[UPDATED] Devs' Corner: November 2024
 Our developers have something to tell you! Every three (3) weeks, our devs will provide you with information about their work in the “Dev’s Corner.” This publication is a way of keeping everyone updated on what’s happening with the game. We invite you to discuss and leave your feedback for each of the publications. Note: All posts must adhere to the forum guidelines and be constructively made. Take a look at our very first Devs' Corner publication! Warm wishes, The Howrse Team |
I wonder how this has affected the economy of the game. The trophies contributed a lot to the value of the rare coated horses (to the point I started a breeding farm just for 1%ers). Companion trophies gave value to companions and I funded a lot of my game on the back of Yvain and Yokai. I haven't really tried much since the change but has anyone else seen a change in the value of rarer coats/companions? Also very sad to see nothing being addressed from the Howrse Team, I've been here on this game on and off for 15 years this year and this has been one of the most feedback heavy players have ever been on a change. It absolutely must have. On my daily run checking for foundies I find a lot more RC's for a lot less. Also checking the player count: We are bleeding - since January 6th we have lost 1.948 players.
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The change to trophies has WRECKED my will to play this game, it’s impossible to get some trophies realistically for non mass pass buyers, beforehand with dedication you could get SO many of the trophies and feel proud of your collections. Not anymore
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Well I finally snapped and sent a contact us thing, ticket, request, whatever its called. There's a template vibe and a vibe that it gets cut and shut to give an appropriate response to whatever a player has brought up, so that may explain the feeling of an automated response some players have pointed out. I got the " Thank you for your feedback regarding the new Trophies/Collections pages. It will be shared within the whole Howrse Team. Your comment helps us to keep improving the game. However, we cannot guarantee that any changes will be made or that potential changes to come will be exactly what you would like." which is fair enough, you can't appease every player but some simple alphabetization on the breeds in the classic coats section and horse species section would definitely stop the cogs in my brain from grinding when I've missed the breed I'm trying to look at/for  I also got a "Please also keep in mind that we cannot confirm future changes or releases of new trophies before they are officially announced." Firstly that sentence could start at the "We cannot" and it'd read just fine the "Please also keep in mind" just reads really eyeroll-ish to me but hey I'm tired and probably looking way to far into things It's fair enough that they can't confirm future changes, however that makes the spoiler zone seem odd to me, like hey we can't confirm anything but also here's a thread that contains things that are more than likely going to happen, maybe with a few tweaks here and there but definitely still happening. They haven't acknowledged the uh kick up of negative feedback in the last 20 or so pages in this thread (to my knowledge) or explained why these changes from the Jan 3rd update were even implemented in the first place. Yeah I fully get not confirming things but acknowledging things/damage control is a whole other ball game. I didn't even ask about new trophies or mention anything that could potentially even be considered a new trophy, I was more focused on the collections side of things so that's why I was guessing at templates. Complete side note but this had me chuckling with no soul in my eyes "See you soon, and have fun on Howrse" I haven't been having much fun since my classy and timeless trophies got replaced with gross looking medal thingos, I'm hanging on by sheer willpower at this stage  if nothing makes sense its 2:46 am, I'm running on fumes 
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Can't wait to get my next seniority trophy in 2026 That'll be a party. Whoo!I have 2031 days to go on my main server, 2028 for me it is "  " Jokes aside though, I think I, as many others, have lost the spark. I would really appreciate some feedback from Owlient, because I have never seen such a huge critique storm since the removal of the forums and pass horses. I have been playing for ten years, and I was a competitive breeder in the beginning. I have "almost quit the game" a few times, but what kept me going all these years was the trophies - being able to see my collection grow. Now, all of that is gone, and so is my motivation for anything else in the game. I liked to participate in events, because that could gain me customization items for my horses. I liked to breed horses and gather aging points to get every color of every breed of horse. I liked to save up passes (or even buy from time to time...) in order to get that one divine in particular, just to complete a set. I loved to be able to see the little trophies light up as you got them, and rearrange them on my profile page. All I can see now is numbers, generic ribbons and goals that are unattainable for "just a regular player" like me. A huge part of the reason I'm still playing, is now gone, and that makes me really sad and disappointed. All of my effort and time spent on gathering those trophies, are forever gone. The new "trophies" are never going to able to replace that.
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HellOw everyone,
I'd like to first start off by saying I'm sorry for the lack of responses here and to anyone who felt they have been ignored or unheard. It may sometimes seem like you're talking to no one, but please do know that I am here reading all of your messages here and in the other forum topics. I check the 5 English version forums multiple times a week - as well as sharing your criticisms, feedback, and suggestions to the team. As much as I'd love to respond to each and every comment, this is unfortunately not possible. However that doesn't mean there isn't room to improve, so I'll be posting a message each chance that I get. Moving along, I would also like to thank you for providing your feedback and suggestions. I've been sharing your messages with the team. They are reviewing all of the feedback from players from all Howrse versions. Unfortunately, this is all the information that I have currently but will provide any and all information that I receive as soon I receive it. I hope this helps clarify things and that this message finds you well! EchOw 
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[quote=1404394713][author]EmmaKate66[/author]I haven't really tried much since the change but has anyone else seen a change in the value of rarer coats/companions?[/quote:0]
Absolutely. I tried to sell my Violet coat; usually that would have been upwards of 2000 passes in value. I had to mark him down to 800 and he still hasn't sold. Basically a net loss of 1200+ passes, I have no clue what the actual loss is cause I'm not going to go any lower, I'll just keep him at this point. But I think it shows that these horses really have devalued a TON because of this change.
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Thank you, EchOw! I hope they come up with some solutions soon!
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Honestly, I think the backlash shows how much we all love this game and want it to succeed and stay successful for a long time!
These changes have had legitimate, real world consequences for the game (loss of players and decreased prices in sales = less pass buying!) I think the obvious answer, as suggested a few times is as follows:  1. Keep the new trophy page (but please look at adjusting some of the requirements!) 2. Change the 'collections' to the old trophy page. (This would drive sales back up again as people could keep 'collecting'!)That way, we can actually enjoy the new trophies without feeling like we've lost years of time and investment. The anger isn't so much about the new page, it's about the removal of the old one! Please just give us back our little shiny trophy icons
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I made profit off selling customization coats and companions.. judging by the market my customization profit went down to practically zero or barely what it was before. Which means no treating myself to any pretties because I can’t make the passes back fast enough :/ Even companions aren’t nearly worth as much so there goes that too
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Thank you for your post EchOw...i am hopeful for some positive changes in the future!
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Thank you EchOw! It was encouraging to see your post!
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Thank you for the feedback EchOw.
It's unfortunate that the economy has been adversely affected and for the life of me I cannot understand why Howrse has done this. Discouraging collecting by making these changes means that anyone who bought passes to further their game by collecting will not do that anymore. Less passes bought = bad no? Is the server space freed up by culling trophy horses that are now worthless a good trade-off? Surely having more valuable horses that can be traded on the platform is better for commerce and moving passes? Very interesting, I would give a lot to be a fly on the wall in the meeting where they discussed this change. A lot of the more unpopular changes made sense from a "selling more passes" point of view e.g. promotions every weekend, limiting pass horses and then discarding them entirely.
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Surely having more valuable horses that can be traded on the platform is better for commerce and moving passes? Probably, in the long run, but you can see what they're trying to pull if you look close. 1. Under the old model, players could buy coats/companions/etc. for the trophy in sales. Now the ONLY way to obtain these trophies is by placing them on the horse yourself, which means having them in your inventory directly. This means more people using the Black Market/spending passes on Events and less getting "discounts" from the Sales. 2. Most of the trophies are centered around pass-spending-heavy actions. Collecting and using SPECIFIC Divines (the Zonkey one is the most blatant since their perk can only be used once, forcing people to buy multiples of that Divine if they want the trophy) and participation in Events. 3. With players getting less revenue from selling their now-devalued horses, they'll (in theory) be forced to buy passes since they won't have as much income anymore. 4. A lot of the prior trophies were "one and done" and once you collected everything you had the trophy and could stop. These new ones go on forever (seemingly) so, players never reach the "end goal" and thus never stop buying passes. Will any of this work? Probably not. Most likely with less income, people will just stop buying things. They also didn't take into account that a lot of people DID but passes FOR the purpose of collecting, and barring that, they don't have anything to spend on anymore. I know they think we'll just go "oh, darn, our Golden Apple horses are now worthless? Drat, looks like I'll have to buy a Zonkey now!" but that's not going to happen  Also the "no end in sight" is discouraging/makes people NOT want to play, and barely anyone is going to switch their entire playing style to encompass overpriced Divines they don't even want. They will just quit the game instead, which is why we've lost nearly 2000 players in a month. 
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[quote=1404394847][author]Crookedstar915[/author]They will just quit the game instead, which is why we've lost nearly 2000 players in a month.
[/quote:0]I haven't kept track on how many players have quit but in the past month when putting my silver apple howrses to bed every one of them went down in the number of coats by two or more. I keep track of how many uses they have in their name. This told me that many players had quit and cancelled out their accounts. I have never seen a drop in coat uses before in such a short time period. I am glad that EchOw posted above but until we have actual responses to our questions or even a statement that nothing is going to change, it means very little to me.
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@Arabians are best - I haven't kept track myself personally but the forums have gotten WAY quieter in the past month, and I've jumped nearly 40 positions in the rankings since the change, too, telling me that we've lost a TON. I haven't been progressing or putting effort into the game, so it's not because of my efforts, it's because 40 players ahead of me must have quit.
The exact number I got was from Asfridur's comment at the top of the page, but it seems to track with what we can observe regarding there being less people here and active. I would also bet that that's only players who have quit outright, and a LOT more have kept their accounts technically but gone dormant/stopped playing.
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The exact number I got was from Asfridur's comment at the top of the page, but it seems to track with what we can observe regarding there being less people here and active. I would also bet that that's only players who have quit outright, and a LOT more have kept their accounts technically but gone dormant/stopped playing. Which is interesting to me, because the last few days/weeks has seen an increase in popularity ranking numbers. I've been running around congratulating everybody I can find, and it seems people who haven't logged on in a long time are slowly coming back. In May 2022 I got #1 in popularity with only 216 congratulations. Now, 216 is only good enough for top 10-ish. I saw a big rise in activity through the fall, and now I just hope Howrse didn't squish out a little revival with the new updates and chase these players away again 
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Some feedback - I really don't like how so many of the trophies are going to be tied to promos, it's very frustrating seeing bronze and not being able to do anything about them once the promo goes. I haven't counted how many different promos we have had recently, but since this change we've already had the challenge, lottery, and now the wanderers, with more to come. Eventually, the promo trophies will take up a good chunk of the page, so I wanted to suggest the ability to filter out trophies that currently can't be improved upon at the time, the same with trophies you can't currently work towards due to not owning the divine series linked to them.
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Probably, in the long run, but you can see what they're trying to pull if you look close. Very interesting insight Crookedstar, thanks for taking the time to explain. 
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Which is interesting to me, because the last few days/weeks has seen an increase in popularity ranking numbers. I've been running around congratulating everybody I can find, and it seems people who haven't logged on in a long time are slowly coming back. In May 2022 I got #1 in popularity with only 216 congratulations. Now, 216 is only good enough for top 10-ish. I saw a big rise in activity through the fall, and now I just hope Howrse didn't squish out a little revival with the new updates and chase these players away again Indeed your right. I haven't checked in a few days. Checking right now I can see we went from 138.099 (June 6th), to 136.442 today. So the amount of players missing are now 1.657. I really wonder how may of the 136.442 are active- not to mention how many will stay Probably, in the long run, but you can see what they're trying to pull if you look close. Agree it is very clear what is happening
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Can we not get something to show our Iris Coat achievements for collecting all the colours? I finally bred a violet, it was a long painstaking process and I would love something to show for it
 I was so elated when I saw that I'd finally gotten a violet coat since it was the last one I needed to have all the colours and I was like "yes I've finally got that pretty trophy" and then my brain caught up and I was like "OH, oh no trophy "
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Coask for the 5th element trophy.. I didn't spend YEARS trying to get it for nothing
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All the 5th element trophies*
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They cull players a few times a year so if you saw a drop over eight months, some of that is removal of inactive accounts.
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They cull players a few times a year so if you saw a drop over eight months, some of that is removal of inactive accounts. Absolutely they do but it wasn't over 8 months. The drop was in January 2023 alone. From January 6th more specifically, a few days after the change.
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It's been a month since the update and it's still as bad as it was. I've barely worked any of my horses. I log in for the events and daily objectives and a few divines and then I'm pretty much done. I haven't made any effort towards getting trophies. Or, actually, I tried to make progress on some of the previous trophies before remembering they were gone.
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