They don't care about f2p, and shouldn't... the goal is to convert X% of players > CUSTOMERS.  The 95% that quit or stay f2p, or whatever the number is, are not the target of anything they do.  

All of us f2p are just along for the ride.

Well said Trips, f2p is as very strange construct, it is like a 'demo' or 'trial', as long as you will not put even single penny into any game you are not customer, and basically plarium or any other company in mobile game market is not obliged to satisfy or do anything for f2p.

from the other hand, for myself this game is not good enough on multiple levels to start put my money into it

^^ while i mostly agree with tanthil and trips, i dont completely agree

If enough ftp leave and the  game starts to seem 'small scale' to whales

And if the whales dont have enough peasants to beat up and feel superior too- then whales may leave too.

There is a reason plarium at least leave it slightly playable for ftp.

LOL.  I don't think the whales notice the minnows... there really isn't enough PvP.  With Gold tag being capped at a fixed N and not a %, the minnows are even less relavant.  I guess Classic would actually become more difficult but not many really quit because of these "whale additions" to the game.  The f2c subsegment of f2p is not that large, just very vocal :)  

I would argue the game is well beyond "slightly playable" for f2p.  I would give it a 9/10 today for f2p playability vs. 5/10 a year ago and lower than that 2 years ago.

I am not a whale so i am not sure of their psychology, but my gut instinct tells me they want to play games with hundreds of thousands of players, not just a few thousand.... a game that feels like it is popular.

I could be utterly wrong though.

As for its playability, you absoloutely can get along as ftp, im 330 days in now and close to finishing FW (two factions left) and 10 floors short of doom tower hard completion...so im approaching end game i guess.

But the game would be a hell of a lot more playable with chickens (and now barrels/feasts) to speed things up

As ftp its playable, but only if willing to have your phone or pc tied up for hours a day auto running your grinds.

Hmm, all I did was ask a question. Now can you go into detail on how a question means I'm taking Plariums side? 

You are taking sides when you are asking questions with obvious answers pretending that you don't know them.

If a journalist asks someone " and how exactly the oil companies pollute the environment?" it is more than obvious that he is working for them since the answer is quite obvious and he must be the only one in the planet not knowing it.

The barrel does nothing that can be replaced. Yes it saves time but why not saving time, if Plarium cares so much about it, by speeding artifact upgrades? Why I need to watch a line  going from left to right for 15  minutes every time I need to upgrade artifacts when the whole procedure could end in 1 -2 minutes?How exactly speeding up artifact upgrades would affect gameplay? Plarium couldn't care less to save us time. You know that, I know that , everybody knows that. There are many changes they could do that wouldn't affect gameplay even a tiny bit yet they don't do them. The only thing they have done that last year is employing occasional superraids which are an aspirin in a patient with cancer. You are a player yet you don't know(or you conveniently don't see) that.

The barrel does something that is replaceable. The book does something that is irreplaceable. Any f2p player from lvl 50 to lvl 80(if I am not mistaken it's the vast majority of the playerbase)would take the book over the barrel without a second thought.

 You are a player as you claim but you don't know that either. You need someone to tell you. Seriously?

p.s. If I was in your shoes I would do the same, I am no better and that was never the point. But if you were in my shoes you would have the same reaction against someone asking a question with so obvious answer.

I disagree completely wih the OP's tone, but his point stands. There is no way that bringing a champ to max level, even a level 1 6* champ, is worth the loss of a legendary tome. 

You really don't understand how things work that is why you don't understand how important is to have many million f2p players playing the game.

Dota 2 is a completely free to play game. Everything unlocked since day 1, no paywalls at all. There is nothing you can buy that will affect your game except skins and other purely cosmetics yet it makes 18 million dollars every month and has tournaments with prizes that reach 9 million dollars. Do you know why? Because people pay to look different among the million other users.  It's success is based on the huge f2p playerbase.

Edit: I wanted to add that over the years , dota 2 devs have done nothing , not even one thing, to offer even the slightest advantage to paying players.

There are many ways to earn money and Plarium has chosen the worst one. But the problem is that some don't see it and if Plarium is what they want , Plarium is what they are going to get!

You're comparing apples to oranges. Do you honestly think that Plarium has even a fraction of the budget that Valve has?

This is an entirely different game, and an entirely different market. I don't think you understand what you're walking into. This is the way this business works. It's like going to a bingo hall and complaining when you don't win :/

Certainly someone doesn't understand what he is talking about. The question still remains who since you offered nothing in terms of arguments. You are the one bringing as example a Bingo Hall yet I am the one comparing apples with oranges.Yeah , right!!! Do you know what irony is? 

If I ever go to a Bingo hall I won't expect to win but I will expect the game to be fair and not rigged and I will certainly complain if the organisers don't even try to keep it fair. It's, of course, your right to shut up and let them do whatever they want. I have no problem with that but don't expect we will all do the same.

Many more FTP struggle to get the 2500 points needed for champion chase events during fusions/fragements, let alone save up for something every 2 to 4 months.  I think a vast majority of FTP accounts won't notice the difference between these reward changes as they were never within reach to begin with.

That said, I do agree that the barrell reward is significantly worse than a legendary book, regardless of where it is.  It doesn't make sense for it to be the top milestone reward of any tournament.  I think it takes 50 odd XP brews to level a 5 star champ from 1 to 50, and about 100 to level a 6 star champ to 60.  What this is essentially saying is that the top milestone reward for champion chase at 5500 points is 100 XP brews, which is absurd. 

Fusions are very time consuming. A lot of us don't have the time to participate in them, especially those who don't have the luxury to have a pc running raid all night(I am talking for me and several players I know that never do fusions because they don't have the time). So what remains is trying to get the books for those we already have. In this case saving the shards for a 2x ancient  shard event that lines up with a champion chase is not that hard and 5500 is doable.

I don't really care , I have stopped playing the game , I only log in help my clan with clan boss and log out. But the fact remains. Plarium advertises the game as "free to play" when in fact they do everything they can to make the life of f2p players as difficult as possible.  Their creativity in screwing f2p players with every single patch is really phenomenal. What is worst is that they expect no one will notice and no one will say a damn thing about it and they even try to convince us that they are doing it for us.

Thanks everyone who have been nice and supportive to Harbby and I in this conversation.

I think what clouseau doesn't realize is that Harbby and I are both very interested in bringing player feedback back to Plarium. I consider it my primary job as a moderator. I say "job" loosely though, as I am a volunteer, I am a player just like everyone else on these forums and in the discord. Harbby and I often ask questions so we can clarify why someone feels the way they do, so we can pass on more detailed info to plarium rather than "PLAYERS MAD, YO!" 

That being said, insulting the people who serve as your direct line to the developers isn't helping anyone. Nor is insulting the players who disagree with you, or are trying to have a discussion here in this thread.

If you've stopped playing the game, I wish you well! Even less of a reason for you to be bashing on everyone here.

I  am  trying  to  wrap  my  head  around  what  the  OP  has  said.

The  problem is  I  just  don't see  how  the  new  items  are  hurting  F2P.

Here  is  the  Chase  Event  the  OP  is  talking  about.

i

I  must  be  missing something.

 The way I see it is being F2P-friendly builds trust. If I trust a game I will spend about as much on it as I would on a console game just to support something I enjoy. I think there are a lot of players like that and there are also a lot of players who have whale accounts and F2P accounts. I find Raid to be very F2P-friendly and while nobody is perfect I think Plarium has done a lot to show they care about the playerbase and longterm health of the game.

 I like the idea of new food items but I don't think this was necessarily the best implementation. These items seem like something that might be good as a prize for very specific events, a reward given out once a year for Christmas or compensation for a really bad bug/outtage. I don't think they're a good item to put in the shop but considering the limited PVP and and the fact that they'll probably cost $1,000US each based on typical shop pricing structure :-) I think they have more potential to hurt Plarium in the long run than the playerbase.

 If I were to add a food item to the game it would look more like this;

Item: Smoked Turkey Leg

Effect: Instatly increases champion of any level by 1 rank

Availability: Milestone rewards, Clan Shop, Bazaar, promo codes

On 5500 points there was a second legendary book till now and a 3rd one for first place. The 3rd one is beyond the reach of f2p players but the second legendary at 5500 was doable with good preparation(I have taken it a number of times).

I am not sure where did you saw me insulting someone unless answering in the same tone of some comments counts as an "insult". Whereever my tone was aggressive I was provoked but I am sure you conveniently ignored that and you will keep doing that regardless of what I say.

If you want to talk about insults,  Harbby  insulting our intelligence claiming that barrel will "help us save time" is something that bothers you or you conveniently ignore that too?

I did like your comment though. You bypassed all the problems mentioned, you expressed no opinion , you answered to nothing and you even found someone to blame in an attempt to derail the disussion. Have you considered a carreer in politics? If not, please do , I think you are ready.

p.s. The only insult to Harrby is that I claimed that he doesn't act as a player.  That was the heavy insult that made some of you tear your cloths apart from exasperation.  For all the oversensitive out there , please don't worry. I'm sure, he will survive. Even my nephew that is 5 would. 

I would prefer the legendary book over the barrel, too. But the way you say that here in the thread makes me think you gave your account pw to your 5 year old nephew. Harbby is insulting you by expressing a different opinion, and his fellow mod harleQuinn, as part of the big mod conspiracy, does not react to that heavy insult Harbby made. Do you need a safe space where nobody is allowed to contradict?

Well, everyone is entitled to their own opinions even if your opinion is completely wrong. I was genuinely curious since I am far from f2p. I wanted to know your reasoning behind it.