Let me start by saying, much more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc.
The offer is a good one.
The way it was announced as a 'celebration' was, IMHO, misleading. I do not ask people to celebrate my birthday by giving me money, I would offer to throw a party which is free of charge, people can chose to give or not give gifts. Likewise, if a bookstore was to celebrate the birthday of Jane Austen, they may ask if I'd like to celebrate with a free coffee and serve it to me by the Jane Austen display in the hopes of make a purchase. But then I'm from the UK, perhaps it's a cultural thing?
So once again this is down to wording. Lucky enough I've been burnt enough in the past by TP/DB that I expect to be disappointed.
DB used the word "celebrate" (or some form of it) for previous birthday pack offers. I personally do not see that as a big problem.
I will concede that using certain keywords with different offers to help manage expectations might be convenient or efficient. It also might not be the best marketing strategy. I'm on the fence about using consistent keywords. It's an interesting line of thinking, imo.
I'm torn... about the presentation of this 'celebration' pack, as well as which Phlox to take!
Yes we have received some free 5* crew, but other actors have been celebrated with themed premium packs, where 650 dil is more likely to net you a duplicate 4* variation. Free would be awesome, but a beGold for 1500 dil is pretty good value.
As for which Phlox to take, that is even tougher...
1. Reverend Phlox - he is 4/5 after his campaign, and his event will likely be repeated eventually, meaning I could finish him for free
2. Naked Phlox - he is sitting at 1/5, but not on my priority citation list at all
3. Defensive Phlox - he's one of a few crew that I've wanted for a long time, mainly for the gauntlet, but I typically prefer not adding a new 1/5 when I have the option to add a star to an existing crew
I'm leaning towards Naked Phlox, but Defensive Phlox is soooo tempting!
TP can shovel this behold. Would anyone be white knighting if the contact day behold had been 1500? The only thing more repulsive than adding a cost to celebration observances is the white knights who smile while they eat it and try to convince everyone else.
I am tempted as Defensive Phlox would be a gauntlet upgrade to my Sulan. It is tough to part with the dilithium that will potentially bring me 5 desperately needed crew slots at the next sale. I would be more willing if I had any confidence that cataclysm will return anytime soon with dilithium rewards retained.
TP can shovel this behold. Would anyone be white knighting if the contact day behold had been 1500? The only thing more repulsive than adding a cost to celebration observances is the white knights who smile while they eat it and try to convince everyone else.
This is a birthday pack. Birthday packs have never been for free, they were Tuesday-pack style in the past, which means that you could buy a 10x pull with 650 dilithium and get one of 3 featured super-rares or, if you got very lucky, one of 3 featured legendaries.
With this pack you have a 100% chance to get a legendary of your choice for 1500 dilithium.
With the old format there was a very real chance of spending all your dilithium (that would usually mean 2 or 3 pulls for me, but for a bigger spender it could mean 6500, 13000 or more dilithium) and get nothing for it.
It's a huge improvement if compared to old birthday packs.
I bought and finished Naked Phlox. I like the guaranteed begold idea, although I'd like the price a little lower. 1000 dil would be a price I think most people would junp at.
Let me start by saying, much more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc.
The offer is a good one.
The way it was announced as a 'celebration' was, IMHO, misleading. I do not ask people to celebrate my birthday by giving me money, I would offer to throw a party which is free of charge, people can chose to give or not give gifts. Likewise, if a bookstore was to celebrate the birthday of Jane Austen, they may ask if I'd like to celebrate with a free coffee and serve it to me by the Jane Austen display in the hopes of make a purchase. But then I'm from the UK, perhaps it's a cultural thing?
So once again this is down to wording. Lucky enough I've been burnt enough in the past by TP/DB that I expect to be disappointed.
DB used the word "celebrate" (or some form of it) for previous birthday pack offers. I personally do not see that as a big problem.
I will concede that using certain keywords with different offers to help manage expectations might be convenient or efficient. It also might not be the best marketing strategy. I'm on the fence about using consistent keywords. It's an interesting line of thinking, imo.
You know what would have avoided the confusion had? Put in the original MOTD what it says now. Whenever there is something like this and they do a MOTD, just include the price iñ the MOTD. Doing that from now on would avoid further confusion.
I really wanted defensive Phlox and already had the other two, really couldnt resist. Roughly 1/3 of the price of regular 650 dill packs for a guaranteed legendary seems pretty good to me, besides Phlox is awesome lol
After sleeping on it... decided to give myself another gauntlet option and took Defensive over improving my duplicate 3/5 Reverend. Defensive won't solve all my MED gauntlet issues, but he's a nice option. (Seriously, why are most of the featured MED gauntleteers so weak in their secondary/tertiary rolls? I use Guinan far more than I should just because of her skill balance.)
Let me start by saying, much more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc.
The offer is a good one.
The way it was announced as a 'celebration' was, IMHO, misleading. I do not ask people to celebrate my birthday by giving me money, I would offer to throw a party which is free of charge, people can chose to give or not give gifts. Likewise, if a bookstore was to celebrate the birthday of Jane Austen, they may ask if I'd like to celebrate with a free coffee and serve it to me by the Jane Austen display in the hopes of make a purchase. But then I'm from the UK, perhaps it's a cultural thing?
So once again this is down to wording. Lucky enough I've been burnt enough in the past by TP/DB that I expect to be disappointed.
Sorry I'm late to this party, I crashed and burned HARD last night after having stayed up nearly 30 hours. I appreciate your honest candor here, and I see myself in a lot of your post, you went with a candid free-flow narrative rather than premeditated essay which lead to a few non sequitur situations, but like I said, I appreciate the shoot-from-the-hip style you used, and I think it is easy enough for somebody to deduce your message. I also appreciate and accept your "I'm from the UK" explanation, I think it is massively important for people to try and take a step back and make even a small effort to understand the differences in cultures, that line really helped me filter and process your words. And finally, I respect your conclusion, even though I do not share it
In reference to your bookstore analogy, I think it is important to remember the context in which we experience STT. The core of the economy in-game is the exchange of real world currency for a chance at acquiring something desired. This is not a bookstore where a customer enters, acknowledges a price tag, gives the store the asking price, and departs as the new owner of the book, this economy functions in a similar way but with an added element of chance factored into most transactions.
Returning to the bookstore analogy, you had the store suspend a primary function of Capitalism by having the supply side of the equation incur a mild expense (offer a free cup of coffee) as a gesture to try and entice customers into increasing book sales, which is fine, I'm sure things like that happen all the time. In the case of this deal the company also suspended a primary function of their business model (removing the element of chance) to provide their customers/players an opportunity to acquire one of three quality cards, which to me at least seems equitable.
We both agree that this deal was good, so I guess all we really have to quibble over is the language or fairness of attaching a cost to a deal centered around a celebration, and given that there are "more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc," I will just wrap this up by saying I heard your words and respect your opinion, hopefully you can understand why I do not share it
My brand new Nekkid Phlox ™ is Level 60/2 🌟 and Tipping Point is $45 closer to keeping the lights on. Between buying $20 of Dilithium, and doing the DYC thing on Nekkid Phlox ™........
"The truth is like a lion; you don't have to defend it. Let it loose; it will defend itself."
I bought enough dil to get this pack, been wanting puffer phlox for a long time as I had to use merits in the gauntlet every time I saw him. I do hope these offers continue as well as the other celebratory ones.
Well, I took my 5th star for Rev and then realised it was a one time only thing. Ah well never mind. Already had puffer but was willing to spend twice to grab a Nekkid Phlox.
Well, I took my 5th star for Rev and then realised it was a one time only thing. Ah well never mind. Already had puffer but was willing to spend twice to grab a Nekkid Phlox.
In general I wished TP would consistently point out purchase limits on store offers. Most often they do but sometimes they... forget it?
Even the event purchases do not mention their once-in-a-lifetime nature. I never bought one, so I only know it from the forum at all.
Wir, die Mirror Tribbles [MiT] haben freie Plätze zu vergeben. Kein Zwang und kein Stress, dafür aber Spaß, Discord und eine nette, hilfsbereite Gemeinschaft, incl. voll ausgebauter Starbase und täglich 700 ISM.
I didn't read the original MOTD text, but the terms in the portal were explicitly clear. It's a behold of those three choices for 1500 dilithium. This isn't Diplomatic Deluge 2.0. It's not as though anyone clicked to claim it and then found it it wasn't free, or that it didn't include something it said it included.
I am a bit confused, though, why we were celebrating on the 15th a birthday that won't be until the 20th. Why not run this offer then? It'll be Wednesday, a day we're used to event packs going live so it's not like it'd be on a weekend.
TP can shovel this behold. Would anyone be white knighting if the contact day behold had been 1500? The only thing more repulsive than adding a cost to celebration observances is the white knights who smile while they eat it and try to convince everyone else.
Suppose they ran this same format, but the three choices were the three most recently 5* event crew. I suspect there'd be near-unanimous enthusiasm for that. It's not about the format. It's about the three choices in the format. This format may be beneath you, but it's not because you're enlightened and the rest of us are lemmings. Had the First Contact offer been 1500 dilithium, I'd have said the same thing I've said about this one. The format has appeal, but I would have passed because I wouldn't have valued any of those three specific choices at that price. It's the same decision making process I use for everything else I buy in life.
Just weighing in that I liked this deal. It's a lot better than buying packs hoping for the gold the drop, at least in this one I can pick which one I wanted. I think it's a bit pricey in terms of dilithium, 1500 dilithium is $20 U.S. the LTO's run 9.99 or 700 dilithium and I think you get chrons and credits. Obviously this was different in that it was your choice of 3 cards. So why did I buy it? Cause I'm a sucker, I immortalized a phlox without having to use a citation and I had dilithium to spare. I get my dilithium from the purchase of the monthly card and the campaign, so I get what? About 3700 dilithium a month, for 15 bucks? Does that sound about right? Anyways my thoughts are incoherent but maybe someone can make sense of them and hopefully I'm not making points that were already brought up.
Going forward I would like to see this more often on cast members birthdays, hopefully at a cheaper cost between 1000-1200? With a retroactive one for Gates McFadden
Just weighing in that I liked this deal. It's a lot better than buying packs hoping for the gold the drop, at least in this one I can pick which one I wanted. I think it's a bit pricey in terms of dilithium, 1500 dilithium is $20 U.S. the LTO's run 9.99 or 700 dilithium and I think you get chrons and credits. Obviously this was different in that it was your choice of 3 cards. So why did I buy it? Cause I'm a sucker, I immortalized a phlox without having to use a citation and I had dilithium to spare. I get my dilithium from the purchase of the monthly card and the campaign, so I get what? About 3700 dilithium a month, for 15 bucks? Does that sound about right? Anyways my thoughts are incoherent but maybe someone can make sense of them and hopefully I'm not making points that were already brought up.
Going forward I would like to see this more often on cast members birthdays, hopefully at a cheaper cost between 1000-1200? With a retroactive one for Gates McFadden
The wiki shows 1083 dilithium in all if you complete the premium track. There's 3000 dilithium from the monthy card, so 4083 in all for $13.98.
Now that you bring it up, this behold offer would cost half of the dilithium from a monthly card. In that context, I think it's hard to dispute the value. If this became a regular thing, I could easily see myself indulging often.
TP can shovel this behold. Would anyone be white knighting if the contact day behold had been 1500? The only thing more repulsive than adding a cost to celebration observances is the white knights who smile while they eat it and try to convince everyone else.
I don't get the "white knight" comment. Is it because people have different opinions and you fancy yourself a dark horse? The "smiles while they eat it" part seems pretty insulting. I can't tell if you're trying to run people you don't agree with away from the forum or if you are just content to insult people to see how they react.
Whatever the case, I hope things can settle down a bit and we can return to civility.
Deal or No Deal? If I needed the extra star for at least one of him, I would take this deal. However, I don't in this case. And the last thing I want is to be stuck with another 1/5 that will never get finished. No Deal, Howie.
Fleet Admiral - Dazed & Confused 🤸🤸🙃 We are still waiting for Enterprise B, the Delta Flyer, and a Runabout! We should also have a TNG season 1 red shirt LT JG Worf, and a "Far Beyond The Stars" DS9 episode crew collection!
Deal or No Deal? If I needed the extra star for at least one of him, I would take this deal. However, I don't in this case. And the last thing I want is to be stuck with another 1/5 that will never get finished. No Deal, Howie.
Not even for the gauntlet rockstar, Defensive Phlox, who only requires one star to be useful? (And more stars would help fill in a couple tough voyage combos.)
If you don't have Defensive Phlox and need an elite MED gauntlet option, getting that first copy guaranteed for 1500 dil is not bad in terms of the overall economics of the game (yes, the game economics are generally a poor value proposition, but that's a separate topic that's already been discussed ad nauseam).
I wouldn't pay that price for a first star on either of the others, but I can at least see some appeal for Rev Phlox's MED/CMD due to skill set rarity.
For me personally, I have Rev Phlox already immortalized and have enough other MED/CMD options that I don't need a dupe (and certainly not one at 1/5). That leaves bringing Def Phlox to 4 stars or Naked Phlox to 5 stars. I lean towards immortalizing Naked Phlox since my SCI/MED options are more limited than MED/SCI.
I don't have 1500 dil, but am waiting to see how the Sunday offer shakes out. It's not a done deal, but I'll probably buy some dil and immort Naked Phlox since it would be similar to a $9.99 Tuesday crew LTO for me.
Overall I like this offer format, but would normally pass unless I already had 1500 dil and/or the crew options were amazing.
I went with Naked Phlox on both accounts. My first copy of him on my main and my second on my second account.
Almost all my spending of dil. goes to the recap packs. So when @Prime Lorca [10FH] pointed out that this is a better deal than the recap packs he convinced me, because he is right, it is.
Let me start by saying, much more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc.
The offer is a good one.
The way it was announced as a 'celebration' was, IMHO, misleading. I do not ask people to celebrate my birthday by giving me money, I would offer to throw a party which is free of charge, people can chose to give or not give gifts. Likewise, if a bookstore was to celebrate the birthday of Jane Austen, they may ask if I'd like to celebrate with a free coffee and serve it to me by the Jane Austen display in the hopes of make a purchase. But then I'm from the UK, perhaps it's a cultural thing?
So once again this is down to wording. Lucky enough I've been burnt enough in the past by TP/DB that I expect to be disappointed.
Sorry I'm late to this party, I crashed and burned HARD last night after having stayed up nearly 30 hours. I appreciate your honest candor here, and I see myself in a lot of your post, you went with a candid free-flow narrative rather than premeditated essay which lead to a few non sequitur situations, but like I said, I appreciate the shoot-from-the-hip style you used, and I think it is easy enough for somebody to deduce your message. I also appreciate and accept your "I'm from the UK" explanation, I think it is massively important for people to try and take a step back and make even a small effort to understand the differences in cultures, that line really helped me filter and process your words. And finally, I respect your conclusion, even though I do not share it
In reference to your bookstore analogy, I think it is important to remember the context in which we experience STT. The core of the economy in-game is the exchange of real world currency for a chance at acquiring something desired. This is not a bookstore where a customer enters, acknowledges a price tag, gives the store the asking price, and departs as the new owner of the book, this economy functions in a similar way but with an added element of chance factored into most transactions.
Returning to the bookstore analogy, you had the store suspend a primary function of Capitalism by having the supply side of the equation incur a mild expense (offer a free cup of coffee) as a gesture to try and entice customers into increasing book sales, which is fine, I'm sure things like that happen all the time. In the case of this deal the company also suspended a primary function of their business model (removing the element of chance) to provide their customers/players an opportunity to acquire one of three quality cards, which to me at least seems equitable.
We both agree that this deal was good, so I guess all we really have to quibble over is the language or fairness of attaching a cost to a deal centered around a celebration, and given that there are "more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc," I will just wrap this up by saying I heard your words and respect your opinion, hopefully you can understand why I do not share it
I also respect your opinion, thanks for sharing it. The world would be a less interesting place if we all agreed and we would never progress as a society if we accepted the status quo.
I am also open minded enough to alter my opinion based on a different perspective and/or new information provided. I think your perspective - that they suspended an element of their business model (that of chance) in order to entice the customer - is a valid one. Thanks for sharing.
It's certainly not a situation in which I was wasting any emotional time or energy anyway but it is an interesting distraction 😉
Edited to add: I hope this post doesn't come across as snarky, it certainly isn't supposed to - I have genuinely altered my perspective after reading yours. I stand by the final paragraph in my original post though - I am so used to being disappointed by DB/TP that it is never a suprise to me anymore.
Let me start by saying, much more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc.
The offer is a good one.
The way it was announced as a 'celebration' was, IMHO, misleading. I do not ask people to celebrate my birthday by giving me money, I would offer to throw a party which is free of charge, people can chose to give or not give gifts. Likewise, if a bookstore was to celebrate the birthday of Jane Austen, they may ask if I'd like to celebrate with a free coffee and serve it to me by the Jane Austen display in the hopes of make a purchase. But then I'm from the UK, perhaps it's a cultural thing?
So once again this is down to wording. Lucky enough I've been burnt enough in the past by TP/DB that I expect to be disappointed.
Sorry I'm late to this party, I crashed and burned HARD last night after having stayed up nearly 30 hours. I appreciate your honest candor here, and I see myself in a lot of your post, you went with a candid free-flow narrative rather than premeditated essay which lead to a few non sequitur situations, but like I said, I appreciate the shoot-from-the-hip style you used, and I think it is easy enough for somebody to deduce your message. I also appreciate and accept your "I'm from the UK" explanation, I think it is massively important for people to try and take a step back and make even a small effort to understand the differences in cultures, that line really helped me filter and process your words. And finally, I respect your conclusion, even though I do not share it
In reference to your bookstore analogy, I think it is important to remember the context in which we experience STT. The core of the economy in-game is the exchange of real world currency for a chance at acquiring something desired. This is not a bookstore where a customer enters, acknowledges a price tag, gives the store the asking price, and departs as the new owner of the book, this economy functions in a similar way but with an added element of chance factored into most transactions.
Returning to the bookstore analogy, you had the store suspend a primary function of Capitalism by having the supply side of the equation incur a mild expense (offer a free cup of coffee) as a gesture to try and entice customers into increasing book sales, which is fine, I'm sure things like that happen all the time. In the case of this deal the company also suspended a primary function of their business model (removing the element of chance) to provide their customers/players an opportunity to acquire one of three quality cards, which to me at least seems equitable.
We both agree that this deal was good, so I guess all we really have to quibble over is the language or fairness of attaching a cost to a deal centered around a celebration, and given that there are "more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc," I will just wrap this up by saying I heard your words and respect your opinion, hopefully you can understand why I do not share it
I also respect your opinion, thanks for sharing it. The world would be a less interesting place if we all agreed and we would never progress as a society if we accepted the status quo.
I am also open minded enough to alter my opinion based on a different perspective and/or new information provided. I think your perspective - that they suspended an element of their business model (that of chance) in order to entice the customer - is a valid one. Thanks for sharing.
It's certainly not a situation in which I was wasting any emotional time or energy anyway but it is an interesting distraction 😉
Edited to add: I hope this post doesn't come across as snarky, it certainly isn't supposed to - I have genuinely altered my perspective after reading yours. I stand by the final paragraph in my original post though - I am so used to being disappointed by DB/TP that it is never a suprise to me anymore.
I think a lot of us agree on some level with that last paragraph. A lot of us come to the forum specifically to see how an offer works (if it's new) or to see if someone got burned or just to discuss the pros and cons of a deal or offer. They have a spotty track record, but I think it has largely improved. The exception being those 550 packs. But even those have gotten steadily better.
TP can shovel this behold. Would anyone be white knighting if the contact day behold had been 1500? The only thing more repulsive than adding a cost to celebration observances is the white knights who smile while they eat it and try to convince everyone else.
I don't get the "white knight" comment. Is it because people have different opinions and you fancy yourself a dark horse? The "smiles while they eat it" part seems pretty insulting. I can't tell if you're trying to run people you don't agree with away from the forum or if you are just content to insult people to see how they react.
Whatever the case, I hope things can settle down a bit and we can return to civility.
Troll opinions have no merit and we shouldn’t listen to them or worry about them...being insulted just means the troll wins. Same goes for leaving, which would also deprive someone of great math-based posts like yours above that helped put a little more perspective on the value of the behold offer - I went from feeling pretty good about my purchase (as is the case any time you can immortalize a valuable 5* crew) to feeling really good about it and being even more interested in seeing these types of offers in the future.
TP whiffed with the demerit packs (no matter how many non-forum players were uninformed enough to buy it) and hit this one out of the park.
I could see myself going for this offer if I didnt already have multiples of those Phloxes. At least I know what I'm getting for the money. So I applaud them for doing at least that. I like to know what I'm getting. There are no bad crew there.
I think on balance its an okay offer, 1500 dil is still quite a price tag unless you have a stockpile from campaigns or dailies. I don't need Pufferfish Phlox, so its quite easy for me to pass on so in this case its a no-deal but I welcome some different offers.
Defensive Phlox is MED/SCI/SEC. I struggle on all three of those voyage combos. SEC/SCI is what I really want, but I'm so weak that secondary/tertiary is good enough to get my attention.
I take it you don't have Gary Seven? If you're looking for another option in the MED+SCI+SEC combo, Twilight T'Pol has very similar combined stats to Def Phlox.
Indeed, no Gary Seven. Like Defensive Phlox, my Twilight T'Pol is 1/5. I'm not ready to drop 4 citations on either. But getting Defensive Phlox to 2/5 is closer to citation territory.
I think this is why I was so glad to snare Gladiator Spock and then cite him up, bar Gary Seven he hasn't really been trumped yet.
Generally I try and field M. Picard, FO Burnham, Surak (or Picard) Neelix (or High Roller Sisko), Gladiator Spock, Wrathful Kirk, Survivalist Kirk, Protomorphosis Barclay (4/5) EV Suit Seven (4/5) Armus (4/5), Q'Od (or Indulgent Seven), EMA.
I have 3/5 M De Neuf, Detective Data, Species 8472
and 1/5 Maquis Tuvok.
Out of them only Species 8472 provides the best option but is only two Skills.
[was on Sabbatical/Hiatus] Currently a trialist at Galaxy SquadronSTAY SAFE and KBO
Comments
DB used the word "celebrate" (or some form of it) for previous birthday pack offers. I personally do not see that as a big problem.
I will concede that using certain keywords with different offers to help manage expectations might be convenient or efficient. It also might not be the best marketing strategy. I'm on the fence about using consistent keywords. It's an interesting line of thinking, imo.
Yes we have received some free 5* crew, but other actors have been celebrated with themed premium packs, where 650 dil is more likely to net you a duplicate 4* variation. Free would be awesome, but a beGold for 1500 dil is pretty good value.
As for which Phlox to take, that is even tougher...
1. Reverend Phlox - he is 4/5 after his campaign, and his event will likely be repeated eventually, meaning I could finish him for free
2. Naked Phlox - he is sitting at 1/5, but not on my priority citation list at all
3. Defensive Phlox - he's one of a few crew that I've wanted for a long time, mainly for the gauntlet, but I typically prefer not adding a new 1/5 when I have the option to add a star to an existing crew
I'm leaning towards Naked Phlox, but Defensive Phlox is soooo tempting!
Advice/comments appreciated
This is a birthday pack. Birthday packs have never been for free, they were Tuesday-pack style in the past, which means that you could buy a 10x pull with 650 dilithium and get one of 3 featured super-rares or, if you got very lucky, one of 3 featured legendaries.
With this pack you have a 100% chance to get a legendary of your choice for 1500 dilithium.
With the old format there was a very real chance of spending all your dilithium (that would usually mean 2 or 3 pulls for me, but for a bigger spender it could mean 6500, 13000 or more dilithium) and get nothing for it.
It's a huge improvement if compared to old birthday packs.
You know what would have avoided the confusion had? Put in the original MOTD what it says now. Whenever there is something like this and they do a MOTD, just include the price iñ the MOTD. Doing that from now on would avoid further confusion.
"Free"
"1500 Dilithium"
"30000 Honour"
"30000 Merits"
Just include the amount clearly in the MOTD. And how much do I want for my suggestion to reduce confusion?
Why, it's free!!!
Sorry I'm late to this party, I crashed and burned HARD last night after having stayed up nearly 30 hours. I appreciate your honest candor here, and I see myself in a lot of your post, you went with a candid free-flow narrative rather than premeditated essay which lead to a few non sequitur situations, but like I said, I appreciate the shoot-from-the-hip style you used, and I think it is easy enough for somebody to deduce your message. I also appreciate and accept your "I'm from the UK" explanation, I think it is massively important for people to try and take a step back and make even a small effort to understand the differences in cultures, that line really helped me filter and process your words. And finally, I respect your conclusion, even though I do not share it
In reference to your bookstore analogy, I think it is important to remember the context in which we experience STT. The core of the economy in-game is the exchange of real world currency for a chance at acquiring something desired. This is not a bookstore where a customer enters, acknowledges a price tag, gives the store the asking price, and departs as the new owner of the book, this economy functions in a similar way but with an added element of chance factored into most transactions.
Returning to the bookstore analogy, you had the store suspend a primary function of Capitalism by having the supply side of the equation incur a mild expense (offer a free cup of coffee) as a gesture to try and entice customers into increasing book sales, which is fine, I'm sure things like that happen all the time. In the case of this deal the company also suspended a primary function of their business model (removing the element of chance) to provide their customers/players an opportunity to acquire one of three quality cards, which to me at least seems equitable.
We both agree that this deal was good, so I guess all we really have to quibble over is the language or fairness of attaching a cost to a deal centered around a celebration, and given that there are "more important things going on in the world, it's only pixels, etc etc," I will just wrap this up by saying I heard your words and respect your opinion, hopefully you can understand why I do not share it
In general I wished TP would consistently point out purchase limits on store offers. Most often they do but sometimes they... forget it?
Even the event purchases do not mention their once-in-a-lifetime nature. I never bought one, so I only know it from the forum at all.
I am a bit confused, though, why we were celebrating on the 15th a birthday that won't be until the 20th. Why not run this offer then? It'll be Wednesday, a day we're used to event packs going live so it's not like it'd be on a weekend.
I mostly concur, though there may be an instance of a choice being a 5* I want to add a star to who isn't in the portal.
Suppose they ran this same format, but the three choices were the three most recently 5* event crew. I suspect there'd be near-unanimous enthusiasm for that. It's not about the format. It's about the three choices in the format. This format may be beneath you, but it's not because you're enlightened and the rest of us are lemmings. Had the First Contact offer been 1500 dilithium, I'd have said the same thing I've said about this one. The format has appeal, but I would have passed because I wouldn't have valued any of those three specific choices at that price. It's the same decision making process I use for everything else I buy in life.
Going forward I would like to see this more often on cast members birthdays, hopefully at a cheaper cost between 1000-1200? With a retroactive one for Gates McFadden
The wiki shows 1083 dilithium in all if you complete the premium track. There's 3000 dilithium from the monthy card, so 4083 in all for $13.98.
Now that you bring it up, this behold offer would cost half of the dilithium from a monthly card. In that context, I think it's hard to dispute the value. If this became a regular thing, I could easily see myself indulging often.
I don't get the "white knight" comment. Is it because people have different opinions and you fancy yourself a dark horse? The "smiles while they eat it" part seems pretty insulting. I can't tell if you're trying to run people you don't agree with away from the forum or if you are just content to insult people to see how they react.
Whatever the case, I hope things can settle down a bit and we can return to civility.
Not even for the gauntlet rockstar, Defensive Phlox, who only requires one star to be useful? (And more stars would help fill in a couple tough voyage combos.)
I wouldn't pay that price for a first star on either of the others, but I can at least see some appeal for Rev Phlox's MED/CMD due to skill set rarity.
For me personally, I have Rev Phlox already immortalized and have enough other MED/CMD options that I don't need a dupe (and certainly not one at 1/5). That leaves bringing Def Phlox to 4 stars or Naked Phlox to 5 stars. I lean towards immortalizing Naked Phlox since my SCI/MED options are more limited than MED/SCI.
I don't have 1500 dil, but am waiting to see how the Sunday offer shakes out. It's not a done deal, but I'll probably buy some dil and immort Naked Phlox since it would be similar to a $9.99 Tuesday crew LTO for me.
Overall I like this offer format, but would normally pass unless I already had 1500 dil and/or the crew options were amazing.
Almost all my spending of dil. goes to the recap packs. So when @Prime Lorca [10FH] pointed out that this is a better deal than the recap packs he convinced me, because he is right, it is.
I also respect your opinion, thanks for sharing it. The world would be a less interesting place if we all agreed and we would never progress as a society if we accepted the status quo.
I am also open minded enough to alter my opinion based on a different perspective and/or new information provided. I think your perspective - that they suspended an element of their business model (that of chance) in order to entice the customer - is a valid one. Thanks for sharing.
It's certainly not a situation in which I was wasting any emotional time or energy anyway but it is an interesting distraction 😉
Edited to add: I hope this post doesn't come across as snarky, it certainly isn't supposed to - I have genuinely altered my perspective after reading yours. I stand by the final paragraph in my original post though - I am so used to being disappointed by DB/TP that it is never a suprise to me anymore.
I think a lot of us agree on some level with that last paragraph. A lot of us come to the forum specifically to see how an offer works (if it's new) or to see if someone got burned or just to discuss the pros and cons of a deal or offer. They have a spotty track record, but I think it has largely improved. The exception being those 550 packs. But even those have gotten steadily better.
Troll opinions have no merit and we shouldn’t listen to them or worry about them...being insulted just means the troll wins. Same goes for leaving, which would also deprive someone of great math-based posts like yours above that helped put a little more perspective on the value of the behold offer - I went from feeling pretty good about my purchase (as is the case any time you can immortalize a valuable 5* crew) to feeling really good about it and being even more interested in seeing these types of offers in the future.
TP whiffed with the demerit packs (no matter how many non-forum players were uninformed enough to buy it) and hit this one out of the park.
I think this is why I was so glad to snare Gladiator Spock and then cite him up, bar Gary Seven he hasn't really been trumped yet.
Generally I try and field M. Picard, FO Burnham, Surak (or Picard) Neelix (or High Roller Sisko), Gladiator Spock, Wrathful Kirk, Survivalist Kirk, Protomorphosis Barclay (4/5) EV Suit Seven (4/5) Armus (4/5), Q'Od (or Indulgent Seven), EMA.
I have 3/5 M De Neuf, Detective Data, Species 8472
and 1/5 Maquis Tuvok.
Out of them only Species 8472 provides the best option but is only two Skills.