I have only a week left out of my one-month club membership. After having tested the club membership for over three weeks, I will not renew the membership when it expires. At this point the membership does not offer enough value that its asking price of $10 a month, and the game interface and mechanics still have too many issues that need to be addressed. I suppose the monthly membership is a good value for someone who plays a lot of hours and opens a lot of chests every day. The "all you can eat" membership does not make sense for casual players who just want to play a game or two every day or every other day, or skip weekends to go out, have fun or spend time with family or friends. Every battle, match or session can take up to 40 minutes, so casual players really do not have time to play more than a game a day. Here is my proposal: Give two options to paying customers: (a) they can pay for the monthly club membership that is currently available, or (b) they can pay for a bundle of "keys" or "lockpicks" to unlock the club-membership chest slot. The two options should have the same price, i.e., cost the same amounts of pizza. For people who play a lot of hours a day, then option (a) would be a better deal. They pay $10 a month and can enjoy have the "all they can eat" chest buffet. For people who play casually, like a few times a day or a week, then option (b) would be a better deal. They can buy a certain amounts of "keys" or "lockpicks", like 250 keys/lockpicks or so in a bundle. Each key or lockpick unlocks one club-membership chest slot. That way, they can play at their leisure pace, and do not feel that spending $10 a month on a membership that they do not use enough is a waste of money. I am using using the 250 as an example. I am assuming: (a) if someone wins 6 multiplayer matches/chests a day to open the the first 3 gold chests, he will open 6x30 = 180 chests in a month. (b) if someone wins 11 matches/chests a day to open the first 4 gold chests, he will open 11x30 = 330 chests in a month. So 250 is a good middle ground between 180 and 330. The 250 keys/lockpicks are not enough for someone to reach the purple chest every day in a month. They are not even enough for someone to get 11 chests (or 4 gold chests) every day. People who want to play that much should pay for the club membership. However, for people who want to play about 10 matches a day (and assuming he wins 80% of the time,) or people who play mostly on weekdays but not on weekends or vice versa, then the $10 "250 key/lockpick bundle" is a better alternative to the club membership. To sweeten the deal: during special promotion periods, the key/lockpick bundle will include or 275, 280 or 300 keys. For people who want to play a lot of hours every day, the monthly membership will still be a better deal than 250, 275 or 280 or 300 keys.
Lockpicks to select certain club rewards is a good idea, however it might lead to less revenue, as many people don't buy club membership until they see a legendary on the reward pillow that they really want. Then people will end up using just one "lockpick" instead of getting a month of club. For a selective person (say someone who only grabs legendaries) a single bundle of "lockpicks" might last them the entire duration of the game.
Players do have keys/lockpicks not get to decide when they want to use one. When someone has 250 keys/lockpicks, the next 250 chests will automatically unlock the membership slot. The person does not get to decide, "oh, I want to use my keys/lockpicks on only gold chests," "I want to use it for the next chest but not this one," etc. He has a key/lockpick, and it will be used and open the next immediate chest he wins. So. If someone has 250 keys/lockpicks, the keys/lockpicks will automatically unlock the next 250 chests he wins. If he plays a few matches every day, the 250 keys/lockpicks will be used up in a month or two. If he as a very casual player plays a match every other day, the 250 keys/lockpicks will last him a year or more. But when he has a key/lockpick, then the membership slot will always automatically unlock.
I also spent $10 on a month-long subscription, and the only benefit I got was feeling good for having supported the devs. I do like this idea, but the proposed single-item-purchase cost (1.2 pizza per item) would leave no reason to purchase the monthlong subscription. I would be quite happy spending ~12 pizza to unlock an item. With the month-long subscription costing 300pizza, this would be equivalent to 25 items unlocked. I don't usually find more than 4 or 5 worthwhile items on the pillow each month, so that would keep me happy for ~6 months. (And I'd be willing to just donate $10 every 6 months to keep the servers going.)
Actually, reading your latest post, we have different notions of what a key does. I like yours less, because I'm discriminating about the loot.
I think this is a good idea. I enjoy the game but only play sporadically. I can't justify spending $10 for even a single month of membership when I'm only going to play for probably 6 hours in that time. I would be happy to spend that $10 knowing that the value would last me 6 or months of game play - even though I will probably gain less loot than someone who plays regularly for only a week with a membership. My sporadic dabbling feels like I would be losing items and so decreases my perceived value - despite the main reason I considered paying was to support the game rather than gain items. I keep thinking "I'll wait and get a membership when I have some more time" which realistically will not happen. The unlocks would need to be mandatory - picking and choosing would destroy the current membership basis but it would open up the option of spending money to casual players. This may of course spark more interest and lead to more game time and a transfer to a standard membership.
I also dislike the per month style of membership. I specifically don't want to be a member right now because I would want to try to play as much as possible during that month to "get the most for my money," but that means turning the game into an obligation rather than something I do for fun. It's what killed Fallen London for me - once they put in content that required you to regularly log in and maintain your character it turned from fun into work. I don't want my experience with Card Hunter to share a similar fate.
For all the reasons outlined above I fully support this idea, especially the one about not turning CH into work. Buying a club membership appeals to me, but my work schedule only allows for sporadic free time, and so to 'maximise' the value of the membership I would need to prioritise my leisure time to play CH, which would feel like work. $10 a month is relatively affordable considering the other options for leisure, but I chose to stop playing MMOs simply because logging in starting feeling like work.
Reading your response I agree this is a good idea. I think the most friendly way of doing it is to have a certain number of club rewards that membership gives you (say, 250). If the player exceeds that number of wins in a month then the club works as usual. If the player gets less than 200 wins that month, then the remaining rewards roll over into the next month. I think that's a lot less pressure than making the player choose infinite rewards for the month or a set number of rewards for an unlimited time. Then you don't have to try to guess how much you are going to play that month, you can just play as much as you want and have it work out.
I support some kind of new option that the devs find appropriate. I'm going to buy another club membership at some point because I want to continue doing the quests in the campaign. But it's going to have to wait until next year at this point because I'm so busy in Nov. & Dec. that it wouldn't be worth it. January is perfect because it's one of the most horrible and coldest months where I live. That assumes I'll still be playing then, which I think I will. In the meantime, if something else comes out as an option, I'll reevaluate my decision.
I like the idea of key, but again, depend on the price point. Granted as much as I like them cheap, I do support the dev in making a living.... so maybe if at a high price point (say $2-$3 ish per key) might work. But yet, also agree on that there are not as much reason to continue clubbing (FOR NOW)... but hope to see more stuff added (And soon) And still loving the game.
I would NOT pay $2 per key. That is ridiculous. $2 for each membership slot? That is $2 for ONE membership slot, in ONE chest, that can have any random item. $2 per chest. Are you out of your mind?
I guess I was thinking of key differently.... $2 - $3 is per key. A key is on use, and only when you want to use it. So you see what you would of get first, then decide to use the key to unlock it or not.
Still TOO expensive. Do you know I can frequently get a FULL game for $2 or $3 on GOG, Steam and Android? Heck, sometimes TWO or THREE FULL games.
Picking and choosing chests is never going to be a good option for the devs. There are so many loot drops that people aren't interested in and looking at it as $|epic it may end up leading to more hard core players choosing it - hurting revenue. The best option is for them to look at how often people log in and and compare the paid and unpaid groups. From that they should be able to work out some kind of number that draws more people into paying a bit without having people drop down from the proper club membership. I had forgotten about the special dungeons too. Perhaps they could still be club membership only (it's not too much content to be missing) or cost a certain amount of chest opens to unlock for a limited time (per attempt or for 24 hours or something). It's all about price discrimination. It's the same theory behind giving students cheaper movie tickets. They might not have gone if it cost full price so you bump up sales but still get to charge full price to those who are more likely to have a greater income (ie normal adults) and still keep the greater income there. They need to draw in the time poor with a cheaper more appealing product without sacrificing the market they already have.
