Trove Receiving Major Store Changes, Classes Will No Longer Be Available For Cubits

In order to better support their game and build the business model around it, Trion will be making major changes to Trove's store. The most extreme of these changes is that classes will no longer be available for Cubits. Players will also receive far fewer Cubits, the Cubit cost of remaining items will be higher, and Patron status will be pushed a lot harder.

For those of you that don't know why this is a big deal, Trove's business model was largely lauded for being fair to free users due to employing a League of Legends-like business model in which free users could unlock all classes with time. Each player could fill a daily Star Bar for Cubits simply by playing the game and completing dungeon runs. If you played during the week, you would receive 500 Cubits per Star Bar. If you played on weekends, you would receive 1000 Cubits instead. This worked out to, at most, one class every 13 days of active play. Going forward, classes will not be available as freely as before. Players will get one Class Coin for purchasing "any amount" of cash shop currency, one for raising their Mastery level, and one for "being referred." Other than that, classes will require a Class Coin obtained through trade or the cash shop currency.

According to the forum post, this system left the Trove development team feeling that they needed to push out classes at a rapid pace, undoubtedly to keep up with more active players. The new business model will "help [them] continue to make the investment in our existing classes." They are careful to note that they will still be releasing new classes, but at a slower pace than before.

In the near future, the Cubit economy will also be changing in major ways. Players will receive far fewer Cubits when they begin playing the game. Cubit prices for items will be raised. The cheapest mounts are being removed, but may return in the future. Style Unlockers will be available for Cubits once again. It is also vaguely noted that "some of the new class progression will have a Cubit-based bonus."

A post on the official subreddit has outlined some of the new Cubit prices. Flasks have been raised from 6500 Cubits to 7500 Cubits. All Emblems that were previously 6500 Cubits have been raised to 10,000 Cubits. Mounts that were 10,000 Cubits have been raised to 16,500 Cubits. Wings and the Legendary Tome Dragon have gone from 20,000 Cubits to 25,000 Cubits.

Patron status isn't exempt from changes. In the near future, Trion will be pushing players to subscribe via the HUD. In the near future, Patron may be required to "access some systems or features," which does not sound promising. The post states that they have "opted to build up Patron since it's already quite valuable and something that is being used by most if not all of our supporters."

This is no small amount of changes being made to Trove's monetization scheme all at once. It has already started a bit of a commotion, with users already claiming that "Trove is going pay-to-win." With any luck, the new system of class progression will not cause further commotion.