Guild Wars 2

Iures.2894:

Kilrain Daggerspine.6843:

I doubt anyone is expecting people to people to sell them at a lower value then what they are worth.

However when the average price if manipulated up by a group of people it becomes a problem, especially considering the general rarity of the item in question.

And your evidence that the changing prices are a result of market manipulation is ???

I never claimed it was a fact that manipulation was going on, It is however my belief based on what I’ve seen time after time.

Though I could have been clearer about that in my reply i agree.

last time It got upped there were a few dusks on the ah, with somewhat steady sales, then bam the rest of them goes in a single day, only to see several more listed a few hours later at considerably higher price.

The exact same thing happened yesterday to dusk, bam went to 0, then a few hours later 5+ went up at a 70g higher price.

Like I said, I can’t prove there is manipulation going on, as such I am not claiming it is a fact, I am just saying that based on what Ive seen it surely looks like it, so my opinion is that precursors are being manipulated.

Ursan.7846:

Kilrain Daggerspine.6843:

Exactly, precursors are not the only thing they are connected to, the fact that they are also impacted by ecto prices is not a positive thing.

So…you’re agreeing with me?

1. Precursors aren’t the only use for rares
2. Precursor/rare price increase/decrease don’t happen in 1:1 ratio
3. Therefore it’s possible in some situations where the MF with rares is a “smarter choice” (situations where the percentage increase in precursor price is larger than the percentage increase in prices of rares)
4. Therefore your statement that it’s “never” smarter is false.

In theory I guees I can agree it is “possible”, however with the odds of getting a precursor you would in my opinion have to go a much higher up then 2000g for it to be smarter, even with the current price of materials..

Like I said I throw rares in the mystic forge every day, and every day I feel like a idiot for doing it, because I know chances are I can keep doing it for the rest of my natural born life without getting it.

Kilrain Daggerspine.6843:

Iures.2894:

Kilrain Daggerspine.6843:

I doubt anyone is expecting people to people to sell them at a lower value then what they are worth.

However when the average price if manipulated up by a group of people it becomes a problem, especially considering the general rarity of the item in question.

And your evidence that the changing prices are a result of market manipulation is ???

I never claimed it was a fact that manipulation was going on, It is however my belief based on what I’ve seen time after time.

last time It got upped there were a few dusks on the ah, with somewhat steady sales, then bam the rest of them goes in a single day, only to see several more listed a few hours later at considerably higher price.

The exact same thing happened yesterday to dusk, bam went to 0, then a few hours later 5+ went up at a 70g higher price.

Like I said, I can’t prove there is manipulation going on, as such I am not claiming it is a fact, I am just saying that based on what Ive seen it surely looks like it, so my opinion is that precursors are being manipulated.

There’s a problem with that, though. Even at an under-bidding price of 600g, you’d need to increase the price by more than 90g just to break even. Specifically, you’d have to list at 706g—an increase of 106g—just to break even. At anything over about 400g, a 70g increase just isn’t worth it. So, your opinion can be whatever you want, but based on your own evidence, your opinion is wrong.

Kilrain Daggerspine.6843:

In theory I guees I can agree it is “possible”, however with the odds of getting a precursor you would in my opinion have to go a much higher up then 2000g for it to be smarter, even with the current price of materials..

Do you have the odds? If you do, you don’t have to have an opinion on it, you can actually calculate the break-even point.

If you do have data/a website, show me, I’d love to calculate it myself actually =). I just looked at the wiki and it’s not there.

All depends on the motives for driving up the prices tbh lures, and how long term they are playing.. to throw a obvious conspiracy theory out there:

You and your group are sitting on a large quantity of precursors from the MF bug or from karka event mass purchases, you would want to slowly push the price up while stringing along the various bidders, off loading a few precursors on bidders now and then to fuel the boat.

By doing it slowly, you would steadily increase the average price of the precursor, which would slowly but steadily increase the value of your stock.

Obviously It would be a risky move, but I has the potential to pay of BIG, especially since other stuff is influenced by precursors, such as rares and ores etcetc.

This is something I could see a gold selling site possibly doing.

But like I said conspiracy theory, my point however is that it is possible to make a profit of manipulating up the precursors, without making a profit of the actual sales we see.

However if this was the case, it could easily be stopped/discovered by adding a bidding tax on precursors.

Not that I suggest that happens.

Ursan.7846:

Kilrain Daggerspine.6843:

In theory I guees I can agree it is “possible”, however with the odds of getting a precursor you would in my opinion have to go a much higher up then 2000g for it to be smarter, even with the current price of materials..

Do you have the odds? If you do, you don’t have to have an opinion on it, you can actually calculate the break-even point.

If you do have data/a website, show me, I’d love to calculate it myself actually =). I just looked at the wiki and it’s not there.

Ursan, I can only go of the assumptions based on what I’ve seen other people throw in the mystic forge, and the “fact” that everytime you roll that dice you have the same chance of getting it.

Also the amount of precursors availible considering the amount of worlds connected to the tp, for me is a pretty ugly clue.

Kilrain Daggerspine.6843:

Ursan, I can only go of the assumptions based on what I’ve seen other people throw in the mystic forge, and the “fact” that everytime you roll that dice you have the same chance of getting it.

Also the amount of precursors availible considering the amount of worlds connected to the tp, for me is a pretty ugly clue.

Well no, I’m sure there’s tons of data out there. I was hoping if you knew anyone who’s published their data. Because I’ll be very interested in doing some calculations for myself.

I’m actually somewhat confused at what you’re trying to say. I’m not disagreeing with you or anything, I just want some numbers, and was curious as to if you had any. Math is just math.

No I do not, and like you I have looked for them, and would absolutely love to know the actual odds.

I can only gueestimate, and to me what I see is pretty grim.

If over 30 Dusks have been sold recently, that can mean the current price for them is reasonable.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

If over 30 Dusks have been sold recently, that can mean the current price for them is reasonable.

I would agree completely.

I hope these threads come to an end….but sadly, they won’t.

Depends who’s buying them. It could very well be gold hoarders buying up low priced Dusks just to flip them at a higher price later. If that’s the case, the prices will only continue to rise and people who actually want them for Legendaries will have a harder time acquiring one. Just speculation on my part, but I’m certain that at least some of the sales of Dusk are solely for the purpose of making money.

SkeletalLlama.5381:

Depends who’s buying them. It could very well be gold hoarders buying up low priced Dusks just to flip them at a higher price later. If that’s the case, the prices will only continue to rise and people who actually want them for Legendaries will have a harder time acquiring one. Just speculation on my part, but I’m certain that at least some of the sales of Dusk are solely for the purpose of making money.

What number of Dusks-per-day would make the conspiracy mongering stop?

That 10 a day are added to the potential pool tells you that while there might be people of similar interest doing similar things in terms of investment (not manipulation, investment) nobody could strangle a 7-8 THOUSAND gold-per-day influx of product.

Remember guys, if people want to sell it simply for money, they have to overcome that 15% tax. Right now the highest buy order is at 620G, while the lowest sell order is at 700G. If you’re to buy it for 620G, you’ll have to sell it at a minimum of 713G just to break even.

People talk like it’s easy making money buying/selling precursors. It’s not. It has horrible profit margins, if at all. There’s looooots of other, more lucrative markets out there.

Honestly, with 10 per day entering the market someone has figured out there’s a decent long term return to buying and flushing exotics and has found the rewards outweight the risks when you can sell the results for 700g. Or possibly its further down the supply chain and they are building exotics to flush.

SkeletalLlama.5381:

Depends who’s buying them. It could very well be gold hoarders buying up low priced Dusks just to flip them at a higher price later. If that’s the case, the prices will only continue to rise and people who actually want them for Legendaries will have a harder time acquiring one. Just speculation on my part, but I’m certain that at least some of the sales of Dusk are solely for the purpose of making money.

John just said that it was different individuals purchasing/selling the Dusks. Unless you’re claiming all of them are gold hoarders?

Price of dusk is reasonable. Many people are willing to purchase it for it’s current price.

Nike.2631:

Honestly, with 10 per day entering the market someone has figured out there’s a decent long term return to buying and flushing exotics and has found the rewards outweight the risks when you can sell the results for 700g. Or possibly its further down the supply chain and they are building exotics to flush.

Why do you think this? Given the size of GW2 and the global nature of the trading post, 10 per day entering the market could be mostly due to drops. It’s possible we’re dealing with a hundred thousand active players at level 80 (maybe more, that’s only about 3% of the number of people who bought the game); when several million mobs are being killed every day (just 20 per 100,000 players hits 2 million), even one in a million odd drops will happen fairly regularly.

Eolirin.1830:

Why do you think this? Given the size of GW2 and the global nature of the trading post, 10 per day entering the market could be mostly due to drops. It’s possible we’re dealing with a hundred thousand active players at level 80 (maybe more, that’s only about 3% of the number of people who bought the game); when several million mobs are being killed every day (just 20 per 100,000 players hits 2 million), even one in a million odd drops will happen fairly regularly.

Because its 10 per day appearing in the hands of people who don’t personally need them for something. If it were drops, distributed randomly across the player landscape, I would expect most of them to be absorbed into use before being posted – “Wow, I got a Dusk. I guess I know what Legendary I’m making now…” Now if we’re seeing a surplus of every precursor entering the market on the order of 10 per day, then sure it might just be the game is filling up with a total of 230 precursors put up for sale every day (that above and beyond people getting the one they want or settling for the first one they get – 230 trading hands every day), and we’ll all have our precursor shortly…

…Or it could be that the ones that command the highest price are being specifically manufactured, since the risk appears to be the same for all of them, regurdless of the value.

Since I don’t get the impression there a 7200+ satisfied precursor buyers per month, I’m guessing that there are more Greatsword Precurrsors being created for sale than most other weapon types.

Maybe John Smith will offer some insight into the volume of transactions going on for the non-greatsword precurrsors. Until then we are all speculating .

Well, you’re assuming that every player actually wants to get a legendary.

Despite all the clamor in this forums, I’m willing to bet that a sizeable portion of the player base do not care about Legendaries at all. Some players, if they get a dusk, their first impression might be “Hey, I’ll sell this dusk so I have money to buy my Infinite Light.” Or something.

People like that do exist, you can’t discount them!

I don’t discount them. I’m one of them. I’d sell probably 60% of the possible precursor drops to finance my Infinite Light project. Thing is that would still mean there are more than 230 precursors dropping per day to people who don’t want what they got – and I don’t believe that is true. The volume of Dusks changing hands is too high to be entirely – or IMO even “largely” – drop-based.

Now THERE is the magic question for John Smith, then number that would be profoundly illuminating:

How many Dusks were produced by the Mystic Forge in the last 24 hours?

Ursan.7846:

Remember guys, if people want to sell it simply for money, they have to overcome that 15% tax. Right now the highest buy order is at 620G, while the lowest sell order is at 700G. If you’re to buy it for 620G, you’ll have to sell it at a minimum of 713G just to break even.

People talk like it’s easy making money buying/selling precursors. It’s not. It has horrible profit margins, if at all. There’s looooots of other, more lucrative markets out there.

The numbers are further kitten when you consider that to get a modest 10% return on your investment, your 620g purchase needs to sell for just over 800g. That is, it needs to actually sell at that price, which I’m not convinced happens often or quick enough to be worth the effort.

Nike.2631:

I don’t discount them. I’m one of them. I’d sell probably 60% of the possible precursor drops to finance my Infinite Light project. Thing is that would still mean there are more than 230 precursors dropping per day to people who don’t want what they got – and I don’t believe that is true. The volume of Dusks changing hands is too high to be entirely – or IMO even “largely” – drop-based.

Now THERE is the magic question for John Smith, then number that would be profoundly illuminating:

How many Dusks were produced by the Mystic Forge in the last 24 hours?

I’m not saying that there isn’t some amount of forge generation, just that even 230 Precursors a day is not really that much for a game with the population size of GW2. Without actual data, it’s impossible to make a solid determination on where they’re coming from, but the numbers aren’t wildly out of bound. Half the professions can’t even use Greatswords, and profession distribution is relatively equal, so half the population isn’t going to need a Greatsword legendary.

Edit: Not to mention that Dusk covers most of the cost of Infinite Light just by itself; it being in much more demand makes it much easier to want to sell it rather than keep it and try to get all the other expensive things you’d need for a legendary

Smooth Penguin.5294:

If over 30 Dusks have been sold recently, that can mean the current price for them is reasonable.

That number by itself means relatively nothing. Now if it were out of 50, 30 sold in past 72 hours, then you’d have something. For all we know it could be out of 5,000, 30 sold which means something completely different.

We simply cannot come to any hard fast conclusions based on that info as it is lacking.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

If over 30 Dusks have been sold recently, that can mean the current price for them is reasonable.

On all respect are you telling me 600-700 gold is reasonable? We were promised a game that wasn’t like the rest but grinding out 600 gold doesn’t sound like it.

Revolution.6301:

On all respect are you telling me 600-700 gold is reasonable? We were promised a game that wasn’t like the rest but grinding out 600 gold doesn’t sound like it.

People keep saying this. But you’re misunderstanding Anet’s intentions.

Here’s what we believe: If someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it, that rare item should be differentiated by its visual appearance and rarity alone, not by being more powerful than everything else in the game. Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games — we leave the grind to other MMOs.

http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/

He never says there’s no grind. What he’s saying is that he doesn’t believe in grinding for stats, but he fully endorses a cosmetic grind. Which is what Legendaries are.

It seriously annoys me when people say “Anet promised no grind!” They made no such promise. They endorse a cosmetic grind, just like in GW1.

Fully agree to Ursans post! Btw the game is also not grindy in any known way. People make it grindy to get their desired things as fast as possible.

Anet actually discourages grind in any way. That’s why they included DR and changing dailies. They try to introduce new and unique content every 2 – 3 months. And this game is in fact NOT grindy.

+1 to Ursans post- there is no grind in attaining a full endgame viable gear.

If you want the cosmetic gimmicks of a legendary you either accept that its currently the ultimate long time goal and put the required effort into it and work toward it- or you don’t, but if you go the road to a legendary you know how long and bumpy its going to be.

John Smith.4610:

Sorry, I didn’t have time right now to read the whole thread, but I’ll throw this at you. In the past 72 hours well over 30 dusks have sold to and from different individuals.

Whether or not all these Dusks ended up as Twilights is my question there.

Iehova.9518:

John Smith.4610:

Sorry, I didn’t have time right now to read the whole thread, but I’ll throw this at you. In the past 72 hours well over 30 dusks have sold to and from different individuals.

Whether or not all these Dusks ended up as Twilights is my question there.

I kind of doubt that Anet has a cristall ball that can tell them who will forge the dusks and who won’t.
You are implying that everyone who buys a dusk does so as the last step in forging a legendary and immediately uses it.

But as someone already said, even the clear reply of John Smith is not enough for the conspiracy believers.

Legendary only for a select few? No that is a misconception. Everyone should be able to get one, but the epic effort involved would turn most people off. That was the idea.

Which it didn’t, apparently.

goldi.3129:

I kind of doubt that Anet has a cristall ball that can tell them who will forge the dusks and who won’t.

But I’m sure they got a crystal ball that shows which precursor goes into a legendary and which is being manipulated.

You are implying that everyone who buys a dusk does so as the last step in forging a legendary and immediately uses it.

No, I’m implying every single Dusk is used to make a Twilight eventually and is NOT flipped. That’s how it should be. But it isn’t.

But as someone already said, even the clear reply of John Smith is not enough for the conspiracy believers.

There is no conspiracy. Precursors get flipped. Gold sellers have 10+ of each precursor according to their spam. Currently the only reliable way of obtaining one is forking over huge amounts of dosh on the TP.

What at least I personally am kittening about is the lack of a repeatable, finite, deterministic, skill-based, difficult way to obtain an account-bound precursor of my choice; every other legendary gift has it that way, I just want precursors to share the same fate.

I’m curious which precursors you think are getting flipped. Certainly not Dusk, since the current market isn’t a very good one to try to flip in. . .

Iehova.9518:

goldi.3129:

I kind of doubt that Anet has a cristall ball that can tell them who will forge the dusks and who won’t.

But I’m sure they got a crystal ball that shows which precursor goes into a legendary and which is being manipulated.

You are implying that everyone who buys a dusk does so as the last step in forging a legendary and immediately uses it.

No, I’m implying every single Dusk is used to make a Twilight eventually and is NOT flipped. That’s how it should be. But it isn’t.

But as someone already said, even the clear reply of John Smith is not enough for the conspiracy believers.

There is no conspiracy. Precursors get flipped. Gold sellers have 10+ of each precursor according to their spam. Currently the only reliable way of obtaining one is forking over huge amounts of dosh on the TP.

This is a prime example for the conspiracy talk in regards to the both most common samples, market manipulators and gold sellers.

Read the post of John Smith to get an answer about the control of gold sellers on the precursors.
Read the posts that mentioned that there is no profit to be made in flipping precursors (and if there is it is so small and during a large time span, that its not profitable for anyone seriously plaing the market).

So how come no one loves to talk about the price of precursors like Storm or Venom?

Oh right, because those precursors are cheap because the market does not want them.

Yet the market loves and wants Dusk, which is justly reflected in it’s price.

All the people complaining about the expensive precursor prices are simply folks who don’t want to pay market price when there are people out there willing to do so. 30 in the last 72 hours, in fact.

Vol.5241:

So how come no one loves to talk about the price of precursors like Storm or Venom?

Oh right, because those precursors are cheap because the market does not want them.

Yet the market loves and wants Dusk, which is justly reflected in it’s price.

All the people complaining about the expensive precursor prices are simply folks who don’t want to pay market price when there are people out there willing to do so. 30 in the last 72 hours, in fact.

^^^ THIS……exactly ^^^

It’s amazing to see all of these threads that continue to pop up….all complaining about the same thing. Throwing out wild speculation that the ONLY reasonable conclusion to the price of the precursor they want is either gold sellers or market manipulators.

Could it happen to be that the reason the price is higher on this specific precursor is because it is in higher demand than the rest? No…..it couldn’t be. That would make sense and forums are NOT the place for making sense.

I hope that someday, people will remove their blinders and set aside their self-centered attitude to stop, think, and evaluate things from the perspective of the whole, rather than the individual.

I want a Legendary weapon too, but I don’t need it right now. I’m planning to play the game, save up, work toward all the different pieces I need, and hope I get my precursor drop in the process. If I don’t get my drop, I’ll utilize one of the methods in place at the time to get one…..even if that means buying it off the Trading Post.

There’s a part of me that looks at just how much it costs in Karma, gold, and time to craft a Legendary and thinks……“You know, I could outfit all 8 of my characters with 2 full sets of Exotic gear and still have money left over. Do I really need that shiny?” The answer for now is yes & no. I don’t need it, but I want it…..so I’ll continue working toward it….for now.

The reason why (imo) is because it is one of them that inflates by more than most that are grinding/playing game content can make in an equivalent amount of time. Ergo working towards it via those means seems like it’ll never reach an end.

Ofc that’s just my opinion.

In terms of manipulating…..I wouldn’t underestimate the nature of people. I’m sure there are some out there who’s just reward is watching ppl squirm on here ranting about the prices.

goldi.3129:

This is a prime example for the conspiracy talk in regards to the both most common samples, market manipulators and gold sellers.

“There is no conspiracy” is now a conspiracy. Whether or not “‘There is no conspiracy’ is a conspiracy” is a conspiracy is my question there.

So how come no one loves to talk about the price of precursors like Storm or Venom?

They’ve been manipulated as well, have no doubt about that.

Iehova.9518:

goldi.3129:

This is a prime example for the conspiracy talk in regards to the both most common samples, market manipulators and gold sellers.

“There is no conspiracy” is now a conspiracy. Whether or not “‘There is no conspiracy’ is a conspiracy” is a conspiracy is my question there.

So how come no one loves to talk about the price of precursors like Storm or Venom?

They’ve been manipulated as well, have no doubt about that.

Read the rest of my post and the second part of the part you quoted. Maybe you will understand what I meant.

And again the “oh they have been manipulated” conspiracy. Maybe- just like Vol said the prices have adjusted to the actual worth of the items?

Essence Snow.3194:

The reason why (imo) is because it is one of them that inflates by more than most that are grinding/playing game content can make in an equivalent amount of time. Ergo working towards it via those means seems like it’ll never reach an end.

Ofc that’s just my opinion.

In terms of manipulating…..I wouldn’t underestimate the nature of people. I’m sure there are some out there who’s just reward is watching ppl squirm on here ranting about the prices.

I would love to hear your definition of the term “inflates”.
Thank you.

Maylojager.1307:

Essence Snow.3194:

The reason why (imo) is because it is one of them that inflates by more than most that are grinding/playing game content can make in an equivalent amount of time. Ergo working towards it via those means seems like it’ll never reach an end.

Ofc that’s just my opinion.

In terms of manipulating…..I wouldn’t underestimate the nature of people. I’m sure there are some out there who’s just reward is watching ppl squirm on here ranting about the prices.

I would love to hear your definition of the term “inflates”.
Thank you.

I don’t think they are suggesting “inflation”….just a rise in price that occurs more rapidly than most people are able to acquire that much gold.

The rise in precursor prices isn’t due to inflation, it’s due to the high demand and low supply of the item. The price of precursors will rise to a point where the supply and demand curves meet. Since we do not have enough data to calculate and plot the real supply and demand curves for each precursor, we will probably see the price of some continue to rise while the price of others become more stable. Not all precursors are created equally in terms of demand. Therefore, higher demanded precursors will likely have higher prices….hence the situation we currently have with Dusk.

I think the basis of all those discussions is: Who of the player base should be able to get a Legendary.

On the one hand there are Vol., Ursan and Goldi, who say they should just be available for the most hardworking players.
On the other hand there are players like me, who started with their legendary a long time ago, when we had no idea how it would develop and who are now sitting on their gifts without precursors. And so we can’t understand why we shouldn’t get our legendary after we spent many hundreds of hours working for the gifts.

Well in fact, I can totally unterstand guys like Vol., but it’s not my opinion.
And as long as Anet doesn’t give a statement about who shall be supposed to get a legendary the discussions will go on.

I wasn’t using “inflate” in a strictly economic meaning, rather as a synonym for increase, rise, grow, etc.

Iehova.9518:

goldi.3129:

This is a prime example for the conspiracy talk in regards to the both most common samples, market manipulators and gold sellers.

“There is no conspiracy” is now a conspiracy. Whether or not “‘There is no conspiracy’ is a conspiracy” is a conspiracy is my question there.

So how come no one loves to talk about the price of precursors like Storm or Venom?

They’ve been manipulated as well, have no doubt about that.

Just as Dusk has been manipulated by 30 different accounts!
Sure this will make a good cut, we make 30 accounts for 60$ to make a plus of 100gold per precursor or even less.

Surferboy.1649:

I think the basis of all those discussions is: Who of the player base should be able to get a Legendary.

On the one hand there are Vol., Ursan and Goldi, who say they should just be available for the most hardworking players.
On the other hand there are players like me, who started with their legendary a long time ago, when we had no idea how it would develop and who are now sitting on their gifts without precursors. And so we can’t understand why we shouldn’t get our legendary after we spent many hundreds of hours working for the gifts.

Well in fact, I can totally unterstand guys like Vol., but it’s not my opinion.
And as long as Anet doesn’t give a statement about who shall be supposed to get a legendary the discussions will go on.

Let’s put this to rest. ANYONE can get a Legendary weapon. Anet put in the requirements into the game, and it’s up to the individual to decide if that’s for them or not. Be it a Casual player or Hardcore player or anyone in between, there’s nothing stopping us from reaching our goal.

The real issue here is Entitlement. They want their stuff, and they want it now. Some players don’t want to spend the time it takes to get all the Mats, so they shortcut the process by purchasing from the TP. From Precursors to T6, if another player has it for sale, it’s an opportunity for them to get it faster than on their own. But heaven forbid a player paying a price for Dusk that another player feels is unjust.

And I’ll repeat this line because a lot of people fail to remember: Precursors are free from the Mystic Forge. You just need a lot of luck, because <gasp> it’s RARE </gasp>.

Surferboy.1649:

I think the basis of all those discussions is: Who of the player base should be able to get a Legendary.

On the one hand there are Vol., Ursan and Goldi, who say they should just be available for the most hardworking players.
On the other hand there are players like me, who started with their legendary a long time ago, when we had no idea how it would develop and who are now sitting on their gifts without precursors. And so we can’t understand why we shouldn’t get our legendary after we spent many hundreds of hours working for the gifts.

Well in fact, I can totally unterstand guys like Vol., but it’s not my opinion.
And as long as Anet doesn’t give a statement about who shall be supposed to get a legendary the discussions will go on.

What, isn’t the fact that Anet made Legendary requirements so steep (~800G just without the precursors) and made precursors incredibly rare not indicative of their design choice?

It’s okay to hold an opinion that it’s too hard or too expensive. But that’s how the system is built and the system is working as intended. You can not like the system, but Anet deliberately designed the system this way. So you can infer pretty easily what Anet’s intentions are.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

And I’ll repeat this line because a lot of people fail to remember: Precursors are free from the Mystic Forge. You just need a lot of luck, because <gasp> it’s RARE </gasp>.

I really disagree with the way you word this, though I kinda understand your intentions. No, it’s not free. It’s never free. Even if you get it on the first try, you’ve spent the equivalent of 4 rares to get it. Not to mention the inherent risks of gambling. It’s like saying “Winning in a casino is free, if you’re lucky!” No it is not, you have to buy in first.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

And I’ll repeat this line because a lot of people fail to remember: Precursors are free from the Mystic Forge. You just need a lot of luck, because <gasp> it’s RARE </gasp>.

Okay, I agree with most of your points, but the above is wrong and I am compelled to explain why.

Precursors are not “free” from the mystic forge. They cost however many rares (and thus the values of those rares) it takes put into the forge in order to get the precursor out. In many cases the cost of the precursor is greater than the TP price, and in some cases less. It’s a gamble, and you need to know that walking in. If the average chance of getting it out of the MF were a significantly cheaper route than the TP price more often than not, then the prices would rebalance until such an imbalance no longer existed. That is the nature of the economy.

I guess I my words are a bit off, since I’m not factoring in the costs of either crafting the rares or the opportunity costs of not selling rare drops. So my apologies to Ursan and Rising. But the underlying reasoning would be that there are other ways to get a Precursor than just buying it off of the TP.

Indeed, and I can definitely agree with that. I, personally, earn a swath of dungeon tokens I’ll never put to better use, so I buy exotic Greatswords and chuck them into the forge in the hopes that one day it’ll pay me out a Dawn/Dusk that I can turn around and sell for gold.

I actually never thought about doing D-runs for tokens, then converting into Greatswords. I’ve been crafting Rares with all the T5 mats I find to throw into the Forge.

But back to this topic. It just irritates me that people keep on complaining over and over again. Perhaps a way to end the complaints would be for Anet to stealth nerf all Precursors, and make them Account Bound? But only after they implement the “scavenger hunt” idea.

Essence Snow.3194:

The reason why (imo) is because it is one of them that inflates by more than most that are grinding/playing game content can make in an equivalent amount of time. Ergo working towards it via those means seems like it’ll never reach an end.

Ofc that’s just my opinion.

In terms of manipulating…..I wouldn’t underestimate the nature of people. I’m sure there are some out there who’s just reward is watching ppl squirm on here ranting about the prices.

Looking at the charts for Dusk in spidy, it looks like it averages about 100g increase per month. That is, if you ignore the spikes up and down, the average price range seems to increase about 100g. Are you really arguing that most players can’t average 3g a day?

Smooth Penguin.5294:

It just irritates me that people keep on complaining over and over again. Perhaps a way to end the complaints would be for Anet to stealth nerf all Precursors, and make them Account Bound? But only after they implement the “scavenger hunt” idea.

Players are still going to complain about precursors. No matter what ArenaNet does, it will irritate players and they will complain.

If they made precursors Account Bound after / at the same time as the scavenger hunt, people will complain that Anet took away one of the ways to get a precursor….even though they didn’t like the price of it on the Trading Post anyway.

I’m looking forward to a scavenger hunt for precursors and I hope it’s really time consuming. I hope it spans multiple areas in the game, covering tons of Dynamic Events, dungeons, Champions, etc. I hope that we have to go to far reaches of the world to find hidden passages, underwater relics and/or to the tops of mountains.

I LOVED the Black Moa Chic scavenger hunt in GW1 and think something along those lines, but about 10 times longer, would be amazing.

Charismatic Harm.9683:

Smooth Penguin.5294:

It just irritates me that people keep on complaining over and over again. Perhaps a way to end the complaints would be for Anet to stealth nerf all Precursors, and make them Account Bound? But only after they implement the “scavenger hunt” idea.

Players are still going to complain about precursors. No matter what ArenaNet does, it will irritate players and they will complain.

If they made precursors Account Bound after / at the same time as the scavenger hunt, people will complain that Anet took away one of the ways to get a precursor….even though they didn’t like the price of it on the Trading Post anyway.

I’m looking forward to a scavenger hunt for precursors and I hope it’s really time consuming. I hope it spans multiple areas in the game, covering tons of Dynamic Events, dungeons, Champions, etc. I hope that we have to go to far reaches of the world to find hidden passages, underwater relics and/or to the tops of mountains.

I LOVED the Black Moa Chic scavenger hunt in GW1 and think something along those lines, but about 10 times longer, would be amazing.

I hope it’s essentially another piece instanced content, just difficult enough to keep most players from completing it, but where you can have friends help you. That way, people can still sell precursors to hopeless people for ridiculous sums of gold. >_>

Okay, I don’t actually hope that, but it would make me laugh my kitten off. . .