New Pledge Rewards, New Pledge Tiers, Player Owned Towns & Stretch Goal Store Megapost

Yeah but if they did you might have upgraded to whatever that tear is... Baron Marshal or whatever... and then once there you might say, ah heck it's only 750 more to duke why not!

 

Baron 3
There's nothing in Baron 3 to justify paying an additional $1600.
The video conference with Richard Garrot is cool. Looks like he would have to do at least 25 video conferences. If that was a yearly thing, it might be worth it. But, a one time conference? I don't know.

Duke isn't appealing because of "Full tour of the Portalarium studios in Austin, Texas for a behind the scenes look and personal design discussion with the game team." If I lived in Texas, it might be cool. But, it's not going to look that awesome to the family if I take a trip to a game company's studios in Austin.

That would also include: "V.I.P. access to special round-table design discussions hosted by Lord British"

Both of them seem very cool if I lived in Texas.

The keep level property deed is cool.
The duke's cloak is ok. It's decent but not awesome.
Extra bank slots aren't that beneficial.

The most appealing aspect of Duke is the order of house placement. Everything else isn't that great--at least for me.

 

My thinking as well. Just not seeing anything in Baron to be worth a $1600 jump just for the city lot and lot placement priority.

 

This is the one that would move me to Dukedom if in the next several months I were to lose what little is left of my sanity:

Custom Avatar

Direct interaction with our team artists to model custom character features for your avatar's head, different from the avatars of all others (can be based on your own likeness; all avatar images must be approved by the development team).

 

Items made by Lord British with his maker's mark. Only a limited number of those items will be made. They probably couldn't be powerful or people would cry "pay to win."

 

Maybe even better. A player sends x number of materials to Lord British and he just puts on the maker's mark. X number of items could be made with that mark every month.

 

Or better yet. A player gets a token which will put Lord British's makers mark on a item the player makes. Maybe one token per month.

 

Or better yet. You click on the token and you have a 20 percent chance for a lord british maker's mark. Maybe the rest would be chances to get other important people maker's marks.

 

I can just see a "Persistent Light of Pinkness" sword with Dark Starr's maker mark

 

That would also be my single real weakness that could get me to do Duke...

 

Maybe something like all lords get a custom face, and all dukes get complete custom appearance ?

 

I could deal with that! *nods sagely*

 

Has there been an updated breakdown of how many Lords, LM, Barons, Dukes, etc. there are currently? I'd be curious to see, more specifically, the breakdown of where all those pledges started at. Meaning, did someone immediately begin with a LoTM pledge or did they start out as an Explorer? My spidey sense tells me that most people started at a lesser tier and then upgraded their pledges over time, predicated on their own financial capabilities and enjoyment of the game. Which is common sense given that the game is still Pre-Alpha.

If you were to extrapolate that data into a simple excel spreadsheet, I think the results would show a simple underlying commonality. Given proof of concept and financial capability to do so, people will pay more to become a Lord, Baron etc. Yet, as mentioned above by many folks, there is most likely a HUGE dropoff when it comes to making that jump to Baron. Myself included, because the extra income investment doesn't seem worth it to me. Think about the thousands of dollars being left on the table then. Here I am (and obviously others) willing to keep paying more but unwilling to do so because the "rewards" aren't commensurate with the price increase. One way to capture this money then, would be a one day only sale of all Lord level accounts and above. Portalarium would have to run the numbers to see if the roi on such a sale would be worth it, but from reading this forum I definitely feel that it would be. Plus, a one day sale at that level focuses primarily on those with an interest in upgrading, without cannibalizing the product as a whole.

Again, this is all opinion and speculation. I am sure Portalarium has done their own market research and SWOT analysis on this stuff already!

 

Darkstarr said earlier they didn't plan on creating more pledge tiers, but here is the update that discussed the data from February:
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?p=48265

 

Thanks Lord Andernut, I forgot that they had released that information. It is interesting to note that the Edelman and Knight pledge levels have been the most lucrative. Going by that information, there is a clear dropoff after the Knight pledge level. Why? The financial jump in pledge levels at that point are significantly greater ($400 to Knight Marshall). Granted, I believe Portalarium has done this on purpose to limit the amount of Lords, Barons, Dukes, etc. in game. So let's game this out...say Portalarium does a "one day only" 20% sale on all Lord levels of above (bringing cost down to $1280 for a Lord pledge) and you captured roughly 30% of the 800 Knight pledges currently out there...that's a revenue increase of $115,200. Just at that pledge level. The key of course is keeping the Knight Marshall pledge at $1,200. Just $80 dollars more to become a Lord looks like a steal at that point. Especially when you add in the psychological effect of a one day only sale and then it's gone. I would be shocked if Portalarium couldn't generate another $500,000 from a sale structured in that way. Something we all benefit from in the long run!

 

I'm at Knight Marshall.

I would pay $80 to upgrade to Lord SO HARDDDD.

 

Of course you would Jack, who wouldn't?

People who have already invested up to that tier level will more than likely increase their pledge, given an appropriate incentive. My follow up question to you Jack would be, "Are you likely to increase your pledge if nothing changes?" Maybe you are and maybe you're not, but a one time reduction in price makes it pretty difficult to say no...

 

The only problem with this line of thinking is then people will "wait for the sale" instead of upgrading at the higher price tag when they can afford it/feel compelled to do so. It'll slow down the amount of money that's trickling in, and then the Devs will be forced to have sale after sale to keep the bigger pledges rolling in. Once they "show their hand", few will be willing to pay the full price when it goes back up.

 

This is a very good point, which is why it can only be done once, hence my comment on cannibalization. In this manner, timing is absolutely imperative. If there is a need for influx of cash you might do it sooner rather than later. If budgets are fine, time it right at the very end prior to release, but again it can only be done once. Otherwise, to your point, you will erode at your customer base once it goes back to full price.

Best example of this is a Harvard Case Study that focuses on the auto industry and why their "year end clearance sales" are always their most profitable quarter.

 

I don't think that would be fair at any pledge level to do this. Those that have paid more for their tier would be getting ripped off for what they've paid already.