Extra frashuns for you, big man.
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Iâve just recently seen discussion in moddersâ chat (canât prove itâs true though) on the fact that armor skins, like body or head armor, are separate two items behind the curtains. There is a mod that allow you to combine, say, gloves from one body armor piece with chest part of some other, naturally (only will be visible for you).
So FS could significantly increase creativity people can manifest by just implementing separate slots for each of those pieces, allowing people to combine them more freely. That would be pretty easy thing to implement also - taking into account some enthusiast who learned their code in their spare time could do it.
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Youâre overthinking this. Itâs a reward for login, not a punishment for not playing.
Login rewards are just that, rewards for playing the game, a little thank for people who play the game often.
There is literally no downside.
Vermintide literally has a system like that.
IMO youâre underthinking the psychological (and downstream) effect of these types of patterns. Themâs the downside.
If thereâs something I can give a little thank you for itâs FS making a cash shop experience so poor that I am not even remotely motivated to invest in it! Thatâs some truly player-first design 
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Yeah, the For the Drip mod clearly reveals how modular and customisable the system they use for making cosmetics is. You can toggle and reposition doodads, combine parts from different cosmetics in the same slot, retexture and recolour them, all sorts of things. Makes you think if it were the remnants of a better customisation system (similar to the initially planned modularity of weapons) that either never got properly finished on time or scrapped for their current monetisation scheme. The mod simply hooks to whatâs already there and provides a GUI.
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@Fuplaayz This very very strongly. Like if youâre gifted basic resources that often affects the whole design of the gameâs economy. Itâs beneficial for the developer to make you depend on those resources from login bonuses because thatâs what creates the strongest incentive to keep logging in every day.
Itâs kinda like paid xp boosters in RPGs. You damn well know the speed of leveling in the game has been intentionally turned down to make the boosters more appealing. Design choices like this can easily end up distorting the core gameplay to accommodate them.
Can you add a login bonus without negative impact? Yes of course but that is very much not how these things always play out and you SHOULD be highly sceptical of the intent and ramifications of such features.
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Psychological ramifications of logging in being appreciated as customer? A little thank for playing our game on dailies bases? Darktide is basically Genshin Impact.
Getting pennies worth of ordos dockets and 3 melk bucks once day will definitely break the non existent Darktide economy.
If only there was another tide game where FS did that already and no one ever complained about it.
If only there wasnât a game that fumbled almost every attempt at rewarding players that would be a cause in being wary of them implementing anything involving âretentionâ that isnât in-mission gameplay/content.
That being said, being given resources that can be collected through other means wouldnât unbalance anything too much as long as it doesnât affect those other avenues, but I donât trust Fatsharkâs Darktide teamâs management/upper echelons to not turn it into a cynical retention metric considering everything theyâve done with the game outside of the missions.
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If you believe these tactics are out of the kindness of the businessâ hearts and to show appreciation for you as a customer (let alone a human being) then I have a Firestorm-class frigate to sell you.
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I donât think youâre reading or intending to engage with what I actually said here so Iâm not going to waste my time further with you.
Furthermore as I said further up if they introduce a daily login reward that does nothing to actually keep players online then itâs just a waste of Dev resources. Nobody with 100+ hours is going to be encouraged to log in for a few dockets and melk bucks. That is the Dev resources allocation equivalent of farting in the wind.
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Log in Vermintide 2, click on Lohner, click on Daily Rewards.
If only the was a system already in place for years in a previous title that worked, no one ever complained about, can be simply copy-pasted into darktide with small obvious adjustments and no downsides.
Why would they NOT incentify logining in? Theyâve done it before and it worked.
You mean like penances? Are you complaining about penances? What about events? Might not be to your taste but they are there. They work, give you free stuff. These are reward systems and they work. What about free skins that you can get with ordros dockets? Are these considered reward systems?
Please explain that cynical retention metric? They track data either way. Iâm confused.
Like what? What did they do?
Simple systems like that are always appreciated, there are no downsides. They did it in Vermintide 2
ofc most people donât loggin for these rewards duh, they are there as a simple token of appreciation/small intensive for some players.
Itâs a nice to have feature Not for you? itâs cool.
Almost every mmo/online game have these sorts of systems because they work., itâs not a waste if it works.
If you want talk about waste resources, there are MUCH better examples of that from FS. (Just being honest sharkies, no hate)
But adding freaking simple login rewards is a spit in a bucket for them in comparison.
Iâll explain in simple terms, if you come to my coffee shop everyday and I give you a free candy with your drink because youâre regular. Whatâs the issue again? I get your bisness, you get your coffee and free candy.
Itâs not some master plan to manipulate you into getting addicted to coffee or sugar.
Whatâs the issue with login rewards again?
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Yes, the daily login system in VT2 isnât really complained about, but it was also added when a large majority of the issues VT2 had been finally ironed out enough, but current Fatshark has shown they are not content in copying-pasting things from VT2 as they are except as a placeholder.
Almost everything has been or was changed for the worse from VT2, âsocialâ hub, itemisation, mission selection, reward structure, community features, etc. Also, a massive amount of quality of life present in VT2 was never transferred across like hub hotkeys, a unified menu where you can access almost everything, etc.
No, the penance system is probably the main reason for the âalmostâ. Commissary has been abandoned for almost 2 years and counting. Events are bland especially compared with VT2 events and the rewards are significantly worse to me.
They used to have timers for everything, hourly timers for items, daily and weekly timers for melk, small slices of available missions rotated on a timer. You had no agency in affecting those timers nor alternatives, so you had to wait either in game or log back in when those timers rolled over to either see if there were items you want or a mission you wanted to play. Those kinds of cynical retention tactics. So, while we eventually got alternatives, itâs still telling that technically none of those timers are gone.
In your example with the coffee shop, your plan is fine, itâs relatively personal and thereâs no real ulterior motive apart from getting customers to think of you a bit kindlier and keep coming to patronise the shop. When you get marketing and MBAs involved, you start having convoluted loyalty schemes with conditions, restrictions and expiry dates to force change on the customerâs behaviour to benefit your business. Weâre almost certainly deep within the latter with Fatshark.
Simply put, Iâm not against daily login systems, but I donât trust modern Fatshark to implement one that either doesnât take something away in exchange or have ridiculous hoops to jump through, especially when they still have all the structural, institutional and managerial issues they have with both the game and the studio/stakeholders.
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This a good read and well though out response., I appreciate you taking time and explaining how you feel about the matter. I agree with most of things youâve wrote.
Your example reads to me more like a personal gift than a daily reward. But itâs common enough practice for some cafes to offer treats (cute little biscuits in my experience) so Iâll focus on that.
The whole point of the treat is to differentiate your shop from the others. You can rest assured that the cost is factored in to the margins on price per coffee. Itâs just business! At least with coffee the addiction is intrinsic 
A login reward is an extrinsic method to lure players into your game because you want them to pick yours over another. Thatâs why login rewards tend to focus on building habits as you can see by the increased reward over time (day 1: $, day 7: $$$). This type of psychological manipulation in my (abridged) opinion hurts people and is bad. It may seem innocuous, but thatâs the point. I may seem paranoid, because I am 
Again, in your example itâs a loyalty reward (which can absolutely be granted without strings). An example from FS history would be giving beta/launch players Acquilas â especially after the gamepass free Acquilas uproar.
In short the issue is introducing manipulation under the guise of goodwill. In fact, the less manipulative FS is the more business I will give them.
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Sure but to echo @zaygr here itâs a luxury in the current game state wherein Iâd probably rather see those resources spent elsewhere for now, even if itâs not a heap of work for them to implement (very hard for me to judge how much work this would actually be for them but considering simple lua edits take months Iâm not convinced itâs negligible for them).
Yeah, the layers of manipulation is what keeps me from spending any money in the cosmetic shop.
I would rather Fatshark improve retention through methods that improve a playerâs UX (user experience) when interacting with systems that lead to and support the core gameplay loop first rather than something external. For all the changes they have made, thereâs still a surprising amount of friction there.
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this daily stuff or limited event xp boost thingie if anything makes me play a game less.
conan exiles battle pass i was (for a moment) doing incredibly boring chores, so out of my usual gameplay loop, that it showed me an ugly side i usually avoided/neglected which soured the whole game for me.
granted itâs an ever speeding up hamster wheel that accelerates the more ressources you have but âfetch 100 feathersâ âkill 30 spidersââŚ
honestly i went admin mode, spawned that crap and moved on with my day.
only that after a short while (and itâs really about the cosmetic/building piece/carrot from the stick) you had your ârewardâ but no motivation in firing up the game that bored you in the process to even use the bling bling you unlocked.
and that is me going 3 hours iron farming.
difference is I could distract myself at any second and do whatever to spice it up.
space marine 2.
weapon/character leveling 
what a slough, but hey have a weekend xp boost.
nope i donât think i will. havenât planned on playing sm2 this weekend and certainly wonât come like a good puppy to the whistle.
now major difference to darktide?
i WANT to play it on a daily basis hence i dont have âtimeâ for other gamesâŚ
melk in terms of useless fluff is âpushing itâ already cause letâs be honest at this point I neither need resources or weaponry at all.
sure numbers go up âŚyayâŚ. but whatâs on offer for the currency is literally obsolete.
so my take as long as the gameplay is that âuniqueâ and addictive i donât look left and right for additional fluff, once out of a mission i run to the board and hit ready again, no hadron no brunts no melkâŚ
maybe stuff like character alterations to show youâre a veteran with experience under your belt, like battle scars, artificial limbs, trophies on your armorâŚ. that kinda stuff that actually builds my connection to âmeâ onscreen⌠sure
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not once in my lifetime did i think to myself âi should log in to recieve my daily reward of 20 silverâ
doesnt help that silver mostly only can be spent on the least inspired cosmetics
sure it doesnt hurt to get some, but again with such a pitiful amount its barely worth to interact with an NPC and wasting time on the 3 clicks
hardly a well implemented daily reward system
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And thatâs kinda the dance between the two viewpoints being expressed here. Itâs like event rewards. If theyâre too good, theyâre FOMO, and if theyâre not good enough theyâre pointless.
And more broadly on this topic: I think âincentives to log inâ (daily rewards like in VT2, major order rewards like in HD2, time-limited events with/without special rewards, etc.) arenât inherently bad/evil. They can be, like if they come with an upfront cost (e.g. a subscription fee) or hook players back into a loop purposefully made to extract money from them (like a mobile game where you can pay for more charges/plays or whatever). But DT doesnât do that stuff.
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At least they finally give a reason spend the silver by allowing you to purchase missed event cosmetics when a regularly scheduled event happens.
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