THE GOLD

Yeah it happened to me once where an empty province a minute ago would have produced 3 nuclear rockets or 20 units strong division of armored units, although the situation of ours are different for the gold user did not need to spend that many to win, while yours being on Antarctica map, there's little place for negotiation as this round only allows 1 winner, they may not have skills, time nor the ally to get the sweet taste of victory. I guess since they have paid it, they do deserve that sweet taste of victory, but i dislike how it sounds since you probably struggle to get in your position before engaging against that gold user in the end only to lose it all. I don't think this will ever change based on what a Mod said.

In the current business model the revenue to pay for the servers and developers comes from sales of gold. People are free to buy and spend as much as they wish, in the same way that you don't prohibit people from buying expensive cars or boats if they wish.

While gold can play a role in a game, there have been many more times that I have been defeated by skill or attentiveness of my opponent than by any amount of gold.

VorlonFCW wrote:

In the current business model the revenue to pay for the servers and developers comes from sales of gold. People are free to buy and spend as much as they wish, in the same way that you don't prohibit people from buying expensive cars or boats if they wish

Now on the other hand if gold was only allowed to be used in game to purchase the gold plated of existing guns, tanks, plane or boats, or even diamond platted of existing tanks, planes or boats then you would get no complaints from me.

Why dont the game designers allow players to use gold only to beautify existing units.

This could be CoWs revenue source, and you would not get any complaints from me, and they can spend as much gold as they like.

CoW could allow gold spenders to give the standard soldier more colourful uniforms of their choice, and I would fight them with my standard uniformed soldiers any day with no complaints.

Some games like Company of Heros allow players to purchase different camouflage schemes for their tanks. CoW could do something similar and continue it on to planes and ships. Get gold from players to paint the std unit whatever colour or camo they like.

Allow gold to be used as above, and hence dont make it unfair in battle to those that dont use gold.

@BattleIvan: I read that you very unhappy with the income politics from Bytro. Every second post from you get's in the same direction...

But did you ever try to change the side? You are the Chef of a company that has a income for you and you personnel. You have a commitment for this family's. You get income from unknown people, some spend more some spend less. Some of them a unhappy some of them are pleased. Why change this system with a big risk to loose it all?

Did you think that many players will give a lot of money for Golden Tanks? Some players spend a lot of money for a direct win. Some of them spend more than 100 dollar in only one single game.

I like your idea and i have also a lot of good ideas suggest in the past years, but it's a dilema.

See how many players buy the High Command? So less

We can try to get a special gold free event each month for player of the HC, that's all.

But it's only a small group of players that unhappy with the situituation. This community is not so big, for this group of dedicated players we have already the gold free Players League and in the future The Dirty Dozen. We can be happy with this. I have spend a lot of time, to get this gold free community events.

Thank you for your reply above.

You have me wrong if you think I dont realize that Bytro need to make money - I understand that.

Maybe you have misunderstood me. When I asked for the Pay-to-play game, the standard game was always still another option that would still be selectable.

I was a gold spender. CoW is a great game. CoW will always have people that will want to play the standard game and have too much money and spend on gold for CoW. I have spent over a $1000 on gold in CoW. I dont think Bytro will be in any danger of not having people wanting to play the standard game and spend gold.

Even my suggestion of a 2nd type/option when creating a CoW game called Pay-to-Play would still bring in money for Bytro. True there may not be as many players that want to play a Pay-to-play game. It would probably be for the more serious Tactical/strategical player that wants to play a game just for tactical/strategical skill with no influence on anything by gold during the game. I enthusis during the game. I said before also that before play even with the pay-to-play game that Bytro could get more money from players by having other options that they could pay up front to open other options in the game for all players - for example - extra resources, faster run times etc.

So I am not saying at all that Bytro doesn't make any money - they have a good game and should be reward for that, and for having this forum and for keeping the game going. I am also not saying that they should discard the game already being played. You already have options in the player game creation where players can choose to pay gold for a better AI player. All I am saying is that CoW have ANOTHER option here where players can select either 1. standard game with gold use allowed (the existing game) or 2. Gold up front for a Pay-to-play game with no gold usage once the game has started.

Players like me when I spent on gold know they need gold to do any good and will not probably play the Pay-to-play game as they know they want be able to relie on gold to win or do any good.

It will only be the seasoned, veteran player that wants a good game, and not to be beaten by some young player, still wet behind the ears that has bottom less pockets. There will be players that would be happy to pay for a game to fight other good players just on their skill in tactics and strategy without gold in game. They would also probably be willing to pay Bytro for other selected pre game extra options to add cost to the cost of the basic pay-to-play game such as extra resources and faster run times (just two of 10 mentioned before).

So I do understand that Bytro needs to make money, and i hope you keep getting the bottom less pocket players that I have played (at one stage I was probably considered to be one myself).

I think you will always have the gold spender and you need to keep catering for them to keep getting their money.

What you may now lose is the serious veteran strategical/tactical player that wants a good strategical/tactical game where gold doesn't give any advantage to one player over another just because he/she is richer.

The question is does Bytro keep this type of player, and still make money off this type of player at the same time as well by giving this type of player slightly different game creation options?

Xarus wrote:

But it's only a small group of players that unhappy with the situituation. This community is not so big, for this group of dedicated players we have already the gold free Players League and in the future The Dirty Dozen. We can be happy with this. I have spend a lot of time, to get this gold free community events.

This has been suggested many times before - BOTH pay-to-win and pay-to-play versions of the game. Nonetheless, the company's management has chosen not to implement this. It is their game, and they're free on the business model they want to apply to it, no matter what we, the community of mere mortals, think about that. They have their reasons, even if they are beyond our comprehension; and the company is prospering, so they are probably right, as well. Even if it is unfair from a gameplay perspective, it makes perfect sense from a business perspective; and the game could not exist without a business perspective, and we'd all still be playing text-based games.

I don't feel frustrated about meeting a coiner anymore, even if I did in the past. When I encounter one these days, I see it as a bit of community service to fight them, and make them spend as much money as possible for Bytro's coffers. Of course it is impossible to win if they keep spending more (and also have some idea on how to play the game), but I know that MAKING them spend it generates income for the company which runs my favorite FREE game, and that actually makes me feel good on the day I lose my capital to an army supported by 200 planes...

The one thing I still completely fail to understand, is why anyone would do it at all, and put the extra queen on the chess board... but hey, I don't understand why people would buy an original Van Gogh either...

Well said - the best reply.

I completely understand the need for Call of War to make a profit. It's a good game, and the designers deserve to benefit from it.

It does seem that CoW could offer games that do not allow spending of gold within the game itself, but that require spending gold as an entry fee. That would allow the better players a chance to really test their skill, while also allowing CoW to profit.

Or, perhaps in addition to showing the other stats of the game, one could also see how much gold each player has spent?

I am not sure that the number of players who are frustrated by prolific gold spenders is as small as some seem to think.

It is supposed to be a game, after all, and allowing one player to BUY victory does make it something less than that.

Hello all,

Why can't they make gold free maps a high command only thing? I'm sure would get high command if that would be the case. I think many more would agree with me.

K.Rokossovski wrote:

This has been suggested many times before - BOTH pay-to-win and pay-to-play versions of the game. Nonetheless, the company's management has chosen not to implement this.

We have to show Bytro how much money it can earn with pay-to-play.

If Bytro management was answering to us it would say "Yeah, but part of the motivation for the current gold spenders is they can use it against those who care. Against those who take the game seriously. If some of these escape their reach by vanishing into pay-to-play rounds, their motivation to use gold in pay-to-win games will sink."

With which they're right. But on the other hand, they underestimate the wallets and the power of the sincere. Of the strategy lovers. Of the boost they would give to the community. How much more attractive their presence would make the maps. And Bytro doesn't know how many of them quit the game or never tried it because they're disgusted by pay-to-win.

I can only say CoW with a gold-free option would be fantastic. Not only because such rounds would mean same chances for everyone. But also because already small amounts of gold corrupt the strategy part of the game. Best example the "reveal all enemy units" function. If your opponent is willing to spend only 1650 gold, it's almost impossible to surprise him with a good move. Hence the fun in contriving a good move is gone.

So let's show Bytro how much we would pay for it in this anonymous poll. Please be honest.

@Hans A. Pils: I think your survey will work better in GOLD, not in US-Dollar.

Bare in mind that players will be more willing to spend their money if they think they could win it back by getting a winning place in the game or winning a free game by getting in the top 3 or 4 etc

Xarus wrote:

But it's only a small group of players that unhappy with the situituation.

You have only HEARD a small group complain.

Only 1 in 10 people will complain,the other 9 will tell friends about the bad time they had.

I've played in no less than a dozen games that were Wrecked by some credit-card warrior compensating for his severe lack of strategic prowess by over-eagerly paying for a MASS of units to overwhelm his opponent and either running the table,or getting called out on it and quitting,leaving a HUGE mass of units for everyone else to deal with.

That ain't what I call "fun".

It ain't very "entertaining" either.

And yet...

Well you see Incompetent Gold Users are the best my KD goes up every single time, but I do pay for HC and I think of the gold users as a way to Keep Call of War free and the lights on at COW. My 4 allies and I managed to cause a gold user to use 3,000,000 gold with only skill and gold we have won with achievements,(we still lost) Who cares that you lost you caused people to waste ACTUAL money and killing their units. However I do feel like increasing the price of the operation per day would be a good idea like instead of concrete prices increase the price by day. Day 1 cost 50 gold per action day 2 100 day 3, 200 ect. like doubling every day.

I suspect most coiners are newbs. The first time I met one, we had a WH shouting match. He beelined from Russia to S.America to crush me and I just quit.

The next time, I convinced him to join my coalition. I explained to a third that good players see them as lame and some players just quit but others do their best to make it as expensive as possible. He also joined coalition. Could diplomacy be a counter to gold use?

Xarus wrote:

@BattleIvan: I read that you very unhappy with the income politics from Bytro. Every second post from you get's in the same direction...

But did you ever try to change the side? You are the Chef of a company that has a income for you and you personnel. You have a commitment for this family's. You get income from unknown people, some spend more some spend less. Some of them a unhappy some of them are pleased. Why change this system with a big risk to loose it all?

Did you think that many players will give a lot of money for Golden Tanks? Some players spend a lot of money for a direct win. Some of them spend more than 100 dollar in only one single game.

I like your idea and i have also a lot of good ideas suggest in the past years, but it's a dilema.

See how many players buy the High Command? So less

We can try to get a special gold free event each month for player of the HC, that's all.

But it's only a small group of players that unhappy with the situituation. This community is not so big, for this group of dedicated players we have already the gold free Players League and in the future The Dirty Dozen. We can be happy with this. I have spend a lot of time, to get this gold free community events.

The Chef situation(no offence) is actually different from this situation. Changing this system would bring justice to those who actually have skill, and don’t merely use gold every second. I’m not surprised if someone used 200k gold in 1 game... after all, this game is so addicting. Many just want to win

I also just created 1 thread on it anyway with a bit different stuff inside.

A big part of the problem with gold can be solved by not allowing manpower to be bought with it.

Let's begin by remembering that criticizing the current state of gold isn't the same as rejecting its existence as part of the game. Here are some aspects of the current situation that can be seen as problems, along with potential solutions for each problem.

Problem: Gold use is essentially concealed from other players, up until they're being overrun by planet-sized armies. See, a big part of strategy games is reflecting on what happened, and trying to figure out what allowed you to win, but more importantly what made you lose. The problem with gold is that sometimes it might be unclear as to whether or not you lost because of something you did wrong, or because the other guy spent some gold on a reveal all and an extra lvl 3 medium tank... or even an extra 10 stack army that could have been made legit since the reveal all you got 2 days ago. You see where the problem is? The game doesn't tell you! For dedicated players, the pain of not knowing is sometimes worse than the actual situation. It stifles player growth and turns people away.

Potential Solution: Early in the thread, Jeff the Valiant mentioned showing gold use in players' stats. This seems to be a good idea in my book. I can already hear people saying that this would make people spend less on gold, since they would be shamed by other players. If anyone is of this opinion, one counter is that there is not necessarily any proof of this. Secondly, the major gold users that really bring the cash are extremely obvious, and most likely receive shame anyway. This solution is not towards those types of players anyway; It's in response to those who maybe use smaller amounts of gold, and you at least want to know for sure if your enemy used it on you, just like you know if they have High Command. I think dedicated players who sink hours in the game at least deserve to know if other players in their match have used, and are using gold, before they sink even more hours in. Perhaps this can at least be used by attentive players to make alliances against gold users, or even with them.

Problem: Dedicated players are at the mercy of gold users in normal matches. This is simply the standard gold problem, which is that gold users have extreme advantages over all other players. This by itself is the purpose of gold, but there should be a place for players to go that still provides revenue to Bytro. Sure, there are some players that can fight off some gold users, as there are always outliers in situations like this. Additionally, there is definitely something to be said about the average skill of gold users, and how some of the big spenders can still be monumentally outplayed by experienced players. However, those situations seem to be the minority, and those players can continue to play matches against gold users if they want.

Potential Solution: It's been suggested before, but that doesn't mean it's not optimal or feasible: Matches where you can spend a gold fee/High Command to join. If successful enough, perhaps a few current features of gold be removed, such as buying manpower, since they would no longer rely so much on mid-game gold spending. Who said this entry fee had to be cheap? The fee's price could be adjusted based on what's most profitable. Perhaps these payed matches have extra features as opposed to free maps. Point is, things can be done with this, and it should keep being considered.

In conclusion, we have to remember that this is an evolving game, and we shouldn't give up on things we really want. I think every idea with weight should be pushed to its fullest, and if the developers themselves tell us it can't be applied at all, no matter what, at any time in 1 year or 100 years, then we stop. We shouldn't stop ourselves, because then what's the point in fighting for meaningful change if we're our own biggest obstacle? Does anyone really think this game will be the same in 2 to 4 years? There are many aspects of this game that are completely unrecognizable (which the RestoreCanvas people made quite clear), so one could argue that there will be many new features in this game in the near and far future. We should be there to guide that change, instead of just settling for what we have and being complacent. Bytro cares about the game, and they care what we have to say, so we should keep saying things.