Make inventory/bank slots more affordable!

Make inventory/bank slots more affordable!

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Posted by: Enzi.5496

Enzi.5496

Hey there!

Right now we have the following costs for inventory and bank slots:

400 gems – Inventory
600 gems – Bank tab

I get 800 gems for 10€. That equals in:
5€ – Inventory
7.50€ – Bank tab

Don’t you think that’s a little steep? Why don’t you follow in the footsteps of Valve’s business model with cheap prices, but more customers?

Not only would it enable more players to actually buy more Inventory/Bank slots. It further encourages more people to buy gems and smooth out the spike gold->gem conversion rate. (Which is an absolute joke right now, seriously)

My proposal for the prices:
200 gems (2.50€) – Inventory
300 gems (3.75€) – Bank tab

What do you think?

edit:

Ok, guys. I realize that this proposal doesn’t work. At least not in an live environment.

Lowering prices would just further encourage people to buy more gem store items with gold.

My only thought would be increasing the gems you get for dollars. Still, the system is too finicky to just change/balance some values.

So, what’s the general opinion here?
Take gold to gem conversion out of the equation.
Are the gem store items like inventory/bank expansions too expansive or are they just right?
If they are too expansive, do you feel you’d buy more if they are cheaper?

(edited by Enzi.5496)

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Posted by: lordkrall.7241

lordkrall.7241

Too cheap.
The prices they have now are quite good and people that really want/need these extra slots will buy them sooner or later.

With a price of 200 gems it would take less than a day of playing the get enough money to change to gems and buy it.

Krall Bloodsword – Mesmer
Krall Peterson – Warrior
Piken Square

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Posted by: Enzi.5496

Enzi.5496

It would cost 2.84g when you use the current Gold→Gem conversion for an inventory slot.

It’s not that cheap. You won’t get gold so easily when you just ‘play’ the game. At least my income comes from selling globs and exotics.

Also, this is a recurring thing. You won’t stop at 1 inventory/bank expansion, do you?

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Posted by: Vilidius.3618

Vilidius.3618

As compared with the cost/revenue we’d expect for a subscription game? No, it isn’t excessive at all – not in real money terms and certainly not in gold.

The unlocks are the one price in gems that isn’t high at all. If anything it’s low. I imagine you’re complaining about this in particular because it’s the only thing you care about. I agree – this is the one thing that most players past a certain point will feel they objectively “need.” And that’s fine. ArenaNet needs to make money, don’t they?

So yes, in terms of real money, the pricing is fine. If you want to unlock a couple of slots every month that’s the cost of a subscription game. Soon enough you’ll have your whole shared bank done (which stays done across all characters) and every inventory slot on the characters you play regularly. And then what?

In terms of gold to gems, that’s what every player who wants everything but doesn’t want to spend real money complains about. And you know what? If you don’t feel like spending real money but you want everything AND you think it should come easily then you just don’t get the model. If it came easily for in game currency then no one would spend real money. Many players, myself included, find it ridiculously easy to make money in game. I know, that sounds like boasting. It isn’t. I know I’m good at it. But if the exchange rate were such that even players who -weren’t- good at it found things easy we’d have TWO problems. First, no one would ever buy gems because they didn’t need to. And second, the gems to gold ratio would suck as a consequence, and even the players who do buy gems would never want to change them to gold because you think gems should be cheap.

Allow A-Net their business model, please. Or offer to pay a monthly subscription and you can have everything unlocked for as long as you continue paying. I’m fine with either option. But enough is enough with this “I want to play the game for free” crap. We all like this game. It’s just a shame only some of us seem to appreciate the financial reality of it. If there’s no revenue, there’s no development. And soon enough, there’s no game at all.

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Posted by: Enzi.5496

Enzi.5496

Vilidius, you interpreted a lot into my post that I wasn’t saying.

First of all, I don’t want anything for free. Not sure where this is coming from.
Fact is, none of my friends put real money into the game because the money:reward ratio is lower than gold:reward.

Realistically speaking I make some runs in FotM, get an exotic that I sell for some gold and then surely have 2.50g for an inventory slot.

You argue that that’s the way to go. I say, no, that shouldn’t be the (only) way. Gems/Gold should be on equal footing and it will never be with the current prices.

Gem prices for gold are skyrocketing. Why is that? Because not enough people are BUYING gems. That’s it.

Instead of further discouraging people, they should be motivated to drop some dollars onto a bank tab. But again, people don’t do it because it’s too expansive. They wait till they have enough gold and then convert it.

Dropping real money should feel exclusive. It does in every F2P game. Here it isn’t exclusive. Gold is exclusive and that should NOT be.

As I said in my initial post. The Valve business model proofed again and again that you’ll get more sales when the price is right. Nowhere did I state that it should be free, just cheaper.

Furthermore, after the costs of inv slot, bank tab you also have character slots (which I find appropriate for 800) and Mystic Forge Stones. There’s a lot to spend here and they surely won’t stop with newer items.

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Posted by: ImagoX.4718

ImagoX.4718

Last time I checked, extra character slots (which have a base 20-slot bag + extra slots which can be filled with relatively cheap 8- or 12-slot extra bags) were the cheapest “extra storage” option. Plus that way you have more space for alts.

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Posted by: Veltoss.9135

Veltoss.9135

That doesn’t seem steep at all, especially considering you could buy it with gold. ArenaNet has to make money somehow.

Blackgate

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Posted by: illgot.1056

illgot.1056

Character inventory will not be an issue once you have 18-20 slot bags.

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Posted by: Culwenimos.1594

Culwenimos.1594

I think that the since there is demand for space(because of the lack of it) and character slots(with most people buying 3 extra immediately as to have one of each profession), and the fact that there are people who are actually buying them at those prices. They have no incentive to sell them cheaper. If however, they realise or discover that the sale of those things becoming stagnant or non-existent, they will reduce the price or make a sale to encourage sales.

What you suggest is them going from Stage 1 to Stage 2 sooner. But realistically, they want to stay in Stage 1 for as long as they can.

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Posted by: Enzi.5496

Enzi.5496

Ok, guys. I realize that this proposal doesn’t work. At least not in an live environment.

Lowering prices would just further encourage people to buy more gem store items with gold.

My only thought would be increasing the gems you get for dollars. Still, the system is too finicky to just change/balance some values.

So, what’s the general opinion here?
Take gold to gem conversion out of the equation.
Are the gem store items like inventory/bank expansions too expansive or are they just right?
If they are too expansive, do you feel you’d buy more if they are cheaper?

Make inventory/bank slots more affordable!

in Black Lion Trading Co

Posted by: NoOneShotU.3479

NoOneShotU.3479

I personally think these are priced ok. In RL money they are similar to what they charged in GW1. I bought more bank and more character slots. (There was no gold option).

What I think are overpriced is just about everything else. Obviously they think the skin prices are ok based on sales, so that’s fine, but anything random and anything like crafting boosters et is just a waste.

Before GW2 launched my friends and I were playing World of Tanks which is a FTP first person vehical shooter. Their model was extremely addicting. Like GW they gave you stuff for free but you could enhance your game play by buying xp boosts, lower repair costs, transferable xp et. We are all tightwads and between the 3-4 of us we spent well over $500 in 3 months.

I’ll tell you why: 1) Nothing Random – I knew exactly what I was buying. 2) Sales. I actually thought about buying stuff this weekend, but I held my money because I wanted to see what was going to be on sale later in the weekend. I ended up buying nothing. Had they just put all 9 items on sale for 3 days I’m sure I would have bought something. 3) Value Added. For about $2-3 on a sale weekend I could get a 50% xp boost ALL WEEKEND. That same money here buys me a couple hours of game time and the boosts are minimal at best. Upping the boost might be unbalancing, so lower the price and get me wanting to use more. That’s what they did. The xp you got per game was depressing for the first few days after the weekend, so it made you want to either up for 3 days next weekend, or just up for a month and play it like a subscription game.

Protip for Anet. We aren’t as loyal as you think we are. Use that as a strength not a weakness.

(edited by NoOneShotU.3479)