Why I don't like the idea of paying for extra retainers.

[Merciless]

As much as I love beating a dead animal I would ask that if you don't have anything to say about this issue that maybe you don't need to reply to this thread?

I have yet to see any posts bringing up the points I have made here but if you have read this all already please provide me a link to it so I can see it myself.

[Felis]

What I want to know, unlock it a 3rd retainer on the account for a time (every character on the account get a 3rd retainer for2$/month), or do you need to choose a character for it (only 1 character get it)?

[Mcshiggs]

I would like to point out that venture tokens will have a soft cap on how quickly you can earn them. Yes you can grind seals and continue to earn more nonstop, but for easily gotten tokens, there is a limit on how many you can get per day. This gives an even greater advantage to people who level alts for extra retainers, because not only do they get that, but double the amount of easy venture tokens per day.

It's not just about the easily gotten tokens, even though I would call farming 1k seals really easy, but the ventures that give the best rewards, look like they can take up to 18 hours. On Sargatanas right now, the items on the markets that sell for the most are the minions and the crafted items exclusive to treasure maps, so I can see the minions and crafting items exclusive to ventures being right up there too. With 18 hour ventures, it isn't about the number of tokens you can get, but the number of retainers you can send out at a time, so basically you will spend $4 not only a month for the extra storage, but to also double your chances at getting items that have the potential to be the among the highest priced items on the markets. I know they have planned to sell retainers for a while, SE's greed isn't new, but Yoshi just recently said they will not sell items that will affect game balance, I think doubling you shot at what can be the most expensive items in the game could have an affect on balance.

Another thing is that we are having to pay because they are too cheap to pay for more server space out of the profits from the subscriptions. The game did better than they thought, well they should pony up more money, instead they are expecting us to do that, they are treating this like they don't want to spend money now, because they are expecting a good number of dropped subscriptions in the future, so the more they pay for now, it seems the more will be wasted when that does happen, and they only need the server space to accommodate what, 700k subs instead of one million. So to me the issue isn't just the cheapness and greed of SE, but also the lies about what and why they are doing it.

[Djeserit]

Another thing is that we are having to pay because they are too cheap to pay for more server space out of the profits from the subscriptions. The game did better than they thought, well they should pony up more money, instead they are expecting us to do that, they are treating this like they don't want to spend money now, because they are expecting a good number of dropped subscriptions in the future, so the more they pay for now, it seems the more will be wasted when that does happen, and they only need the server space to accommodate what, 700k subs instead of one million.

You do realize that large companies set up budgets. If the CEO/board/rulingbodyofSE says they can only spend X amount of yen this year on servers, then their hands are tied and they have to plan ahead and make do with what they know they can spend.

Yes, the game did better than expected, but that doesn't mean that the dev teams budget has been increased proportionally yet. Next year/quarter/whatever time period SE's budget is planned ahead for, they will likely have a bigger chunk of the money they have already made.


Accordingly, paying for extra retainers = more money in future SE budget for XIV development = maybe dropping the retainer cost completely in the future.

[Merciless]

You do realize that large companies set up budgets. If the CEO of SE says they can only spend X amount of yen this year on servers, then their hands are tied and they have to plan ahead and make do with what they know they can spend.

Ya but if the game makes twice as much as you expected it to they you can probably adjust that budget.

[Shirana]

Not to sound like I'm very knowledgeable about the inner workings of SE (cuz I'm not), but...

from my understanding of MMO developers and the ruling body, even the developers often have trouble convincing their higher ups/whoever controls the budget of increasing it. Apparently because of how often the MMO market fluctuates even SUCCESSFUL MMO's can have strict budgeting because the higher ups are always afraid that it will go from "the next big thing" to "left behind" or something like that. So businessmen tend to be really stuck up on the idea of spending extra cash on MMO's even when it's successful o:
Not to say all companies are that way 100% of the time. Maybe SE is different. I just wanted to share some knowledge (that's hopefully accurate) C8

[Mcshiggs]

You do realize that large companies set up budgets.

They do set up budgets, but they can make the decision to put more money in mid year or quarter if it is needed. If a company budgets to have 10k units onhand, but then gets a deal with a big retailer saying they need to have at least 20k units onhand at any time for orders, the company could change it's budget midstream in order to adapt to the changing marketplace. Yoshi keeps bringing up how successful WoW has been, and that a lot of XIV has been influenced by that game, well when WoW released, they realized they didn't have near the servers they needed because of it's success, they didn't charge their customers more, they put up the money and doubled their servers in what, like the first 3 months. Almost every issue that is brought up about this game they give just a few excuses for, RMTs, server space, or lack of time/manpower. Well 2 of those can be solved by SE throwing more money at the problems, don't have enough server space, buy more servers, don't have enough manpower, hire more people. They are just trying to hold out and find out how much the players are willing to put up with and still continue to pay. Which doesn't surprise me, that is really a bad way to treat customers, which fits with the history of SE customer service.

[ReplicaX]

Ya but if the game makes twice as much as you expected it to they you can probably adjust that budget.

Easy to say when you aren't running the company and dealing with other projects and expenses that require funding. XIV has a internal roadmap to 3.0 planned out and they will always be adjusting the game's budget. Yet some forget all losses, layoffs and restructuring over the years they are trying to re-coop as well to please their shareholders. It's a double edged sword.

[Renik]

the extra character slots are unused in most accounts, if they let us can make 1 retainer for every char slot then everyone will make 7 retainers plus the 2 ones we have in our main char, SE will then, not lose money, but get less money to develop more content. If they offer 8 char slots it's just because they know the vast majority of the player-base will never touch the additional slots.

But this is just speculation, just like your OP.

The decision is made, and it damages no one, so this will happen no matter how much you complain.

[WHS]

They can adjust. Every company has a planned budget but then if something comes up they go ask for more money. Doesn't mean they will get it but it don't hurt to ask. I think they can find some resources to increase server space w/o taxing the user base.