Today's offer drop rates

Aren't these offers supposed to reveal drop rates according to Apple's TOS? I mean real drop rates not the joke there is now.

Comments

StevieManWonder

On a related note, I just opened the free 5% from the TB calendar and formed my first tech t5cc! Ghost is going up next week!

DNA3000

I’m not bothering with it even though I’m only 900 frags off from r3ing Ghost. If they show the drop rates of each percentage, I might.
Either way, it seriously irritates when they follow the letter of the law rather than the spirit.
Wow. Yes, irritating when people follow the law. Maybe in the spirit of Kabams ToS, they shouldn't ban hackers, modders and mercs right? They should put gifting events back to the way they were before 2 years ago. Spirit of the law says Kabam doesn't have to question where the money comes from right?
Oh please, get off it. You know full well that the only reason why they didn’t post the drop rates is because they think that it’ll discourage people from buying it.
Actually, I've never sat down with a veteran monetization professional and asked this question, but I suspect it is not for something as simple as this, given the answer to a tangentially related question tends to be very complex: why don't most game developers disclose their game mechanics in full?
I’ve studied enough economics and done enough marketing to feel confident in saying that if information is withheld from a product, it is because it either isn’t relevant to the consumer or because it it will diminish the likelihood of purchase. Since the drop rates are very much relevant to the consumer, I’m left to believe that it’s being withheld because they think it’ll have a negative impact on their sales.
Of course, I’m open to other explanations.
Maybe in an ultimate sense, but not always in an easy to trace direct sense. For example, consider Apple. Apple rarely talks about the numbers surrounding their products. They don't give specific scores or measurements. Is that because they think they will lose sales if they disclose those? I don't think that is true, at least not directly. I think they don't talk about those numbers because they don't want customers to be thinking about those numbers. If you take those numbers away, consumers have to compare Apple to competitors based on other factors. And Apple thinks they have a much higher advantage over competitors if consumers are thinking about subjective criteria.

So it might all be about selling more product in the end, but it might not be a simple case of "if we give out this number it will hurt our sales." It could be a lot more strategic: if we don't give out this number we can't be compared to our competitors on the basis of that number, and in fact it may cause consumers to stop caring about that number at all, since they can't use it to evaluate us. And that lets us shift the playing field to one where we have a much better advantage.
Apple doesn’t give out those numbers because it’s not relevant to their customers’ decision to buy their product. It’s unnecessary info, that’s why it’s excluded not because they think customers won’t buy it because of the numbers.
Those numbers are not relevant to customer decisions because they don’t have them, so they cannot use them to form decisions by definition. But you’re wrong that they don’t give out numbers because numbers are not relevant to their customers decisions, because Apple does give out numbers in very specific strategic situations. And you can’t say Apple only gives out numbers when they are relevant, because that is a tautology.
You lost me, sorry. I was trying to say that specific measurements of apple devices don’t really have any relevance to their customers. I’m sure it does to some, but the majority of people buying apple phones are buying them because they are popular, operate smoothly, and are the best available for standard use. Most customers don’t need to know the specific measurements because they aren’t buying it with those in mind. However, the drop rates are relevant to Kabam’s customers’ decision to buy a deal or not.

Saying Apple doesn't release or promote numbers because it isn't relevant to their customers implies a cause effect relationship that is the reverse of reality. It isn't that Apple knows that their customer base just happens to not care about numbers, so they know they don't have to hand them out. Even when it is patently true that their customers care about numbers and even when it provably affects their purchasing decisions, Apple *still* doesn't promote those numbers. Because Apple doesn't attempt to compete on those numbers, they curate their own customer base to be the set of people who are willing to purchase Apple products on the basis of other criteria. Apple doesn't omit numbers because their customers don't want them, they omit them regardless of whether their customers want them, and let their customers decide if that's tolerable.

This is relevant to things like lootboxes, because when you say performance numbers aren't relevant to Apple customers, that's a general statement. Of course it is, or would be relevant to many of them if they knew what they were. Even if they wouldn't switch completely out of the Apple ecosystem, numbers would still matter to their decisions about which Apple products to buy. Of course, most people wouldn't use those numbers, or even know what to do with them. But how is that different from drop odds? I've been an advocate for releasing those numbers, and in fact all game mechanical documentation, from the very start. But that's because I think players *deserve* that information, not because I actually think more than a tiny percentage of players would actually use it.

In fact I cannot honestly say that I know for certain that such documentation wouldn't mislead more players that it educated. I don't advocate transparency on the basis of net benefit. I advocate for it because everyone should have the opportunity to use it, whether they are qualified to do so or not.

StevieManWonder

I’m not bothering with it even though I’m only 900 frags off from r3ing Ghost. If they show the drop rates of each percentage, I might.
Either way, it seriously irritates when they follow the letter of the law rather than the spirit.
Wow. Yes, irritating when people follow the law. Maybe in the spirit of Kabams ToS, they shouldn't ban hackers, modders and mercs right? They should put gifting events back to the way they were before 2 years ago. Spirit of the law says Kabam doesn't have to question where the money comes from right?
Oh please, get off it. You know full well that the only reason why they didn’t post the drop rates is because they think that it’ll discourage people from buying it.
Actually, I've never sat down with a veteran monetization professional and asked this question, but I suspect it is not for something as simple as this, given the answer to a tangentially related question tends to be very complex: why don't most game developers disclose their game mechanics in full?
I’ve studied enough economics and done enough marketing to feel confident in saying that if information is withheld from a product, it is because it either isn’t relevant to the consumer or because it it will diminish the likelihood of purchase. Since the drop rates are very much relevant to the consumer, I’m left to believe that it’s being withheld because they think it’ll have a negative impact on their sales.
Of course, I’m open to other explanations.
Maybe in an ultimate sense, but not always in an easy to trace direct sense. For example, consider Apple. Apple rarely talks about the numbers surrounding their products. They don't give specific scores or measurements. Is that because they think they will lose sales if they disclose those? I don't think that is true, at least not directly. I think they don't talk about those numbers because they don't want customers to be thinking about those numbers. If you take those numbers away, consumers have to compare Apple to competitors based on other factors. And Apple thinks they have a much higher advantage over competitors if consumers are thinking about subjective criteria.

So it might all be about selling more product in the end, but it might not be a simple case of "if we give out this number it will hurt our sales." It could be a lot more strategic: if we don't give out this number we can't be compared to our competitors on the basis of that number, and in fact it may cause consumers to stop caring about that number at all, since they can't use it to evaluate us. And that lets us shift the playing field to one where we have a much better advantage.
Apple doesn’t give out those numbers because it’s not relevant to their customers’ decision to buy their product. It’s unnecessary info, that’s why it’s excluded not because they think customers won’t buy it because of the numbers.
Those numbers are not relevant to customer decisions because they don’t have them, so they cannot use them to form decisions by definition. But you’re wrong that they don’t give out numbers because numbers are not relevant to their customers decisions, because Apple does give out numbers in very specific strategic situations. And you can’t say Apple only gives out numbers when they are relevant, because that is a tautology.
You lost me, sorry. I was trying to say that specific measurements of apple devices don’t really have any relevance to their customers. I’m sure it does to some, but the majority of people buying apple phones are buying them because they are popular, operate smoothly, and are the best available for standard use. Most customers don’t need to know the specific measurements because they aren’t buying it with those in mind. However, the drop rates are relevant to Kabam’s customers’ decision to buy a deal or not.
Saying Apple doesn't release or promote numbers because it isn't relevant to their customers implies a cause effect relationship that is the reverse of reality. It isn't that Apple knows that their customer base just happens to not care about numbers, so they know they don't have to hand them out. Even when it is patently true that their customers care about numbers and even when it provably affects their purchasing decisions, Apple *still* doesn't promote those numbers. Because Apple doesn't attempt to compete on those numbers, they curate their own customer base to be the set of people who are willing to purchase Apple products on the basis of other criteria. Apple doesn't omit numbers because their customers don't want them, they omit them regardless of whether their customers want them, and let their customers decide if that's tolerable.

This is relevant to things like lootboxes, because when you say performance numbers aren't relevant to Apple customers, that's a general statement. Of course it is, or would be relevant to many of them if they knew what they were. Even if they wouldn't switch completely out of the Apple ecosystem, numbers would still matter to their decisions about which Apple products to buy. Of course, most people wouldn't use those numbers, or even know what to do with them. But how is that different from drop odds? I've been an advocate for releasing those numbers, and in fact all game mechanical documentation, from the very start. But that's because I think players *deserve* that information, not because I actually think more than a tiny percentage of players would actually use it.

In fact I cannot honestly say that I know for certain that such documentation wouldn't mislead more players that it educated. I don't advocate transparency on the basis of net benefit. I advocate for it because everyone should have the opportunity to use it, whether they are qualified to do so or not.

I see, that makes sense. Once again you’ve opened my mind lol. Always happy to read your posts.

TitoBandito187

If Kabam can't be bothered to put in the drop rates for the amount of fragments, I'm always gonna assume the worst possible outcome and just skip it. Let's face it, when you gamble, you usually lose. And if you don't even know the odds, how can you really know if you've really won? If this was a good deal, the drop rates would be there, no questions asked.

If this was a flat 10% deal, or if a 10% fragment had at least a 50% chance, I would have bought it. With no way of knowing, it might as well be considered a pure 5% offer and not worth the cost for me at that price.

The more we put up with these and buy them, the more Kabam will keep testing the waters with devalued and obscure offers to make a short term profit.

Save your money and show them the deal sucks... unless you absolutely need just 5% or just don't care enough about what $40 could avtually get you in this game or be better spent IRL.
What in Kabams history leads you to believe that if the offer was "good" the drop rates would have been shown? Please cite that offer that shows this to be true. Remember, needs to be the same type of offer. I'll wait.

It's common sense. I don't expect you to understand. I'm not working for you so you can site the contrary if you can offer Kabam statistics. I'm not anti Kabam, bit I am anti **** deals that cost real money and don't share drop rates.

DNA3000

The more we put up with these and buy them, the more Kabam will keep testing the waters with devalued and obscure offers to make a short term profit.

I'm not sure what you think Kabam is "testing" but these kinds of offers have been the bread and butter of F2P microtransaction supported games since the concept of such was invented. And this is not short term profit either: these kinds of offers have generated sustained multiyear profit for the game that has been increasing year after year for years.

TitoBandito187

Oh, and it's part of the MCOC blog about being transparent @Demonzfyre. But common sense should be used too as a consumer, at least the consumers who possess that ability anyway.

https://playcontestofchampions.com/mcoc-drop-rates/

This is a crystal being sold for real money, no?

Demonzfyre

If Kabam can't be bothered to put in the drop rates for the amount of fragments, I'm always gonna assume the worst possible outcome and just skip it. Let's face it, when you gamble, you usually lose. And if you don't even know the odds, how can you really know if you've really won? If this was a good deal, the drop rates would be there, no questions asked.

If this was a flat 10% deal, or if a 10% fragment had at least a 50% chance, I would have bought it. With no way of knowing, it might as well be considered a pure 5% offer and not worth the cost for me at that price.

The more we put up with these and buy them, the more Kabam will keep testing the waters with devalued and obscure offers to make a short term profit.

Save your money and show them the deal sucks... unless you absolutely need just 5% or just don't care enough about what $40 could avtually get you in this game or be better spent IRL.
What in Kabams history leads you to believe that if the offer was "good" the drop rates would have been shown? Please cite that offer that shows this to be true. Remember, needs to be the same type of offer. I'll wait.
It's common sense. I don't expect you to understand. I'm not working for you so you can site the contrary if you can offer Kabam statistics. I'm not anti Kabam, bit I am anti **** deals that cost real money and don't share drop rates.

There's nothing to cite. This is literally the first time this has been offered. Every offer in the past, good or bad, has had drop rates but nothing like this has been offered. So what you said has no basis.

Demonzfyre

Oh, and it's part of the MCOC blog about being transparent @Demonzfyre. But common sense should be used too as a consumer, at least the consumers who possess that ability anyway.

https://playcontestofchampions.com/mcoc-drop-rates/

This is a crystal being sold for real money, no?

They gave you the drop rate. 100% T5cc. That's all they're required to tell you. So they are being transparent.

TitoBandito187

Read the next paragraph bud. Nice try.

Demonzfyre

Oh, and it's part of the MCOC blog about being transparent @Demonzfyre. But common sense should be used too as a consumer, at least the consumers who possess that ability anyway.

https://playcontestofchampions.com/mcoc-drop-rates/

This is a crystal being sold for real money, no?

You're buying a T5CC fragment crystal. You're guaranteed to get T5CC fragments. Gold crystals say 100% chance for gold and there's a minimum of 15k gold that drops. Where's all the keyboard warriors wanting their justice for the gold crystals that have been in the game for years. Oh, it's not T5CC so you don't care. Got it.

Demonzfyre

Read the next paragraph bud. Nice try.

My god. I know what it says. They literally did that. You are buy a crystal that contains T5CC fragments. You are 100% guaranteed to get T5CC fragments.

You buy a gold crystal. You are 100% guaranteed to get gold. The drop rate says 100% to get gold. They listed the drop rates just like they said they would.

DNA3000

Oh, and it's part of the MCOC blog about being transparent @Demonzfyre. But common sense should be used too as a consumer, at least the consumers who possess that ability anyway.

https://playcontestofchampions.com/mcoc-drop-rates/

This is a crystal being sold for real money, no?

They gave you the drop rate. 100% T5cc. That's all they're required to tell you. So they are being transparent.

The Apple developer guideline specifies that the odds should be shown for every "type" of drop. However, the intent of the rule was to allow players buying lootboxes to have some idea what the average value of the lootbox was. The problem was that lootboxes were being advertised as "potentially" containing high value rewards, without specifying the odds for obtaining them might be astronomically low. Apple crafted a loose rule that says "type" to indicate different rewards of radically different value.

However, rewards of the same quote unquote "type" but with dramatically different quantities is also a case where the "high value reward" could have arbitrarily low odds even though it is the same "type" as another reward that is more common. I'm pretty sure the game developers (of all games) know this, and are choosing to interpret the language in the manner most advantageous to themselves rather than honor the spirit of the rule.

You can argue that they have every right to do this, and they do, but if they do they should not expect any sympathy from their customers when Apple uses the same letter of the law against them, which they occasionally do randomly and capriciously. But always within the letter of the law.

Demonzfyre

https://forums.playcontestofchampions.com/en/discussion/57450/drop-rates-not-shown#latest

Again, this was talked about when it first came out. Didn’t get an answer from kabam ever.

The difference is, a gold crystal costs 20 units, people rarely buy gold crystals, there are tons of places to get gold

T5cc is rare, it is an endgame resource and is being sold for real money. That is why people don’t care as much about the gold. It’s not something kabam is literally selling for $40 (yes I’m aware gold can be bought with 40 dollars worth of units, but as there is no gold offer for purely gold, it is not a comparison that can be made)

Both crystals offer the same set up. Get x amount of gold with the minimum being 15k for Thronebreakers.

Get x amount of T5cc for the offer but it's not the only thing you're getting.

It's literally the same thing. The type of resource doesn't matter.

Demonzfyre

This is taken straight from apple-
https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#in-app-purchase
Disclose the odds of each type of item. There's 1 type of item, the odds are 100%. Apple states "type of item". That's not a gray area. That's not a loose term. 5% T5CC vs 25% T5CC isn't a different item. It's the same item in different increments.

TitoBandito187

Oh, and it's part of the MCOC blog about being transparent @Demonzfyre. But common sense should be used too as a consumer, at least the consumers who possess that ability anyway.

https://playcontestofchampions.com/mcoc-drop-rates/

This is a crystal being sold for real money, no?

You're buying a T5CC fragment crystal. You're guaranteed to get T5CC fragments. Gold crystals say 100% chance for gold and there's a minimum of 15k gold that drops. Where's all the keyboard warriors wanting their justice for the gold crystals that have been in the game for years. Oh, it's not T5CC so you don't care. Got it.

You got it. I don't care.

I'm keeping my money and gonna advocate all the smart people do the same. You do you though, cause you do it so we'll

If Kabam wants more money (mine included).... no real drop rates, no spend.

Buyers beware. Or listen to @Demonzfyre sage advice. It's your money and Kabam needs it. We need better drop rates and more transparency as their goal is far from being met.

Demonzfyre

Oh, and it's part of the MCOC blog about being transparent @Demonzfyre. But common sense should be used too as a consumer, at least the consumers who possess that ability anyway.

https://playcontestofchampions.com/mcoc-drop-rates/

This is a crystal being sold for real money, no?

You're buying a T5CC fragment crystal. You're guaranteed to get T5CC fragments. Gold crystals say 100% chance for gold and there's a minimum of 15k gold that drops. Where's all the keyboard warriors wanting their justice for the gold crystals that have been in the game for years. Oh, it's not T5CC so you don't care. Got it.
You got it. I don't care.

I'm keeping my money and gonna advocate all the smart people do the same. You do you though, cause you don't so we'll

If Kabam wants more money (mine included).... no real drop rates, no spend.

Buyers beware. Or listen to @Demonzfyre sage advice. It's your money and Kabam needs it. We need better drop rates and more transparency as their goal is far from being met.

SMH. Read above. Apple is pretty clear on what they said. By all means. Keep posting the same thing over and over again like it's going to mean something different the next time. They were as transparent as they needed to be. Just not what you wanted them to be.

TitoBandito187

Shake away brother. Still don't care. They were as transparent as they wanted to be, not as they could be. I'll buy a good deal with a true drop rate, and I won't when it doesn't exist. This is feedback for Kabam. I don't care what you think unless you're putting the deals together. Never have, never will. I'll repeat as much as you care to respond.

DNA3000

This is taken straight from apple-
https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#in-app-purchase
Disclose the odds of each type of item. There's 1 type of item, the odds are 100%. Apple states "type of item". That's not a gray area. That's not a loose term. 5% T5CC vs 25% T5CC isn't a different item. It's the same item in different increments.

This was discussed back then on the Apple developer forums. The consensus was that "type of item" was not to be taken as literally as you seem to be willing to do, because if you take type of item literally, every game company has a loophole you could drive a truck through. All you had to do was have the lootbox contain only one "type" of item, a special reward box that itself contained a random set of items. Since every lootbox contained only the same type of item, they would only need to state that the lootbox has a 100% chance to drop that type of item. And since the intermediate reward boxes could not be directly purchased via the in-app purchase mechanism, they were not subject to the disclosure requirement.

Most developers concluded that this was rules-lawyering, and also that Apple just loves it when developers try to outsmart them.

DrZola

I’d tend to think there’s plenty of wiggle room around interpreting the term “item”—just a wild guess.

Dr. Zola

TitoBandito187

This is taken straight from apple-
https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#in-app-purchase
Disclose the odds of each type of item. There's 1 type of item, the odds are 100%. Apple states "type of item". That's not a gray area. That's not a loose term. 5% T5CC vs 25% T5CC isn't a different item. It's the same item in different increments.
This was discussed back then on the Apple developer forums. The consensus was that "type of item" was not to be taken as literally as you seem to be willing to do, because if you take type of item literally, every game company has a loophole you could drive a truck through. All you had to do was have the lootbox contain only one "type" of item, a special reward box that itself contained a random set of items. Since every lootbox contained only the same type of item, they would only need to state that the lootbox has a 100% chance to drop that type of item. And since the intermediate reward boxes could not be directly purchased via the in-app purchase mechanism, they were not subject to the disclosure requirement.

Most developers concluded that this was rules-lawyering, and also that Apple just loves it when developers try to outsmart them.

This. <^^^^

Kabam can offer a "virtual game item" that's guaranteed to be in the offer, but they are not actually providing the % rate for the chances of the lowest reward vs the highest reward, which would be the true drop rate.

We know we're getting a t5CC shard already, that is the "item. We're told we have a chance at 5-25% of the t5cc, but not given a probability of what the lowest amount compared to the highest amount is , so we can decide if the gamble is worth the risk (win or lose on that gamble). That would be a true drop rate.

Kabam can be as grey as legally allowed, but as a customers, we should, and I will, voice my opinion on it. I would gladly spend knowing my actual chances, and will gladly not spend as long as it's kept a secret. $40 is not chump change for a mobile game. It's not a large amount of money for me, but Im not gonna throw money away just because I have it. I would never buy this deal if I had a 99.99% chance to get 5% t5cc and only a .01% chance split between 10%-25% t5cc. Unfortunately, we have no way of knowing what the probability actually is in this offer to weigh the risks before spending actual cash.