I’ve been thinking about this for a while. The current game economy has some issues, but could be great with the right changes.
Dead Currencies and Worthless Rewards
Food, Gold, Scrolls, Runes, Keys, can all suffer from this issue depending on where you’re at in the game. Examples: Open a chest and get rewarded food and gold when food and gold is maxed and there is nothing to spend food or gold on (complete waste of a chest and key). Do a level 100 Dungeon Challenge for a Legendary Rune that you already have 30 of. Do a Level 85 Skirmish Challenge for a pile of food with maxed food inventory. This is an unnecessary point of frustration in the game. An item having value does not need to be situational in the game. This can be resolved by allowing items to be traded or sold, thereby ensuring that all items will always have at least some value in the game.
There are countless ways this could be implemented well. A simple implementation would be to allow items to be sold for something like Honor, which is a pretty universal currency and would allow the player to then trade the honor for something else of value. This kind of implementation could be implemented with ease with a single store or follower. Or, you could go more complex and offer different stores/followers and even introduce new items. For example, Scrolls/Runes could be traded for an Elemental Charm (call it whatever you want) that allows you to change the mastery of a Weapon, Armor, or Accessory item. Food and Gold could be spent to obtain a Transmute Charm (again, call it what you want) that allows you to change a Weapon, Armor, or Accessory Attribute. Maybe add other items that can be traded for, like an Attuned Incantation (or whatever) that allows you to lock an items abilities so they never conflict with the existing Mastery… or maybe upon Evolution, the player sees 3 possible new attributes and gets to choose which one gets implemented. (I would cast that “Attuned Incantation” on key Rare/Epic Items ASAP to help ensure Evolutions are not wasted on worthless attributes.) Like I said, there are countless ways things could be implemented that are limited only by imagination. THE KEY though is that there are NO DEAD CURRENCIES and that everything always has value.
Shards
It’s very frustrating to have 1000 Minor or Superior Shards and 0 Lesser, Greater, or Major Shards and continually pull even more of the shards you already have a surplus of with no way to use them. I’m not going to dwell long on this since there have already been many posts on the forum about this and some legit solutions to the issue as well. But, I wanted to mention it because it’s an unnecessary frustration for players that doesn’t add to the game and should get addressed in some way.
Real Money Purchases
In general, it seems to me like the keepers of the economy are missing opportunities in this area. Incentives for real money purchases could be much better without breaking the game or making it a Pay-to-Win style game.
- Battle Pass
This one is the most obvious to me (Full Disclosure, I’ve never purchased Battle Pass and at my current rate will complete all 30 levels of the Free rewards). The current 56 Day cycle is way, way, way too difficult to complete for someone who has dropped $10 USD on it. By my most recent calculations (in the link below), someone has to average around 470 crests for 8 straight weeks in order to complete all 30 levels of the Battle Pass. That’s a higher requirement than any existing Kingdom has for membership in the entire game. That’s crazy! Now, if you want to keep that level of difficulty for the free players, whatever. But, the paying players should get, as a bonus for paying, a much, much easier time completing it. It should nearly be guaranteed with average effort. That should be part of the incentive. By my calculations, I would recommend adding to EVERY Premium Reward level : +10 Horns in addition to the existing reward. That essentially makes the completion of the Battle Pass 33% easier for those that pay.
- VIP
I’ve played quite a few games that have a VIP system. The best implementation I’ve seen, by far, is when VIP levels have permanent benefits. You should seriously consider separating out your VIP subscription benefits and the VIP Level benefits. I can pretty much guarantee you will see more people interested in VIP that way. Examples of VIP Level rewards:
- Level 1:+10% Ore Production, +1 Shard for all Shard drops, +1% Relic Drop Rate, +10% Crowns from Crown Purchases
- Level 2: +20% Ore Production, +2% Relic Drop Rate, +.1% Glyph Drop Rate, +20% Crowns from Crown Purchases
- Level 3: +30% Ore Production, +2 Shards for all Shard drops, +2% Relic Drop Rate, +30% Crowns from Crown Purchases
- Level 4: +40% Ore Production, +4% Relic Drop Rate, +.2% Glyph Drop Rate, +40% Crowns from Crown Purchases
- Level 5: +50% Ore Production, +3 Shards for all Shard drops, +3% Relic Drop Rate, +50% Crowns from Crown Purchases, +10% Weapon Shard Drop Rate
- Etc.
(The examples above are just ideas. I think ore generation is currently way too low and it should get bumped whether adding it to something like VIP or not). VIP Level Rewards should be permanently tied to an account whether they are currently enrolled in a subscription or not. To sell the subscription, make the daily/monthly rewards compelling enough to make people want it. You could probably get some good feedback from existing customers on what works and doesn’t work for the existing VIP subscription.
