Daily Deals by Category
Shards
The following table shows the Shards Daily Deals by offering (please forgive the size):
Observations:
- Most shard offerings Pre-0.35 were in lots of 10 and were only available to be purchased in Gold. Shard offerings Post-0.35 are offered in all 3 currencies (lots of 20 for Gold, lots of 50 for crowns/gems). The gold prices of shards dropped substantially on a per shard basis with the exception of Superior shards which experienced a more modest price drop
- Although there are less gold offerings Post-0.35, the shards available for purchase with gold are sold in lots of 20, compared to primarily lots of 10 Pre-0.35 (with the exception of weapon shards which were sold in inconsistent lot totals).
- The Crown-Gem-Gold ratio of the value of the shard pricing is consistent across all shard types Post-0.35
- Greater Shards continue to have anomalous pricing in that the price scaling would suggest that Greater Shards and Major Shards prices are switched. Pre-0.35, Greater Shards were absurdly overpriced relative to other shard types along the spectrum of rarity.
Analysis
I think the results here are a mixed bag. Even though players have less gold offerings, the gold purchases they can make are often for twice the shards that they could buy before and at a signficant gold discount compared to Pre-0.35. This is a help to newer players but is less beneficial to existing players as gold is essentially in abundance. There are certainly more options now and the Gem deals and Crown deals give ample shards (x50) and the pricing is consistent. Is it good value though? Our measuring stick is 250 Crowns for ~$5: What can that buy you? About 25 levels on a single piece of armor, and that’s 1-25, not 10-35. Given that shards are obtainable by various means, albeit at a slow rate, spending crowns, or even gems on shards seems a poor use of resources. Players would be better off being given shard offers exclusively in gold, and saving the premium currencies for more enticing items, such as glyphs, relics(?), etc. However, I can see newer players being enticed by the gem deals due to the scarcity of shards when starting out.
Runes/Scrolls
Observations
- Pre-0.35 Uncommons and Rares were often sought after to facilitate Follower evolutions (scrolls) and gear evolutions (runes). However, Post-0.35 has eliminated the need for Scrolls for Followers and Gear evolutions are effectively halted until a later update
- Post-0.35 has reduced prices significantly on Mythic and Legendary Runes/Scrolls but also removed the ability to purchase these with Gold
Analysis
This is arguably the worst category of Shop offers Post-0.35. The demand for Uncommons/Rares is down but even if they were back in demand (evolves were able to be done), they are relatively cheap and will be bought anytime they are up. Legendary/Mythic Runes/Scrolls are abundantly available in chests particularly once a player hits Level 50 on at least one class. Even with the drastic reductions in price in Gems and Crowns, there is virtually no benefit in acquiring these in the Shop. Epics are harder to collect from gameplay (much like Tier III Shards), but often a player will be looking for a specific Mastery color and with only a 20% chance to get the one you want, even the Epic offers are unappealing. Lastly, the removal of the option to find Epic+ offers as Gold removes a significant source of gold sink. However, even if these were still offered for Gold, I would be hard pressed to say which is the better value for players’ gold investment: Mythic Runes/Scrolls or more Marks from Empowered Dungeons.
Keys
Observations
- This category of Shop Daily Deals is mostly unchanged Pre- and Post-0.35. The main change appears to be a 20% increase in price in Crowns for all Key types. However the Gems and Gold costs remained the same
- Keys are a “key” component of the VIP Pass valued at $9.99 USD
- The following Key offers are also available in the Shop, distinct from the Daily Deals:
Analysis
Is it worth buying Keys from the Shop Daily Deals? The best value for keys is undoubtedly the VIP pass. For ~$10USD you receive 30 Ruby Keys, 30 Gold Keys, 60 Iron Keys, and 120 Wooden Keys as well as 300 Gems, an assortment of other resources, an additional vault slot, etc. It is far and away the best value purchasable by a new player but has diminishing returns over time as documented previously by @Tacet:
VIP Pass rewards fall off after a few months of playing - #10 by Marin
The Key Daily Deals are more in line in value with the Small Key and Large Key Pack Bundles. The Small Key Bundle is priced at 450 gems; if you were to buy the equivalent amount of keys from the Daily Deals it would cost you 480 gems (however you would have to buy the keys in larger increments as referenced in the table). The Large Key Bundle is priced at 950 Crowns; if you were to buy the equivalent amount of keys from the Daily Deals it would cost you ~750 Crowns and you would be buying them increments that match up almost identically to the amounts offered in the Large Key Bundle. So it turns out that the Large Key Bundle is a staggeringly bad deal (the ultimate in gotta-have-it-now bad spending).
Ultimately, in my view, the only resource worth using to buy Keys is Gold. Keys are lotto tickets, a chance to open a chest with wildly variable contents. Using gems or even actual cash (Crowns) to buy lotto tickets is often a poor value. However, with the availability of the VIP pass, if you were going to spend cash, for $10USD you essentially get the Crown Daily Deal value of 7,560 Crowns. Buying Keys for Crowns (or even Gems) from any other source than VIP is essentially a waste.
Random Gear/Minions/Spells
Observations
- Pre-0.35 all Daily Deal offers of this type were purchasable in Gold; Post-0.35 these offers are only purchasable in Crowns/Gems
- There are 20 possible unique offers (assuming Epic is the highest rarity offered) and they are offered sporadically (around 1 every 4-5 Daily Deal refresh) making it difficult to capture all pricing detail
Analysis
BUYER BEWARE. This category is the worst change Post-0.35. Previously these were entirely available for gold, and made for the fun occasional lotto ticket based on the number of random outcomes (“Maybe it’s an Octoghoul! Oh, no, it’s just another Hogger”). This could have continued to be a fun way to sink some gold and possibly get a nice item or two. Instead, developers took the gold purchase option away, and replaced it with seriously inflated Crown/Gem prices. If you look back at the tables for Shards and Keys, I calculated the “conversion rate” used in pricing, which for Shards was essentially 2.5 Gems per Crown, 10 Gold per Gem, 25 Gold per Crown (meaning that if I paid 10 Crowns for something, I could expect to pay 250 Gold for the same item in a different Daily Offer). For Keys it was slightly worse (2.67 Gems per Crown, ~12.5 Gold per Gem, ~33.3 Gold per Gem; meaning that if I paid 10 Crowns for something, I could expect to pay 333 Gold for the same item in a different Daily Offer). But in this case we don’t have easy comparisons because Pre-0.35 all offers were in gold, and Post 0.35, all offers are in Crown/Gems. Thankfully, since I tracked as many prices as I could, I can estimate prices in Crowns/Gems based on these other other “conversion rates”. I used the conservative rate (Shards) that is more favorable to the developers (meaning that they would achieve a higher price in gems and crowns when using the “Shard Rate” compared to the “Key Rate”) but even then you can see for the data collected so far, prices in Crowns/Gems terms were increased by 80-200+%, where the largest increases were on the least valuable items (Common, Uncommon).
In my view, this category should be avoided like the plague. It’s a terrible setup, with inflated prices on lotto based picks. The developers should rethink these changes entirely.
Glyphs
Observations
- Once again we have the removal of Gold purchase options.
- Prices in terms of both Crowns and Gems have been reduced for the 5 new Glyph types relative to the single Pre-0.35 Glyph.
Analysis
What is there to say here? Until we get more options for Glyph drops and Relics actually appear in such amounts that allow for evolutions, how can these prices be evaluated. It’s pure speculation: perhaps it’s a good investment to use gems on these items; perhaps instead, the availability of glyphs will outpace relics and there will be no need to invest in glyphs beyond the additional means made available in the future. For now I reserve judgement.