What do the economy changes mean for different types of Rivals players?

Edit: CaptainBenzie released a good video on this, so maybe you want to watch it as well:

Simultaneously to the big Balance update, there was a big update to the "Economy" of Rivals.

The balance changes will certainly change what decks we will see – already giving me a big incentive to re-do the GDI & Nod top player analyses in a couple of weeks.

The economy changes might have more subtle effects, because they impact different player groups in different ways. If you're just interested in the straight up impact on "what is the optimal way to spend Diamonds going forward", I recommend you to read this great analysis by Reddit user tonytuna99. There's also a reddit thread on this analysis if you have questions or comments.

My post is based on the insights from these great calculations, but I simplify a bit here on purpose. In a nutshell, the changes mean:

• Rushing chests (without Diamonds) got nerfed a bit, but not too much
• Rushing chests with Diamonds is now double as expensive
• Cloning vats are now 2x as good (free) / 3x as good (paid) as before

Rushing crates with Diamonds now costs more than twice as much

Here, I wanted rather to look at how these changes affects different types of players in different ways. I want to differentiate between 4 groups of players:

1. Normal players who don't spend any money
2. Top X players e.g. Top 300) who spend little or no money
3. Players who spend some money, but not tons (e.g. $10/month)
4. Players who spend lots of money (often also called Whales)

Normal players who don't spend any money

These players are better off than before: The absolute free return improved. 

• Diamond prices don't matter for these people
• Crates & crate rushing thus were not nerfed a lot for them
• Cloning vat is much better than before, even the free variant
• The "repeat bounties" option is not relevant for them, and it's still perfectly doable to complete the set of bounties every day

These players will be able to catch up a bit better than before, which is a great thing.

Top 300 Players

For Top 300 Players, it's a bit different. Most of them earned a lot of Diamonds in recent months, especially from some very juicy Champions events.

Here, it depends on how you look at it:

• If you assume they should continue to be able to earn Diamonds, then things have gotten worse
• If you assume that Redwoods anyways does not want to give many Diamonds as rewards anymore, this specific economy change does not make a big difference

Honestly, I personally would see this economy change as one big change together with the reduced Diamond rewards after February. Conclusion: Especially together, this is significantly worse for the Top 300.

Players who spend some money

For these, it's really worse. Because whilst the free rewards got a bit better (say, 20% overall?), the nerf to rushing chests is big. Before, with just $1 a day, you could rush 10 additional chests. Now, that's not possible anymore.

Especially players who pay low amounts and optimize their return, and who have no chance to win Diamonds in big events, are really worse off / incentivized to pay more to get the same progression.

Whales

You could argue that not much changes for Whales. Yet, I'd say things got better, or at least fairer, for them. Before, the differences in "return per Diamond" were so large that probably spendthrifts would waste a ton on very bad deals.

Conclusion

I think it's great that the situation for "normal" F2P players improved a bit, or at least did not get worse.

I think it's "okay" that the Top 300 are not winning out here. Of course, they are a key part of the community, and their view is important. But at least they usually have already L9 / L10 and can keep up a bit. Plus, even if they might not get many Diamonds, they will more other stuff in events going forward, allowing them to still outpace all other non-payers in terms of progress.

I think it's also good that Whales are not "tricked" into horrible deals anymore as much as before.

The one aspect I don't like is that people who spend a bit and tried to optimize their returns on it were punished. It feels these players are very healthy for the game. A continuous spend on some Diamonds for rushing chests could be seen as similar to a subscription. These players would be better able to catch up, but not get hilarious high levels like whales. Instead of nurturing this type of player, the change seems like an attempt to squeeze them. Which fits to the logic of game devs, of course: "You showed your general willingness to spend. Let's see what more we can get from you."

Ah well. I guess I can accept that, if (and only if) Redwood continues to improve on the game, especially in two areas:

1. New player experience
2. Tournaments!