Could Hearthstone Players on iOS Soon be Buying Dust Instead of Card Packs?
Note: Blizzard has not yet made an official statement on the change.
Back in June, Hearthstone players in China were no longer able to buy card packs but instead were purchasing a small amount of Arcane Dust with their money. As a bonus for their purchase, card packs were thrown into the mix as a "gift" for their dust purchase.
Why did Blizzard make this change? This is because of a change to laws in China regarding loot boxes in video games where it was required for video games to publish the odds of their drop rates.
The shop interface for Hearthstone in China.
So then, why on Azeroth are iOS players potentially buying dust soon? That's thanks to a policy change in Apple's App Store.
The Apple App Store Update on Loot Boxes
In the Apple App Store guidelines, a document which details the rules app devs must follow to get through the app approval process, there is now a section which states apps need to make note of the odds of receiving each type of item to customers.
- Apps offering “loot boxes” or other mechanisms that provide randomized virtual items for purchase must disclose the odds of receiving each type of item to customers prior to purchase.
With this addition, it looks like Hearthstone will need to go the same way as it did in China to prevent disclosure of the drop rates which would be accomplished through giving players another object and tack on card packs as a gift. The alternative would be to cut the crap and officially state card drop rates which have been well known for years at this point. On the plus side if they do try to get around it by using arcane dust and not disclosing the odds, it's a little bit more dust in everyone's pockets which will help craft the powerhouses we need for our decks.
Rarity Distribution in Card Packs Today
Card rarity distribution hasn't changed since Hearthstone launched, though players will see slightly more Legendaries now thanks to a guaranteed Legendary in your first 10 packs for each set. The following rarity distribution is from our TGT community card pack opening and is still inline with other documented, more recent pack openings.
Rarity | Normal | Golden | Total | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Legendary | 696 | 0.94% | 56 | 0.08% | 752 | 1.01% |
Epic | 3029 | 4.09% | 143 | 0.19% | 3172 | 4.28% |
Rare | 16017 | 21.61% | 934 | 1.26% | 16951 | 22.87% |
Common | 52153 | 70.36% | 1097 | 1.48% | 53250 | 71.84% |
Total | 71895 | 96.99% | 2230 | 3.01% | 74125 | 100.00% |
We've also got some totally new information from Blizzard China from in May which was posted with loot box regulations in mind.
- You'll get at least 1 rare, or better, in each pack.
- An epic will be received, on average, in 1 of every 5 packs.
- Legendaries, on average, will be received in 1 of every 20 packs.
- As players open more packs, the actual probability of opening cards with higher quality increases.
It's possible we could see the above being enough for the Apple App Store and it wouldn't require Blizzard to provide the actual drop rates which means they won't need to move forward with giving users dust for their money instead.
Quote from BlizzardAccording to the relevant national laws and regulations, "slag legend" is now the probability of taking cards to publish, as follows:
Note: "slag legend" card package a total of five cards, including four different quality.
Rare cards
Each slag card package, at least to get a rare or higher quality card.
Epic card
An average of 5 slag card card package, you can get an epic quality card.
Legend card
An average of 20 slag card card package, you can get a legendary quality card.
In addition, it should be noted that: with the number of cards to increase the number of packages, players actually get high-quality card card probability will also increase.
Loot Boxes: How Do You Feel?
It's been a very popular topic in gaming communities over the past few weeks thanks to EA and their garbage with Star Wars: Battlefront II having absurd lengths of time being required for character unlocks unless you buy loot boxes and I'd like to know how everyone else feels about loot boxes both specifically with Hearthstone and then with other titles.
And before you comment, remember that developers in large companies usually aren't the people deciding how much stuff sells for and the drop rates for these; There's a whole different team of people to thank for this. Don't be a dick to game developers and call them out personally. Attacking developers, especially when they aren't even to blame for the fiasco, pushes them away from interacting with the community and then everyone gets upset no one comes out to talk with us anymore.
I've seen a lot of people say that loot boxes are different from booster packs, but I don't think that's really true. You can literally play HS without having bought a single pack (with gold or real money). But you wouldn't, because the basic set doesn't give you a lot to do. Similarly to Star Wars Battlefront 2, you can play without buying loot boxes, but you won't be able to be very competitive online and will probably hate the experience. While it's certainly more common for loot boxes to be cosmetic changes rather than useful or critical features, there are clearly examples outside of CCGs where buying loot boxes is important.
I think the comparisons to gambling are fairly apt. Gambling and video gaming work on the same basic psychological principals to keep consumers engaged, and spending money for the chance to get something is pretty explicitly gambling. We don't let kids into casinos, but we have no qualms letting them play all manner of video games, so it's not surprising this has become a legal issue lately.
More broadly, even if you don't think the points about gambling are fair, there's something to be said for the value of transparency. Markets work for consumers when there is transparency about what they're getting for their money - it's necessary for fair pricing of goods. Companies will set a price point for their virtual goods, and If people know what they're getting for their money and don't think it's worth it, that will eventually drive prices down. But you can't make a well-informed decision about the value of a card pack or loot box in the absence of that transparency. That's a big part of why so many people have done aggregate views on the probability of getting legendaries, epics, etc., and why Blizzard was public in their announcement to create a new "no dupe legendary" policy in their packs.
Loot boxes are gambling, absolutely no question about that in my mind. And I say that not because of the maths of them, but because of the effect they have on people (myself very much included).
Opening packs gives you an endorphin hit; the times when you see that glowing orange around a card there's a rush of adrenaline, and when you open a 40 dust pack you're left feeling empty. So then you think "OK just one more pack, this next one will definitely have a Legendary in it...". It's addict-like behaviour, and we get sucked back in every time a new expansion rolls around...
For the most part I think you should allow people to make decisions for themselves rather than cocooning them with over-zealous regulation. But if you're going to regulate gambling, you need to regulate all gambling - and loot boxes absolutely fall under that category.
I don't have it. I'm free-to-play, and I'm always cheerful when I see a Legendary pack. But if I see a 40 dust pack, I just wait until I get better packs. And if you say that being free-to-play is bad for your "career" and you can only make bad decks - I have my Jade Druid and Midrange Hunter. DK Hunter, DK Druid, Aya, Lich King, Sindragosa and Rhok'Delar. And I'm seriously thinking of dusting the last two.
The key part in this is actually that you're measuring everyone by the same standard which isn't quite correct. A casino can check in person if someone who comes in is a responsible adult who has their finances under control or a twitchy addict who keeps asking for loans and second chances; or even minors and other people not legally allowed to play. They have much more options to actually safeguard that only people who should gamble are allowed to.
There are many ways to gain hearthstone packs very easily without any sort of checks and Blizzard cannot actually figure out whether a person can afford to buy those or even legally acquired the money for the purchase. You can't treat online like a physical casino. So I'm all for stricter payment regulations for online games, especially a pay limit. You can play on 3 servers so if you wanted to get one expansion full that's 550$ on average to get all legendary cards (at which point you probably have all the lower rarities and if not, enough dust to craft whats left). Since Standard currently has 5 Expansions + Adventure available along with the standard set which has more cards, a new player could reasonably spend up to ~3500$ until they have all cards. And this is before set rotation or wild is even factored in.
People complain about DLC pricing all the time today yet CCGs never get this level of scrutiny.
If a country or system wants to disallow sale of loot boxes (even conditionally); offering loot boxes for "free" along side super expensive dust seems extremely scummy to me. I hope they don't get away with it.
Release the information of how the chance of opening legendaries depends on how long since you opened your last legendary. I will be a somewhat mathy article, but I don't see the reason to hide it, seeing as it basically has been reversed engineered already.
It sure would be nice to simply buy the full expansion for 50$ instead though, like any other sane game on the market. People give this game so much leeway because it looks so much like a physical CCG, even though it is just a digital game.
At this level it really makes it seem like blizzard has something to hide. Something players haven't figured out.
Why they can not just make rates public? Something wrong or tricky? Looks too suspicious for me.
p2w ? Blizzard please no ,
Whatever they do, it has to apply to all systems. This simply can't be an iOS-exclusive thing.
mmm...you mean regions ?You can login on ios, android and PC
there are already differences between platforms. Buying packs on IOS is more expensive than on android/pc (in EU at least), and you can buy pack with amazon coins if you use the amazon app store, paying less than a regular android user.
Card packs are completely different from loot boxes in my opinion because card packs (or cards themselves) are the entire point of the game. Where as loot boxes usually are like "oh hey u can enjoy this game MORE if u buy this loot box to randomly get this convenience item that levels u up faster!" . With a card game you know what you are signing up for before you even download it.
With that said, how Blizzard got around China's law is completely disgusting and how they let them do it makes you wonder why the law exists in the first place. $200 gets you like 50 cents worth of dust and $200 worth of "free" card packs lol.. Why doesn't every game do that then.
Edit* I also don't think it's any of the government's business to fucking dictate how a video game company runs their business model. Trying to be more like china is NOT a good thing. Do you want what websites you can visit dictated by the government "for your interest" as well?
I can see the merit in dictating that the odds need to be placed SOME where (as is the law with casino games) so if somebody wants to find that information they can. I often hear the argument that they want the government to put their foot down and just ban it though.
I know this is a bit weird, but I can see why they are doing this. With people complaining about a certain sci-fi game about galactic wars and how it affected their customers, it's just a way for these businesses to distance themselves from a possible dangerous (and expensive) situation. Sure there are differences, but showing customers that you are different than that could enough for some customers.
Still on the plus side extra dust is better than no dust.
Well it is understandable though. Legislation can hurt business and it is wise to remember that Blizzard is a business. That runs on profit.
Can't think of another alternative that would keep gambling regulation satisfied as well as players, without giving a community preferable treatment.
You could try wild
What you're saying is nonsense: every TCG can be considered a "lootbox system" because you will never know what there is inside a pack, but you just know what it may contain. It's how card packs work by definition.
I may agree that the value of pity timer is a bit too high and may be lowered in the future, but consider that it's a mechanism that it's actually outdated from a time where HS had no competitor at all. Probably Blizzard would not change it, since the game is doing fine atm as it is but at last they're giving much more free loots to everyone to help F2P players to keep up with their new 3-expansion set per year market business and the removal of Adventures (I liked the so much!). Don't get me wrong: Blizzard is greedy and the game could improve under tons of aspect, both business and gameplay, but it's not that bad afterall. It's improving just really slow.
I wished Blizzard didnt have to find a way around regulation, that is behavior of shady businesses. Just publish the odds and thats it
Because they've turned into a greedy company just like the others. Its all about the bottom line now, not the games and especially not the community. Gone are the days of WC3, SC and Diablo 2 Blizzard. Oh well at least I can say I lived and played Blizzard games when they were in the peak.
388 yuan for 78 dust+78 packs, that is less then 50 euro, wish we had those prices here in europe
It's now 388 yuan for 60 dust + 60 packs in China. That 78 packs in the picture was on sale.