Discussing the relationship between difficulty and gold cones

So just a quick disclaimer, this is not meant to be an argument against people who have made this kind of suggestion, in fact I want to bring up an open discussion about this to try and bring it to light! I don't plan to change minds or anything, I just think this is worth discussing as this pertains to everyone's perceptions on how difficulty of this site can be, since it's meant to be by design more difficult than Lioden :> However there's one thing that I feel should be addressed, and that's the idea of conflating difficulty to making features only purchased by GC ;v; Also just a heads up I've never played Lioden, I figured I'd bring that up cause that means that I can't personally weigh in on much discussion, if at all, pertaining to it. 

(Also how I speak is probably going to look dry because I have a hard time expressing myself through text, nothing I say is meant to be taken as accusatory or even all that seriously!)

While I don't look at every single suggestion in the suggestion forum, one common occurrence I see on almost every suggestion I've personally seen is "this should be made as a GC only option, otherwise it'd be too easy".

This isn't to say this is always an inherently bad suggestion, but it's interesting how no matter how many stipulations or limitations a suggested feature has, this same suggestion pops up by either the original poster or by someone responding. And of course these are suggestions, there's no guarantee that these will be only GC options or that they'll ever be implemented at all, so what's the issue here? 

It's not that I think it's an issue for suggestions, but I think it's an issue for how some players perceive difficulty. It seems like since GC is more difficult to get, that it should be applied to the "easy features", but I think this is a bit of a misconception personally.

Sure it's more difficult for players that don't spend money, but you know who it is easy for? The players that do, especially the ones that spend a lot (nothing wrong with this by the way, y'all are lovely!!). While most players are probably not likely to invest a lot, that just means that making suggested features like being able to breed non-breeding males within the pack harder for them, and gives way more leverage to those that can afford it immediately.

I say "immediately" because in this game, GC is obtainable by other players, so every player is capable of getting GC. The one issue is that the value of GC is ever changing, there is no guarantee that the conversion rate as of now will even be as low as it is due to it being close opening day. Plus, not only does it take time to get the SC to convert them, then you have to convert them, which can take time on its own. Whereas if players could simply pay for a feature immediately, that removes all grind.

Of course it doesn't stop players from buying GC and then converting it all to SC for SC exclusive features, but like I said, the caveat is the ever changing conversion rate. Maybe the player would rather wait for a really good spike before converting. There's still challenges to going backwards, but it's still a lot more than going forward.

I know the argument to this is "when you're supporting the site, you deserve to skip the grind", and to that extent I agree! However, as it stands now, a lot of options available in the Grove are features that ultimately don't effect gameplay except for QOL, most of which can be considered extremely cheap! 

I think it goes against the Grove's groove to try and force every QOL suggestion or any feature that improves game quality into it. Using my earlier example of "allow non-breeding males to breed within the pack idea", regardless of whether you support it or not, if it was implemented, would you really want that to be behind a GC gate? A feature like this just naturally feels like it fits a breeding sim involving wolves, not lions (since this feature is a carryover from it). If you think adding this feature would make things "too easy", is the only solution to fix that really be to make it GC exclusive? Wouldn't it be more interesting and accessible to add stipulations to it rather than just making it a GC exclusive feature? 

Personally, I'd rather take a free/SC feature that has a lot of stipulations than a GC only feature with no stipulations. I feel like making seemingly natural mechanics GC exclusive will just make the game feel pay-to-play. Plus if the feature has so many stipulations to the point that people don't support it on its own, then why would they want to pay for it in a currency that's hard to earn for most?

Edit 2: A point I forgot to add: I think where these misunderstandings come from, as I mentioned, is how people perceive difficulty. One big variable to this is that we know this game is meant to be a bit more difficult, however it's too early/underdeveloped to tell how difficult it's meant to be. Not only that but difficulty is just slightly subjective. That somewhat explains to me why regardless of suggestion, the GC exclusive suggestion is almost always added on. It seems to be some kind of safety net of "well if devs think it's too easy, they can make it GC exclusive". Though I think that still pertains to my mentioned issues, it ends up replacing constructive ideas and equates making the game "harder" by throwing in GC into the mix.

I don't know, maybe I'm overthinking things xD I just found this fascinating and I really want to know what people's thoughts are! I'm completely fine with being proven wrong or being told that maybe I am overthinking it and that I just happened to be seeing the smallest percentage of players with these opinions.

Edit: just realized that this coouuuld go in the game development forum? I only just realized that it seems to not be exclusive to suggestions, so if this post needs to be moved I'm okay with that!

I agree! I think GC stuff should be pretty much exactly what it is currently - overpowered items. Skipping having to wait for your energy to refill? Not having to wait to go into heat? Instantly giving birth? Getting the exact markings you want with just a few clicks? Those are all perfect items to have behind GC walls. You get to skip the grind in exchange for supporting the game. But putting down a GC barrier to make things 'harder'? Absolutely not. It has nothing to do with difficulty, it has to do with whether or not you want to spend real money on this game. Especially because my experience in other games like this tells me that the price of GC (in exchange for SC or items, not the actual $ price) is going to SKYROCKET as the economy stabilizes and the early access players spend up their GC. GC is, in my opinion, for 'cheat' items that make the game way easier/let you skip the more tedious parts. It shouldn't be needed to unlock relatively basic gameplay features. There are better ways to make something more difficult when necessary, even if that way is just to put it behind a large SC paywall (a currency all players have roughly equal access to). 

I have to agree. Some features should not be behind a payway.. Cosmetic options like the newborn stages? Sure why not. Some Backgrounds that are without "decay" but accountbound? Sure. The above mentioned cheat items... Of course.

But gameplay features should not be paid for if the game otherwise is free. The words Pay-to-win allready leave a bad taste in the mouth of quite a few people. A Pay to "get the full version" would make the SC only side of Woveden feel like the free trial demo version of a bigger game you can only glimps at.

That players can slowly work towards acquiring one GC after another doesn't take out the complete dependance on someone being able to pay for them in the first place. And let us face it: The more the site grows the more we will go from 100% players that were able and willing to pay for this site (early access players) to the random person you find in the internet dominated domain. Which mean we will have over 90% of players that cannot or will not regularly spend money to get GC. There is also the realization that even IF you have a lot of people bringing in GC to the economy they can also just as fast dissolve back into the site. If any player buys GC to buy any of the aforementioned items or features there will be non of them in circulation for others to trade in for.

Difficulty in obtaining a feature should not be (solely) locked behind a paywall unless you want to split the whole site into paying customers...and the REST. I guess it would be okay to have a feature "fast unlocked" by GC - and have it free or Quest locked as a standard unlocking procedure. Craftable items that are needed to make something work come to mind too. There are many many ways to do this. And I would be very disapponted if the creators of Wolveden would take the "easy" rout and just make it a paid for thing.