. Are. Not. Required.
They help yes, I said that. Do you need them? No. Can you X1 a fleet for free before the end of it’s useful life? Yes. Do you need X1 to do the raid? No
https://www.youtube.com/c/DerpyTheCow47?sub_confirmation=1
1. To enter a target and get points in the raid is "doing the raid", but the amount of damage taken is relevant to "doing the raid reasonably successfully" and the time spent bringing hulls up to X1 and the availability of upgrade tokens to help this is relevant to a lot of peoples game experience. You can wax lyrical about not needing X1 upgrades but even in Derpy's well thought out video's it is suggested that at least 1 hull should be X1 to benefit etc....and that I agree with.
2. There are all sorts of variables that individual players have to contend with in this game, some compounded by lack of experience/lack of time to play/lack of shipyard time to build/lack of good management of ship yard time/lack of upgrade tokens/upgrade kits/etc/etc.
But......
If you haven't got a good enough fleet to compete successfully in the raid then you start trying to build the next raid fleet on the back foot, the only way around this is to plough more money and more time into what after all said and done is just a pixel game.
3. SO you are on the back foot but around the corner is VXP weekend......but you haven't got all your blank hulls out.......Not To Worry.......
3.1 In a week or so there will be a TLC... which will give you chance to add to what you missed out on earlier......but if you haven't already built your fleet for this you will struggle to complete as it is geared for what you need most to be in the Mastery Rounds....which you will struggle to achieve without a reasonably fitted out fleet or a lot of coin...... Not to Worry
3.2 There is always Pillage the supposed catch up raid.....But to be successful here you will need your previously unfinished upgraded fleets...AND you will be given the chance to add the Flag hull to your fleet with just a week to go till the next raid.........Not to Worry
3.3 Kix doesn't gear the 1st raid up to fully fledged hulls........Oh Really!!!!! So why do we hear/read so often that the damage has been tuned down???
Yeah "Don't Worry everythings gonna be alright"........
https://www.youtube.com/c/DerpyTheCow47?sub_confirmation=1
It is just a cycle that will never end and those that throw money at it, well either have no life or more money to know what to do with.
For revenue, we can only guess at player numbers but it’s generally agreed its upper ceiling is 30k. How many of those are free to play players? How many are alt accounts of free to play players? How many are alt accounts of coiners? (some people spend twice sure, some wont they will spread their total money over the multiple accounts). Actual coiners will only be a fraction of that 30k.
Using some hypothetical approximates, 10 staff earning 40k p/a + another 100k for the miscellaneous costs adds up to 500k p/a. “If” you have a spending base of 10k they each need to spend 50 p/a. That’s before thinking about greed/profit. That’s just a hypothetical framework. Move the sliders up and down to wherever you think is realistic for this game. Outside of upgrades there isn’t a lot you can spend money on in this game. Without the revenue from upgrades this game would probably go under very quickly.
Im not sure what you mean about waiting on a timer for repairs? If you dont coin repairs then its slow repairs and thats how its always been in this game. If you were to ask a doctor or a nurse or look at gov advice on how long you should sit at a computer it will say not much longer than an hour and then take a break. Its bad for your back, your eyes and your mental health. I have played for a long time so i remember spamming seawolves all weekend and it really wasnt healthy. Wheter it was deliberate or accidental you cant blame the product for forcing players to take regular breaks.
Im reading between the lines a little so correct me if im wrong but it sounds like you`re saying, you dont want to spend hours playing. You either cant or wont coin upgrades and presumably you arent getting enough from events to keep current and it isnt fun. This game has always been seattime or coin (sometimes both) so if you arent prepared to do either what are you realistically expecting? and what is different now than what it was back in the day?
It seems that you`re frustrated but I dont see any ask for advice or help. There are players in here and alliances who might be able to help with some strategy advice or maybe a little prepping in an event if you ask. Shipyard management is crucial. Maybe theres a couple tips someone can give you how best to tackle builds/upgrades. It is possible in a cycle to have a good build with some upgrades very cheaply and capable of tackling.event targets.
That said , and like we all have an real life out of the game i have to say the pay out from the targets are just way to low.
If ya have top fleet X1 you should be able finish a raid by hitting targets and coin repairs in 4-6 hours.
The way raids are setup lately you gonna need 3 times the ammount of that time what is in my opinion way to much time to spend.
or have to higher pay outs or get writ of the limited bp`s again and stay the prize the same.
There was a time when done raids in a few hours you started hitting bases for half repair.
And than i dont even mind i die in some bases like it is now ...
now i can go on and on but i think you get the point