Guild Wars 2

Folk.2093:

Dont bother arguing in this forum, the economists sit here and vehemently defend their little wet dream of a TP. The average player can see the prices of many end game materials has been going up while the average earning income for players hasn’t gone up as much. But people aren’t going to care if they’re the ones making the money, I know several people in game who’ve made a descent ammount of gold, not one of them has done so without flipping items on the TP.

Gold supply is infinite. Players doing well… anything (quests, dungeons, world bosses, farming) make the game code produce gold. The amount of gold circulating in the game will constantly and forever be increasing. Inflation is a constant here.

And why is it such a surprise that players who take the time to invest (as opposed to spending or even saving gold) have more money? Do you think this shouldn’t be? That if I handle my money wisely, don’t go buying every dumb set of armor my heart desires, take the time to examine a market, take advantage of opportunities I spot… that I should have no more money than you, who (most likely) does nothing but spend?

It’s amazing how there are people complaining about a perfectly healthy economy. It’s like people PREFER inflation to occur and to have big numbers in their bank that are worth nothing.

As I always say, the supply price can only be as high as what the demand is willing to pay!

This kind of reflects in real life too. A lot of young people think real money is made off salary but it’s not! For example, sure dentist usually get paid well, but well place investments easily out earn a man’s salary/wage. The key here is to apply both in conjunction. Why do you frown upon some well placed investments which literally any monkey can learn. There aren’t that many economic experts in the game world, just kids experimenting with stuff (the real ones are making real money, not virtual money…)

Kam.8109:

Folk.2093:

Dont bother arguing in this forum, the economists sit here and vehemently defend their little wet dream of a TP. The average player can see the prices of many end game materials has been going up while the average earning income for players hasn’t gone up as much. But people aren’t going to care if they’re the ones making the money, I know several people in game who’ve made a descent ammount of gold, not one of them has done so without flipping items on the TP.

Gold supply is infinite. Players doing well… anything (quests, dungeons, world bosses, farming) make the game code produce gold. The amount of gold circulating in the game will constantly and forever be increasing. Inflation is a constant here.

And why is it such a surprise that players who take the time to invest (as opposed to spending or even saving gold) have more money? Do you think this shouldn’t be? That if I handle my money wisely, don’t go buying every dumb set of armor my heart desires, take the time to examine a market, take advantage of opportunities I spot… that I should have no more money than you, who (most likely) does nothing but spend?

To add to that, I’m always amused whenever we see news reports about how the wealth of the top 1% grow at a faster pace than the wealth of the average person. Or how the top CEOs have already made your salary in one day (we always see this in New Years papers)

It’s as if this is entirely surprising that a guy with millions in disposable cash can make safe investments and earn way more in interest when compared to the guy making minimum wage.

I always find it funny about these people, like that they somehow deserve the same amount of money that a CEO earns, or a billionare makes off of interest.

Unfortunately, this mentality is prevalent in this game as well. You have a good portion of players who work hard grinding and earning gold, or people who are smart enough to play the TP effectively through flipping or trading. Then you have the rest of the people who don’t like those who are earning more than they are, but are not willing to make those same sacrifices. Sure, some people are lucky, but that’s a small minority out of the already small minority of rich people.

You can do whatever you want and make however much you want, I dont care but investing/examining in the market shouldn’t be a requirement to be able to afford high end materials; playing the game (dungeons, fractal, WvW, Events, Hearts) should and it shouldn’t have to be done with a repetitive grind.

Lets looks at (guess what!) legendary requirements as an example, how many people do you see complaining about the ammount of skill points or Karma needed to get whatever materials you need for a legendary? Not many, why? Because you can do that playing the game in a variety of ways enjoying every step of the way without a grind, sure you can grind that part out making it faster but it’s not neccesary. The end goal stays the same so it doesnt feel like a race and skill points and karma are relatively easier to hold onto and save.

Also what kind of silly retort is " buying every dumb set of armor", who even does that? Heck I bought karma armor.

Folk.2093:

You can do whatever you want and make however much you want, I dont care but investing/examining in the market shouldn’t be a requirement to be able to afford high end materials; playing the game (dungeons, fractal, WvW, Events, Hearts) should and it shouldn’t have to be done with a repetitive grind.

…

Investing/examining the market is not a requirement. It may not even be the fastest way for the majority of people to earn gold / items. It may be for some people, but not all people. If done poorly, it my not even be a viable way period.

If a player does the other things mentioned in the post, they will have gained items and gold they can put towards the “high end materials”, they may even acquire some of those materials outright.

The difference is in perception on how easy, or difficult, or quick, or time consuming a course of action is to an individual that determines how much of a “grind” getting something is.

Most importantly, no where is a player required, or entitled to acquire these “high end materials”. Doing so, or attempting to do so, is a voluntary choice, and shoudl be undertaken with the understanding of what doing so will require and entail to do so. If those requirements are not favorable, or particularly enjoyable to that person, then they simply should opt not to.

Mourningcry.9428:

Most importantly, no where is a player required, or entitled to acquire these “high end materials”. Doing so, or attempting to do so, is a voluntary choice, and shoudl be undertaken with the understanding of what doing so will require and entail to do so. If those requirements are not favorable, or particularly enjoyable to that person, then they simply should opt not to.

This, though, applies to the game as a whole, too. Guess what happens once a high enough % of the population finds the game unfun and leaves for good?

I have yet to read a compelling argument about how this brilliant economy is making the game more fun, barring those players who get their enjoyment out of the act of making money itself.

Everyone makes fun of WoW, and how stupid it is, how dumbed down, how ridiculous it is to hand welfare epics and yadda yadda yadda. And yet Blizzard/Activision goes to town with billions of $$$/year. I wonder who’s the one being smart there.

MagnusLL.8473:

Everyone makes fun of WoW, and how stupid it is, how dumbed down, how ridiculous it is to hand welfare epics and yadda yadda yadda. And yet Blizzard/Activision goes to town with billions of $$$/year. I wonder who’s the one being smart there.

I’m too lazy and don’t care enough to touch upon the rest of the post, but but I’d like to point out that you can’t really use that argument because there’s many many maaaany other factors that have contributed to WoW’s economic success (their longevity being one of them) that you’re not controlling for in this comparison.

“WoW’s economy is better than GW2’s, because the game earns more money” is hardly a compelling argument.

EDIT: Though I would love it if someone could show me some compelling data that the player base is actually decreasing, for any reason really. No one knows, except Colin Johanson who has stated their core player base is actually increasing (And I’ll believe him. You see a similar trend on xfire too). You can use anecdotal evidence all you want, but in the end your personal opinions don’t really reflect the opinions of the player base as a whole.

Ursan.7846:

“WoW’s economy is better than GW2’s, because the game earns more money” is hardly a compelling argument.

EDIT: Though I would love it if someone could show me some compelling data that the player base is actually decreasing, for any reason really. No one knows, except Colin Johanson who has stated their core player base is actually increasing (And I’ll believe him. You see a similar trend on xfire too). You can use anecdotal evidence all you want, but in the end your personal opinions don’t really reflect the opinions of the player base as a whole.

I never used that argument, nor did I claim anywhere GW2 is failing/having success. I was just remarking about how all the white knights spend a ton of energy explaining how this whole TP thing is so brilliant and no one takes a second to explain how it makes the game, you know, more fun. And also, how saying to someone “if you don’t like it go away”, like lots of people are doing about legendaries, can be a double edged sword because people could actually follow the tip and go away, and I fail to see how Arenanet is going to profit from that.

By your same metrics, though, I’d like to see hard proof of how GW2’s player base as a whole is ecstatic about its brilliant economy and how everyone is convinced it’s the best thing since sliced bread and how it makes the game 1000% more fun for everyone.

My hunch is that if you’re after the big money, the smart bet is on games where everyone can get everything [and no, I’m not claiming it’s the only thing you would need]. But I’m not trying to convince anyone of it.

MagnusLL.8473:

I never used that argument, nor did I claim anywhere GW2 is failing/having success. I was just remarking about how all the white knights spend a ton of energy explaining how this whole TP thing is so brilliant and no one takes a second to explain how it makes the game, you know, more fun.

Why should anyone have to prove the TP makes the game “more fun?” Literally no one has complained that the TP makes the game less fun, and if they did, the burden of proof would be upon them to prove that it detracts from the enjoyment of the game. The only thing that people have claimed is (erroneously) that the economy is “bad” or not performing properly.

The “white knight” claims are more than tiresome, and rather pathetic. People disagree with you, and they have provided solid logic, evidence, and explanations as to why. If you have reason to disagree with that, provide that reason or remain quiet. Crying about how everyone who disagrees with you is [random ad hominem attack] is unbecoming.

MagnusLL.8473:

I never used that argument

MagnusLL.8473:

And yet Blizzard/Activision goes to town with billions of $$$/year. I wonder who’s the one being smart there.

Translation: Blizzard/Activision makes lots of $$$/year, they obviously have the smarter system.

Yeaaaaa no, you definitely used that argument.

MagnusLL.8473:

I was just remarking about how all the white knights spend a ton of energy explaining how this whole TP thing is so brilliant and no one takes a second to explain how it makes the game, you know, more fun.

The TP is great because it lets the global market dictate the price of goods, and makes it easy for you to buy/sell at that price. Find that rare item that you don’t plan on using? Sell it for for the price the market’s willing to pay easily. No need to go to trade forums to research the “True” value of the item like in GW1 so you don’t get ripped off.

Want to buy something? Go to the TP and buy it at market price. You have absolutely no fear of getting ripped off, because that item you bought for 20G for? Thousands of others paid 20G for also.

MagnusLL.8473:

By your same metrics, though, I’d like to see hard proof of how GW2’s player base as a whole is ecstatic about its brilliant economy and how everyone is convinced it’s the best thing since sliced bread and how it makes the game 1000% more fun for everyone.

The difference is that I’m not making claims such as “players will leave because of X.” Nor am I saying “Players love this game because of X.”

MagnusLL.8473:

My hunch is that if you’re after the big money, the smart bet is on games where everyone can get everything

First of all, there’s a distinction between “being able to get everything” and “being able to get everything quickly.”

The 2nd is terrible for lengthening game longetivity. Many players are motivated by progression of their characters, in this game cosmetic. If everyone was able to get everything rapidly, many people will lose motivation of play (Except the hardcore WvW/PvPers, but that really highlights the importance of user-created content vs dev-created content.)

The 1st is very possible in this game, you just have to spend a bit of time doing it.

Syeria.4812:

The “white knight” claims are more than tiresome, and rather pathetic. People disagree with you, and they have provided solid logic, evidence, and explanations as to why. If you have reason to disagree with that, provide that reason or remain quiet. Crying about how everyone who disagrees with you is [random ad hominem attack] is unbecoming.

Ehrrr…. what? People disagree with me on what, exactly?
If you’re talking about the state of the economy, I’ve never claimed the economy was either good or bad in any of my previous posts.

Ursan.7846:

MagnusLL.8473:

I never used that argument

MagnusLL.8473:

And yet Blizzard/Activision goes to town with billions of $$$/year. I wonder who’s the one being smart there.

Translation: Blizzard/Activision makes lots of $$$/year, they obviously have the smarter system.

Yeaaaaa no, you definitely used that argument.

“I wonder” is different from “they obviously have”. To be honest, it was also a remark directed at the accessibility of in-game goals rather than the economy itself.

Syeria.4812:

MagnusLL.8473:

By your same metrics, though, I’d like to see hard proof of how GW2’s player base as a whole is ecstatic about its brilliant economy and how everyone is convinced it’s the best thing since sliced bread and how it makes the game 1000% more fun for everyone.

The difference is that I’m not making claims such as “players will leave because of X.” Nor am I saying “Players love this game because of X.”

Show me where I did. While you try to do so, however, keep in mind that enunciating a possibility is different from making a claim.
I get the feeling you read a lot of things in my previous post I simply never wrote.

Syeria.4812:

The 2nd is terrible for lengthening game longetivity. Many players are motivated by progression of their characters, in this game cosmetic. If everyone was able to get everything rapidly, many people will lose motivation of play

How many is “many”?

Who is making claims now?

MagnusLL.8473:

Syeria.4812:

The “white knight” claims are more than tiresome, and rather pathetic. People disagree with you, and they have provided solid logic, evidence, and explanations as to why. If you have reason to disagree with that, provide that reason or remain quiet. Crying about how everyone who disagrees with you is [random ad hominem attack] is unbecoming.

Ehrrr…. what? People disagree with me on what, exactly?
If you’re talking about the state of the economy, I’ve never claimed the economy was either good or bad in any of my previous posts.

Way to completely not address the comment that was made. No one has established how the TP adds “fun” to the game as that has never been challenged. Therefore you have no point. If you would like to make the argument that the current economy detracts from the “fun level” of the game, feel free to do so, but be warned that you will be expected to back your claims up with logic or evidence.

Also, you should figure out how to use the quote function before breaking quotes up again as your post repeatedly attributed statements to the wrong people.

MagnusLL.8473:

Ehrrr…. what? People disagree with me on what, exactly?
If you’re talking about the state of the economy, I’ve never claimed the economy was either good or bad in any of my previous posts.

Wait, so what are we discussing then? I just thought you wanted a compelling argument why this TP is so nice and wonderful to have. Well, I gave it to you, but I see you felt the need to completely ignore that portion of the post?

People keep thinking in terms of “lets make this more profitable”, without realizing what would happen IMMEDIATELY after. If it starts making money, everyone will start doing it which would create the same cycle: supply goes up, demand goes down, profits go down.

Yeah, difficulty needs to be a part of profitability. It’s like, you can run CoF Path 1 in a given amount of time and get a given amount of gold. You should be able to take the same time to craft items and sell them for the same gold, but only IF it requires the same amount of skill and effort, not just clicking a few buttons in LA.

That’s why I suggested some sort of special resource that could not be purchased and that would require player participation to acquire. If high end crafted gear required this resource, but players wouldn’t seek out this resource unless they wanted to craft (the activities to earn it would not be great sources of XP/loot), then only people who cared about being crafters would be able to make the optimal gear, and the stuff they produced with it would be profitable enough to justify their efforts, but not so profitable that people would feel compelled to abandon other pursuits.

Even though the prices on the TP turned out to be on par with the material cost, it’s still better to possess the profession, as you’re not relying on other people to make the gear you want.

Yeah, but in practical terms most gear you can make, you can buy on the TP for less than the material costs. It’d be nice if that wasn’t the case though. Anyways, I’m not saying that crafting should be the most profitable thing, just that it should be profitable. If your goal is maximum profits, clever farming or dungeon runs should still be the most profitable methods, but a more complex crafting system should be reasonably profitable.

The ideal balance is that the crafting takes enough time and effort that while anyone can do it, most people wouldn’t want to bother, and so the crafters can make the items, sell them, and turn a profit, while the dungeoneers can do that, make money, and use it to buy crafted gear from others.

The problem with the current system is that all the difficulties and costs of crafting you can get as a side effect of leveling. If you get to 60 without crafting then you’ll have almost all the resources you’d need to master two crafts, enough cash to buy the rest, and doing so will not only produce a ton of random junk, but also level you the rest of the way to 80. There need to be tasks you need to complete to craft “useful” stuff that have nothing to do with the leveling path (but this is only if you want to profit from crafting, you should still be able to master the skills themselves using the existing methods).

And now we get to the real reason people complain about the economy. They’re not complaining about the economy, or how much profits can come from crafting, no. What they’re really complaining about is their lack of legendaries.

Can’t it be both? I don’t know, I’m not “on track” for a legendary, even setting aside the high cost resources needed to make one, I am also nowhere near the WvW requirements for it, but even so, I can look at items going for hundreds of gold on the TP and say “that just doesn’t make any kitten sense.”

If the rare items suddenly became easy to come by everyone would have one. Stop and think about that for a moment. The item that you’ve been hoping for and pining for (that in both the cases of legendaries and lodestone crafted items offer no stat advantages) would suddenly be everywhere.

Excellent! What kind of absolute kitten takes a look at the bow in his hand that shoots rainbows and unicorns, looks at another guy nearby with the same bow, and says to himself “aw, well now I’m no longer happy with my bow that shoots *kitten rainbows and kitten unicorns out of it,”* Anyone who wants a legendary because they want to show off how much money they have is a complete kitten, kitten them and the kitten imaginary horse they didn’t ride in on because GW2 doesn’t have mounts in it.

This would be the ideal market, in which people buy the things that they wants so that they look how they want to look, not how they can afford to look.

And why is it such a surprise that players who take the time to invest (as opposed to spending or even saving gold) have more money? Do you think this shouldn’t be? That if I handle my money wisely, don’t go buying every dumb set of armor my heart desires, take the time to examine a market, take advantage of opportunities I spot… that I should have no more money than you, who (most likely) does nothing but spend?

You’re combining two distinct positions here, one right, one wrong. Yes, players who SAVE money, who spend less than they could, and retain their money, should end up with more than player who waste theirs. Of course. However, players that “invest” money should not make more money than players who just save it up. You should not be able to make money from money. You should not be able to buy things and then sell them at a higher price than you purchased them at to end up with more money than you started with.

Ohoni.6057

Excellent! What kind of absolute kitten takes a look at the bow in his hand that shoots rainbows and unicorns, looks at another guy nearby with the same bow, and says to himself “aw, well now I’m no longer happy with my bow that shoots *kitten rainbows and kitten unicorns out of it,”* Anyone who wants a legendary because they want to show off how much money they have is a complete kitten, kitten them and the kitten imaginary horse they didn’t ride in on because GW2 doesn’t have mounts in it.

I thumbed up your post just for this part.

Unfortunately, while I more or less endorse what you’re saying wholeheartedly from an ethical standpoint of economics, human nature just won’t allow it. We are, as a general rule, greedy, selfish and power-hungry; we want to be rare, to stand out from the crowd, to be superior to other people. We can’t help it; it’s built into our very genetics.

As a result, we scheme and plot to raise ourselves up, and once we’ve made it, we do our darndest to prevent anyone else except those we favour (our “tribe”) from reaching the same position.

Ohoni.6057:

And now we get to the real reason people complain about the economy. They’re not complaining about the economy, or how much profits can come from crafting, no. What they’re really complaining about is their lack of legendaries.

Can’t it be both? I don’t know, I’m not “on track” for a legendary, even setting aside the high cost resources needed to make one, I am also nowhere near the WvW requirements for it, but even so, I can look at items going for hundreds of gold on the TP and say “that just doesn’t make any kitten sense.”

Why not? What is wrong with luxury items having a high cost?

It seems many people’s arguments hinge upon some sort of belief that certain items are “overpriced.” What’s the logic behind that? Why shouldn’t these items be expensive?

I thumbed up your post just for this part.

Unfortunately, while I more or less endorse what you’re saying wholeheartedly from an ethical standpoint of economics, human nature just won’t allow it. We are, as a general rule, greedy, selfish and power-hungry; we want to be rare, to stand out from the crowd, to be superior to other people. We can’t help it; it’s built into our very genetics.

As a result, we scheme and plot to raise ourselves up, and once we’ve made it, we do our darndest to prevent anyone else except those we favour (our “tribe”) from reaching the same position.

Maybe so, but unlike the real world, Tyria doesn’t have an invisible and uncaring deity, it has active developers, and they should not be supporting this type of behavior. They should use any tools they have available to reward players who just want what they want, rather than wanting other people to have less. They should make economics of exclusion harder to succeed at, not easier.

Why not? What is wrong with luxury items having a high cost?

This is a game. There is not a single item in this game that is a “necessity,” therefore ALL items are “luxuries.” There is no reason why “luxuries” should need to have an extremely high cost. Now, some things can cost more than others, certainly, but none need to cost as much more as some currently do in the marketplace, and conversely there are plenty of things that are probably going for too cheap, such as many crafted goods that sell well below the cost of their ingredients. There are many items currently selling for a 90%+ loss.

Also, the criteria for being able to afford those items should not be how good you are at playing the markets, it should be how well you play the actual game. Gameplay should be rewarded, not market-play.

I would feel far better about rocket-high prices of some items on the TP if I knew that the only people who could afford them were people who had been playing high level, high skill gameplay since day one, rather than people who had either exploited game benefits just enough not to get caught up in a dragnet for it, or that had leveraged the marketplace to turn some money into more money, and then more money into even more money, and so on until they had way more money than standard gameplay could produce.

Ohoni.6057:

This is a game. There is not a single item in this game that is a “necessity,” therefore ALL items are “luxuries.” There is no reason why “luxuries” should need to have an extremely high cost.

Oooooooooooooooh my god.

I’d like to see you do some dungeons without any armor, because apparently that isn’t a “necessity.”

This “this is a game! Nothing is necessary! Nothing is a luxury!” Line of argument is one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard.

You need armor and equipment because it gives you stats, which allow you to do content in-game. Cosmetic items do not give additional stats, and hence it is a luxury.

From a purely functional perspective, yes, there are gear that is “necessary” and gear that isn’t “necessary.” To say nothing is “necessary” because it’s a game is to completely ignore the context of the game itself.

Ohoni.6057:

Why not? What is wrong with luxury items having a high cost?

This is a game. There is not a single item in this game that is a “necessity,” therefore ALL items are “luxuries.” There is no reason why “luxuries” should need to have an extremely high cost. Now, some things can cost more than others, certainly, but none need to cost as much more as some currently do in the marketplace, and conversely there are plenty of things that are probably going for too cheap, such as many crafted goods that sell well below the cost of their ingredients. There are many items currently selling for a 90%+ loss.

Also, the criteria for being able to afford those items should not be how good you are at playing the markets, it should be how well you play the actual game. Gameplay should be rewarded, not market-play.

I would feel far better about rocket-high prices of some items on the TP if I knew that the only people who could afford them were people who had been playing high level, high skill gameplay since day one, rather than people who had either exploited game benefits just enough not to get caught up in a dragnet for it, or that had leveraged the marketplace to turn some money into more money, and then more money into even more money, and so on until they had way more money than standard gameplay could produce.

But you didn’t answer the question. Why shouldn’t there be extremely expensive items in the game? What logic do you follow that leads you to the conclusion that a particular item is “overpriced?”

It’s worth pointing out right here that there is not a single item in this game that cannot be attained simply by playing the game. For an example, a friend of mine completed his first legendary earlier this week without ever engaging in the market play you’re claiming is essential for that. He earned the items through regular gameplay, through farming them directly, and by farming other things for currency to buy them. The part he had the most trouble with was the badges of honor (until I reminded him that he could just do the jumping puzzles on multiple characters for them).

My impression from your posts is that you’re saying “The items I find but don’t want often aren’t very valuable and that’s bad, but the items I want are very expensive and I don’t like that.” But that’s what we should expect in any remotely functioning economy. If the items you have are things you don’t want, odds are that other players of the game share a lot of the same basic preferences as you, so they don’t want them either. If no one wants those items, they won’t have much value because there’s no demand for them. Likewise, the items you want are likely the same items that other people want because there’s a lot of preference overlap between players. Due to this, these items are very valuable because demand for them is high.

Syeria.4812:

It’s worth pointing out right here that there is not a single item in this game that cannot be attained simply by playing the game. .

I call and raise you a Final Rest!

Ursan.7846:

Ohoni.6057:

This is a game. There is not a single item in this game that is a “necessity,” therefore ALL items are “luxuries.” There is no reason why “luxuries” should need to have an extremely high cost.

Oooooooooooooooh my god.

I’d like to see you do some dungeons without any armor, because apparently that isn’t a “necessity.”

This “this is a game! Nothing is necessary! Nothing is a luxury!” Line of argument is one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard.

You need armor and equipment because it gives you stats, which allow you to do content in-game. Cosmetic items do not give additional stats, and hence it is a luxury.

From a purely functional perspective, yes, there are gear that is “necessary” and gear that isn’t “necessary.” To say nothing is “necessary” because it’s a game is to completely ignore the context of the game itself.

To add on to this, specifically dealing with legendaries or items like Infinite Light or destroyer/corrupted weapons:

These items are pure luxury items because perfect substitutes for them (in everything except for appearance) exist at very low costs. Infinite Light (which costs about 900g to make) is functionally identical to an Explorer’s Pearl Sabre (3.3g) with a Superior Sigil of Luck (1.4g). The only difference between the two is their appearance.

Essence Snow.3194:

Syeria.4812:

It’s worth pointing out right here that there is not a single item in this game that cannot be attained simply by playing the game. .

I call and raise you a Final Rest!

I call your bluff by demanding you prove Final Rest actually exists! I will accept you showing me how it’s acquired as proof.

Syeria.4812:

Essence Snow.3194:

Syeria.4812:

It’s worth pointing out right here that there is not a single item in this game that cannot be attained simply by playing the game. .

I call and raise you a Final Rest!

I call your bluff by demanding you prove Final Rest actually exists! I will accept you showing me how it’s acquired as proof.

This is the point at which I knew how to link things……but, all the info you seek can be found in 2 threads….1 in the crafting section and one in general chat. There is ofc the data mined code for it, which allows it to be on databases, not to mention the 2 dev comments confirming it’s existence.

edit see if this works:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/crafting/Final-Rest-how-do-you-get-it/first
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Final-Rest-Current-Theories/first
http://www.gw2db.com/items/68519-final-rest
[&AgGgSwAA] <—-use that code in game to see it

I’d like to see you do some dungeons without any armor, because apparently that isn’t a “necessity.”

You don’t have to run that dungeon. You can park your character in LA all day, they won’t die of hunger or exposure. If you want the luxury of visiting high level dungeons you might need high end gear, but that’s your choice.

The point is, nothing in this game is not a luxury. It’s a game, it’s all luxury. Everything in it exists not for survival, but to enable your fun. Maybe doing high level dungeons is how you have fun, and if so, having a full set of orange gear might make that easier. Maybe firing unicorns at zombies is how you have fun, and if so, you need a Dreamer for that. In either case they are just tools for enabling you having fun.

You need armor and equipment because it gives you stats, which allow you to do content in-game. Cosmetic items do not give additional stats, and hence it is a luxury.

That’s only if you believe that running high end content is the only way to enjoy this game. Some people value their character’s appearance more than they do their character’s stats.

But you didn’t answer the question. Why shouldn’t there be extremely expensive items in the game? What logic do you follow that leads you to the conclusion that a particular item is “overpriced?”

Why should there be extremely expensive items? Who benefits from that? All that a high price does is put an item out of reach of a lot of players. Why is that a good thing? You can make item A more expensive than item B to encourage people to go for item B instead, but beyond a certain point the price discrepancy becomes more punitive than it ever needs to be.

My impression from your posts is that you’re saying “The items I find but don’t want often aren’t very valuable and that’s bad, but the items I want are very expensive and I don’t like that.” But that’s what we should expect in any remotely functioning economy. If the items you have are things you don’t want, odds are that other players of the game share a lot of the same basic preferences as you, so they don’t want them either. If no one wants those items, they won’t have much value because there’s no demand for them. Likewise, the items you want are likely the same items that other people want because there’s a lot of preference overlap between players. Due to this, these items are very valuable because demand for them is high.

Sure, and if the difference in value between the stuff I’ve got, but don’t want, and the stuff I want, but don’t got, was only a relatively small margin, then sure, fair enough. But if I were to sell everything that I’ve got, and still only have 1/10th or less of what it would cost to get what I want, then I believe that something is wrong there, either the value of what I’ve been getting is too low, and thus the floor need to be raised, or the cost of the things I want are too high, and thus the ceiling should be lowered.

These items are pure luxury items because perfect substitutes for them (in everything except for appearance) exist at very low costs. Infinite Light (which costs about 900g to make) is functionally identical to an Explorer’s Pearl Sabre (3.3g) with a Superior Sigil of Luck (1.4g). The only difference between the two is their appearance.

That may be important if all you’re going for it being able to run dungeons, but what if your goal is instead to have a sword made of glowing golden runes? Can the Pearl Saber do that as well?

Mourningcry.9428:

plasmacutter.2709:

…
I graduated from a top 10 econ program, understood the subject better in my sleep than most of the people nosing the grindstone, and I say this game has a bad economy.

….

here are some examples from a real economy:

So much wrong here…

when aluminum becomes too expensive, auto manufacturers can swap to steel.
Try swapping a crystalline lodestone for a charged one and see how far that gets you.

Horrid example of a substitute, and a profound ignorance of manufacturing.. not even mentioning resourcing, contractual, operational, or even the regulatory costs of “just switching”. With resepct to GW2, one of the main price factors of legendaries (and hence all the subsequent components required to acheive one) is intangible – all exotics of the same stat and item type are legitamate substitues with resepct to performance, only in that the skins are the intangible which commands the degree of price variance between them. And even then, being able to transmute them makes skins an even more universal commodity.

When the price of oil skyrockets, everyone goes out drilling for more. The price of precursors is rocketing out of control, but the horrific drop rate makes volunteering to add to that supply a ludicrous option.

Again, the start up cost is a significant barrier of entry for “everyone” going out and drilling for more" which inhernetly allows for the preclusion of the majority. Fruther the incremental cost of adding a new drill site for an established oil company is vastly different between even established participants much less then the start up cost for a new drilling company.

Likewise, if you have already have a precursor, and are willing to sell it, acquiring the next precursor and repeating the process is much less then someone who doesn’t have one to start with. The barrier of entry to getting that first precursor is the same for everyone.

When you plant crops, you will, barring a horrific natural disaster or outright negligence, be able to reap what you sow. If you go to farm in GW2 you get a backpack full of porous bones.

Wow… And therefore there’s absolutely no need for a commodities market…. by the same logic, eveyone should be a farmer because reaping what you sow would always be profitable, regardless of any methods of production, costs, prices, etc.

This, is a bad economy. So bad it, along with ANet’s insistence on swinging and missing wildly with the nerf club before even making the trait lines of half the professions in the game have the novel concept of “synergy”, discourages me from logging on.

Perhaps the time may be better spent on another degree?

Let me get this straight, please.

Fallacy #1 – argumentum ad verecundiam
You seem to ignore the continuous shift between steel and aluminum casting of parts in the auto industry (easily proven by talking to any experienced auto mechanic), and produce a very verbose but substance-free “rebuttal” consisting of “it.. it’s not analogous because I said so”.

You use the excuse of “startup costs” to refute the idea that a healthy economy will see a “resource rush” as a counter-force to a price that skyrockets out of control. I’m sorry, it doesn’t fly. Modern gold and diamond mining operations, as well as the proliferation of oil rigs, knocks this feeble argument clean out of the water.

Fallacy #2 – the straw man.
You then set up this straw man idea that farming raw materials and ONLY raw materials will produce prsperity for everyone, then knock it over, as if that has anything to do with the point I was making.

Please return to your 7th grade logic class and get a passing grade this time, or go to Fox News where you will most certainly have a promising career.

Ohoni.6057:

You don’t have to run that dungeon.

There’s a difference between “you can’t” and “you choose not to.”

How players want to play is their own choice. Some people want to WvW, some people like to dungeon, etc. What players choose to do is their own choice. However, content can’t be gated too severely, or you’re severely limiting a player’s choice on how to play.

This is why exotics in GW2 have max stats, and are relatively easy to get. It allows people to not worry about content being gated from them because of gear.

“Looking pretty with a sword” is not gameplay. No content/gameplay is denied from them. Which is why pretty swords are classified as luxury items.

Though I probably will never persuade you otherwise, this is Anet’s philosophy. They completely endorse grind for cosmetic gear. This has been their mantra in GW1, and now GW2. It’s a system that worked for them in GW1.

Ursan.7846:

Ohoni.6057:

You don’t have to run that dungeon.

There’s a difference between “you can’t” and “you choose not to.”

How players want to play is their own choice. Some people want to WvW, some people like to dungeon, etc. What players choose to do is their own choice. However, content can’t be gated too severely, or you’re severely limiting a player’s choice on how to play.

This is why exotics in GW2 have max stats, and are relatively easy to get. It allows people to not worry about content being gated from them because of gear.

“Looking pretty with a sword” is not gameplay. No content/gameplay is denied from them. Which is why pretty swords are classified as luxury items.

Though I probably will never persuade you otherwise, this is Anet’s philosophy. They completely endorse grind for cosmetic gear. This has been their mantra in GW1, and now GW2. It’s a system that worked for them in GW1.

Grind is not the issue so long as the goal, no matter how distant, has a guarantee that you will attain it.

This is where their economy is “bad”.

Prices are inflating faster than real, normal players can make money, and whenever normal players find a way, they nerf it, so only exploiters, manipulators, and no-life basement dwellers have access to anything beyond the most basic of basic visual upgrades.

WoW provided a much higher supply for in-demand end-game items, resulting in prices which were high, but still stable, and thus attainable by people who slowly but surely worked toward that goal.

This is especially true for crafting and DR on loot.

In other games, if the price of something on the TP is too high, you can get it yourself. The end result will certainly not net you a profit if you use them to craft, but you will slowly reach your goal of crafting that weapon skin.

Try doing it in this game, try farming a stack of lodestones I dare you!

Essence Snow.3194:

Syeria.4812:

It’s worth pointing out right here that there is not a single item in this game that cannot be attained simply by playing the game. .

I call and raise you a Final Rest!

How sure are you about that? from what little i gather no one has figured out just how to attain it yet, if its even possible.

chances are its also a mf item, just a less logical combination, and If it was atleast we’ll see another gold rush.

Lets late a global look on the market with materials in GW2
The market with mats will ultimately fail at some point because of this:

1. Who ads the value to mats ? Crafters
2. So who is the target group for purchasing materials ? Crafters
3. Is crafting viable ? In global point of view NO. 90% crafted items are not profitable
4. people will soon realise that the crafting is not profitable
5. The target group for purchasing mats will dissapear
6. The market with mats will collapse

or maybe not because max crafting is also achievment so people will level crafting only because of that and its a pain to collect all mats so they will buy them from TP

plasmacutter.2709:

Prices are inflating faster than real, normal players can make money, and whenever normal players find a way, they nerf it, so only exploiters, manipulators, and no-life basement dwellers have access to anything beyond the most basic of basic visual upgrades.

WoW provided a much higher supply for in-demand end-game items, resulting in prices which were high, but still stable, and thus attainable by people who slowly but surely worked toward that goal.

This is especially true for crafting and DR on loot.

In other games, if the price of something on the TP is too high, you can get it yourself. The end result will certainly not net you a profit if you use them to craft, but you will slowly reach your goal of crafting that weapon skin.

Try doing it in this game, try farming a stack of lodestones I dare you!

Do you realize, the faster/more people farm for gold (sell loot to npc, do dungeon runs, etc), the faster they inflate goods?

John,

The problem here is not really about your TP or economy system design. It’s pretty much the best I’ve seen in any game. But this is not an economy game. There was a HUGE mistake by placing the legendary and its prerequisites as TP listed objects.

We are here to play as adventurers, we are warriors, archers and wizards. We kill Ogres, Trolls and Dragons. We simply don’t care about economy and I don’t need more gold that what’s needed to get a beer barrel and sharpen my axe. Now,… how did the big end rewards for long term achievements ended up bottle neck in the TP?

This is why people complain.

Nobody complained in Wow when players reached ridiculous amount of gold, because all the big shines were at the end of a dungeon and everyone who can make it there (playing the game) would have access to it.

I can tell you from my personal experience that this is not the case for us guild warriors. I achieved almost anything the game has to offer. From Dungeon Master tittle, to world completition, WvW kills, even the whole jumping puzzle list. I have hundreds of Dragon and many other big bosses kills. I like to go exploring and solo whatever champion I find around…. I even went far on Fractals just to experience the hardest content. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying come here and hand me a Legendary; but why is it that I’m SO far from it? Even if I get lucky enough to get a precursor… I would still be around 400g away from it. I’ve been doing dungeons and anything at my reach on daily basis… I play every day and have over 850 hours in my Warrior. The one and only thing I don’t do is play the TP and this is why “I fail” at this and can’t have my Legendary yet. It all comes to this… economy and TP. The huge bottle neck of the game for us who play the game.

Of course, you don’t NEED a Legendary to play the game, but so far it is the only one big reward implemented and of course, us adventurers; think we deserve a better chance at getting one that the people standing inside Lions Arch the whole day.

Mesket.5728:

John,

The problem here is not really about your TP or economy system design. It’s pretty much the best I’ve seen in any game. But this is not an economy game. There was a HUGE mistake by placing the legendary and its prerequisites as TP listed objects.

We are here to play as adventurers, we are warriors, archers and wizards. We kill Ogres, Trolls and Dragons. We simply don’t care about economy and I don’t need more gold that what’s needed to get a beer barrel and sharpen my axe. Now,… how did the big end rewards for long term achievements ended up bottle neck in the TP?

This is why people complain.

Nobody complained in Wow when players reached ridiculous amount of gold, because all the big shines were at the end of a dungeon and everyone who can make it (playing the game) there would have access to it.

I can tell you from my personal experience that this is not the case for us guild warriors. I achieved almost anything the game has to offer. From Dungeon Master tittle, to world completition, WvW kills, even the whole jumping puzzle list. I have hundreds of Dragon and many other big bosses kills. I like to go exploring and solo whatever champion I find around…. I even went far on Fractals just to experience the hardest content. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying come here and hand me a Legendary; but why is it that I’m SO far from it? Even if I get lucky enough to get a precursor… I’m would still around 400g away from it. I’ve been doing dungeons and anything at my reach on daily basis… I play every day and have over 850 hours in my Warrior. The one and only thing I don’t do is play the TP and this is why “I fail” at this and can’t have my Legendary yet. It all comes to this… economy and TP. The huge bottle neck of the game for us who plays the game.

Of course, you don’t NEED a Legendary to play the game, but so far it is the only one big reward implemented and of course, us adventurers; think we deserve a better chance at getting one that the people standing inside Lions Arch the whole day.

1. Who are you to dictate how players should play the game? Contrary to nature, a lot of people gain “fun” from playing the market. Case in point, neopets (if you know that). Stupid cute web page game, but has a “stock market” section. Even if it wasn’t advertised, the feature is there and people derive fun out of playing with it.

2. The fact that there are multiple people who have multiple legendaries (which some, i reckon, aren’t tp players) indicate that legendaries are attainable and fine as they are.

penatbater.4710:

Of course, you don’t NEED a Legendary to play the game, but so far it is the only one big reward implemented and of course, us adventurers; think we deserve a better chance at getting one that the people standing inside Lions Arch the whole day.

1. Who are you to dictate how players should play the game? Contrary to nature, a lot of people gain “fun” from playing the market. Case in point, neopets (if you know that). Stupid cute web page game, but has a “stock market” section. Even if it wasn’t advertised, the feature is there and people derive fun out of playing with it.

2. The fact that there are multiple people who have multiple legendaries (which some, i reckon, aren’t tp players) indicate that legendaries are attainable and fine as they are.

1.This is not a stock market game, and the simple point that someone might be playing the market because its the most fun they have in it is absurd.

2. Legendaries are another additional content that does not change your in game stats, so whoever wants to put that much effort into getting one is welcome to do so. I for one don’t care so much about the appearance, but the skill lvl of people.

penatbater.4710:

Mesket.5728:

John,

The problem here is not really about your TP or economy system design. It’s pretty much the best I’ve seen in any game. But this is not an economy game. There was a HUGE mistake by placing the legendary and its prerequisites as TP listed objects.

We are here to play as adventurers, we are warriors, archers and wizards. We kill Ogres, Trolls and Dragons. We simply don’t care about economy and I don’t need more gold that what’s needed to get a beer barrel and sharpen my axe. Now,… how did the big end rewards for long term achievements ended up bottle neck in the TP?

This is why people complain.

Nobody complained in Wow when players reached ridiculous amount of gold, because all the big shines were at the end of a dungeon and everyone who can make it (playing the game) there would have access to it.

I can tell you from my personal experience that this is not the case for us guild warriors. I achieved almost anything the game has to offer. From Dungeon Master tittle, to world completition, WvW kills, even the whole jumping puzzle list. I have hundreds of Dragon and many other big bosses kills. I like to go exploring and solo whatever champion I find around…. I even went far on Fractals just to experience the hardest content. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying come here and hand me a Legendary; but why is it that I’m SO far from it? Even if I get lucky enough to get a precursor… I’m would still around 400g away from it. I’ve been doing dungeons and anything at my reach on daily basis… I play every day and have over 850 hours in my Warrior. The one and only thing I don’t do is play the TP and this is why “I fail” at this and can’t have my Legendary yet. It all comes to this… economy and TP. The huge bottle neck of the game for us who plays the game.

Of course, you don’t NEED a Legendary to play the game, but so far it is the only one big reward implemented and of course, us adventurers; think we deserve a better chance at getting one that the people standing inside Lions Arch the whole day.

1. Who are you to dictate how players should play the game? Contrary to nature, a lot of people gain “fun” from playing the market. Case in point, neopets (if you know that). Stupid cute web page game, but has a “stock market” section. Even if it wasn’t advertised, the feature is there and people derive fun out of playing with it.

2. The fact that there are multiple people who have multiple legendaries (which some, i reckon, aren’t tp players) indicate that legendaries are attainable and fine as they are.

1.- During my whole joruney in Tyria, it was never pointed out to me that I should glue my face to the Black Lion Trading Post company representative and do business there for hours. Maybe I missed something?

2.- Yes, I know a few… they all had lotery luck with precursor drops and it was due to TP that they were able to sell and buy whats needed. I know noone who got a legendary without stepping into the TP at least several times.

I kind of agree, the economy is horrible in this game, a capitalists wet dream.

John Smith.4610:

I have to make the argument that your deals are coming at the expense of another player. You are arguing against market efficiency because you want to exploit other people easier, I don’t agree that’s a positive goal for the game overall (though I make no judgement about personal goals).

I have to make the argument that this is exactly how the TP already works, all the time. You call it “market efficiency” but it’s really just “he who knows what the deals are, wins.” I don’t personally agree with the person you’re responding to, but you’re trying to attack his point by holding up the gold standard model of what his point is already about. He is simply asking that the market be easier for him to play – as opposed to the people who play the market now.

Mesket has a good point. There are two games here: the MMO, and the day-trading mini-game (TP PvP). It’s become abundantly clear that being good at one yields far superior results than being good at the other, and they really don’t have much in common. It’s frustrating when you’re no good at TP PvP. You’ll never get the kind of gear / fun items / whatever that people who are good at it will get, no matter how long you play the rest of the game. Certainly the “play however you want” quote gets abused too much on this forum, but ultimately there is only one effective way to acquire end-game gear, and that’s by playing John Smith’s economic mini-game.

Malediktus: The person having the wet dream is John Smith. Seriously, the guy loves pure capitalism. I, personally, was never a real fan, but this game has taught me that I will not enjoy another pure capitalism-based game again.

selan.8354:

get sims 2 type the code rosebud around 100 times, build your mansion and be on the top of the world and then come back to GW 2 with lots of energy to farm and play.

At least in SIMS (no cheats needed) I didn’t have to make profit by reselling my chairs and wall materials to be able to purchase something new. I just played with my character having fun and the income would be enough to achieve anything in the long term.

Here, its impossible. Play the game, you earn 10, TP players raise prices 20. You earn 50, TP players raise prices 150.

Lets go play Need for Speed! but this time, if you don’t spend hours reselling car parts instead of racing with it, you won’t get the best one.

I can do this all day but I’m afraid people will still not get the point…

the ONLY hope for us players is to bypass the system with that 0,00001% of getting a precursor out of the box that will save us…

In other words, we are the working class who pays for the riches and put our hopes in a lotery. Pretty sad and pathetic analogy for what real life is.

Well done ANET but it kind of ruin the fantasy and kill the game,

Lafiel.9372:

It’s amazing how there are people complaining about a perfectly healthy economy. It’s like people PREFER inflation to occur and to have big numbers in their bank that are worth nothing.

As I always say, the supply price can only be as high as what the demand is willing to pay!

This kind of reflects in real life too. A lot of young people think real money is made off salary but it’s not! For example, sure dentist usually get paid well, but well place investments easily out earn a man’s salary/wage. The key here is to apply both in conjunction. Why do you frown upon some well placed investments which literally any monkey can learn. There aren’t that many economic experts in the game world, just kids experimenting with stuff (the real ones are making real money, not virtual money…)

Perfectly healthy economy you say…
Example:
In which healthy economy you buy a brand new car only to get it apart to get the junk and sell the junk because the junk is worth more than the brand new car ?

I which healthy economy you craft something from materials that costs X and the final product that cost Y and the X is 5 times more than the Y ?

matemaster.2168:

Lets late a global look on the market with materials in GW2
The market with mats will ultimately fail at some point because of this:

1. Who ads the value to mats ? Crafters
2. So who is the target group for purchasing materials ? Crafters
3. Is crafting viable ? In global point of view NO. 90% crafted items are not profitable
4. people will soon realise that the crafting is not profitable
5. The target group for purchasing mats will dissapear
6. The market with mats will collapse

or maybe not because max crafting is also achievment so people will level crafting only because of that and its a pain to collect all mats so they will buy them from TP

Just throwing out there, (and, I have never seen this from ArenaNet), that in EVERY other game I have played, sooner or later the devs say crafting is designed as a MONEY and time SINK, not to make people rich. HOWEVER, they have also said that crafters usually have MORE money, due to producing stuff.

For me, I craft not to be rich per say, but so I can have gear when I want it, at a price I want, and, heck,, Anet LETS ME GET XP FOR IT. (Interesting side note, a friend went from zero to 400 cooking yesterday, and gained 15 levels.) My guildies say I am usually the guy, in every game, who has money while they run around broke.

I will say that, as long as people are joining the game, or creating alts, or, in this game, changing professions, materials will always have a market, voiding your points 5 and 6.

arabeth.2361:

John Smith.4610:

I have to make the argument that your deals are coming at the expense of another player. You are arguing against market efficiency because you want to exploit other people easier, I don’t agree that’s a positive goal for the game overall (though I make no judgement about personal goals).

I have to make the argument that this is exactly how the TP already works, all the time. You call it “market efficiency” but it’s really just “he who knows what the deals are, wins.” I don’t personally agree with the person you’re responding to, but you’re trying to attack his point by holding up the gold standard model of what his point is already about. He is simply asking that the market be easier for him to play – as opposed to the people who play the market now.

Mesket has a good point. There are two games here: the MMO, and the day-trading mini-game (TP PvP). It’s become abundantly clear that being good at one yields far superior results than being good at the other, and they really don’t have much in common. It’s frustrating when you’re no good at TP PvP. You’ll never get the kind of gear / fun items / whatever that people who are good at it will get, no matter how long you play the rest of the game. Certainly the “play however you want” quote gets abused too much on this forum, but ultimately there is only one effective way to acquire end-game gear, and that’s by playing John Smith’s economic mini-game.

Malediktus: The person having the wet dream is John Smith. Seriously, the guy loves pure capitalism. I, personally, was never a real fan, but this game has taught me that I will not enjoy another pure capitalism-based game again.

Thank you for understanding.

As I said before, I don’t blame John Smith here… his TP system is great and I always liked that this game has a harsh economy (expensive WPs, repairs, etc paired with low income from dungeons or killin); but this is not the point exactly.

I couldn’t care less for people getting richer and richer, as long as it doesn’t affect my game. Thing is, my game now is to aquire a Legendary (like everyone else) and I’m willing to do whatever challenge the game has prepared for me. Problem is, the challenge here has nothing to do with playing a fantasy MMO. The challenge relies on knowing economy, having lots of hours online to keep track of your deals and invest lots of gold to make more gold.

I dont know… I joined this game to use my axe to make gold (yeah, as stupid as it sound but I think we all had a similar idea at the begining) and not use gold to make gold. I leave that to real life.

Sad thing is, it’s not possible to fix this by increasing one part of the game income. This will only raises TP prices even further as players will have more gold to purchase things.

I just hope next campaign will have a new set of Legendaries and those will have NOTHING to do with items or drops but with ingame challenges.

I really don’t get why people are against an economy… seeing from the forum posts it seems that people actually want a game where every item has a fix prize… let’s say 1000g for high end items and every enemy you kill grants you 5 copper. Now you know exaaaactly how much time you’ll need, there are no random loot drops and no other kind of drops…

What? Does that sound boring to you? Well guess what: people actually like loot. They actually like the ability to sell things for a price they seem fitting. But are people that understand the market evil? Is it a bad economy if players can decide prices THEMSELFS??? I think not..

Another example of “evil” market players: if i bought 100 ectos at 14s ea ( ~ 5-6 months ago) in order to craft some exotics and my exotic armour. But then i decide that i like dungeon armour more and i start farming it. Well surprise 5 months later i still have my ectos and they are 40s now. Am i an evil market manipulator now?? Because that is basically what market flippers do… this is neither evil nor a bad economy.

It let’s you a lot of freedom but appaerently that’s not what players want…

Lucas of the Desert.2165:

I really don’t get why people are against an economy… seeing from the forum posts it seems that people actually want a game where every item has a fix prize… let’s say 1000g for high end items and every enemy you kill grants you 5 copper. Now you know exaaaactly how much time you’ll need, there are no random loot drops and no other kind of drops…

What? Does that sound boring to you? Well guess what: people actually like loot. They actually like the ability to sell things for a price they seem fitting. But are people that understand the market evil? Is it a bad economy if players can decide prices THEMSELFS??? I think not..

Another example of “evil” market players: if i bought 100 ectos at 14s ea ( ~ 5-6 months ago) in order to craft some exotics and my exotic armour. But then i decide that i like dungeon armour more and i start farming it. Well surprise 5 months later i still have my ectos and they are 40s now. Am i an evil market manipulator now?? Because that is basically what market flippers do… this is neither evil nor a bad economy.

It let’s you a lot of freedom but appaerently that’s not what players want…

Well just like RL, the poor like to hate the rich for the sake of being rich. They seem to think that the poor class deserves as much wealth as the rich, but they don’t want to make the sacrifices that the rich make.

Vol.5241:

Lucas of the Desert.2165:

I really don’t get why people are against an economy… seeing from the forum posts it seems that people actually want a game where every item has a fix prize… let’s say 1000g for high end items and every enemy you kill grants you 5 copper. Now you know exaaaactly how much time you’ll need, there are no random loot drops and no other kind of drops…

What? Does that sound boring to you? Well guess what: people actually like loot. They actually like the ability to sell things for a price they seem fitting. But are people that understand the market evil? Is it a bad economy if players can decide prices THEMSELFS??? I think not..

Another example of “evil” market players: if i bought 100 ectos at 14s ea ( ~ 5-6 months ago) in order to craft some exotics and my exotic armour. But then i decide that i like dungeon armour more and i start farming it. Well surprise 5 months later i still have my ectos and they are 40s now. Am i an evil market manipulator now?? Because that is basically what market flippers do… this is neither evil nor a bad economy.

It let’s you a lot of freedom but appaerently that’s not what players want…

Well just like RL, the poor like to hate the rich for the sake of being rich. They seem to think that the poor class deserves as much wealth as the rich, but they don’t want to make the sacrifices that the rich make.

The big difference is that “the poor” here, are playing a game, by the game theme and think that “the rich” who just make rich by staying the same place (LA) the whole day are not.

In an epic fantasy game where dragon spread terror and villages get raided by centaurs… who deserves the reward? the Hero? or the Merchant?

This game made a wrong turn somewhere…

PS: DONT FORGET THIS IS A GAME! A FANTASY GAME! NOT MONOPOLY!

plasmacutter.2709:

Let me get this straight, please.

Fallacy #1 – argumentum ad verecundiam
You seem to ignore the continuous shift between steel and aluminum casting of parts in the auto industry (easily proven by talking to any experienced auto mechanic), and produce a very verbose but substance-free “rebuttal” consisting of “it.. it’s not analogous because I said so”.

Do you even undestand what “argumentum ad verecundiam” is? Obviously not, or you wouldn’t suggest your assumptions are fact just by “talking to any experienced auto mechanic”. The assumption that the expertise of just “any” expericed auto mechanic upon any and all auto part manufacturing decisions being conclusive is just absurd.

Further, the concept of a substitute is something that you brought up but failed to use properly with the Steel-Aluminum analogy. What you failed to acknowledge is that these are not legitimate substitutes. You claim “real-world” examples, but fail in that “aluminum to steel” is a shift, not a substitute. One model of the same car, from the same production line, from the same model year doesn’t arbitrarily have steel or aluminum depending upon a whim. The engineering and manufacturing changes needed to accommodate this shift is not trivial, nor arbitrary.

You use the excuse of “startup costs” to refute the idea that a healthy economy will see a “resource rush” as a counter-force to a price that skyrockets out of control. I’m sorry, it doesn’t fly. Modern gold and diamond mining operations, as well as the proliferation of oil rigs, knocks this feeble argument clean out of the water.

The key concept to understand is that of barrier of entry, in this case, being the start-up cost. The proliferation you site, is no doubt, a proliferation within the industry itself, is more of an expansion by existing participants, rather than an increase in the number of the participants in the industry itself. Simply put, the startup costs are a significant barrier of entry for every Tom, Dick, and Harry, from going out and plopping down an oil rig. The proliferation is a factor of the marginal cost for the Exons, BPs, and Mobiles to plop down another rig.

With respect to GW2, and in the example I gave, the barrier of entry is the initial acquisition of the pre-cursor. Further, this is in direct response to your assertion of lack of contribution to the precursor market.

Fallacy #2 – the straw man.
You then set up this straw man idea that farming raw materials and ONLY raw materials will produce prsperity for everyone, then knock it over, as if that has anything to do with the point I was making.

Are you trying to pull a straw man? My response was in direct response to your analogy or “reaping what you sow”, which is ridiculous at best. Obviously, my sarcasm was lost on you. If crop production was as stable and only affected by “a horrific disaster” then it would stand to reason, that everyone would be a producer because of the guaranteed return.

In summary, you claim “real world” examples as analogies to in game mechanics. But all your “real world” examples are flawed, and are sandboxed with set conditions which ignore other “real world” factors (i.e. natural disasters being the only factor in crop prices, or engineering and manufacturing limitations). My initial response to your post was meant to refute these unsubstantiated and flawed real-world analogies.

Mesket.5728:

Vol.5241:

Lucas of the Desert.2165:

I really don’t get why people are against an economy… seeing from the forum posts it seems that people actually want a game where every item has a fix prize… let’s say 1000g for high end items and every enemy you kill grants you 5 copper. Now you know exaaaactly how much time you’ll need, there are no random loot drops and no other kind of drops…

What? Does that sound boring to you? Well guess what: people actually like loot. They actually like the ability to sell things for a price they seem fitting. But are people that understand the market evil? Is it a bad economy if players can decide prices THEMSELFS??? I think not..

Another example of “evil” market players: if i bought 100 ectos at 14s ea ( ~ 5-6 months ago) in order to craft some exotics and my exotic armour. But then i decide that i like dungeon armour more and i start farming it. Well surprise 5 months later i still have my ectos and they are 40s now. Am i an evil market manipulator now?? Because that is basically what market flippers do… this is neither evil nor a bad economy.

It let’s you a lot of freedom but appaerently that’s not what players want…

Well just like RL, the poor like to hate the rich for the sake of being rich. They seem to think that the poor class deserves as much wealth as the rich, but they don’t want to make the sacrifices that the rich make.

The big difference is that “the poor” here, are playing a game, by the game theme and think that “the rich” who just make rich by staying the same place (LA) the whole day are not.

In an epic fantasy game where dragon spread terror and villages get raided by centaurs… who deserves the reward? the Hero? or the Merchant?

This game made a wrong turn somewhere…

PS: DONT FORGET THIS IS A GAME! A FANTASY GAME! NOT MONOPOLY!

But as long as there is an economy people can get money through trading. Take GW1 for example. How many players have bought ectos off of unknowing ones that sold them for 6-7k and sold them for 9k? Or the bracelet of truth (i guess it’s called in english) which were flipped all the time for money. Or BDS or froggys or celestial foci.. i could go on about this but i guess you see the point.

The problem is that GW2 makes players very well aware of ghe trading post and the opportunites that go hand in hand with it. Although this is probably one of the best decisions they made, since everyone’s now able to participate with an almost common knowledge, it leads to people crying in the forums about how unfair it is of other players to make a profit…

“Looking pretty with a sword” is not gameplay. No content/gameplay is denied from them. Which is why pretty swords are classified as luxury items.

Again, you are pushing your own personal preferences when you value function over appearance. Not all players agree with you that being capable of performing in dungeons is more important to them than looking good. Not all players value dungeon running, you know.

1. Who ads the value to mats ? Crafters
2. So who is the target group for purchasing materials ? Crafters
3. Is crafting viable ? In global point of view NO. 90% crafted items are not profitable
4. people will soon realise that the crafting is not profitable
5. The target group for purchasing mats will dissapear
6. The market with mats will collapse

Not really. The problem with this is that 1. most “crafters” in this game are not true crafter types, they are standard adventurers that are burning through crafting either to level up their character or max the skills needed for their legendary. They may not value the process, but they do need the components as they go. And 2. crafting mats are used for more than strict crafting, mostly in Mystic Forge recipes for high end gear, which uses massive stacks of them. This is why some high end crafting mats sell for exponentially more than other mats in the same tier, because stacks of 250 of them are vital to highly desirable Forge recipes.

If they were to remove the character XP from leveling crafting then the price of T1-5 mats would plummet overnight to vendor trash levels. If they were to greatly reduce the cost of mystic forge recipes, from 2-3 stacks of T6 components to maybe 10-15 of each or something, then the price of T6 materials would plummet overnight to, if not vendor levels, at least a fraction of their current cost.

1.This is not a stock market game, and the simple point that someone might be playing the market because its the most fun they have in it is absurd.

/Second. If people want to play a stock market game, then that’s fine, there are other games for that, but I do not want this game to be considered a stock market game, because their play griefs the rest of us. It is anathema to the sort of “players helping players” philosophy that the rest of the game is designed around.

Vol.5241:

they don’t want to make the sacrifices that the rich make.

LOL!

Mesket: Actually, I think it would be possible to adjust some of that TP PvP stuff downwards… Doing things like limiting TP listings to, say, 50/day, and never introducing items that make TP posting faster/easier (like I think they are doing/have done) would help. Making the maximum TP value 999 instead of 9999 would certainly set an upper limit on profit margins as well (although 9999 is at least something). Basically anything that allows fast, quick, or easy profits on the TP increases the value of TP PvP, but you could tune those down quite a bit without affecting anyone who just uses the TP as an actual trading post.

Lucas of the Desert.2165:

Mesket.5728:

Vol.5241:

Lucas of the Desert.2165:

I really don’t get why people are against an economy… seeing from the forum posts it seems that people actually want a game where every item has a fix prize… let’s say 1000g for high end items and every enemy you kill grants you 5 copper. Now you know exaaaactly how much time you’ll need, there are no random loot drops and no other kind of drops…

What? Does that sound boring to you? Well guess what: people actually like loot. They actually like the ability to sell things for a price they seem fitting. But are people that understand the market evil? Is it a bad economy if players can decide prices THEMSELFS??? I think not..

Another example of “evil” market players: if i bought 100 ectos at 14s ea ( ~ 5-6 months ago) in order to craft some exotics and my exotic armour. But then i decide that i like dungeon armour more and i start farming it. Well surprise 5 months later i still have my ectos and they are 40s now. Am i an evil market manipulator now?? Because that is basically what market flippers do… this is neither evil nor a bad economy.

It let’s you a lot of freedom but appaerently that’s not what players want…

Well just like RL, the poor like to hate the rich for the sake of being rich. They seem to think that the poor class deserves as much wealth as the rich, but they don’t want to make the sacrifices that the rich make.

The big difference is that “the poor” here, are playing a game, by the game theme and think that “the rich” who just make rich by staying the same place (LA) the whole day are not.

In an epic fantasy game where dragon spread terror and villages get raided by centaurs… who deserves the reward? the Hero? or the Merchant?

This game made a wrong turn somewhere…

PS: DONT FORGET THIS IS A GAME! A FANTASY GAME! NOT MONOPOLY!

But as long as there is an economy people can get money through trading. Take GW1 for example. How many players have bought ectos off of unknowing ones that sold them for 6-7k and sold them for 9k? Or the bracelet of truth (i guess it’s called in english) which were flipped all the time for money. Or BDS or froggys or celestial foci.. i could go on about this but i guess you see the point.

The problem is that GW2 makes players very well aware of ghe trading post and the opportunites that go hand in hand with it. Although this is probably one of the best decisions they made, since everyone’s now able to participate with an almost common knowledge, it leads to people crying in the forums about how unfair it is of other players to make a profit…

I agree on that, and I have no problem with people making profit out of commerce. Hey, I even envy their ability.

In this game we have an horizontal progression. We don’t get better stats, we get better looks. We agree in this too right? Then what do Legendaries represent if not the top end of progression? many fail to realize this…

I understand that the “idea” of crafting the legendary was forcing players to participate in most aspect of the game but it was horrible implemented. Dungeon Gifts as material is OK. 250 items with low chance of drop forcing players to buy them, or precursors with such lottery chances are wrong.

As economy is part of the game (and I agree on this as well) there is already a gold prerequisite on legendaries recipe and that is the 100 icy runes… everything else is a redundant accident of the pure game mechanic and a failure to foresee this happening.

There could be a fix but it wont be easy lol… lodestones for dungeon tokens? laurels? speed up the precursor scavenging hunt thingy?

Syeria.4812:

Folk.2093:

I guess the vast ammount of people and number of threads popping up complaining about the economy in this game doesnt mean a thing.

This is known as argumentum ad populum. You are correct when you state that it doesn’t mean a thing.

logical fallacies dont mean they are inccorect or valueless, it just means its not a logical arguement.

also, even logical fallacies can be logical within a scope. If you are trying to objectively measure whether the economy is bad in numbers, maybe its a fallacy, but if the question is,
Is guild wars creating a satisfying economy, then the amount of people who complain becomes relevant.

The problem with guild wars is,

A)the main means of profiting over the predetermined baseline for most activities is, by being the merchant class, Manufacturing, and gathering(includes geting drops from enemies) is generally undervalued.
B) almost all mid to long term goals at 80 can be bought
C) many mid to long term goals at 80 have enforced rarities (IE only a certain limited amount of these items will drop[, and hunting for the specifically is not that effiecient or heavily luck based in effectiveness)
D) this means the prices for mid to long term goals at 80 will be determined by the people with the most money, IE the merchant class, as well as some people who can afford to spend the time to do massive farming. the third option, buy gems.

essentially the system will continue to be less friendly to normal players, IF they want to pursue endgame goals, like mystic forge skins, legendaries, or craftable ascended pieces and infusions. These goals money component will always shift to prices representitive of the top earners and the top earners continue to have an increasing ratio of money to the low earners.

I would really love to see data on the difference in wealth between the low, the average, and the top 5%. as well as how it is changing over time.