[TERA PC & Console] En Masse is closing, but TERA lives on! We will continue to support TERA PC (NA) and TERA Console until service is transferred. Stay tuned for more information.
[TERA Console] The Grotto of Lost Souls update (v85) is now live! Read the patch notes here: https://bit.ly/TERACon_v85
[TERA PC] The 64-bit update (v97) is now live. Check out all the changes delivered on August 11 here: https://bit.ly/tera64_patchnotes
[TERA PC & CONSOLE] Summerfest Part 2: The Beach Bash is on from August 11 until September 1! Participate in event activities to earn tokens redeemable for costumes, consumables, mounts, and more! Details: https://bit.ly/tera_sf20
Comments
*no promises
It is a MAJOR change for us players and there is no word in the Patch Notes about it, what ifarce is this?
However, after thinking through this seemingly expanded dual-type enchanting system, the reliance of getting the exact same pieces of gear to cover for the gap in feedstock actually ends up being more limiting than the previous system that was solely dependent on the more flexible feedstock (and plentiful) items. Hell, it was even MORE limiting than the ancient 'fodder' only system, because at least you could use any piece of gear as fodder as long as it goes into the same equipment slot. Our current fodder system is restricted to a 'must be exact same name' basis.
Have fun trying to get that specific slaughter weapon or gloves again for your weapon/glove just to enchant.
Despite a common belief, the fact is that EME is given only so much freedom to make changes to what BHS puts out, and BHS can basically say "take it, or leave it". We're not the target audience for Tera, which is the teen and college age Korean male, in Korea. Keep that in mind. The NA and EU audience is a bonus to them, but if they lost us, it wouldn't force them out of business, or even affect their profits all that much.
EME tries to keep things on the level with us, and make changes appropriate to the different market, but again, they only have so much they can do. For all we know, BHS hard coded the change in to the point where after this patch, everything would break without it. Asian MMO developers have done so in the past, screwing over the western audience because, quite honestly, they don't care what we think.
We're not their target demographic. We're not their most profitable one. Our playing this and getting them some more money and profits is merely a bonus to them, a means to an end, so to speak. If they lost the Western audience, how much do you think it would impact them? Not one bit.
Sure but this would lead to a lot of jobs lost if they lost NA/EU population. But that is besides the points. They need to [filtered] fix it.
You clearly don't know what you are talking about.
EME is owned by BHS. If NA Tera dies then they lose lots of money.
It's true that BHS caters to their own audience than us. But that's what they are suppose to do.
It's EME's job to cater to our needs and relay this to BHS.
But somewhere along the lines those people in charge don't know how to do their jobs.
I'm fairly certain the NA/EU market does actually count for quite a bit of their income. I think it was about 40%, give or take? Either way - losing this market would definitely impact BHS, to the point where it would seem a pretty stupid move to hard code any of these changes.
Then again, it's BHS we're talking about - they definitely don't seem to care all that much about NA/EU players, so eh.
There's a limit to what they can do on their own, though. BHS is only going to have a certain amount of time to spend catering to each individual market's whims, so EME has to choose very carefully when they want to request a programming change (and they'd have to convince BHS that it's worth their time). BHS does all the TERA programming for all markets worldwide, and whatever deviation they make (if it's unique) makes future builds that much more risky. So, if at all possible, BHS would probably direct them to use their own more-limited tools to compensate for issue to the extent they can. From what we've seen, publishers can control things like the cost of items on merchants, the amount of drops in dungeons, and special in-game events.
If they do need to go to BHS and request special programming, it's probably much easier for them to justify it after the change takes place and the problems in the in-game economy are tangible and the player feedback is visible. To go to them proactively and be like "we think you need to change the game for us because it's going to be crap" is a tougher argument, because BHS had their reasons when implementing the change. The most likely response would be "it's fine in K-TERA; wait and see how it goes, and we'll do something if it's really needed". This is probably why EME doesn't spend a whole lot of effort proactively seeking out problems and trying to negotiate with BHS on proactive solutions -- it's a lot easier to light a fire under people when customers are actually complaining.
To be honest, even aside all this, these sorts of economic problems are a bit tricky to predict. Obviously, everyone is complaining right now because it's a big culture shock due to the change. But there's another set of dungeons coming out next week, and this will affect the balance yet again. So figuring out the exact things to change right now is a bit tricky. The more prudent response would be to maybe do a few low-risk temporary measures (like events) and then give it a bit of time and see how things settle to see to what degree things need to be adjusted, and how to best accomplish it.
All of this is not trying to defend this system or EME's fault in not pursuing a proactive solution to this problem... but mostly to provide a thought about how these problems can happen in this sort of industry and situation. Even if I or any of us were in their shoes, I'm not sure it would be so easy to do that much better.
Hoard> Dump for profit> Everyone cries about short of supply> Event/Changes kick in price drops>Hoard back same amount of fods for lower price and the extra gold difference is yours
Brawler day 1 patch of t7 fods rose to over 24g each, within a day it dropped back to 11g, go figure.
Note quite a few people will never read patch notes, you can now burn a gear of the same type to attempt a +, so effectively you spend same amount of fods but save on the MWA. so it swinged in favor of new players who need to farm for intermediate gear while flying kicking the VM owner who have not +15'd in the face.
If you haven't noticed the harder it is to farm the longer people stay. They will keep whinging but keep playing. The early brawler patch where you can farm 600 vg point in 10 minutes with TAR easy switch was the true low point when everyone log on different alts all day just to farm and never participated in anything.