Sleuth Home - Message Boards - Sleuth Talk

Dec-15-2007 12:59

So, as you may have noticed the "Beating a Dead Horse" discussion has been archived. (A post started by Roamie about the perceived steepness of Shady prices). Be assured that everyone's opinion was read and appreciated here in the Sleuth Admin household. We would like to put an offer on the table: cap at 1 mil.

Please let us know what you think and based on your posts, we'll make a decision by Christmas morning.*

*Disclaimer:
This message is not intended to promote and/or belittle Christmas. You do not have to celebrate Christmas or any other winter holiday in order to post here.

Dec-21-2007 16:38

Ran: I think that is a great idea for players who have all there skills and don't mind losing contacts but I think it's the newer players who leave the game because of Shady's prices.

Stooby may believe it aint broke but as Big Mac replied, what about the others.

And this brings me to exactly what I said originally:

"It's easy to see the ones the win, Casinos make a big deal of those ones so you can't miss it. What is harder to see and what you don't see, is the people that lose, and they are the majority.''

I think that is the situation we have here, we see the people who say are doing well and don't mind Shady's high prices, we're not seeing the ones who leave and never come back.

Now, I don't know about the figures and facts and I don't how many people have quit the game because of Shady and retirement but I do know of a few.

This means that for some, maybe a lot more than you realise, the system as it is now, it NOT working.
With high Shady prices and no cap OR with retirement which doesn't only lose a player experience*, it means the game is not working well with it being one or the other.

Also, I don't think that a cap is the best solution rather part of a solution.
I think changing the formula of what he charges and then perhaps capping that would be much better.

*Loss of 25% of their Experience Points
Loss of 90% of their Money
Loss of Skill Points commensurate to Experience Points lost. Since no skills are lost in the process, this usually means the detective will start with negative available skill points. (for a newish detective, this woud be really hard!)
Loss of one randomly selected piece of Equipment
Loss of all Contacts

Dec-21-2007 16:43

(I also like the idea of a freeze, I think it's unfair that his price increases so much when you're doing cases, this is like how the Government used to charge interest on Student Loans while a person was still studying but once again, if the formula was changed and was made fairer then perhaps a freeze wouldn't be needed.
As it is now, with a $512 increase to an F.A, well that makes Shady lower than a Government dept to me ;))

Dec-21-2007 19:22

lol.

So since everyone's having a second bite of the cherry.

**AND I still encourage people just to post FOR or AGAINST rather than say nothing!**

The freeze is an OK idea, but how do you work out where you re-start from once you've paid off the frozen FA is beyond me. Do you start from Zero? And base the price of your next FA purely on the XP you've accrued since your last FA? That's problematical.

The freeze will work pretty well for new players. So I like it in that respect. But for old players, if you false at 10 mil get your HUGE Shady price well you're only freezing something you'll never be able to (or be less than willing to) pay back anyway (apparently).

Another possibility and I'm not sure if Ben & Sunny want another new idea, so much as they want an opinion on theirs :D, but if we have Cairo, and we already have to do all those favours for shoes etc. Why not just add to the bottom of the list: 'Shady reduction 25%'. 'Shady reduction 50%'. 'Shady reduction 75%'.

Or why not make the Villian Hunts worth something too (and this just isn't coz I've done lots) you know why shouldn't someone who's done 20 or 30 or 40 hunts get a Shady Price Reduction? Rather than just stockpile Uber gear they're not using.

Anyway, coupled with an adjustment in how Shady's prices accrue. [Because I don't see any reason why the formula couldn't be rejigged (again) to decrease the rate at which Shady's price accrues. Eg the higher XP you have the lower the rate of accrual.]

Since it's generally the people with more XP encouraging a change, and they are the ones with less to do these days, then why not make a reduction - in part - incentive based.

I'd much rather have people doing something proactive - something that increased people's interest in the game itself - towards reducing their Shady debt.

Don't forget, you can just say 'FOR' or AGAINST'.

Dec-21-2007 20:02

I think the ultimate question is whether the proposed changes would simply be a cap at the top or a restructuring at all levels, although I am against both. I like the difficulty level of this game and wish it could be made more difficult at certain levels in all truth. But that's just me :) I guess I'm just one of those that don't think it's broke. But that's my opinion of the game and not the issue at hand.

As I understand it, the issue on the table is simply setting a $1 M cap. That is, when Shady's regular prices hit $1 M, they would never rise after that.

Again, for myself, I could live with a complete restructuring if that's what Ben & Sunny feel would be best for the game. But a cap at the top seems to be blatantly unfair to those other people that LED and Mac were talking about. Mac said that he would be for a $1 M cap, but that wouldn't even begin to help him in his own dealings with Shady until millions and millions of experience points later. Tax cuts for the rich anyone? Advocates of the Trickle Down Theory as a reason to cap Shady at the top? I just don't see it as a good idea.

Dec-22-2007 02:09

this is obviously a very emotive issue that i've stumbled upon!! Out of curiosity i've read all the posts (it took a bit of time...) and now i've decided to throw in my two pennies worth. I noticed that almost everyone who's contributed so far is quite experienced (>100,000 xp). is it possible to earn 1mill by then?

As a newbie, i haven't even considered the possibility of earning 1 mill dollars. I did pay off shady once when i was young (even younger than now i mean), it cost me $4500!! you can imagine how little i had then... but now i'm s*** scared of getting another FA and have in fact quit cases rather than risk it.

in terms of re-doing how shady calculates how much to charge, i think that would certainly make the game easier for newbies and make it easier to progress in the earlier stages. But would that encourage more guessing? it probably would for me if i knew the penalty was really low.

in terms of a 1 mill cap, i can't really comment on that. at this point in time it wouldn't make a difference to me at all, probably for a long long time. tho i imagine that by the time i get there i would be travelling and helping newbies in the agency etc so i wouldn't have that much money still.

in terms of freezing the penalty at what level you were when you got it, well, real life doesn't really work like that, why should sleuth? again it might encourage guessing if you knew that after getting an FA you could just do lots of safe/easy cases to earn the money without worrying about the price going up, whilst you were trying to earn this money.

in terms of paying shady with something other than money, perhaps a range of choices? Money, skill points/skills, xp, contacts, maybe a ban on travelling, not be allowed to be in an agency, not allowed to do harder level cases, lose faction standing points.

ok, so that's not a yes or no from me, but i really feel that i can't decide at this point in my sleuth life. but i hope that this has given a newbie point of view.

Dec-22-2007 09:37

Just wanted to say I really like the idea of adding a Shady Reduction as something to go along with the Shoes in Cairo! - But I think that should only be added if a cap isn't, since then you could get things far too cheap.

Dec-22-2007 09:45

Like Jojo, I would be in favour of a Shady Reduction. (probably through Cairo given the setup, but steeper prices)

I would sooner have a reduction than a cap.

But failing a Shady Reduction, a cap is fine.

Dec-22-2007 09:55

I am FOR a cap on Shady.
Even if I am not experienced enough to be able to owe 1 million $. When I read most of the comments on this thread, I would suggest that many of you were Norwegians, who at least inside of Norway is known to score high in the envy contest. "It was hard for me, then sure it's going to be hard for you too..."
But, since there seem to be so many who want to pay shady the full amount of money, I suggest that you get the option of paying at the capped price IF you meet theese requirements:
* Your subscription does last more than 6 months
* You agree to not being able to do cases harder than Really Really Hard for one week. (That would restrict you from doing AVH's and participate in Treasure Hunts, and you might as well have to observe someone passes you on a high score list...)

When reading the posts, I see that there seems to be many having too much money to spend, so I suggest that a charity institution is introduced to Sleuthville. The institution may be called Salvation Army. When you pay to the charity institution your agency get 3% of the amount in fame, and 30% of the money is transferred to a randomly selected subscribed sleuth who got less than $3 000. Imagine how a sleuth that have been hard beaten by the war (1. world war?) would rejoice if they recieve an envelope from Salvation Army containing $15 000 because someone else in Sleuthville have been gracious and paid $50 000 for charity.

Dec-22-2007 16:23

Although I like Secret Squirrel's idea, it doesn't help people in lower levels who are hit hard if it's linked to Cairo.

I have to agree with Treschaude. A cap at the top may be great for the people at the top, but what about those in the middle and at the bottom?

Topkebab said: "in terms of re-doing how shady calculates how much to charge, i think that would certainly make the game easier for newbies and make it easier to progress in the earlier stages. But would that encourage more guessing? it probably would for me if i knew the penalty was really low."

To which I say, If not going completely broke to pay Shady off encourages you to guess, then you'll be paying him more often. Even if you're paying less each time, you'll still end up shelling out just as much money because you'll be paying more often (in fact, if you're going to be reckless, you'll either end up paying out MORE, or be retired).

I do not think that retiring your detective as a way to lower your Shady costs makes any sense at all. While I'd love to re-do my contacts (!!!!), the loss of skill points would HURT. I'm not yet at the point where I've got extra skill points, I'm not yet at the point where I've got a full apartment and tons of money left over.

I am, however, at the point where I usually need agency help to pay off an FA. And as careful as I am, I know too well how things happen when you're tired or distracted - or both.

If I wasn't in a agency with a partner who's always there to help me, I would be that dreaded thing right now - retired - and I can assure you I wouldn't be playing Sleuth anymore, as much as I love it.

And that's the point of view of one who is neither a lowbie nor a highbie, not a newbie but not an oldbie.


PS -- And please, people, if you have a negative comment to make about someone's ethnicity or culture, or to make about someone based on their ethnicity or culture, kindly keep it to yourself. No one wants to hear it.

Dec-23-2007 23:11

I suppose it's time to put in my 2 cents...

I will admit, I was wanting an unretirement, but since then, I have not retired, and I have paid off shady a few times. I have kept track of what has happened. I just want to say, I don't like the unretirement now since there is a high number using it to not pay Shady.

The original idea of this post, I do NOT agree with having a cap on Shady. You would think that one would know not to make a guess, educated or otherwise, since Shady prices do increase with experience points. Quite frankly, there are several long posts for me to catch up on since I haven't been on boards for days. I will just say I want Shady left alone, and unretirement removed. I'm even willing to give up all the detectives I've unretired and transfer my sub to a new one if that's what it takes to remove it. That's saying a lot considering how far I've gotten with lil since I've resurrected her. If that's what it takes, then that's what it takes. It won't make complaining any less. And quite frankly, people will still complain about having to fork over a million sleuth dollars to Shady. I don't particularly like to hold 200k on me... so I'll complain now if I really wanted to, because if I get an FA with lil now... the price of shady is over 200k for sure. Not my idea of fun, walking around with 200k cash on you. I do realize that the agency safe is there, but some agencies don't help on Shady, due to rules their rules saying "Whatever you do, DO NOT GUESS!" If you're not 100% sure, then quit the case. It costs a lot less than an FA.

In summary, I'm against the idea of changing Shady's current standings.