Ok the dev's ask and answer was a waste of time and my life....

[The Calling]

First they gave one sentence and the typical reply was "It is on the backlog".....What does that even mean? The answers were vague and not much detail was given. I hate that they used the excuse that I am short so I can answer as many questions as possible......many were the same questions by different people... remember people quality over quantity.

Here is a thought......How about answer fewer questions and give detailed replies so we as players don't feel that was a total waste of time. You did this process with no to little thoughts. The dev gave us nothing more than what we all could have guess.

Once again, I am disappointed on the Q&A just like last time. But it is my fault as I expected something different so now I am mad at the world

[UP Jen]

"backlog"is an IT term meaning list of features they're going to implement sooner or later, basically.

I'm annoyed they didn't answer my questions!

[Regretz]

Im just dissappointed to their response regarding heroic mode time limit. They basically said since so many people r logging on to play heroic they have no intention of giving us a longer time limit. I mean, they know how us as players feel about this time limit and they blow it off as if its not important. Highly dissappointed in that regard, but looking forward to the milestones in wars that r supposed to be coming out. Might actually participate in wars now.

[The Calling]

The response for HM was really a joke. Everyone or the majority of players hate the time limit of one week. The answer that was given was basically "why change it? since some players that don't have a full time job can spend some gems to achieve it so suck it all". A slap in the face to those who were asking that had a valid reason on why they wanted it changed.

But we all know that money talks and since a few people spend gems to get it, it shall never change. I will be happy to get the regular one for fusion. However the answer about the drop seems to truly made up.....some players have great luck while others have horrible luck. If the coding for luck was the same across the board, we wouldn't have to do 100 runs in order to get 5 shards while others that did 100 runs get 98 shards.

One time, I meant to ask was can you get rid of the miss mechanic....I hate it with a passion.


Tks Jen for letting me what backlog meant.

[Soberranger]

I usually shrugged it off when others would call the developers "GREE-dy" but I wasn't too impressed with the Q&A either... Most of the other Q&As from other games I've attended showed a team of developers who obviously put a lot of themselves into their game and obviously loved and cared about their game as much as any of their fans that were asking questions...What I saw today was nothing like that..it was a collection of very short, uninformative answers to questions that people have been asking for months. Where is the passion?

[Regretz]

Like Calling said they dont care, they only see $$$. The fact that some ppl can play 24/7 to finish heroic is wats keeping it a 1 week limit. I guess they dont care about the ppl that have jobs and a life to attend to. This is Gree's response to heroic, in a nutshell: "Either no-life heroic or spend, others do so we will keep it 1 week 'to be fair'". Extremely dissappointed.

[Marco_]

"backlog"is an IT term meaning list of features they're going to implement sooner or later, basically.

I'm annoyed they didn't answer my questions!
About your question on number of players: scrolling to the last player leaderboard page on a raid or damage leaderboard on an epic boss is a decent indication.
Last raid it was 49k on Android, this epic boss it lists 59k on android. So on android probably 60-70k accounts a bit active, the rest of the over 5 million that were ever created are dead.

[Marco_]

I wonder how many that just use Heroic when it's there to trigger bosses and maybe get 1 or 2 fusion boosts for completing 1 or 2 of the 16 crystals add noise to their numbers on "participation to Heroic mode"...

[Lord P]

The overall message from Gree was to stop paying and stop playing if you want things to change. That is one heck of a business strategy.

It seemed very much like the people answering the questions had to do it at gunpoint. They didn't seem at all excited about the Q&A and acted very much like "yeah we know this company sucks but this is our job."

If you can't get excited about interacting with the people who pay your salary then what does that say about your company and the love you have for your job?

This game and this company are dying a slow death....... the Q&A was just another example of a company not in touch with their user base. Just one more reason why I haven't bought gems in over a month and don't see that changing............. sigh

[UP Jen]

Thanks Marco, good point. We should track it by week and see if the game's falling off or what.

[Konny]

The overall message from Gree was to stop paying and stop playing if you want things to change. That is one heck of a business strategy.

Doing exactly that this time.

Right when it started I thought about the time commitment necessary again after such a short break and decided I'm not gonna chase the armor. So far I'm at 4 full crytsals with no intention to get the fifth. All the other heroics before I got 8 crystals for the non+ armor. So you have at least 1 player with less participation than before. I hope they look at past participation and count me.

[legalious]

"backlog"is an IT term meaning list of features they're going to implement sooner or later, basically.

I'm annoyed they didn't answer my questions!

You kinda asked for personal questions about other players spending habits which we should not be privy to.


The overall message from Gree was to stop paying and stop playing if you want things to change. That is one heck of a business strategy.

It's more of a "Players are actively perusing Heroic Mode and it is do-able." If more people were unable or do not complete the Heroic mode normal armor, then they might consider revamping the dates or drop rates to allow for more people to successfully complete the shards.

[Lord P]

Took me 31 tries to get 8 fragments from the Kingdom of Darkness.......... Only the most patient of players will put it with nonsense like that.

[Greg Wickstrom]

I haven't bought gems in a long time, and will not. This game needs to go Free to Play. I'm just waiting for them to wipe all armour from people and call in a system fail.

[Lord P]

It's more of a "Players are actively perusing Heroic Mode and it is do-able." If more people were unable or do not complete the Heroic mode normal armor, then they might consider revamping the dates or drop rates to allow for more people to successfully complete the shards.
In an effort to make a few extra $$$ Gree has gone in a not fun direction. I hope you get my logic here.

People are complaining about the drop rates yes. But why are they complaining? Because they can't get the plus armor? I would argue that isn't necessarily the case. The frustration comes from going through a level and receiving nothing for your labor. This is new to Knights and Dragons in the 9 months I've been playing. Before if you couldn't beat a level you understood that and made whatever preparations were necessary to change that in the future. But the way Gree has done things with Heroic Mode they've gone in the direction of...... you can have the strongest armor in the game and still not be able to progress........... for no other reason than the games just decides not to give up a fragment. That's just plain corny and very frustrating. You can do everything right and still not receive a crystal fragment for no good reason....... just luck of the draw. I feel that's the part that really frustrates people.

The Heroic Mode would still be fun if the opponents were super hard. If you have to gem to beat them, you have to gem to beat them. At least people will know what they're up against. It sucks big time do everything you're supposed to do and not be rewarded at the end (over and over and over again). This strategy to make the mode more difficult by even having a drop rate is actually making the Heroic Mode far less enjoyable. Its a departure from the norm, it's transparent and makes for a worse gaming experience.

Since it's clear Gree wants to make money so bad, they should also be stepping up to keep the gaming experience fun. Isn't that why we started playing the game in the first place? Because it was fun?

[legalious]

Since it's clear Gree wants to make money so bad, they should also be stepping up to keep the gaming experience fun. Isn't that why we started playing the game in the first place? Because it was fun?

I started playing because I wanted to collect certain armor. My type of fun would involve a lot of Disneyland.

[Lord P]

I started playing because I wanted to collect certain armor. My type of fun would involve a lot of Disneyland.
so collecting armor isn't fun? You've been playing this game how long?

[legalious]

so collecting armor isn't fun? You've been playing this game how long?

Only the ones I want, and I have been playing since late 2013.

[Lord P]

Only the ones I want, and I have been playing since late 2013.
So only collecting the armor you want is fun........ this implies fun is not the primary reason for playing this game in the first place. Is fun even required for you to continue playing?

[Yerofeich]

I agree with Lord P in regards to randomness of drops. Now personally, I wish HM was longer (2 weeks at least) but I can accept the fact that if there are a lot of people who do play 24/7 and spend a million gems, they deserve that heroic armor more then I do, even if i do think of them as basement dwelling freeloaders without a life. But the idea that two people can spend exactly the same effort and gems and have one of them get the armor and the other not even be close is a bit disheartening.

[Regretz]

I agree, I mean in order to get the + version u must have A LOT of free time on ur hands, time which I (as well as the majority of ppl) do not have as I work full time. Gree is all about making money, I understand. So y aggravate the ppl that r working, who in case spend some of the money they make in gems, by making HM a no-lifer mode. I dont even bother going for the + as I have a job and a family. Also, fighting 1 area 60+ times with only 5 shard drops completely turned me away.
If they think keeping HM 1 week long permanent is gonna make ppl spend more they r sadly mistaken.
Also, their AMA was a complete joke with the questions regarding HM. They gave the same 1sentence answer for a majority of the questions (We have no intention of doing that) or something to that effect. ELABORATE! Each question should have a different answer, explain to us y u choose to not implement that feature. For instance, I suggested making potions buyable or a more common drop and they just said they have no intention of doing so. Well why not? This heroic mode bull has made the 1 fun game mode more of a full time job, and im not looking to take on a second job.

[Marco_]

People are complaining about the drop rates yes. But why are they complaining? Because they can't get the plus armor? I would argue that isn't necessarily the case. The frustration comes from going through a level and receiving nothing for your labor. This is new to Knights and Dragons in the 9 months I've been playing.
Before if you couldn't beat a level you understood that and made whatever preparations were necessary to change that in the future. But the way Gree has done things with Heroic Mode they've gone in the direction of...... you can have the strongest armor in the game and still not be able to progress........... for no other reason than the games just decides not to give up a fragment. That's just plain corny and very frustrating. You can do everything right and still not receive a crystal fragment for no good reason....... just luck of the draw. I feel that's the part that really frustrates people.

Nah, in the long ago past you needed the storyline 3*+ armors to beat epic boss level 43. Which meant collection 18 or 22 materials twice, while most of the drops were 1* materials instead of 3*. All the later storyline locations have secondary drops for their bosses that are more common than their primary drops, so low-ish drop rates have been with KnD from the start.

[Arclite]

"It is on the backlog".....What does that even mean? The answers were vague and not much detail was given.

As UP Jen pointed out this means we want to work on it sometime in the future. We have no set date. I apologize for the vagueness but 1h is not a lot of time to answer questions. Which answer should I elaborate on?


How many people are actively playing K&D now? Has it been going down or up? How many of those are totally free-to-play? What do people spend per month on K&D on average? And have you seen the South Park episode "Freemium isn't free" and laughed like evil, mad super-villains while rubbing your hands and showering each other with dollar bills?

This data is confidential. What I can link you to is thinkgaming.com which provides rough estimates.
That South Park episode is one of my favorites. The rubbing hands and showering in money part I can't do unfortunately. I have bills to pay and kids to feed like everyone else.
According to your logic bank tellers shower themselves with money every day. The "Freemium" market is a result of Player/Customer behaviour, which I can't predict or change.
But that's a discussion for another day.


Phill - Immortal GM: a.) Are you aware that for raids, you give out practically the same rewards for #1, #2, #3 if we look at the MAIN reward - Armor.
Whilst it is understandable you cannot give the three top players, assuming they come from the #1 three versions of a Mono for placing #1 Guildwise and Top 3 Individual wise, don't you think this devalues the idea of attempting to perform on a very high GUILD level in raids?

b.) As developers, do any of you actually PLAY KnD? From other games, often staff have their own private accounts and it really depicts if they truly love the game. If you do play, would you say that you do love the game? If so, what is it that makes you like your own game? Content? Community?

a) We are constantly working on improving Reward structures to find the optimal setup. Since we try and implemented changes incrementally this can sometimes result in odd looking structures. How do you like the latest change?

b) Yes, most people in the office (me included) play the game on a regular basis. I love the game like a brother. We often have arguments but at the end of the day we are bound for life. My favourite aspect of the game are the cool looking armors you can try to obtain, and then trying to get them up to Level 99. I also enjoy socialising with my Guild Mates and discussing Community Feedback with other developers. There are a lot of stakeholders involved in this game and it's difficult to make everyone happy. All I can say is, we are doing our best and we want to continue to learn from our mistakes.

Regards,
Arclite

[Phill - Immortal GM]

a) We are constantly working on improving Reward structures to find the optimal setup. Since we try and implemented changes incrementally this can sometimes result in odd looking structures. How do you like the latest change?

b) Yes, most people in the office (me included) play the game on a regular basis. I love the game like a brother. We often have arguments but at the end of the day we are bound for life. My favourite aspect of the game are the cool looking armors you can try to obtain, and then trying to get them up to Level 99. I also enjoy socialising with my Guild Mates and discussing Community Feedback with other developers. There are a lot of stakeholders involved in this game and it's difficult to make everyone happy. All I can say is, we are doing our best and we want to continue to learn from our mistakes.

Regards,
Arclite

Alright. I can understand you want change. However, some moves really need to be thought over before you implement it. Kind of like you are with the EW-Milestones for Beta users. Don't be afraid to "give us crap" to test, it will show better results than promising us the stars and giving us way less.
To the new changes: I feel you are close, but yet quite far from adapting the Milestones properly. With the addition of Rings&Amulets, milestones to 12M just don't cut it anymore. My advice: Listen to your facebook survey/questonnaire. It will show you that you should not only extend the milestones (way) beyond 12M, but also that (only) the later ones should be beefed up.

I am glad you do play the game. I can personally say that it doesn't reflect in the Customer service, as too often stuff gets mixed up or analyzed wrong. However, that isn't the topic at hand, is it.
When you say socialising with guild mates, is this in the ingame chat function? If so, I hope you agree it needs an overhaul :p.

Thanks for replying anyhow.