Cost of ships in the Premium Shop vs real cost of creating new 3D model

[ZaalKoris_vas_QwibQwib]

OK, so let's start from the beginning. I admire the work of 3D departament. Over the years they are one part of WG which consistently delivers marvels month after month. Of course there is always handful of weak (or gruesome Halloween where I get literally sick) content depending on personal preferences. Still overall in all the time 3D department always delivered.

 

BUT, giant fat but, WG as a company did not.

 

Pricing of the ships in the shop hasn't moved in 5 years. OK there was once small price reduction in 2019 where ship/signal pricing -laughably- went down between 0.5 Euro and 2 Euros and remained there ever since.

 

Now I could understand reasonably high prices early in WoWs life (before I even joined). With only 2 nations and lines of ships every single part and asset has to be made from scratch. That's blocking it over, creating low and high poly mesh, doing the right topology and geometry, texturing, animating (now especially important with AA fire and generally cool visuals) exporting and creating finalized model for the game.

 

Look I know very well how much 3D apps developers charge for studio licenses. It's insane amount the bigger the studio, but...

 

It's only part of the story. Now after initial period of teething and baby steps for WoWs, company grew to a behemoth. 3D departament no longer need to create every 3D asset from scratch.  3D no longer need to create every shader from scratch (plus not counting shaders included in licensing deal because every texturing software has access to unquantifiable amount of those), 3D departament no longer need to animate everything from scratch. After 5 years studio of this size has million of 3D assets ready to be used with a click of the mouse button. Every 3D artists has huge library, even such insignificant entity like me. There is no longer need to pretend that it cost anything to do it. OK making new hull and superstructure of the new ship that's a cost (like that quirky weird USS Kearsarge). But complete 16" turrets are not a cost, 5", 40mm Bofors+mounts, 20mm Oerlikons+mounts, life rafts and thousands of other little details (like anchors or ladders) are in library now. Fully textured and animated with perfect topology. You just load it and put it on the model. Bam took few minutes to put all armament on the ship. Job done. Of course I know there're details which need extra attention. Creating Normal maps for hull texture takes time, but for hull not for universal assets. I don't even mention the Black ships or ARP or AL. WG has ready made 3D model which cost them 0. All they have to do is to apply new textures and cash-in. 

 

Sorry for some 3D tech-speak for guys which are not familiar with the subject. I just want to point out that after certain early period in WoWs history cost of creating new ship/model in game went down Significantly. Often to 0 when WG recycles same 3D mesh over and over again. It's basically a gold mine, with profit margin in region of 85% at least.

 

And we return to the shop pricing. With recent Cluster...storm of monumental scale WG could pull something good for a change. Permanent slashing pricing in the Premium Shop by 30% would be a good start. But NO. We are corpo, we're always right. We can even defeats laws of physics (radar over the islands or hydro not going to the bottom to detect sub cancer).

 

Instead they came up with a statement reminiscent of Japanese surrender in 1945, where not even once Emperor Hirohito used that word. Seems that WG is incapable of apology and fixing what they screwed. They only look for scapegoats like every good tyrant do. Look into history and pick one, all are the same. 

 

Food for thought...

[Panocek]

Its bold of you to assume company would willingly cut down on their profits, as production cost goes down due to ever expanding library of assets for reuse, while customers are used to current prices. Heck, WG has been testing waters how high they can raise prices for years now, first with introduction of tier 9 and 10 ships as well ever increasingly fascinating bundles overinflated with stuff to justify 100€+ pricetags, and now increasing push towards gambling to extract even more money.

[Miscommunication_dept]

So often people make the mistake of assuming cost price has a large effect on sale price.

 

It make a difference to the viability of a product, it must sell for more than cost.

 

Anything above being profitable is based on what people would pay for it. 

 

WG will have in mind certain amount of a product they wish to sell and will price accordingly. 

 

If every player were to buy every premium ship from now on, you can be sure the price will rapidly go up.

 

If we all stop buying, prices will go down.

[Mad_Dog_Dante]

59 minutes ago, ZaalKoris_vas_QwibQwib said:

Food for thought...

Pricing in WG titles have never been about cost. It's always what they can get away with.

[Yosha_AtaIante]

imagine discussing company ethics and pricing when there are far bigger companies with far more outrageous pricings out there 

 

take out the roots, not single branches 

[Mad_Dog_Dante]

Just now, Yosha_nai said:

imagine discussing company ethics and pricing when there are far bigger companies with far more outrageous pricings out there 

Whatabout what now?

[Yosha_AtaIante]

Just now, Europizza said:

Whatabout what now?

well simple, he attacks WGs pricing for premium ships. But not only is it not his business on what price people set for their products but he is also fighting the wrong cause. It's not WGs fault that these prices are being accepted by their customers after all. So taking down WG won't make the issue of overpriced goods go away ever because other far bigger companies are doing it 

[ColonelPete]

Premium ship prices did not really change to the worse.

They just changed the Tiers of the ships you can buy.

[Mad_Dog_Dante]

1 minute ago, Yosha_nai said:

well simple, he attacks WGs pricing for premium ships. But not only is it not his business on what price people set for their products but he is also fighting the wrong cause. It's not WGs fault that these prices are being accepted by their customers after all. So taking down WG won't make the issue of overpriced goods go away ever because other far bigger companies are doing it 

You misunderstand. I was just pointing to your Whataboutery 

[Yosha_AtaIante]

2 minutes ago, Europizza said:

You misunderstand. I was just pointing to your Whataboutery 

you are so mean :(

[CptBarney]

4 minutes ago, Yosha_nai said:

well simple, he attacks WGs pricing for premium ships. But not only is it not his business on what price people set for their products but he is also fighting the wrong cause. It's not WGs fault that these prices are being accepted by their customers after all. So taking down WG won't make the issue of overpriced goods go away ever because other far bigger companies are doing it 

It's a start, you have to go from somewhere at least.

 

Although as a single 3D artist, i would need too sell my ships for a much higher price, the difference being you could print it, animate it, rig it, re-texture it, put it into your own game or games that allow modding etc.

So take miss hitachi for example i would probs sell her for £200-£250 per model, but its isn't limited to just one programme like premium ships are. Which is fair, plus you get to edit the model. For their ships, because they are selling soo many and barely have any costs when it comes to new ships, they can afford to lower their prices.

 

At the end of the day you do what you can do really.

[Miscommunication_dept]

12 minutes ago, Yosha_nai said:

imagine discussing company ethics and pricing when there are far bigger companies with far more outrageous pricings out there 

 

take out the roots, not single branches 

What makes pricing fair? 

It’s just a number buyer and seller agree too. There is no obligation so any price is fair.

 

Prices might be far too high so people won’t buy. It’s still fair as long as the product is as sold.

 

Edit: just saw your follow up post. It seems we agree.

[Mad_Dog_Dante]

4 minutes ago, Yosha_nai said:

you are so mean :(

Sorry <3

[1MajorKoenig]

1 hour ago, ZaalKoris_vas_QwibQwib said:

OK, so let's start from the beginning. I admire the work of 3D departament. Over the years they are one part of WG which consistently delivers marvels month after month. Of course there is always handful of weak (or gruesome Halloween where I get literally sick) content depending on personal preferences. Still overall in all the time 3D department always delivered.

 

BUT, giant fat but, WG as a company did not.

 

Pricing of the ships in the shop hasn't moved in 5 years. OK there was once small price reduction in 2019 where ship/signal pricing -laughably- went down between 0.5 Euro and 2 Euros and remained there ever since.

 

Now I could understand reasonably high prices early in WoWs life (before I even joined). With only 2 nations and lines of ships every single part and asset has to be made from scratch. That's blocking it over, creating low and high poly mesh, doing the right topology and geometry, texturing, animating (now especially important with AA fire and generally cool visuals) exporting and creating finalized model for the game.

 

Look I know very well how much 3D apps developers charge for studio licenses. It's insane amount the bigger the studio, but...

 

It's only part of the story. Now after initial period of teething and baby steps for WoWs, company grew to a behemoth. 3D departament no longer need to create every 3D asset from scratch.  3D no longer need to create every shader from scratch (plus not counting shaders included in licensing deal because every texturing software has access to unquantifiable amount of those), 3D departament no longer need to animate everything from scratch. After 5 years studio of this size has million of 3D assets ready to be used with a click of the mouse button. Every 3D artists has huge library, even such insignificant entity like me. There is no longer need to pretend that it cost anything to do it. OK making new hull and superstructure of the new ship that's a cost (like that quirky weird USS Kearsarge). But complete 16" turrets are not a cost, 5", 40mm Bofors+mounts, 20mm Oerlikons+mounts, life rafts and thousands of other little details (like anchors or ladders) are in library now. Fully textured and animated with perfect topology. You just load it and put it on the model. Bam took few minutes to put all armament on the ship. Job done. Of course I know there're details which need extra attention. Creating Normal maps for hull texture takes time, but for hull not for universal assets. I don't even mention the Black ships or ARP or AL. WG has ready made 3D model which cost them 0. All they have to do is to apply new textures and cash-in. 

 

Sorry for some 3D tech-speak for guys which are not familiar with the subject. I just want to point out that after certain early period in WoWs history cost of creating new ship/model in game went down Significantly. Often to 0 when WG recycles same 3D mesh over and over again. It's basically a gold mine, with profit margin in region of 85% at least.

 

And we return to the shop pricing. With recent Cluster...storm of monumental scale WG could pull something good for a change. Permanent slashing pricing in the Premium Shop by 30% would be a good start. But NO. We are corpo, we're always right. We can even defeats laws of physics (radar over the islands or hydro not going to the bottom to detect sub cancer).

 

Instead they came up with a statement reminiscent of Japanese surrender in 1945, where not even once Emperor Hirohito used that word. Seems that WG is incapable of apology and fixing what they screwed. They only look for scapegoats like every good tyrant do. Look into history and pick one, all are the same. 

 

Food for thought...

Couple of things here:

 

1) a price is not production costs + margin but something that is mutually agreed between yourself and your customer. The larger the gap between agreed price and costs per piece (which is development costs here) the bigger your margin

 

2) production costs for such models are probably a lot higher that you think. You have to count in research, modelling, administration, testing, QA and even “balancing”. Considering a Manday in Eastern Europe will probably clock out around 300 - 600€ depending on required skills you will pile up a tens of thousands euros quickly for one single ship

 

That said - the prices are quite high considering almost no further work / effort is needed once produced initially. 
 

I think 20 - 30 Euros would be a reasonable pricing - everything on top is probably pure enjoyment on WG’s side. But as said in the beginning: a price is what is agree between yourself and your customer. If he throws money at you - most of you will take it 

[Kiagy]

7 minutes ago, ColonelPete said:

Premium ship prices did not really change to the worse.

They just changed the Tiers of the ships you can buy.

tbf premium ships are overpriced anyway

[ColonelPete]

3 minutes ago, Mahaaret said:

tbf premium ships are overpriced anyway

Yes, they are.

[CptBarney]

5 minutes ago, 1MajorKoenig said:

Couple of things here:

 

1) a price is not production costs + margin but something that is mutually agreed between yourself and your customer. The larger the gap between agreed price and costs per piece (which is development costs here) the bigger your margin

 

2) production costs for such models are probably a lot higher that you think. You have to count in research, modelling, administration, testing, QA and even “balancing”. Considering a Manday in Eastern Europe will probably clock out around 300 - 600€ depending on required skills you will pile up a tens of thousands euros quickly for one single ship

 

That said - the prices are quite high considering almost no further work / effort is needed once produced initially. 
 

I think 20 - 30 Euros would be a reasonable pricing - everything on top is probably pure enjoyment on WG’s side. But as said in the beginning: a price is what is agree between yourself and your customer. If he throws money at you - most of you will take it 

For individual artists the price will be a lot higher, depending on the complexity of the 3d model and whether its be UV-mapped, textured, rigged, animated etc. For my ships i do some research, quite a bit of fixing or re-doing parts (either i fecked up on the modelling or they aren't detailed enough or correct enough). 

 

I've even done two commissions for someone both £50 and £30 for 5 turrets, the prices i determined by complexity, time spent and anything additional.

 

But yeah for re-used parts it is pretty expensive, wish i could get that much traffic lol (until i actually sell one anyways).

[Kiagy]

17 minutes ago, ColonelPete said:

Yes, they are.

Just had to have a lie down after the shock of you agreeing with me, might take a while to recover

[Karasu_Browarszky]

Normally, you'd think there are very few incentives for any company to voluntarily lower their prices. It's usually down to competition, but that's something WG hasn't had to worry about too much. They are also immune to the problem of 'over stocking', they don't have to unload older designs at cheaper prices to make room for new products. It's pretty straightforward then, if the price is right, it sells, if the price is too high, the sales go down. They'd only need to worry about pricing if they suddenly find themselves in a situation that the sales, and their revenue, are on the decline.

[1MajorKoenig]

47 minutes ago, CptBarney said:

For individual artists the price will be a lot higher,

Yes sure but you get also much cheaper guys. All-in costs of course. And where is the company based? Maybe they even pay in local currency

[CptBarney]

Just now, 1MajorKoenig said:

Yes sure but you get also much cheaper guys.

True, although i've noticed the higher the price of a 3D model the better it is usually. Things like on turbosquid, sketchfab, cgtrader tend to have expensive but very well done models (topology, uv's, textures, rigs, animations etc.).

Just now, 1MajorKoenig said:

All-in costs of course. And where is the company based? Maybe they even pay in local currency

Tax haven central cyprus.

[1MajorKoenig]

38 minutes ago, CptBarney said:

Tax haven central cyprus.

Having your headquarters there has a lot of advantages for a Russian company. Cyprus is in fact very popular with Russian Companies 
 

But they don’t have their developers there as far as I know (was that Minsk Region?)

 

39 minutes ago, CptBarney said:

True, although i've noticed the higher the price of a 3D model the better it is usually. Things like on turbosquid, sketchfab, cgtrader tend to have expensive but very well done models (topology, uv's, textures, rigs, animations etc.).

Yes sure - that is always the case - you spend more you get more.

But we are not talking about Latvia or Estonia where the Job market is swept clean IT wise. We talk about Minsk - it is more difficult to move to higher wage regions from there than it is from the Baltic states with their pronunced IT industry.

 

That said I could easily imagine that the range I mentioned earlier would take you quite far with regards to production resources (excluding mgmt of course). 
 

Furthermore I am 100% certain that WG established a highly efficient “production line” for 3D modelling. I am sure the productivity of the artists is extremely high and that they get a very high output of these resources. 
 

(it is not like I try to model a refitted Bayern over a span of evenings in a very low quality … )

[General_Alexus]

I guess we can be happy that they dont adjust the prices to inflation.

And now I will be quiet to not give them any idea.

[CptBarney]

3 minutes ago, 1MajorKoenig said:

Having your headquarters there has a lot of advantages for a Russian company. Cyprus is in fact very popular with Russian Companies 
 

But they don’t have their developers there as far as I know (was that Minsk Region?)

 

Yes sure - that is always the case - you spend more you get more.

But we are not talking about Latvia or Estonia where the Job market is swept clean IT wise. We talk about Minsk - it is more difficult to move to higher wage regions from there than it is from the Baltic states with their pronunced IT industry.

 

That said I could easily imagine that the range I mentioned earlier would take you quite far with regards to production resources (excluding mgmt of course). 
 

Furthermore I am 100% certain that WG established a highly efficient “production line” for 3D modelling. I am sure the productivity of the artists is extremely high and that they get a very high output of these resources. 
 

(it is not like I try to model a refitted Bayern over a span of evenings in a very low quality … )

Ye, i can pretty productive if i want too be. But mostly lazy and have way too many projects going on at once. Too be fair if i want too sell models that i know will sell well, ill go for props, that peeps dont want to model and texture, but are fine with paying a few pennies to barneh.

 

Surprised there isn't lootboxes for that, get a chance at a random lootbox. 

 

My next two ships are these btw.

 

[The_Chiv]

3 hours ago, ZaalKoris_vas_QwibQwib said:

OK, so let's start from the beginning. I admire the work of 3D departament. Over the years they are one part of WG which consistently delivers marvels month after month. Of course there is always handful of weak (or gruesome Halloween where I get literally sick) content depending on personal preferences. Still overall in all the time 3D department always delivered.

 

BUT, giant fat but, WG as a company did not.

 

Pricing of the ships in the shop hasn't moved in 5 years. OK there was once small price reduction in 2019 where ship/signal pricing -laughably- went down between 0.5 Euro and 2 Euros and remained there ever since.

 

Now I could understand reasonably high prices early in WoWs life (before I even joined). With only 2 nations and lines of ships every single part and asset has to be made from scratch. That's blocking it over, creating low and high poly mesh, doing the right topology and geometry, texturing, animating (now especially important with AA fire and generally cool visuals) exporting and creating finalized model for the game.

 

Look I know very well how much 3D apps developers charge for studio licenses. It's insane amount the bigger the studio, but...

 

It's only part of the story. Now after initial period of teething and baby steps for WoWs, company grew to a behemoth. 3D departament no longer need to create every 3D asset from scratch.  3D no longer need to create every shader from scratch (plus not counting shaders included in licensing deal because every texturing software has access to unquantifiable amount of those), 3D departament no longer need to animate everything from scratch. After 5 years studio of this size has million of 3D assets ready to be used with a click of the mouse button. Every 3D artists has huge library, even such insignificant entity like me. There is no longer need to pretend that it cost anything to do it. OK making new hull and superstructure of the new ship that's a cost (like that quirky weird USS Kearsarge). But complete 16" turrets are not a cost, 5", 40mm Bofors+mounts, 20mm Oerlikons+mounts, life rafts and thousands of other little details (like anchors or ladders) are in library now. Fully textured and animated with perfect topology. You just load it and put it on the model. Bam took few minutes to put all armament on the ship. Job done. Of course I know there're details which need extra attention. Creating Normal maps for hull texture takes time, but for hull not for universal assets. I don't even mention the Black ships or ARP or AL. WG has ready made 3D model which cost them 0. All they have to do is to apply new textures and cash-in. 

 

Sorry for some 3D tech-speak for guys which are not familiar with the subject. I just want to point out that after certain early period in WoWs history cost of creating new ship/model in game went down Significantly. Often to 0 when WG recycles same 3D mesh over and over again. It's basically a gold mine, with profit margin in region of 85% at least.

 

And we return to the shop pricing. With recent Cluster...storm of monumental scale WG could pull something good for a change. Permanent slashing pricing in the Premium Shop by 30% would be a good start. But NO. We are corpo, we're always right. We can even defeats laws of physics (radar over the islands or hydro not going to the bottom to detect sub cancer).

 

Instead they came up with a statement reminiscent of Japanese surrender in 1945, where not even once Emperor Hirohito used that word. Seems that WG is incapable of apology and fixing what they screwed. They only look for scapegoats like every good tyrant do. Look into history and pick one, all are the same. 

 

Food for thought...

Oh you have no idea... The cost to make a detailed 3d model like we have in world of warships is not as expensive as you think. Most of the art department makes less then 70k usd a year with the average being around 46k. So figure the art department turns out what 20+ new ships each year + new camos, for colabs, special events, and even graphical touch ups on maps and new ports it brings the total cost per ship being produced down to a very small amount. 

 

Where things get even more interesting and this is a topic you will see many defending is the fact that WG applies a NON CIS up charge to people. If you live in the CIS region and you play on CIS you pay less. The total cost of the Napoli comes out to 50USD if you live and play in that region. If you live in EU and play in the EU the cost is about 100 usd. If you live in NA and play in NA the cost is 140USD. Now if you live in say NA and play in EU you get  a small discount but still it is greater then 100USD. So not only are they charging you more for buying the same product on different servers but are also applying a geo loc penalty for any one not in the CIS. Some will argue that cause your region is wealthier they should pay more. This is a fallacy and only goes to validate WG avarice.