Patreon is a subscription system.
I personally divested from it because leadership didn’t meet my expectations. However, the karma accrued was for me to do with as I wanted. On Path, karma already acts like the special gems you can purchase with real money on any gaming apps. I don’t think an added option is needed. Choice would be nice, but... I think the current system needs to be dismantled and rebuilt into something more functional that’s both user friendly and requires less maintenance from admin.
The main problem I see on Path is a lack of informed entrepreneurship. There are plenty of great suggestions that players have made (this one included to an extent), which others have voted on and turned into interesting discussions. These suggestions source from gamers and roleplayers alike, all with the intent of making the game more diverse, user-friendly, and overall enjoyable. Few of these ideas actually get implemented.
There already is a subscription system in place. What is lacking is the consideration for the community’s preferences in terms of that subscription. That speaks to a wider problem that Path has, which no short-term injection of money will resolve.
Stakeholder engagement is a huge part of what makes a community thrive and is crucial for a business to survive. This business is dying and patchwork isn’t going to fix it—be that subscriptions, bursts of activity, or changes that aren’t asked for. Empowering players by taking their suggestions to heart and making the changes asked rather than fixing things that aren’t broken (and breaking others in the process…) would be a first step towards making us feel heard.
A recent example is the new cage traps. As far as I know this was discussed purely behind the scenes between a single player and admin with no input from the community. What about all the other, smaller fixes, that would make gameplay more enjoyable, that people have voted on time and time again? Example: stackable purchases. What about the bugs that have been affecting game play for months? Example: knock out bomb timers being off and kicking people out prematurely, rising notoriety. These are just a few of the things that bug me, but there are plenty of others that affect many in this community: businesses, BTTD, posting errors, energy gains.
Did we really need a new karma option put into place?
How much time did that take out of the allotted time set for Path activities? How much, in the long run, is that time worth in terms of monetary returns vs how many players are lost due to other reasons? Opportunity cost is huge with a lot of these decisions and I don’t think that whatever time has been allotted to this game has been done most judiciously.
It’s not the lack of engagement on the community’s behalf that’s making this place fail — it’s only become a problem recently because have stopped engaging. And with it, their wallets closed.
If this were a community-sponsored project, then the community would have a higher stake in what happens around here. I don’t think it is. If this is a private business venture where one person calls the shots, then the work needs to be put in by that person. If this is a hobby… well, it’s not up to the community to provide for another’s hobby unless it’s value added to them.
Entrepreneurs put in the work that’s needed, take feedback and use it to better the product/service so that people stay engaged. If this is a business, then it is in dire need of being restructured.
There’s a part of me that doesn’t even think this mammoth post is worth the effort I’m putting into writing it and wording it appropriately, because I don’t think it’ll have any impact. I have reached out privately to admin with ideas about bettering things since I first joined two years ago, but my input was duly noted… I’ve reached out with issues against other players here and there, but never had any resolution to these problems. Where do I stand? What happens next?
There’s a lack of follow through, transparency and accountability, and it stems from the head and trickles down to the body. The moderators don’t feel supported. The community doesn’t feel heard. The structure that is meant to hold everything together is weak and allows for too much interpretation. It’s only natural for users to stop caring. They focus on what they can until something better comes along or something breaks. If the latter, they report it… If it gets fixed, they keep playing, maybe eventually spend a little here or there for some energy boosts.
But there are bugs labelled [A] on page three…
There are gaps in this system that require admin. The machine isn’t only lacking oil but it simply cannot work without its human components. It’s flawed. It’s been designed that way. The definitions and rules aren’t rigid enough that those who should be doing their job as moderators can do their job. Community members can’t police the community because there is code of conduct that they can hold others accountable to (and in turn be held accountable to by others).
The community is desperate for leadership. Clearer, codified rules about conduct and gameplay are needed in its absence. Half the **** that’s gone on between a group of players and staff could be have been avoided if there were more structure for both sides to be heard. A lot of what happened this past year could have been stopped if there’d been a quicker, stronger presence from the get-go by admin. In the absence of admin, moderators — the first line of defence — couldn’t act…
I’m supposed to be willing to put my money towards this? What are my incentives? Bugs I’ve reported are still unresolved months after the fact (and continue to affect my gameplay). Suggestions I’ve made have fallen on deaf ears. The chats and boards are a minefield to navigate. The absence of clarity in regards to gameplay and rules and canon make it hard to feel get out of my comfort zone.
I know that admin have tried to implement month preference things and pump some steroids back into this game here and there, but you can’t polish a rotten apple and expect people to be tempted by the shine. The system is broken and needs to be re-evaluated.
Players were happy to spend time offline for the server transfer. The community isn’t made up of grubby-handed children who don’t understand patience. I’m pretty sure that many of us would be eager to get our hands dirty, open our wallets, and be consistently active if we could trust our interests to be protected and our voices to be heard.
Frustration is felt across all tiers: gamers, roleplayers, mods, admin…
…it’s not just the money that’s lacking. It’s the feeling. And I get it? Everyone’s a critic! All these players do is play at leisure and they’re all so quick to pop into the bug reports board when something inconveniences them. They want solutions and they want them now! However, many have tried to get discussions going (about diversity, gameplay, storyline) only to have little to no feedback from admin. The amount of resources in this community is staggering — any business would be ecstatic to have so much of its content sourced from its users (without having to worry about IP and royalties).
Chapters, GM events, voting… Yes, we (as a community) need to show up and people haven’t being doing it enough. I can’t blame them though? They’re disillusioned. It’s one foot in, one foot out syndrome. This is just showcased by people advertising patreon/trying to make subscriptions a thing to ensure that this doesn’t go anywhere, that it is secured by some trickle of money. Because despite it being kind of a dead end, we’ve all built our houses along the way and put effort into them so we kind of… linger. To boot, life happens and we’re all busy, so it’s understandable that people check in when they have time. But for Path to be something that I genuinely make time for… it has to be something that adds value to my life. This is especially true if it requires financial investment on my behalf to keep going. As a stakeholder I'm not feeling too hot as is.
The amount of times I’ve ended up spending $20 more on a bunch of gems on EA games because the bulk payoff was ‘worth it’ is nuts. I can use my gems towards levelling gear or whatnot instantly. It’s addictive. Aside from having more choices as to how I use those gems in said games, I also am empowered to make the choices without having to go through admin each time.
The transferring of karma from one account to the other, the setting up of private abodes… There already are a handful things that you can change yourself (name, redistribute, buy property) and buy/setup (fade-portals, spawning shops), but anything else requires extra effort from players and admin. These measures of distanced control are a noose. Even more so when admin isn’t around to enact said measures.
I give EA so much money that I really shouldn’t, but I keep doing it because I’m satisfied in doing so. It’s not wasted. I collect my gems and I participate in my guild and interact with the other officers in setting up raids and territory battles for our members. Issues? I reach out to EA and I know I’ll get a response within 24-48 hours. They tell me so in their TOS. They get in touch with solutions or with a plan of attack to resolve my issue within the time frame. I keep interacting with them until the problem is fixed and then they ask me if it’s all good. They make sure that I’m happy so that I’ll spend my money. They tell me what to expect and they tell me how I should behave within their community upfront. I can warn others in the guild based on the rules — rules that don’t have loopholes. It’s a solid system. I get that they have more employees and more resources, but there are a lot of people in this community with time, experience, and money who could be far more engaged as stakeholders.
(And people are keen, or at least they sort of are? I think it's just that no one really knows if it's worth it anymore... that's why a subscription with new rewards is probably one of the few incentives to spend more money.)
As opposed to EA? A small business? Kevin from Trillian sent me a message last week — nine months after I’d sent my last data collection re: a bug I’d reported in regards to giving them money. While I appreciate the sentiment, it’s like: far out, mate. I’m not using Trillian anymore, let alone willing to pay for premium again. And that's because we all dealt with glitches and nothing was working out, and something better came along.
I’ve posted bugs months ago that continue to be a problem… I have no idea when they’ll be resolved… I have no idea how long it takes for admin to look into it. There’s more and more clutter in each report as new potentially linked bugs (who knows!?) surface. I’ve already spent a few hundred on this game and I don’t have a lot to show for it. The few things I do have, have led to unresolved bug reports…
So why should I be a Patreon again?
What could possibly lure me to spend some more money?
Sure, choice would be nice. I think the karma shop could be a bit more tailored like Lora suggested — with mix and matching of items, cheaper bulk prices. I also think this would require stricter limits for any bigger items. However whether this type of customisation is possible…. is unknown. It falls in line with the IC shops, where there is still no option to pick and choose a combination of items and purchase them in bulk… I have no idea if it’s even possible, or if admin would even be inclined to do it.
More importantly, what’s the opportunity cost of setting up a new subscription with new options when there are so many things that could use attention, and would make me more likely to continue to pepper money into this game?