Offer a “premium account” subscription that allows players to earn gems in the exact same way that they earn gold through daily wins and weekly quests. (This is very different from the “mastery pass”). Currently, the best deal for straight up buying gems is 20,000 for $99.99 — 200 gems per dollar. The most popular option, 3400 gems for $20, comes out to 170 gems per dollar. So for a premium subscription, something that would allow players to earn somewhere around 250-300 gems per dollar maximum (consistently grinding every daily win/quest reward) and 150+ gems per dollar with regular gameplay (i.e., 50-75% maximum amount of grinding per month) would be a nice sweet spot. $10-$15 per month for a premium account, gem rewards that scale similarly to daily gold rewards, plus some other stable benefits to ensure that players who don’t max out their monthly gem earnings still walk away satisfied. Don’t worry, the “whales” that likely supply a huge chunk (if not the majority) of Arena’s revenue won’t go extinct if you add some sustainable fishing to the business model as well.

I have a more detailed explanation of various specific reasons why this model is best for WotC’s bottom line and Arena players alike, but I’ll save that until after this post receives a response. For now, I’ll leave it at this: the current model of having players pay for gems to buy cards in essentially the same way that they would buy physical or MTGO cards with cash is a bad business model because gems are not real currency, and the cards they buy aren’t real cards. People without tons of disposable income or addictive personalities are not going to pour money into this game like it’s some kind of long-term investment, especially after Magic Duels shut down. You won’t get a third chance if the same thing happens with Arena — monetizing it like a casino rather than a live-service game is not a recipe for long-term success and stability, regardless of short term returns.

Giving people the option to “play to win“ rather than forcing them to “pay to win,” and having them pay as they go for the experience via a monthly subscription, the same way that they would pay for a streaming subscription or something like Runescape, would make all the difference from a psychological standpoint. Do you want a player base of loyal, satisfied, paying customers? Then give them a pay-for-play model that incentivizes and rewards actually playing the game rather than just throwing money at it. Right now, the only thing like that in arena is draft and constructed events, and for less skilled or knowledgeable players, it doesn’t take long to figure out that playing those is a good way to lose gems and/or wind up with a random grab bag of cards they don’t want.

I play Arena because it is possible to enjoy the game as a free player, which I appreciate. I feel a lot of the negative feedback from players simply due to the way WotC goes about incentivizing them to pay. Everything about the current model seems likely to create negative experiences for the majority of players who actually put money into the game… the less often you ask players to whip out their credit card, the better. You don’t want players who buy gems to lose them too quickly or hoard them until they feel confident enough to spend them well — you want them to earn gems and spend gems freely, knowing they can earn more, and pay for it all without clicking “buy”. If you offered the subscription model I described, I would sign up immediately. As it stands now, I would consider putting money into the game in the future, but only when I’ve got money to burn.

(By the way, I haven’t had any of the stability/performance issues that I’ve read about, on either PC or mobile. But it’s something to keep in mind depending on how widespread they are — gonna have to be fast and loose about compensating premium players if technical issues prevent them from using their subscription. I suggest using non-purchasable “daily premium tokens” that double or extend subscriber gem rewards for a day as a way of ensuring players who run into technical issues don’t feel cheated.)