Guild Wars 2

If there is a thread for this elsewhere, I apologize but what I’m looking to discuss is a specific market driver here.

One of the things that can drive an economy is the notion that a skilled player can gain access to loot that has value to more players than are able to obtain that loot. The fact that Exotics do not sell for greater than the cost to craft them is a dead horse, but I think Ascended gear represents an opportunity.

There are people who enjoy running all day in Fractals, and build up piles more Ascended rings than they can use….. there are also people who feel blocked because the RNG has not been kind to them and they don’t have the Ascended rings they need to build up Agony resist. Allowing Player A who has too many rings to sell them, and Player B who is just looking for the gear to progress creates a Win / Win for both players.

Allowing the ascended rings to be traded also allows people who want the gear, but don’t want to do Fractals to have another means to acquire it.

Added bonus, this helps take money out of the economy, preserving the scarcity of gold. Some money exits the economy as part of the listing fees etc imposed by the TP, and more money exits the economy when the people selling Ascended Rings are then able to turn that profit towards already in place gold sinks (T3 armor anyone?)

I know that Chris Whiteside said they would introduce other ways to acquire Ascended gear, and I really don’t want the focus of this thread to be ‘I want ascended gear but don’t want to do fractals,’ but rather a look at the impact on the economy if A-net were to remove the ‘account bound’ status of the ascended gear in game.

Thoughts?

i agree, i don’t have tons of time to farm mats for a legendary but i have the time to log in daily and do my 10 and 20 fractal run in hopes of more rings. i already have enough for my main and alts to have multiple sets and now they are just going to go into my bank. plus this would allow people who get rings they do not want to trade with people who have the ones they want. they wouldnt be expensive on the tp, probably 10-30 gold imo, since their are so many running around right now. i dont see this being a bad idea

Would be helpful. I found 4 rings so far, but none of them has the stats I like.

I completely forgot about the issue with stats. Frankly, the game is lacking of high value tradeable items….. asside from pre-cursors and some of the named exotics or the lodestones used for named exotics.

I think that Ascended rings could fill this niche in the market nicely.

the game lacks a lot atm but its brand new still. Making the rings and Backpeices tradeable would be nice though. Give people who invest time in the dungeon a way to make some money since there is no reward for completing each lvl like the other dungeons where you get tokens, and some silver

I agree as I think getting optimum stats in this game should always be buyable purely with coin, just as was the case prior to ascended being added.

Sure it’ll probably cost MORE coin to do so now vs pre nov 15th, but it should still be possible.

I’m actually against this idea, at least in the short term… While I do think there’s a role that trading of ascended items could fill in the economy, it’s probably better for it to be available from a few more sources before it becomes tradeable.

Astraea.6075:

I’m actually against this idea, at least in the short term… While I do think there’s a role that trading of ascended items could fill in the economy, it’s probably better for it to be available from a few more sources before it becomes tradeable.

I can understand that…. I can see some reaction of ‘I feel forced to do fractals because that’s the only place to get the things that sell for the most money on the TP.’

At the same time, making them tradable accomplishes exactly the goal of getting another source for the items….

I’m not familiar with the A-net code base and I don’t know if it would be more or less implementable to toggle a ‘tradeable’ flag (or toggle off an account bound flag?) on an item type than it would be to introduce systems for the item to be acquired through other methods / locations.

CassieGold.7460:

Astraea.6075:

I’m actually against this idea, at least in the short term… While I do think there’s a role that trading of ascended items could fill in the economy, it’s probably better for it to be available from a few more sources before it becomes tradeable.

I can understand that…. I can see some reaction of ‘I feel forced to do fractals because that’s the only place to get the things that sell for the most money on the TP.’

At the same time, making them tradable accomplishes exactly the goal of getting another source for the items….

I’m not familiar with the A-net code base and I don’t know if it would be more or less implementable to toggle a ‘tradeable’ flag (or toggle off an account bound flag?) on an item type than it would be to introduce systems for the item to be acquired through other methods / locations.

It’s a number of things that make me feel this might be a bad move if it isn’t handled right. Partly, it reinforces the (wrongly held IMO) view from some of the community that the introduction of ascended gear was a “cash grab” introducing more “pay to win” elements. (Reasoning being, I need a truck-load of mats to craft ascended, which equals a lot of gold, which means ArenaNet wants me to buy gems to get the gold needed to craft them…)

So I could then see those who make this sort of argument complaining that it’s now a case of either farm Fractals or buy gems to convert to gold, and it’s all just a big “cash grab” ad nauseum…

There are probably other flow on effects too… for instance, by making it more rewarding to run those fractal levels with higher chances of dropping (tradable) ascended gear, players are disincentivised (more than they currently are) from running other fractal levels.

I just think there are a few implications of such a move, and it’s probably better to be careful before doing something like this.

I made a suggestion thread about this issue. It would probably be best for you to stick your support in that thread.

Astraea.6075:

I’m actually against this idea, at least in the short term… While I do think there’s a role that trading of ascended items could fill in the economy, it’s probably better for it to be available from a few more sources before it becomes tradeable.

Making them tradeable instantly makes them available for almost everyone. The only exceptions being sPvP, or people doing mad things like trying to take the most fall damage in a single hit.
I really can’t think of any way that would make them more accessible to people than making them acquirable for gold. Karma vendors come close, but people who spend a lot of their time not earning karma (eg farming FOTM) will miss out.
To make them acquirable for gold, ANET can either make them tradeable, or make vendors that sell them.

There are probably other flow on effects too… for instance, by making it more rewarding to run those fractal levels with higher chances of dropping (tradable) ascended gear, players are disincentivised (more than they currently are) from running other fractal levels.

Which would mean they start doing other stuff. One complaint against FOTM is how it’s greatly reduced the population doing other things, so this is still a win.

I just think there are a few implications of such a move, and it’s probably better to be careful before doing something like this.

Caution is helpful in situations like this.

ascended items costing 20g+ per item? lol

Were Ascended items the same in statistics as Exotic items, I would have said no, as their sole desirability would have been for appearance and Agony resistance. However, given that Ascended rings are the “best tier”, I do support making them tradeable so players that have an excess of unwanted rings can sell them to players who haven’t had any luck or just don’t like doing dungeons.

alcopaul.2156:

ascended items costing 20g+ per item? lol

Have you totaled up the cost of the materials used for producing some of the Ascended back pieces ?

They take 50 ecto each. GW2spidy puts ecto at 36s24c each, meaning 18c12s00c for the lot.
Then 250 of a t6 fine material. Even more expensive for the lot.

20 gold isn’t going to cover material costs. The real question is how much the Vial of Condensed Mists Essence will sell for, because that is the part that’s bind on pickup.

One thing that has not come up so far is why ANet made them Account Bound in the first place. Yes, I’m speculating, but the answer seems obvious to me. People were speed running through everything, then complaining about nothing to do, no new rewards to get. While the suggestion by the OP would be beneficial to players, it might not fit in with ANet’s possible desire to slow down progression some.

alcopaul.2156:

ascended items costing 20g+ per item? lol

was referring to the rings. the back pieces are a whole different story since ecto and t6 mat prices have jumped