Gear

Because they want to keep a tight bottleneck.

Forces people to make hard choices, or get frustrated and spend money

"Kyno;882550" wrote:
Because they want to keep a tight bottleneck.

Forces people to make hard choices, or get frustrated and spend money

Personally, I don't understand the gear rotation in shipments.

e.g. I need say a furnace... I don't have one, it doesn't appear in shipments.

How will they make more money? are people continuosly refreshing shipments to absurd amounts till they get one to show?

Or is it that people then tend to hoard gear when they see it, considering that they might not see it in the future because of the rotation (but that would adjust over time... and the only real profit would be the gear that was hoarded but never used due to quitting)

And if those are the only advantages to EA, does that really compensate the frustation of players (which leads to quitting/spending less in the game) of not getting the gear when they want it?

Yes a little bit of both. People who want it now will refresh and if someone needed it for 2 weeks (or average time frame of rotation) then when it does appear they will buy it. Flip side of that if you know it's limited and you need one at the end of the limited time frame you are more likely to buy crystals to get it rather then wait and build up crystals over the following weeks.

The frustration is a proven element of the freemium model. I agree that you would think they would make more money if they "catered" to 2 tiers, the current one and a lower lvl one for people that would spend, but not in amounts that make it worth it in this model.

Informed spending is not in this model so they don't do it. I love to buy packs that have a price and an exact payout, I don't gamble with real money.