Guild Wars 2

I can’t even put in a buy order.

Very disappointing.

And the insane inflation of Gems is another matter. Rising over 30s/100 in just over a week is ridiculous.

Seriously, who’s setting Gem prices? Is it the sellers?

Or is it ANet/NCSoft/Nexon?

By all we know, it’s based on supply and demand. More players buying gems with gold = higher gem prices.

The players.

As the quantity demanded of a fixed supply increases, the relative value of the demanded item rises.

Buy it now or they will go up by the end of tomorrow. God knows how much they will be at the end of the month.

The reality is ANet sets the price.

They like to talk about it as if it’s based on supply and demand from the players, because they do base it on a data-driven formula, based on how many players convert one way or the other.

But ANet is the man behind the curtain who sets and adjusts the parameters.

No, the reality is that it is supply and demand. You may be unhappy with the prices but plenty of others are not and so it shall keep rising. When people deem them too expensive then people will stop buying them and a stable price will be reached or it will go down. The reason it’s been steadily going up is simply because the game is new people are accumulating more money as time goes on and they can afford more.

Also, gems are more useful than gold. I’ve been spreadsheeting prices, and while I’ve not yet gotten through all the crafting components (paddings, insignias, and stuff), it seems like prices don’t go up much as you go up the ladder of gear quality, and even go down toward the top tier. So with everything so cheap on the market, what do you do with your extra gold? Buy gems.

I can’t imagine ANet is artificially setting gem prices, as I’m fairly certain the gem store is just players buying and selling gems from each other, with some buying gems with real money… but not enough, apparently. The only way they could “set prices” in this system is if they were buying the gems themselves with gold from outside the game, but I don’t think this is what’s happening.

The impression I’m getting is that the game is just not gear based, and without gear pressure, the pressure to acquire gold with gems is low; thus, people don’t really buy gems (with real money) to get gold with. It is only if people do this that gem prices can drop.

EDIT: Also, there’s this: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/bltc/Gem-Purchases-Keep-Failing

ANet’s buggy payment acceptance system is probably a BIG part of the supply problem. I couldn’t even buy the game from them; I had to go to Amazon.com to get my copy.

oli.4786:

No, the reality is that it is supply and demand.

I’m going to call shenanigans on this. I just went to post 100 of my gems, and guess what? I didn’t get to set a price.

So, the price of gems is whatever ANet/NCSoft/Nexon wants it to be. As I stated in my first post.

As I also stated, there are no buy orders. You’ll sell your gems for whatever you’re told to sell ‘em for and you’ll bloody well like it.

This is NOT a player driven economy.

As for the TP part, neither is that really. It’s a buyer’s market all the way due to the interface (among other things).

oli.4786:

No, the reality is that it is supply and demand. You may be unhappy with the prices but plenty of others are not and so it shall keep rising. When people deem them too expensive then people will stop buying them and a stable price will be reached or it will go down. The reason it’s been steadily going up is simply because the game is new people are accumulating more money as time goes on and they can afford more.

That’s because players are buying gold from gold sellers and converting it to gems.

If I can spend 50 dollars on 200 gold from a gold site, then convert that to gems, I’m getting 4 times the amount of gems than if I buy directly from ANet. But ANet isn’t filtering out these illicit conversions, they are just using them to fuel their insane gold to gem prices.

Colonel Kernel.7506:

oli.4786:

No, the reality is that it is supply and demand.

I’m going to call shenanigans on this. I just went to post 100 of my gems, and guess what? I didn’t get to set a price.

So, the price of gems is whatever ANet/NCSoft/Nexon wants it to be. As I stated in my first post.

It doesn’t need to be player set prices for it to be supply and demand. If more people are buying than selling then price goes up, if less people are buying than selling price goes down. All Anet have done is program the intervals in which the prices change. It is of benefit to Anet to let it be supply and demand and it should keep everyone happy, but some people just want things at the price they were 1 month ago and that is no longer their value. I’d like to buy a car at the price it was 50 years ago but unfortunately the price has gone up since then…

oli.4786:

Colonel Kernel.7506:

oli.4786:

No, the reality is that it is supply and demand.

I’m going to call shenanigans on this. I just went to post 100 of my gems, and guess what? I didn’t get to set a price.

So, the price of gems is whatever ANet/NCSoft/Nexon wants it to be. As I stated in my first post.

It doesn’t need to be player set prices for it to be supply and demand. If more people are buying than selling then price goes up, if less people are buying than selling price goes down. All Anet have done is program the intervals in which the prices change. It is of benefit to Anet to let it be supply and demand and it should keep everyone happy, but some people just want things at the price they were 1 month ago and that is no longer their value. I’d like to buy a car at the price it was 50 years ago but unfortunately the price has gone up since then…

It’s not a player driven economy. The prices behind the scenes are driven by some formula that we never will see. And, given that NCSoft was just bought by the above and beyond greedy Nexon, I have little faith in the players being treated equitably where real money is concerned.

Or it may be a bunch of RMT companies who’ve farmed gold trying to snatch up gems as an investment, not only knowing the price will go up but forcing it to.

And again, I have little faith in the way ANet has handled that fiasco as well. Almost every anti farming measure that has been enacted has impacted the players as much as, if not more than, it has the RMT bots.

Kill the formula, let the players set the market value. If someone wants to meet my asking price, great. If not, it can sit there until I decide to bring it more in line with the reality.

Given that there is no lag between selling gems or buying them I have to say it’s not as if buy or sell orders were waiting to be filled. Which means that ANet is processing the transaction regardless of the availability of the goods. Which again means that, practically speaking, supply & demand is not the driving factor. The secret formula is. and said secret formula may have little to no bearing on the in game availability of either buyers or sellers.

So no, I do not believe that Supply and Demand are even remotely involved in the gem market other than theoretically.

Oh yeah, one more thing.

Checking Gem prices I find that I can sell 100 gems for 44s70c.

However buying Gems I find that if I spend 44s70c I get 72 gems.

They already gouged us for 800 Gems for $10, now they have to gouge us on the gold exchange as well?

Tell me this economy is not fouled up. And add to that the fact that anything on the market that has anything resembling value is quickly driven into the dirt.

Bottom line screams to me that ANet doesn’t want you having enough gold to buy Gems.

Gem prices are rising because people are stocking up on gems ready for the Haloween additions to the gemstore. In the same vein fewer people buying gems for cash are selling them because they also want to wait and see what costumes become available, since supply is so low the prices are getting a bit stupid.

This is going to happen everytime a seasonal event comes around so remember to stock up in the good times in future.

Have you guys never played a game like this before? This always happens, a game is fresh and new and ppl buy stuff, as time goes on people spend less.
Take a look at spiral knights prices started at 1k money for 100 energy and went upto 6k for 100 energy, they released the game on steam and energy went to 2.5k for 100 energy. The price is now 9k for 100 energy.

Who cares? You’re still getting access to a real-money system with in-game currency. That’s all that ever actually matters.

Colonel Kernel.7506:

Oh yeah, one more thing.

Checking Gem prices I find that I can sell 100 gems for 44g70s.

However buying Gems I find that if I spend 44g70s I get 72 gems.

They already gouged us for 800 Gems for $10, now they have to gouge us on the gold exchange as well?

Tell me this economy is not fouled up.

Having a different rate depending on which direction you’re exchanging currency really isn’t that strange or fouled up, considering that every currency exchange in the world does things the same way.

ANET claims that their super secret algorithm is helping supply and demand set the price. But lets look at the other ways ANET have screwed up the economic side of things:
– The TP sales tax is hidden.
– “Predicted Profit” doesn’t include the listing fee. Since profit is income minus expenses, and the listing fee is an expense, it should be included.
– They set a price floor on TP items of 1c above vendor. No price floor would make sense. A price floor at a price where you would make more than vendoring if it sold would make sense. A price floor at vendor price does not, because anyone hitting the floor is still losing money compared to vendoring.
– They let buy orders be placed below that floor, despite knowing they can never be filled. While that is fixed, they haven’t purged the low orders yet.

Why should we believe that ANET has got this secret algorithm right, when they have gotten other visible things wrong ?

as one who sees nothing in the gem store i want but am willing to convert gems to gold I say let her climb to the sky. The more you are willing to pay, the more I will inject into the market.

who sets the price? People that buy gold from gold sellers and then converts that gold to gems.

“Oh yeah, one more thing.

Checking Gem prices I find that I can sell 100 gems for 44g70s.

However buying Gems I find that if I spend 44g70s I get 72 gems."

Wait wait wait, this math is completely wrong and misleading to everyone reading this thread.

100 gems as of this writing nets 46 silver 1 copper, not GOLD, silver.

Anet sets the price.

They do it by adjusting the algorithm the the sets the price.

Its a smoke and mirrors game when they pretend that its truely set by supply and demand.
Its NOT a free market(not even a free market with a big tax.)

mastershke.8145:

John Smith.4610:

Out of curiosity, how many feel that a 100% free market would be a good idea?

Free in regards to what? Everything from the gem store? (Just came into the post and didnt feel like reading.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_market

BobTheJanitor.4936:

mastershke.8145:

John Smith.4610:

Out of curiosity, how many feel that a 100% free market would be a good idea?

Free in regards to what? Everything from the gem store? (Just came into the post and didnt feel like reading.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_market

Aha…thank you

It makes sense for it to be on a free market. Just beware when no one is buying with real money.

100% free?

100% bad

It’d be a good idea if all the supply and demand of stuff weren’t out of whack.

Star Trek Online has a decent system for their cryptic point currency i believe, or whatever they may call it now. The pink stone things. Completely forgot the name of it.

But yeah, you can list x amount of ‘gems’ for y price same goes for buying.

John Smith.4610:

Out of curiosity, how many feel that a 100% free market would be a good idea?

That will depend if the gem to gold conversion is also controlled by us. Because let’s be honest John, with the current rates, gold sellers are winning by very far. And i doubt the current controlled market has any effect. No one wants to use it and everyone that i talk about it says the same. They would never spend tons of money for just a couple of silver.

At this pace, the gold for gems will continue to rise as more and more people buy them, while no one is using the gem for gold. Since the current controlled prices is extremely unfair. As right now, I can buy 100 gems with 60 silver. And I can sell it for 43 silver. I could see me spending if it were 1 gold. 10 dollars=8 gold. Seems fair enough for me with the current prices of the TP.

What if you decided to momentarily raise the exchange rate of gem for gold? Double, triple it. The demand for it would rise fast and stabilize the inflated gold for gem prices. Just enough to calm, then go back to the normal prices. People will be tempted to use it as it is limited, and with no need to rely on shady sources. Then again it might inflate the trading post with so much gold being pooled. But since it is momentarily, the economy might recover.

Haha, either way it looks like everything is screwed. Anet certainly don’t want players buying too much gems with gold, but they also don’t want the economy to be injected with too much gold. Either way, gold sellers are there, and i knew they would screw up that conversion. Anet need to stay competitive with them and offer better deals.

John Smith.4610:

Out of curiosity, how many feel that a 100% free market would be a good idea?

Can you first explain how it works right now?

@Nebilim, you should see it as how many hours do you have to spend in-game to get 1 gold. Say it´s 1 hour in-game to get 1 gold. Now let´s say you are working and you get $10 a hour.

So spending $10 on 800 gems which you can sell for 3.44 gold seems very fair to me.

Didn’t Ultima Online have a free market in so far as it was run completely by the players? I played that, and money wasn’t hard to come by and yet was never out of wack. Worked almost perfectly.

John Smith.4610:

Out of curiosity, how many feel that a 100% free market would be a good idea?

You can’t have anything resembling a free market is this game (or any game for that matter), Anet, is basically the God of GW2, anything you do to the game (bugs, fixes, added content. Node respawns etc…) can destroy or create markets in minutes. So It would make no sense to do such a thing or even pretend to do such a thing.

The free market is the only one that can work. In real-life and in-game. That’s why the free market libertarian economy in EVE works so well, and that’s why in the real world we have a prolonged worldwide economic depression even with all our extensive regulation and central planning. Artificially setting prices will haunt you later. Even if you made it a 100% free market today, there’s still damage that is already done.

Many players without confidence in the system will simply not use it. It doesn’t seem feasible at all to me to trade gems for gold. It’s not a free market so you can’t play the market by buying low and selling high either way. With the current system there’s no smart trading and the Real Money value is very skewed, thus the black market will flourish.

As of earlier; purchasing 10$ of gems from A.Net gets me 800 gems which I could change into approximately 3g 60s. You can say give or take since it does fluctuate slightly. Now, for comparison, I pick out a random gold seller and 10$ gets me 21 gold which if I wanted to I could turn into gems and get in upwards of 3000+ gems, maybe much more.

Now it’s understandable that gold sellers are always going to try and undercut you. But when gold sellers can offer you 6x more value for money, I personally think it’s hard to fault the customers given such a discrepancy. When I first saw the difference that’s when I really knew there was something wrong with the economy. In a free market your product should be relatively similar in price, but instead it’s 600% more expensive. While I advocate the free market, it will take time for it to stabilize. Prices will have to come down and consumers must have their confidence in a free system restored. I would love to play the gem/gold market, but it’s simply not economically feasible.

Btw ANet let me know if you’re hiring :P.

John Smith.4610:

Out of curiosity, how many feel that a 100% free market would be a good idea?

no, it would just be another thing the gold sellers can control.

John Smith.4610:

Smoeki.2756:

John Smith.4610:

Out of curiosity, how many feel that a 100% free market would be a good idea?

You can’t have anything resembling a free market is this game (or any game for that matter), Anet, is basically the God of GW2, anything you do to the game (bugs, fixes, added content. Node respawns etc…) can destroy or create markets in minutes. So It would make no sense to do such a thing or even pretend to do such a thing.

That is correct, there has never been a completely free market in any MMO, patches and fixes modify markets. For the sake of this argument though I think you have to assume (you know economist really don’t like assuming :P ) that the game design is static.

It’s true that there’s always some hand in it, even with EVE. But with CCP it’s not done through price fixing or setting rates. They may have an event that effects the economy , but it’s usually done to spice and mix things up, and it’s a lot different that regulation and planning. I think the plan to get rid of bulk items wasn’t too bad, although I think the rewards were slim, at least consumers had the choice.

Rodasta.3124:

John Smith.4610:

Out of curiosity, how many feel that a 100% free market would be a good idea?

Can you first explain how it works right now?

@Nebilim, you should see it as how many hours do you have to spend in-game to get 1 gold. Say it´s 1 hour in-game to get 1 gold. Now let´s say you are working and you get $10 a hour.

So spending $10 on 800 gems which you can sell for 3.44 gold seems very fair to me.

It is unfair not in the sense that you are not getting enough for what you paid, i meant because of the competition. With 43 dollars, you can buy 100 gold on the shady sources. More money being tossed in the market, more money being spent on the gems for gold and inflating the prices even more.

John Smith.4610:

That is correct, there has never been a completely free market in any MMO, patches and fixes modify markets. For the sake of this argument though I think you have to assume (you know economist really don’t like assuming :P ) that the game design is static.

Hypothetically speaking even being as close to static as possible, The game still incorporates price controls via price minimum and also you have the monopoly of overpriced certain items which no matter how industrious we are in game we can never make for ourselves at a cheaper price. ie see the 10g Bag issue, it’s cheaper to convert right now to 400 gems and get a 5-15 item bag then it is to make or sell a 20 slot bag and it also has an eqel or greater return in value. In order for it to make sense 400 gems would need to cost around 10g and that is a scarryyy thought.

You also have 2 different versions of real cash to Gold conversions(one illegal, and one legal) I also think that is one huge reason for the Gold to Gem prices sky rocketing, You are not getting the offset of the people paying real cash to Anet to lower the Gem cost for those who don’t. (I assume anet wants to make some cash so it must play into the conversion rate) I hate to see this but it’s the same reason Insurance prices are so high, some people scam the system and it costs more for us. However Anet could lower their price to compete or find a way to stop gold sellers, really only 2 options there I currently see.

Anyhow, you can’t have a free market in this game the way it is set up. you can lean towards it, yes… You can’t have it though and free markets don’t work unless they are truly free. I think trying to juggle multiple economic ideas just causes more and more problems.

So NO I say to free markets, (I think I just had a mild heart attack, my libertartian ideals thought I was talking about real life for a second and tried to snuff me out)

Smoeki.2756:

John Smith.4610:

That is correct, there has never been a completely free market in any MMO, patches and fixes modify markets. For the sake of this argument though I think you have to assume (you know economist really don’t like assuming :P ) that the game design is static.

Hypothetically speaking even being as close to static as possible, The game still incorporates price controls via price minimum and also you have the monopoly of overpriced certain items which no matter how industrious we are in game we can never make for ourselves at a cheaper price. ie see the 10g Bag issue, it’s cheaper to convert right now to 400 gems and get a 5-15 item bag then it is to make or sell a 20 slot bag and it also has an eqel or greater return in value. In order for it to make sense 400 gems would need to cost around 10g and that is a scarryyy thought.

You also have 2 different versions of real cash to Gold conversions(one illegal, and one legal) I also think that is one huge reason for the Gold to Gem prices sky rocketing, You are not getting the offset of the people paying real cash to Anet to lower the Gem cost for those who don’t. (I assume anet wants to make some cash so it must play into the conversion rate) I hate to see this but it’s the same reason Insurance prices are so high, some people scam the system and it costs more for us. However Anet could lower their price to compete or find a way to stop gold sellers, really only 2 options there I currently see.

Anyhow, you can’t have a free market in this game the way it is set up. you can lean towards it, yes… You can’t have it though and free markets don’t work unless they are truly free. I think trying to juggle multiple economic ideas just causes more and more problems.

So NO I say to free markets, (I think I just had a mild heart attack, my libertartian ideals thought I was talking about real life for a second and tried to snuff me out)

Not to get off-topic, but if you’re speaking in terms of health insurance, the effect of scammers is relatively minimal. In reality it’s the pharmaceutical industry and the extensive government regulation lobbied for that drives the price up. It allows them to control the market and charge whatever they want. Maybe they profess to sell medicine and cures, but they’re always the most profitable industry in the US making a whopping 17% profit return on their revenue, the most of ANY industry. Health insurance is high because the pharmaceutics industry has a government-regulated monopoly, not because the free-market is being abused. Insurance companies carefully tread between profit and loss because the price of healthcare is so artificially high.

But back on topic… A.Net can compete with gold sellers if gem to gold prices are lower. But I’m against doing this artificially. I don’t think they can ever really be lower than the black market, but I believe consumers would rather buy from A.Net if their prices were at least somewhat competitive, not 600% more expensive.

I dont believe not meddling is true in Eve’s case either. I recall being kittened out by another player because I chose to sell my ore to an npc due to the npc offering a higher price. When apoc was king of mining. Eve was giving some love to their miner players. Also they have had their own emplyees aquire entire sets of t2 bpos on their ingame characters am i correct?

I bought enough gems a few weeks ago with ingame gold to buy a character slot. At that time I seem to recall selling drops to vendors for about 10 copper due to being idk level 25 abouts. Now Im 78 and vendoring stuff for around 100 copper. With more and more players reaching end zones the gold the average player has to spend on gems could be increasing.

For the records, and while this isn’t exactly the focus of this discussion, I’m 100% against a free market.

Players want to profit. If, in order to have the biggest possible profit, they have to impact the other players negatively, many players would chose to do so. In an extreme, a completely free market would be one in which exploiters and scammers are allowed to act freely, and if a player falls for their schemes, the deceived player is to be blamed – “he should have known better”. Seeing the same issue from a less extreme point of view, players are willing to, for example, use profits to buy an item and resell it for a bigger price, using the resulting profit to continue doing the same thing and thus create almost a monopoly for one item, artificially inflating its price. This hurts the other players negatively, both by increasing the price of an item and by concentrating gold in the hands of a few players.

IMO, ArenaNet has to take control of the economy, in order to avoid this kind of thing. Which means, in the most extreme cases, setting a limit to the price of an item that has been excessively targetted by “market players”. Using a current example, ArenaNet should add a cap to the price that could be asked for the Legendary precursors. This would prevent people from articially inflating their prices being what is reasonable.

Eve Online/Star Wars Galaxies was almost completely controlled by players.

Venge.6893:

Not to get off-topic, but if you’re speaking in terms of health insurance, the effect of scammers is relatively minimal. In reality it’s the pharmaceutical industry and the extensive government regulation lobbied for that drives the price up. It allows them to control the market and charge whatever they want. Maybe they profess to sell medicine and cures, but they’re always the most profitable industry in the US making a whopping 17% profit return on their revenue, the most of ANY industry. Health insurance is high because the pharmaceutics industry has a government-regulated monopoly, not because the free-market is being abused. Insurance companies carefully tread between profit and loss because the price of healthcare is so artificially high.

Nope, I never eluded to health insurance. I wasn’t even trying to say insurance scamming as being close to equal to the difference in gem conversions and gold sellers. Just that there are outside forces that break the game laws and do have a detrimental effect on the market.

This rampant inflation can only be solved by us. Less people want the Gems, so the price will continue to increase. Simple Economics. Now, us as players can reverse this. What we have to do is start using ALL of our Coin to buy Gems. Because Demand increases the price will steadily drop. And the supply of Gems will significantly increase in addition. If we want these Gem prices to go down, them buy Gems. It’s the only way.

Erasculio.2914:

For the records, and while this isn’t exactly the focus of this discussion, I’m 100% against a free market.

Players want to profit. If, in order to have the biggest possible profit, they have to impact the other players negatively, many players would chose to do so. In an extreme, a completely free market would be one in which exploiters and scammers are allowed to act freely, and if a player falls for their schemes, the deceived player is to be blamed – “he should have known better”. Seeing the same issue from a less extreme point of view, players are willing to, for example, use profits to buy an item and resell it for a bigger price, using the resulting profit to continue doing the same thing and thus create almost a monopoly for one item, artificially inflating its price. This hurts the other players negatively, both by increasing the price of an item and by concentrating gold in the hands of a few players..

There’s always potential for abuse, even in a controlled economy. I prefer a system in which people are responsible for themselves. When you get on the internet there’s viruses, malware, and all sorts of scams that you can fall into. So, since there’s a massive potential for abuse, should the government take control of the internet? I don’t think so, I think the path of personal responsibility is better.

I just don’t see how A.Net could stop people from turning to gold sellers rather than their gem store without a free market. Short of maybe, eliminating the ability to mail gold. To me it seems similar to the prices charged for snacks at movie theaters or other venues where outside food is banned. The prices are clearly a rip-off, so some try and sneak items through, some buy less than they normally would, and others simply go without. If prices were reasonable people wouldn’t be so keen to try and skirt the rules, they would also be less likely to do without.

You can’t force someone to buy something they deem no worth it. Less people are buying gems because the people that traditionally would spend money on game items are getting a 600% better value from elsewhere. I think a free-market would allow the gem market to stabilize over time. Otherwise it’s just going to continue unless A.Net does something extremely like eliminating the ability to send money in the mail.

Central planning doesn’t work because there’s the human element. Humans don’t follow economic theories and algorithms. In a free-market everyone benefits. Sure maybe someone gets a raw deal occasionally, but in a healthy economy it’s very easy to bounce back. And maybe that person will make an attempt to get informed and make better decisions.

But alas, it seems my philosophy is outnumbered. So I suppose, as with our real-life economy, people will sit around and continue to sit around scratching their heads wondering where all their economic planning went wrong.

Honestly, we just need more ways to make gold in game, you guys have stomped all of the “low-risk” ways, and the high risk forms of farming aren’t very rewarding. I’d say make dungeon gear bind on equip instead of bind on aquire, or allow dungeon tokens to be exchanged to npcs for gold, this way people can do their daily dungeon runs without feeling like the game is trying everything it can do to prevent them from progressing.

LazerEagle.7209:

This rampant inflation can only be solved by us. Less people want the Gems, so the price will continue to increase. Simple Economics. Now, us as players can reverse this. What we have to do is start using ALL of our Coin to buy Gems. Because Demand increases the price will steadily drop. And the supply of Gems will significantly increase in addition. If we want these Gem prices to go down, them buy Gems. It’s the only way.

Actually your doing the opposite of what needs to be done, and you’ll drive the prices up not down.

They, I’m pretty sure that’s not at all how supply and demand works.

I don’t understand the current gem economy, something is broken with your formula ANet.

Apparently there is a HUUUUUUUUGE demand for “GOLD TO GEM” transactions. Evidence of this is that when I started playing, 1g would net 277 gems. Now, 1g gets you 170 gems. That’s a big change.

However, the opposite is not true for “gem to gold” exchange. If I spent 1g to buy gems now, and then I turned around to sell gems for gold, I would lose 30silver. This doesn’t make any sense to me, at all. If there is huge influx in “gold to gem” trading, shouldn’t it RAISE the price of “gem to gold” by like… A LOT as well? Shouldn’t gems sell for more if they cost more to buy? What gives? You don’t seem to want people to actually sell gems for gold.

Hence, enter the gold sellers, hence the economy of GW2 is in deep kitten.