85 replies to this topic

[Vellron2005]

Hello my dear Mechwarriors.

I would like to talk about supply caches.

Note that I'm the guy who buys and spends MC almost exclusively on Mechbays. I simply can't afford to buy large ammounts of MC or mech packs.. So 25 MC is a valued, rare commodity for me.

Most of the MC I have, came from working hard on tournaments, with only some of it from the cheapest MC packs.

So far I've only opened 3 supply caches, but immediately, I noticed something.

The first two contained averagely useful items, and the third one, contained super-cool and useful stuff. Especially with the third one, which only contained one item I would consider undesirable - a pair of Large pulse lasers. The rest contained a mech, mechbay, MC, and other super cool items. I though I was bound to win something awesome.

But alas - the ONLY undesirable and least valuable item came up. The LPL's.

Exactly the same thing happened in ALL the supply caches I've opened so far. Always the least desired item comes up.

Has anyone actually gotten anything good?

I thought, ok, the first one's was just bad luck. The second one, ok, even worse luck. But the third one, where only a single item was "bad" while all the others were absolutely amazing?

Are the supply caches rigged to give you the least favorable item you would usually never spend MC on?

Are they just a cheesy way of funding PGI, while giving you nothing of value, so you still have to buy all the good stuff for even more MC?

I invite you to share your opened cache experiences, so let's see if the supply caches are truly worth spending MC on..

Edited by Vellron2005, 28 July 2016 - 12:15 AM.

[DovisKhan]

I got 250k cbills several times and a lump of coal, a lump of coal...

[DAYLEET]

Thats how gambling works, its not a charity it's a fund raiser for the rich.

[DovisKhan]

DAYLEET, on 27 July 2016 - 11:55 PM, said:

Thats how gambling works, its not a charity it's a fund raiser for the rich.

That's actually true, people on welfare/minimum wage workers spend the most on lottery tickets.


However in MWO, opening chests is way, way better deal than buying cbills directly. Million cbls costs 800 MC to buy from store, you can open 4 chests and get that much for a hundred

[EvilCow]

Probabilities are not equal, the rotating thing animation does not mean that all tiles have equal probability.

Basically probabilities are programmed on server and they can change them in any moment or even do "personalized settings" on a per-player basis based on your spending profile, they officially refused to give any detail so no guarantee.

Edited by EvilCow, 28 July 2016 - 12:34 AM.

[DAYLEET]

DovisKhan, on 28 July 2016 - 12:00 AM, said:

That's actually true, people on welfare/minimum wage workers spend the most on lottery tickets.


However in MWO, opening chests is way, way better deal than buying cbills directly. Million cbls costs 800 MC to buy from store, you can open 4 chests and get that much for a hundred

everything is a better deal than to buy cbills and supply cache isnt the best/cheapest of them. But seriously, dont ever buy cbills for cash, thats just dumb. Dont reason your purchase by telling yourself you are making cbills. Its not what you wanted in the first place and you lost your bet.

[DovisKhan]

DAYLEET, on 28 July 2016 - 12:22 AM, said:

everything is a better deal than to buy cbills and supply cache isnt the best/cheapest of them. But seriously, dont ever buy cbills for cash, thats just dumb. Dont reason your purchase by telling yourself you are making cbills. Its not what you wanted in the first place and you lost your bet.

Well, technically you average 1 mil cbills per 100 MC spent



Say you wanted to buy a Timberwolf, it's 6k MC (13kk cbills), or ~30USD since that's the cost of a 6500 MC pack


SO you'd only need to spend 1300 MC opening chests to get enough cbills to buy it


That's a 5 X better deal

[sneeking]

I opened one with a free key that was given to me after a match for reasons unknown, i own no clan mechs so naturally it gave me the omni pod !

I sold that and the remaining crates....

I will not be sucked in by this game feature !

[El Bandito]

Judging from what people are winning in general, I say crates are faster way to earn C-Bills for newbies than buying the Jenner champion with MC then selling it for C-Bills, or even purchasing 1-3 day Premium Time.

[Paigan]

EvilCow, on 28 July 2016 - 12:01 AM, said:

Probabilities are not equal, the rotating thing animation does not mean that all tiles have equal probability.

Basically probabilities are programmed on server and they can change them in any moment or even do "personalized settings" on a per-player basis based on your spending profile, they officially refused to give any detail so no guarantee.

That is exactely why I (otherwise seeing myself as some kind of "PGI understander" - translates badly from German, sry) call this a scam from PGI.
The UI implies equal chances, but they aren't. So you're tricked into spending money under a false impression (e.g. having a 50% chance of getting something nice if 4 nice items are displayed).

Intentionally scamming customers.
Normally, that kills a business. Or it should.

[sneeking]

Chinese devs use gambling features exactly like this in those cheesy flash based browser rpg games which they like to charge in US$ for...

Yep, in short its an obvious rippoff that most experienced gamers will spot a mile away.

[Star Colonel Silver Surat]

When you play a MWO match you're gambling every time that the matchmaker will give you skilled team mates and that your team's builds will complement each other. So pick your poison I guess - it's a big lottery wheel either way.

[Satan n stuff]

Paigan, on 28 July 2016 - 02:03 AM, said:

That is exactely why I (otherwise seeing myself as some kind of "PGI understander" - translates badly from German, sry) call this a scam from PGI.
The UI implies equal chances, but they aren't. So you're tricked into spending money under a false impression (e.g. having a 50% chance of getting something nice if 4 nice items are displayed).

Intentionally scamming customers.
Normally, that kills a business. Or it should.

Nearly every F2P game with a similar system does it like that.

[Airwind]

i had 2 cache with similar content. and when opening them, both gave me the same "random" item. #stayparanoidmyfriends

[davoodoo]

Pick common stuff, lets say,

6 mechs, large laser, lrm15 are the contents.

lrm15 will get 47% chance, large laser will get 47% chance, each mech 1% chance. Maybe not exactly that, but this is basic principle behind them, they are not rigged, they are just poorly weighted.

Satan n stuff, on 28 July 2016 - 02:29 AM, said:

Nearly every F2P game with a similar system does it like that.

Argumentum ad populum.

Many companies does that, so players shouldnt complain.

Edited by davoodoo, 28 July 2016 - 03:27 AM.

[Yellonet]

If you open 100 crates you might get 1 or 2 items you want.

[Mechteric]

https://en.wikipedia...iki/Probability

[Paigan]

Satan n stuff, on 28 July 2016 - 02:29 AM, said:

Nearly every F2P game with a similar system does it like that.

Every similar system is similar? Okay.
My point still stands. What you wrote is no objection or such. Only a near-empty statement.

Edited by Paigan, 28 July 2016 - 05:29 AM.

[PyckenZot]

Gambling, by definition, is always biased towards by giving better odds to the lowest value item. That's how the system gets its income.

When opening a box, I assume around 75% chance to get rubbish, 10% chance to get a mediocre thing, 5% chance to get something good and 1% chance to get the grand prize.

And I assume that's being very optimistic,...

[AlexEss]

Are the boxes rigged...? Yes... much like ever other game of "chance" lite slot machines. The house always win in the long run. You might be the lucky sod whom the dice fall in favor to.but that just menas that the 20 guys before you lost.

It is ofc not rigged to never pay out... This is not some shoddy Walmart claw machine. But it will always be less sure than t o buy the item you like outright.

Now what redeem the boxes in my mind is that you at least know beforehand if it is worth to open the box at all. Not even Blizzard does that.

As for the practice itself... I like to gamble... So i like gambling boxes.