Open Discussion Pertaining to Monetization Model of Supremacy 1914

    gold gold


    spend it on eco

    spend it on GM-free game

    spend it on special scenarios with you being able to influence pre-set conditions

    spend it on HQ and other fancy options

    spend it to fight corruption and rebels

    spend it on buying possibility to have pink troops and special font in DE

    spend it at possibility to be Frontline Pioneer

    spend it on tournaments and league games participation

    spend it on possibility to get access to map/scenario modding


    DO NOT SPEND IT ON MILITARY ACTIONS AS THIS DESTROYS BALANCE

    I have no problems whatsoever with GMs as long as it does not change outcome of engagement by 180 degrees.

    yep new ideas to new games

    I always thought that they already decided to kill supremacy and test here things which they want to use in other games like 30K ,NWE and others.

    Funny thing but I miss a link to other BYTROgames in the main panel.

    circle of life


    one time your game is getting donations and before you blink it becomes donor for another game

    reusing code graphics and gameplay features is standard practice


    is there any Bytro/stillfront game where GMs are well balanced?

    if yes : copy - paste that sollution

    if not: look at other games that have it balanced and copy-paste


    you do not have to invent a wheel by yourself if someone else is already using it.

    I am in favor of implementing a loot crate system akin to counterstrike go or team fortress 2.


    We would get a loot crate every 5 hours of gameplay and then be able to spend real money on keys to open them.


    Inside them? Cosmetics. Revamp the entire customization system. Maybe even add player-created avatars that can be customized with a wide variety of clothing and features to make our very own WWI general or soldier look how we would like. There would be a bunch of historical uniforms and stuff to take from. Gas masks, grenades, rifles, boots, helmets, hats. All that cool shit. There could also be silly stuff like sunglasses and dumb hats. And if the player would rather use the historical default country avatar like Franz Josef for example, then they would have that option. But the feature to upload your own picture should be removed to fit this model.


    And every time you unlock an achievement, that badge would then be equip-able to your avatar's uniform. So the players with the most achievements would truly look the most decorated. I think this model would also give Supremacy a much-needed mainstream appeal. And the new players coming to the game would make a greater effort to actually learn the rules instead of building a workshop in every province before never logging in again.


    Then, as the customization makes more and more revenue, you could scale down the role of goldmarks. I'm not going to disparage GM. But as a player, when someone uses them against me, I just feel completely cheated. The only time I use GM is when a player uses them to advance a factory or unit production. In that case, I will as well if they are my enemy. Just so as to not fall behind. Otherwise, if someone makes me feel cheated by GM I just throw my hands up and quit the game.

    .... would be nice if they at least sent out a message when someone spent GM in a game, and how much. At least then the rest of us would know if we were losing due to someone with superior strategy or mana from heaven.


    But they wont. They make money off of Gold Marks. The more people think its the key to winning the more people will buy them. It is counter to thier business model to do anything that may discourage people from buying gold mark.


    They have a right to make money from their efforts. Its just annoying that i feel the rules are super vague so im constantly wondering if something happens or another nation jumps ahead because im missing a fundemental item on how to play, or they are dumping real cash into the game.

    Everybody realizes this is a for-profit company. I think if there's ever a place where you can go without saying that all the time, it's this thread.


    I want to preface this by saying that since learning that all exploits are now considered legal, times are finally over in which I would recommend this game to people and I will certainly no longer advocate high command to other players. "Have your way with it, we can't be bothered to care what bugs you abuse anymore", seriously? If you decide to stop supporting the game, don't expect the game to support you. I get it, everything costs money, but this is seriously undefendable. The actual company running this game no longer showing any interest in the integrity of its gameplay is a huge disappointment for me. I'm not interested in being a part of that attempt to turn the game into some kind of money printer on autopilot.


    On the topic of GM: I agree with the notion that many GM features are mostly unproblematic and don't screw the balance a whole lot. Then there's the GM saboteurs.


    Those guys, man. Being struck with them feels exactly like it does to be wallhacked or aimbotted in an FPS. It's the most frustrating thing ever. They're way, way over the top and they are way, way underpriced at that as well. They can change the outcomes of huge wars, of entire games very, very easily.

    For some reason I had this idea in my head for a while that a GM building destruction would cost you 5,000GM and was legit shocked to be reminded that it's actually not even half of that. At 2,000 GM, there isn't even any sort of price/value balance here. Surely the people who I've had use this feature extensively against me in the past would have spent 10k GM on one sabotage action, these are not the kind of people who really care and you know as well as I do that those are the guys who finance this game, not the dude who gets GMs for 5 bucks so he can sabotage two buildings.


    So I really think at the very least those prices could and should be jacked up quite significantly. That way, fewer wars will be unfairly turned whereas those that will be would have been anyway and will at least bring in some revenue that's actually worth these horrible, vile features.

    I still strongly believe that removing ban on exploits gave even edge to regular players who were not protected from skillful cheaters , hiding their dirty tricks for years. Now I can plainly write how to use Advanced Tactics employed by some of the highest ranked players in that game and allow others to anticipate some moves . This also gives them possibility to develop their own defense.


    There is at least one Advanced Tactic, which connected with GMs can create unstoppable army , this is why I will keep that tactic in a shadows for now.


    And as I said earlier - GMs cannot influence opponents army ability to fight

    this is why dmging military buildings like Airfield and Railway should be stopped. Same with lowering province morale to 0 in hope of dmg opponents morale.

    At the same time game will earn a lot in strategy sense if gold spying units every 3-6 hours will be forbidden. This will force opponents to anticipate moves, do some planning, in general force them to learn something about strategy and maneuvering.

    We need to come up with a reasonable plan to keep the game monetized but without penalizing players who have spent YEARS in learning the intricacies of the game getting crushed by GM Whales.


    I know for a fact that we have lost a number of very good players in the last 12 months who have quit because the game has become a "pay to win" situation.


    A GM cap per day or per round would be the first step in trying to address the problem.


    There is nothing more frustrating than playing a 100 or 500 round and taking months to build and nurture your forces only to see them crushed by someone willing to spend 100s of dollars and wipe you out. The big problem is when you've spent years to develop a reasonable set of stats and see them destroyed in a day or two. THAT is what makes people leave the system permanently.


    The idea of using advertising instead of GM purchases as the primary source of monetization is only good provided subscriber base increases but right now we're seeing a steady decline because of the OVERUSE of GM.


    A lot of good ideas have been mentioned here but what we need now is some ACTION to be taken before it's too late. At the moment it seems that nobody is paying any attention to this problem.

    pay for legacy mode


    pay for challenge 1 vs 1 maps with preset units and building


    pay of advanced bot which takes over your country when you are afk. you can order many stances from the bot. bytro can gather that information and study and develop better understanding how AI should work and think


    creating sitters mechanic as a paid option


    remove any offensive gm usage against enemy provinces


    remove gm possibility to spy on enemy units or to finish production of units faster. finishing Buildings is ok imho.


    create at least one well balance, good looking scenario with preset units, building, provinces population and morale. 10 years ago in historic map you had different troops composition and different building within countries- now it has been removed. I would like to pay for such a historic scenario.


    when I say paid option it could be either part of HQ or a separate purchasable item

    Quote from Furry1

    We need to come up with a reasonable plan to keep the game monetized but without penalizing players who have spent YEARS in learning the intricacies of the game getting crushed by GM Whales.


    I know for a fact that we have lost a number of very good players in the last 12 months who have quit because the game has become a "pay to win" situation.


    This is surely not false but also not exactly all that correct.


    The game hasn't "become" a pay2win situation recently. No GM features were added since GM was introduced. They turned it into a pay2win situation when that happened, but today they might be going for an audience that's more prone to spend money in very young players and this has multiplied the issues. There's a good chance some of those kids will pay for ingame purchases using their parents phone bills and stuff - obviously, as a business, having customers that spend someone else's money is a huge get.

    This demographic also lacks any reference, they can't even judge how good or bad the game is, how fair the balance is, they just play it. You can get away with much more (or less - don't even need to care about integrity of the game mechanics, for starters) in that 10-14yo market. There's nothing but fiscal wins all over the goddamn place if you're a business that can push it's product on such a young demographic. This is why I think we're seeing yet another increase in wins being straight up bought in this game. I have long advocated a "Win game instantly" button at a price point of like 500k GM, because that would essentially have the same effect as someone spamming GM saboteurs to pave their way, but I wouldn't have to waste my time in a game with one of these guys.


    I have left this game many, many times because someone nuked my stuff in a game I had gone through thick and thin in for a month. It's too frustrating. And I always, always, always, play with HC membership. Always.

    Then I come back after a few months, play some games and wind up cursing it all over again. This is infuriating.

    The target demographic shift is probably going to lead to the end of that.

    I find it very telling how they threw us this thread to get crazy in, quite apparently never intending to actually consider anything the community says. That would have been a major swing in mentality from the past few years anyway. If they really wanted to know any suggestions on this, just brushing through the forums would have given them tons of input to evaluate. This thread is to keep us busy and make us feel like we still have a say, but we don't.


    I would happily pay to get a supported version of legacy mode. I would happily pay for games without GM in them. I actually do pay a monthly fee in HC to play this game. And yet nobody cares about the experience that I have in this game at all.


    But it has never mattered to offer to pay for anything, Bytro will not change what it considers the best monetization system. They have proven this for years now. So many great things have been suggested over the years to be shot down without reason at best or just blatantly ignored in most cases, like this entire thread. They're raking in a killing with all these children they're attracting now and quite franky I'm sure they couldn't care less about the gameplay experience any of us are having. These kids will play a game for three months tops and move on to the next one anyway, why bother expending effort on having a good longterm experience for anyone? All of the gameplay changes that came since the new UI aired and remain in disregard of severe pushback by experienced players are making this pretty clear.


    So guys, we tried, but I think that's the absolute most we could do. Don't expect to see any changes. At least not any that will aim at making the game fair and more enjoyable in the long term. That is not what Bytro wants this game to be at this point.

    I would offer nice solution to monetization system



    pay2lose: we block all gold options that allow you to progress. Gold does not give you any advantage at all over opponents when it comes to situation of your country. you cannot speed up your troops, you cannot buy resources, you cannot do similar things with building, morale of your provs. I will also remove possibility to watch enemy armies with gold as this benefits you and do not harm enemy directly.


    You can only use gold in destructive manner against others, not on yourself. So lowering morale, slowing down production of units, destroying resources , buildings and maybe even units. I would also add option- Spanish Flu for lets say 10 000 000 GMs which decimates enemy land armies killing half of them. Monsun for 5 000 000 GMs which sinks half of enemy fleets that are not in harbors. And hmm Hurricane 7 500 000 GMs which causes half of enemy airfield in the air to be destroyed.


    pay2lose- completely new approach which allows you to punish those who deserve it without giving you advantage over other countries in the map....why not?

    What about making it so buying a certain amount of GM is required in order to play the game, but only a certain amount of GM is allowed per match? This would make it a lot more fair and assure that there's at least some strategy behind GM use. It wouldn't be "person who spends the most money wins" anymore as everyone would have the same amount.