FEH Pass and what went wrong

[Baldrick]

1 hour ago, NegativeExponents- said:

Then pray tell, what increases your chances of automatically winning?

Increasing your arena score threshold. My maximum arena score is 742; if someone has a higher max score, I cannot outscore them and so they automatically win.

2 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

For some people, that threshold is any advantage at all.

I feel this definition is too loose because a lot of advantages can be compensated for. If I can’t get multiple summoner supports on my arena units, I’ll just pick my battles carefully. No amount of tactics can make the game generate 750+ arena matches.

[DefyingFates]

On 2/9/2020 at 8:21 PM, Othin said:

Ads for it are overly intrusive, and it includes too many things that should be available to everyone. Make the Undo, Auto-Start, stat boosts, and Summoner Support changes available to everyone and hide references to it from regular gameplay and I'm fine with it. This would leave it as skins, quests, and a free copy of the units with the skins, and they could increase the quest rewards to make up for that.

On 2/9/2020 at 8:24 PM, eclipse said:

1. If it was purely for stuff like skins/maybe a free 1st-gen 5* merge, I'd be a lot happier.  Probably wouldn't appeal to the whales, as they most likely have their stuff merged up.  But if Dissidia taught me anything, it's that people will pay a lot for an alternate character appearance.
2. But as it stands, there's way too much of "you need this thing to get stuff", and it's annoying as all hell.  Like, why NOT allow everyone to have three summoner supports?

The first two posts on the topic and they sum up my thoughts perfectly. I'd argue that locking extra stats behind a paywall is cheap as well and I'd much rather Resplendent Heroes be put into the summoning pool for everyone. If you get one it unlocks the new art/ stats for your previous Lyns/ Cordelias, while Pass-owners get the new skins for free. I'd take Othin's alternative any day (either that or cutting the price to make up for the reduced goodies you get by subscribing).

FWIW, I had a dream last night that the next few batches of refines were also locked behind FEH Pass because they were included in the next batch of R. Heroes. That wasn't very nice...especially because among them were Lyon and all the OCs dressed up as different factions.

Edited February 12, 2020 by DefyingFates

[NekoKnight]

I think the concerns about how "P2W" FEH pass is, are alarmist. The Resplendent Heroes available so far are two gen 1 units, one of which is hilariously powercrept. Could we eventually see Resplendent Heroes for characters who are already kings in the meta? Well, it's certainly a possibility but if the devs have half a brain between them they'll pace the distribution so we don't see that happen. Why don't we start complaining after Resplendent L!Alm comes out and not before?

I'm in the camp that believes that "P2W" should be defined as an overwhelming advantage that prevents F2P users from succeeding in the game. If FEH pass subscribers had a flat increase to their scoring for competitive modes, I'd see that as P2W, but increasing unit stats to make it easier win battles isn't the tipping point to where I can't win as F2P.

[Lemmy]

37 minutes ago, NekoKnight said:

I think the concerns about how "P2W" FEH pass is, are alarmist. The Resplendent Heroes available so far are two gen 1 units, one of which is hilariously powercrept. Could we eventually see Resplendent Heroes for characters who are already kings in the meta? Well, it's certainly a possibility but if the devs have half a brain between them they'll pace the distribution so we don't see that happen. Why don't we start complaining after Resplendent L!Alm comes out and not before?

I'm in the camp that believes that "P2W" should be defined as an overwhelming advantage that prevents F2P users from succeeding in the game. If FEH pass subscribers had a flat increase to their scoring for competitive modes, I'd see that as P2W, but increasing unit stats to make it easier win battles isn't the tipping point to where I can't win as F2P.

This post made me wonder if they see the soft P2W methods, like encouraging multiple arena and raids teams through elements, as a failure. 

[Ice Dragon]

7 minutes ago, Lemmy said:

This post made me wonder if they see the soft P2W methods, like encouraging multiple arena and raids teams through elements, as a failure. 

Elemental matching is something that can only generate revenue for a limited period of time. Once players have saturated their barracks, they no longer need to pull for more characters specifically for the purpose of elemental matching.

Right now, they're using Aether Raids and Mjolnir's Strike for Mythic Heroes, but Mythic Heroes only come every other month and Aether Raids scoring scales poorly with merges, so pretty much every Mythic Hero (and Legendary Hero) from here on out is going to be selling largely on their merits as a unit rather than their element.

[Fire Emblem Fan]

22 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

+2 stats on Resplendent Heroes are already a one-time purchase.

Eh not really. If you unsubscribe, you don't get the stats for future Resplendent Heroes; you have to hand over more money and re-subscribe. You wouldn't have to do that if it was a one-time purchase.

[XRay]

26 minutes ago, Fire Emblem Fan said:

Eh not really. If you unsubscribe, you don't get the stats for future Resplendent Heroes; you have to hand over more money and re-subscribe. You wouldn't have to do that if it was a one-time purchase.

You do not get the stats for past Resplendent Heroes unless you purchase past Heroes either, but I would still count this as a one time purchase since it is permanent. I do not think anyone is expecting to Intelligent Systems to make players to pay once to get a stat increase for all Resplendent Heroes, just as no one back then was expecting players who maxed their Barracks space to get all future Barracks expansion for free.

[Jave]

I still think a good feature of the Feh Pass would have been to include two or three copies of an exclusive item that allows you to +1 any 5* unit you have. Heck, had they included that instead of all the QoL features I would have bought it. 

Edited February 13, 2020 by Jave

[Othin]

9 minutes ago, Jave said:

I still think a good feature of the Feh Pass would have been to include two or three copies of an exclusive item that allows you to +1 any 5* unit you have. Heck, had they included that instead of all the QoL features I would have bought it. 

That would have dramatically increased the price, since that's hundreds of orbs per month paying players wouldn't have to buy. 

[Jave]

3 minutes ago, Othin said:

That would have dramatically increased the price, since that's hundreds of orbs per month paying players wouldn't have to buy. 

You think so? Mmmm.... what about just one per Pass?

[XRay]

12 minutes ago, Jave said:

You think so? Mmmm.... what about just one per Pass?

+1 to any unit is huge. It is essentially a free copy of any unit you want. A player can basically just wait 10 months to have a +10 unit. Since each copy on average takes at least around $100, Intelligent Systems would be giving up at least $1,000 per year per paying player who spends money to +10 their unit.

Edited February 13, 2020 by XRay

[Endriu]

1 hour ago, XRay said:

+1 to any unit is huge. It is essentially a free copy of any unit you want. A player can basically just wait 10 months to have a +10 unit. Since each copy on average takes at least around $100, Intelligent Systems would be giving up at least $1,000 per year per paying player who spends money to +10 their unit.

True. But such a feature could have  been quite an incentive for f2p's to start spending as it would provide sth "tangible" for the money. 

A lot of players compare the subsription with what they can get with a years worth of it. Today I ordered two switch games and paid less than 100 eur incl.shipping. The pass is about 120 Eur here. As I don't care about resplendent heroes, qol and resources, the only real benefit would be 2x summoner support for me. Really bad value for me. A +1 token could have made the deal interesting.

 

 

[XRay]

9 minutes ago, Endriu said:

True. But such a feature could have  been quite an incentive for f2p's to start spending as it would provide sth "tangible" for the money. 

Increasing incentive would be nice, but you also do not want to implement a feature to cause you to lose revenue either. If they really want to do that, I think it would be best if they implement it once per year or every six months first to see if there is any noticeable negative impact to revenue before ramping it up to monthly. I think giving a free merge to anything once a month is a bit too high. They could also tie it to a continuous yearly subscription to encourage players subscribe for a loner period of time.

[Endriu]

10 minutes ago, XRay said:

Increasing incentive would be nice, but you also do not want to implement a feature to cause you to lose revenue either. If they really want to do that, I think it would be best if they implement it once per year or every six months first to see if there is any noticeable negative impact to revenue before ramping it up to monthly. I think giving a free merge to anything once a month is a bit too high. They could also tie it to a continuous yearly subscription to encourage players subscribe for a loner period of time.

Thats understandable. Unfortunately the gacha industry as a whole is way too greedy. They make a lot of money with very little investment. Wouldn't hurt them, especially Nintendo, to become a little bit more modest.

[XRay]

1 minute ago, Endriu said:

They make a lot of money with very little investment.

If the business is properly managed, then yes, that would be ideal and it would be safe to assume that. However, with the way Nintendo handled their mobile games so far, I am not so confident we can make that assumption. Pokémon Go and Heroes are their most successful mobile product. I am not so worried about Pokémon Go since it mostly seems to be managed by Niantic. While Heroes is Nintendo's most successful mobile game to be developed completely in house, it is declining. Every other game Nintendo has developed in house is extremely poorly monetized and doing way worse.

[Endriu]

Just now, XRay said:

If the business is properly managed, then yes, that would be ideal and it would be safe to assume that. However, with the way Nintendo handled their mobile games so far, I am not so confident we can make that assumption. Pokémon Go and Heroes are their most successful mobile product. I am not so worried about Pokémon Go since it mostly seems to be managed by Niantic. While Heroes is Nintendo's most successful mobile game to be developed completely in house, it is declining. Every other game Nintendo has developed in house is extremely poorly monetized and doing way worse.

Not sure I am getting your point. What I meant is more like I doubt the actual costs of a game like Feh surpass $1million per month (correct me if I am wrong), even when in decline the game makes $165million per year atm, that's a lot of money. The actual investment into the game itself will be very cheap - I don't think 3rd anniversary maps or bhb rerun quests were expensive, lol. Artists and voice actors don't costs millions, otherwise we wouldn't get 3A console games for $60.

[Ice Dragon]

5 minutes ago, Endriu said:

Not sure I am getting your point.

The point is that Heroes doesn't have the financial leeway to be giving out free merges for $10/month.

[XRay]

Just now, Endriu said:

Not sure I am getting your point. What I meant is more like I doubt the actual costs of a game like Feh surpass $1million per month (correct me if I am wrong), even when in decline the game makes $165million per year atm, that's a lot of money. The actual investment into the game itself will be very cheap - I don't think 3rd anniversary maps or bhb rerun quests were expensive, lol. Artists and voice actors don't costs millions, otherwise we wouldn't get 3A console games for $60.

If mobile games are really that cheap to develop and maintain, then we would not see a lot of them getting shut down and discontinued after a few years. Unless someone can find Nintendo's financial report that details their mobile operations, I think it is too soon for us to assume that is undoubtedly the case that they are having massive profit margins. With how horribly they monetized all their other mobile games and how bad Feh Pass was announced, if I was an investor and putting my money on the line, I would not assume Nintendo is doing well in their mobile operations.

[Endriu]

28 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

The point is that Heroes doesn't have the financial leeway to be giving out free merges for $10/month.

We don't know that.

[Ice Dragon]

19 minutes ago, Endriu said:

We don't know that.

You try being the one to tell your stockholders that you're planning on implementing a feature that might make people more interested in paying for the $10/month subscription, but would definitely lose at least a hundred thousand per month in orb sales.

Edited February 13, 2020 by Ice Dragon

[XRay]

16 minutes ago, Endriu said:

We don't know that.

Since we do not know either way, it would be safer to assume the worse in my opinion. I do not have much confidence in Nintendo right now for their mobile operations.

I think the subscription model is great, but if so, then why did they not implement this right from the start? Are they doing subscriptions as a part of learning to monetize properly or is it more of a response to not doing well financially (if former, then great; if latter, I am a little worried)?

I am not sure if I mentioned in this thread or another, but I do wish Intelligent Systems would be more generous, but I am not sure if being more generous is the right move financially. I think it is definitely okay to be more generous in terms of offering a little more Feathers and Sacred Coins since I do not think they have too much impact on revenue, but free merges definitely has an impact as it essentially replaces Orbs in a big way and people often pay for Orbs.

10 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

You try being the one to tell your stockholders that you're planning on implementing a feature that might make people more interested in paying for the $10/month subscription, but would definitely lose at least a hundred thousand per month in orb sales.

It might earn more in terms of convincing more low spenders to pull more of their favorites instead of pulling only for their top favorites, and just waiting for their secondary favorites to pitybreak them, since +10s are so much cheaper now. But I am not so sure if that increase is enough to offset the loss from players who spend to +10 their units.

I still like the idea as a player though because it is so appealing. You can essentially get a +10 for 1/11 of the cost if you got the right Asset the first time. I think it might be worth a try to tie it to a big purchase or make it very limited first to test the waters.

[Endriu]

32 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

You try being the one to tell your stockholders that you're planning on implementing a feature that might make people more interested in paying for the $10/month subscription, but would definitely lose at least a hundred thousand per month in orb sales.

Like I said we don't know.

If it's JUST 100k per month we are talking about then we just need to sell the pass 20k times and already made double the amount. Missed opportunity.

Anyway, could it be the decline in revenue was brought about by measures to increase revenue? 

 

[Othin]

34 minutes ago, Endriu said:

Like I said we don't know.

If it's JUST 100k per month we are talking about then we just need to sell the pass 20k times and already made double the amount. Missed opportunity.

Anyway, could it be the decline in revenue was brought about by measures to increase revenue? 

 

Whatever the total numbers are, they'd need over 90% of pass sales to come from players who don't regularly spend for merges to just break even on revenue, let alone pay for the additional costs of making Resplendent Heroes or increase overall profit. It's not feasible. 

[Ice Dragon]

24 minutes ago, Endriu said:

Like I said we don't know.

"We don't know" isn't the same as "anything is possible". @XRay is at least making an educated guess based on related things that we can observe.

 

26 minutes ago, Endriu said:

then we just need to sell the pass 20k times and already made double the amount.

Ten thousand more than they would have sold otherwise just to equal what they're getting right now without the feature. That's a lot considering my estimate for the number of players that are currently active in the Arena (based on the equilibrium player distribution and the number of players currently in tier 21) is only about 200,000.

 

33 minutes ago, Endriu said:

Anyway, could it be the decline in revenue was brought about by measures to increase revenue? 

Natural aging is the most likely cause for the largest share of the decline.

I've mentioned it previously, but Heroes is lacking in aspects that extend its longevity:

• Power creep is too slow to force higher-spending players to buy newer units consistently (but it's fast enough that lower-spending players notice and complain).
• The pool of characters that the game can add new units from depletes too quickly and does receive new additions fast enough.
• Original characters cannot significantly slow the depletion of the pool of characters because players come to this game for characters from the main series, not for original characters.

[Endriu]

21 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

"We don't know" isn't the same as "anything is possible". @XRay is at least making an educated guess based on related things that we can observe.

 

Ten thousand more than they would have sold otherwise just to equal what they're getting right now without the feature. That's a lot considering my estimate for the number of players that are currently active in the Arena (based on the equilibrium player distribution and the number of players currently in tier 21) is only about 200,000.

 

Natural aging is the most likely cause for the largest share of the decline.

I've mentioned it previously, but Heroes is lacking in aspects that extend its longevity:

• Power creep is too slow to force higher-spending players to buy newer units consistently (but it's fast enough that lower-spending players notice and complain).
• The pool of characters that the game can add new units from depletes too quickly and does receive new additions fast enough.
• Original characters cannot significantly slow the depletion of the pool of characters because players come to this game for characters from the main series, not for original characters.

Now thats one way to look at it.