Guild Wars 2

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/halloween/Hurricane-Sandy-Interrupts-our-Halloween-Event-Merged/page/3#post581419

We heard your questions about extending the Halloween event for those of you affected by Sandy. Unfortunately we cannot do that, but the reason why we can’t is exciting: We are preparing for our big November update, which will start on November 15, and there will be content that will be in the game prior to that, leading up to the event. But we also want to use this moment to remind you all that your personal safety is much more important than any computer game. If you could be affected by the storm, please listen to the authorities and take every precaution to ensure you and your loved ones are safe. Tyria will still be there once the storm is over.

Now that we have a definite date for huge update coming in November the question on many players minds is: Will Precursors Be Addressed?

There has been no communication from A-NET on the issue in almost 3 weeks. As a result players are left with lots of questions. Such as:

Is A-NET aware that gold selling sites are also selling precursors?

Should I throw another 100g in the Mystic Forge in hopes of getting precursor or wait for update?

Should I purchase from TP or wait for update?

Will the update address the fact that GW2 endgame (Legendaries) is isolated to lottery winners?

Will the update introduce fun gameplay/new design philosophy or a alternative to the acquisition of precursors?

Why are precursor not account bound like almost every other component of the legendary process?

Will players that exploited precursors on launch be held accountable?

All valid questions with no answers. There is absolutely no reason this issue should not be addressed with the upcoming patch as legendaries for many are the only faucet of endgame remaining. Can we please get a status update on this issue please?

I will take a stab at this one.

1. If your aware of it I’m sure A-Net is aware. (remember those sites come with very high risk of identity theft not sure why people keep bringing them up like they are walmart or something)

2. They won’t tell you that stop being impatient wait for it to come. The context of the November update was in response to people with outage issues mostly due to Hurricane Sandy wanting to enjoy the halloween event.

3. 3 is basically the same question as 2 1 is gamble 1 is guaranteed at fixed price but thats your choice.

4. Your Endgame is legendaries. A-Net never said legendaries are end game. Quote please? Source link something

5. You know there is thing called press releases that will tell you about updates. You know like PC gamer had the preview for the Halloween event. Come on I know you know this right?

6. Thats like the only good question.

7. I am sure Arena Net will definitely discuss the terms of other players accounts openly with the community. Who is to say they havent been banned. Some one in another thread said they where.

Valid questions true probably with good intentions. With really obvious answers for the most part and anyone that has played video games longer than 2 weeks knows wont get answered.

“… anyone that has played video games longer than 2 weeks knows wont get answered.”

There is your problem right there. Game developers in the year 2012 should have a more open relationship to their community.

Putting out vague answers or comments once every 1 to 2 months just doesn’t cut it. I don’t see why there can’t be an ongoing conversation between player base and developer. We are in a symbiotic relationship – we can’t play the game if they aren’t making it, yet they can’t make the game if we ain’t buying it! (and continue to buy it, through the gem store, expansions etc.)

The precursor subject is probably the hottest topic in the whole game – only one comment has been made, from our dear Lindsey, that they are watching the prices.

This was a long time a ago when prices were at like half of what they are now!

Ok so i have to farm for 15 more days and i have to wait this upgrade. Arena we need precursor from Token dungeon or other skill based things. I won t to buy it from LT or playing rulette at MF. PLZ fix it!

Yes put a static price or matterials worth of 200-300g. Problem solved and people will stop complaining. If it is the price you are complaining about (which according to some people it is the RNG that is annoying them and not the actual price) then you should reconsider since it is 1/4th of the final combination of the weapon and this is what it SHOULD cost.

oZii.2864:

4. Your Endgame is legendaries. A-Net never said legendaries are end game. Quote please? Source link something

http://en-gb.twitch.tv/guildwars2/b/324689481

This is the video when legendaries are first mentioned.

At around 5:20 he says they’ll be talking about what you can do when you reach lvl 80 (the endgame that they have in mind). He then proceeds to talk about several things that they are presenting to us as endgame. One such thing is the use of the Mystic Forge to make cool skins new skins for yourself. The legendaries specifically get talked about at 12:00.

@ Ozii Regarding point #2. Here is a quote from Colin. November update was planned prior to Hurricane events.

Snow.5269:

A number of the activities/mini-games are things we decided to table for a while in favor of focusing on features and areas we felt were more important for the game. That being said, if you like activities, make sure to stop in and visit during the big Halloween festivities running from Oct 22nd-Nov1st!

In the short-term we’re currently focused on adding a massive wealth of additional content and features for players to do in the game using the players core skill-bar, which you’ll start seeing in the Shadow of the Mad King update in October as well as our massive November release.

Long term we’ll absolutely be adding more activities as well, but we want to make sure we’ve got loads of stuff to do at level 80 in PvP, WvW, and PvE using your characters core skill-bar first and foremost, and we’re dedicating our focus in that area. Down the road, we’ll continue to expand on the scope of activities available in the game as well.

There was a dev post explaining it was endgame. your epic quest now that page cant be found gg anet.

At this point I am meh who cares. I think that I am going to find a game that actually wants me to play instead of attacking and restricting everything I do.

After spending 80g into the forge in last 3 days and getting no precursor im waiting on this update. (ive spent more that this total)

Yes because getting the precursor will be far cheaper than 80g. Some people seem to forget that just a SINGLE COMPONENT of Gift of “Weapon Name” which the other 1/4th of the total procedure and EQUIVALENT to the precursor, worths 100g vendor trash. And the total sum of the Gift is around 400-600g depending on matterials and Lodestones. You seriously think that the precursor will be cheaper than 80g? Or even cheaper than 200g?

The prices of precursors doesn’t matter when 100 Charged Lodestones (at well over 2 gold/piece and still rising each day) cost more than an entire precursor.

Gift of “Legendary name” often cost the same or more than prescursor at the moment due to increasing lodestone prices. My gift of bolt (250 ingot, 250 gossamer, 100 charged, gift of metal, 100 runestones) has a worth of 400g right now.

Honestly, precursor pricing (with many in the lower 200gs right now) is hardly a problem in legendary weapon crafting. Sunrise and Twilight will always be in high demand and remain more expensive than most legendaries, and the high cost of the legend is a non-issue with how dirt cheap the gift of bifrost is. Every other precursor is easily within striking range if you are smart with your resources.

Yes, there’s been nothing from ANet in 3 weeks, and the prices really haven’t gone up much in that time, so I don’t know why you’d expect them to be planning anything precursor-related at this point.

For all you know they are dumping Box of Legendary Armor in the Mystic forge so you guys can go right back to farming. (Unfortunately while the weapons aren’t exciting for my Engineer, armor would be so I will be farming with you).

I’m still uncertain as to why the Legendary weapons are more about gold grind than in-game achievement. Gifts akin to the Gift of Mastery make sense. 600-800g+ in materials seems like a not-so-subtle attempt to coerce players into buying Gems.

Snow.5269:

Why is A-NET so reluctant to comment on this issue?

Perhaps because time spent implementing things is better than time spent blabbering away on the forum on every little thing.

@Khisanth. While that was very insightful, it takes all of 30 seconds to hop on the forums & update the community. If they never plan to change to design concept, that is fine but they should make that known. Linsey’s post suggests they could be making changes which is why the community is inquiring. The direct involvement of 3rd party sites selling precursors should alone be enough to warrant a change as players purchasing off TP are no longer competing with just players, but gold selling organizations who are monopolizing on the low supply of precursors.

@Snow If you think the 3rd party sites are actually selling precursors then go buy one and stop complaining. When your account gets hacked and everything you own ingame is stripped and sold then I don’t want to hear a peep from you. Stop acting like buying things from 3rd party sites is in anyway safe. You see those gold spammers and botters running around? Yeah, they thought those sites were safe too.

I have no interest in using those sites. However, other players do & as a result it effects all of us. The low supply of precursors allows these organizations to purchase all supply & monopolize the market. Anything listed lower is bought immediately. Because there are no alternatives other than MF slot machine, most players are at the mercy of whatever price these organizations set it at.

ryokoalways.3450:

Gift of “Legendary name” often cost the same or more than prescursor at the moment due to increasing lodestone prices. My gift of bolt (250 ingot, 250 gossamer, 100 charged, gift of metal, 100 runestones) has a worth of 400g right now.

Honestly, precursor pricing (with many in the lower 200gs right now) is hardly a problem in legendary weapon crafting. Sunrise and Twilight will always be in high demand and remain more expensive than most legendaries, and the high cost of the legend is a non-issue with how dirt cheap the gift of bifrost is. Every other precursor is easily within striking range if you are smart with your resources.

You can farm for charged lodestones. Getting a full set of Crucible of eternity yield me 30 of them

Oh I don’t need them. I finished bolt last night. I had 100 before the second price spike.

@snow you know alot about how they operate don’t you? So that is the dusk precursor game in a nutshell? Can’t be.

I made colossus last night in the forge not even trying just doing my weekly gamble of 6g. As soon as I made it I sold it on the tp there was only 1 other one at 400g. I sold mine for 365g and turned around and bought dusk at 335g right away.

That was 2 precursors I touched last night. I wasnt even trying to get colosssus as I was in process of working on Bolt.

The low supply of precursors? Where is there a low supply of precursors?

Did you add up all the precursors or we just talking about the normal 3? Dusk, Dawn, Legend. There are more than just 3 precursors and every thread that talks about precursors alway revolves around just those 3 and it really kills the validity of any arguement because its not even factual.

I farmed all of my legendary items in 2 weeks and all I need now is my precursor, The Hunter. I dropped about 130g into the Mystic Forge so far without even a Charrzooka coming out of it. I hear stories of people getting multiple legendary precursors with little effort and it makes this rng system so unfair. I’d be happy about this system if I got a precursor on my 2nd forge, but that is clearly not the case for me. There is no step of the legendary-making process that requires any skill; it is all farming. I would hope that in the future there would be a part that requires some kind of skill rather than mindless/tedious farming.

Smart people put exotics in the forge “gambling” to make a precursor and actually make money or break even.

Silly people blow their wad on expensive exotics on the TP and go home with nothing.

I’m not sure ANet has a fix for people being “silly” or even that one is required.

I’ve dumped around 200g into getting a colossus with no luck. I was very smart about it too, using buy orders and buying hammers low, selling back named exotics, etc. I wish I had counted the number of combines I’ve done because it’s well into the 1000’s.

No precursor, and now I’m completely broke. I have no choice but to head to Orr and farm for pennies to try my hand at gambling again. There’s no use saving up, as there are no longer any Colossus listed on the AH. The ones that do go up now will be in the 500g range I’m sure, and by the time I get 500g they will have gone up more. My only real choice here is to play the stupid forge RNG. It’s not fun, it’s not challenging. Terrible system.

If they wanted us to dump yellows in for the market’s sake they should have had a much higher chance of getting some “shattered peice of colossus/dusk/whatever” that we had to combine in the forge to make the whole weapon. The same amount of yellows would be leaving, but it would take a lot of the randomness out of the process.

Snow.5269:

I have no interest in using those sites. However, other players do & as a result it effects all of us. The low supply of precursors allows these organizations to purchase all supply & monopolize the market. Anything listed lower is bought immediately. Because there are no alternatives other than MF slot machine, most players are at the mercy of whatever price these organizations set it at.

The sad thing is, if I ever somehow get a precursor other than the shortbow (I sometimes throw daggers and greatswords into the forge) I’d undercut them knowing full well they’d buy it and resell it, which would still give me enough gold to complete my icy runestones and save up a bit longer for the lover.

melchiz.7182:

I’m still uncertain as to why the Legendary weapons are more about gold grind than in-game achievement. Gifts akin to the Gift of Mastery make sense. 600-800g+ in materials seems like a not-so-subtle attempt to coerce players into buying Gems.

I actually LOL’ed at this…every time people say “A-Net just wants to FORCE people to buy gems” a little piece of me dies.

Not because I am a “How DARE you attempt to besmirch the name of A-Net” type person. Do you realize that 600-800g converted from gems is $750-$1000. IF you get 1g per 100 gems which you can’t…so it actually cost even more.

NO ONE…count them…NO ONE…is going to spend $1000 on a legendary skin…OK maybe 2 people. So there ya go, A-Net made enough to pay their seckitteny for 2 weeks.

Anyone who drags out the old-dead horse of A-Net just wants to coerce people into buying gems, only shows their lack of understanding and common sense. Gem sales are designed to make them some extra money and for people to get some items, while yes you can get some gold from it, it is obvious that it is not intended to be used to buy everything the game has to offer. It is simply way too expensive.

Edit: LOL, apparently s e c kitteny is too hot of a word for the forums to handle.
Edit #2: Checking thesaurus …ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT!!!

@varl

Just got to the TP and count how many exotics you have bought and derive how many combines you have done from that. I’m still under 100 combines of exotic weapons in the forge, had several named but no precursor yet and I am up over 10g through the whole process.

I just flipped through over 600 pages of bought hammers, that was depressing enough. I don’t even want to try to count these things. I’ve done cheap exotics and rares, they both end up being a loss in the long run.

I don’t see the problem. I’ve forged 3 precursors after maybe 5000 forges. Just takes time and heavy risk but if you can beat the risk it pays off. My first precursor, the chosen, paid for enough forges to get my next precursor, rodgort’s flame. The money from that and what I had left from the chosen got me far enough to get the colossus yesterday which i sold overnight for 400g and bought dawn with. Now I’m sitting on about 25 gold, hoping to profit again.

@neoxide Remind me of the part where you mentioned anything SKILLFUL being involved.

This system is garbage and has no place outside crapfest Korean junk MMOs. Just because some third-rate MMO from Korea uses this kind of ridiculously amateurish and lazy game design doesn’t mean it’s a good idea here.

Just made mine today, and while I did many attempts (though nowhere near the stories I’ve heard of thousands being thrown in) I did manage to get a precursor today However, I agree that the RNG is too much after reading about all these situations. Usually, I salvage my crafted goods for ectos since I need 150 more for the gift of fortune (hardest part for me =( ) and haven’t even gotten started on Twilight Arbor explorable yet (still need the GM manual so I could allocate 30 points into acrobatics and 25 into deadly arts for my dungeon build). I just had a feeling I should use the mystic forge and take a break from my ecto crafting, but my previous advice still stands given the typical scenario: craft rares of the same legendary type you want only using gathered mats while buying fine T5 ingredients (minimal expense given how much you’ll earn questing), and sell exotics from the forge on the TP while saving for your precursor with vendor trash event profits. This way, you’ll not only have a chance for your precursor, but if you never get it you’ll at least have some gold saved towards it. The buying up and reselling of precursors seems to have halted, so they’ve stabilized at around 250-350g.

With 100% world completion, 25 icy runestones, a gift of wood, all the mats but the dungeon token item for the unicorn statue, and 360 PvP marks I’m almost there.

ChairGraveyard.2967:

This system is garbage and has no place outside crapfest Korean junk MMOs. Just because some third-rate MMO from Korea uses this kind of ridiculously amateurish and lazy game design doesn’t mean it’s a good idea here.

I’m sorry what bonus do you get from the legendaries that you can’t get from other weapons? Sounds to me like we got a bunch of kids who want their stuff now now now cause they’ve seen a minuscule population with something shiny. I find it laughable people bring in skill as if grinding is skillful. And for you “hard workers” who spent hundreds of gold trying to make the precursor, you aren’t that hard working cause you you were you wouldn’t try to gamble for the item you would’ve saved a bit more and buy the item outright.

Heard it all I got my first precursor after putting in a few GS in a day over a long period of time vice going all in at once. Legend arise are meant to be a marathon not a sprint, compare it to however many people you want if they have it chances are they worked harder and are more persistent at it than you. The small population of people who got it “easy” is equivalent to the small population of people who got shafted.

The only problem I have with the current system is the RNG for the precursor weapon. There is no part of the legendary-making process that takes skill because it’s just a grind. I honestly don’t care if they change the RNG system or not, but I’d like an official comment if they are going to change the legendary precursor system. I think the current system is garbage just like Korean MMOs but this is really the only goal that takes time in this game even though it’s boring.

Keiel.7489:

I tend to try to be a little nicer about it, but it’s occasionally difficult. I recognize that ANet needs to keep the game population large. Their profit margin is individual transactions, thus it is a boon to have a larger, content population.

The “skill” argument is funny. sPvP is skill. WvW is coordination.
One is completely unrelated to PvE, the other is only minimally related.

LFk.1408:

Keiel.7489:

I tend to try to be a little nicer about it, but it’s occasionally difficult. I recognize that ANet needs to keep the game population large. Their profit margin is individual transactions, thus it is a boon to have a larger, content population.

The “skill” argument is funny. sPvP is skill. WvW is coordination.
One is completely unrelated to PvE, the other is only minimally related.

If we were given a series of difficult quests comprising of dungeons, jumping puzzles, champion mobs, etc., then it would at least be more fun and have some sort of adventure rather than killing the same mobs over and over for farming. I’d at least have to pay attention instead of being brain-dead from killing the same circuit of mobs over and over.

@wicket, exactly so. The reason it’s some of the worst game design you can even make is not because it takes a long time (as everyone keeps trying to attribute to people that don’t like the system) but because it’s boring tripe.

I’d rather have it so the precursor required every non-PvP achievement in the game to make than the current Mystic Forge lazy garbage design. At least then it’d be somewhat of a challenge instead of “farm Plinx for 1000+ hours”.

Right now that’s all getting a legendary takes. Farm Plinx over and over until you have enough gold and complete the non-gold requirements. OMG SO FUN.

I don’t understand why people here think that mindlessly grinding a single event chain should be the sole way to get a legendary.

The entire process takes zero skill or even real effort aside from mindlessly grinding garbage loot. That’s not fun. That’s not good game design and it has no place outside third-rate garbage Korean crap grindfest MMOs.

I love how someone said something like this: ’ Where’s the problem ? I did 5000 forges and got 3 precursors.’
Well that’s kittening great. Now if you’d use your brain for just a second, you will maybe realise how RNG works. I can do 15 000 forges and still get absolutely nothing. If I spend 400gold forging and get nothing, then farm another 50gold and go for another spree, then that does not mean I have higher chances. ‘Oh I’ve spent so much gold I have to get it now!!’

…

And then there’s: ‘Oh hey I got my Dusk after 40 tries, where’s the problem guys ? You all just complain for no reason duh, 2 ez l2p.’

Really please get a clue.
Hi ?

Rng is bad and doesn’t belong in this game. So far legendary needs you to do dungeons, wvw, events, rng(clovers) etc random stuff, but it does not involve any skills or achievements and it definitely should. Fix the broken system please.

No, I’m afraid you’re the one who doesn’t seem to get how RNG works. I mean, yes, it is possible to do 15k forges and get nothing, in the sense that nothing in the game code guarantees this won’t happen. But the odds against that happening are about 3.3 million to 1 (assuming 0.1% chance per attempt, which jives with most numbers people are posting).

To put that in perspective, you are five times more likely to draw a royal flush right off the top of a shuffled deck of cards than you are go make 15k attempts without a precursor.

Hippocampus.8470:

No, I’m afraid you’re the one who doesn’t seem to get how RNG works. I mean, yes, it is possible to do 15k forges and get nothing, in the sense that nothing in the game code guarantees this won’t happen. But the odds against that happening are about 3.3 million to 1 (assuming 0.1% chance per attempt, which jives with most numbers people are posting).

To put that in perspective, you are five times more likely to draw a royal flush right off the top of a shuffled deck of cards than you are go make 15k attempts without a precursor.

it is still possible …..just as some people can and have gotten dusk on their first try with lv 75 rares.

Getting a precursor on your first try is a thousand times more likely than failing after 15000 tries, so that’s not a very good comparison.

Hippocampus.8470:

Getting a precursor on your first try is a thousand times more likely than failing after 15000 tries, so that’s not a very good comparison.

i suppose not but my point is statistics state you “should” get one, but it does not mean you will. the best example i can think of is the lottery (united states mega millions or powerball i guess) look at the odds of winning, chances are u wont but people do still win. you did state it is possible earlier but the odds are unlikly. i believe somone posted that they used hundreds of rares and didnt get a single exotic (correct me if i am wrong), which statistically should not have happened but it did anyways. even then the thought of 1 person having to throw that many weps into the forge is just idk depressing lol.

Devs recently said they was planning to put online a better drop rate, testing it.
Maybe will arrive for the big november 15th update, i hope. Because the actual loot table is blue green blue green rare blue green blue blue blue green. Just trash.
I wasted 10g of cheap rare 80s attempting a precursor. I get back an awesome amount of rare trash, not even exotic, i just left, i’m using my money for something else, until we will have a better drop rate. No more time or money to waste on my side for a stupid lottery.

From personal experience, lvl 80 rares are not made equal either. (for 4x rare to exo promotion)

Some exo’s are extremely common. After a big rare dump the last 2 days i walked away with ~10 exos. I had 4 of the same type, and 2 others that i got 2 of’s also. The one i got 4 of the same type, i’ve gotten 8 total of over all my attempts for that weapon type (so thats 8 out of 21 exotics all ended up being the same one).

complain complain complain …

You should get used to RNG system, thats how its set up and you are not going to change it.

So you have 3 options now ..

1. Continue the mystic forge way
2. Buy it from Trade post (No one cares if you do it with farmed gold, gem gold, etc ..)
3 Dont try anymore and give up, and if the legendary is the only thing you are interested in GW2 (uinstall the game)

I get it, sometimes RNG is unfair but let me give you one nice quote Ive got from different forums and different MMORPG…

‘’Unfair is a beautiful thing.
Back in 1998 I loaded up the new and exciting Ultima Online for the very first time and entered a the strange new world of MMORPGs. Because it was a new genre game developers didn’t know what to expect – the game was a wild west of untested concepts and players. It was a huge social experiment.

Many people don’t know the game was designed to be a simulation. That meant several resources were limited. If you had the taming skill you could tame pets but each server would only allow a small number of high end pets to spawn. For example, there may only be 100 Nightmares (demon horse) on a server at a given time. If they were all tamed and put in a stable no more would spawn.

The system was very unfair because all the high end pets were soon gone.
The first people to buy and play the game had them all locked up in the stables.

I used to rant about how unfair the system was because as a new tamer I never had a shot at getting some of the high end pets. Most people who had them wouldn’t bring them out into the PvP areas because they couldn’t stand the idea of having the pet killed. (Pets couldn’t be resurrected at that time) There is no way a new one would spawn until one of the tamed ones had died. Nothing fair about that. So I ranted about it on the forums.

This unfair system; however, produced some really awesome in game memories though. I’ll never forget the first time I saw a Nightmare in the wild. I’d played for over a year before finding one. Of course, I was totally unprepared and it killed me – but I was still geeked – not many people had the privilege of getting whacked by a Nightmare.

Later, I ran across another very rare tameable and actually ended up making it my own. Totally freakin’ awesome. I’d ride it around on my Frenzied Ostard in town and people would offer me insane amounts of money for it. I’d be really careful where I took it because my chances of finding another one were next to nothing.

Anyways, people began to complain on the boards.
After awhile the developers caved.
They removed the spawn limitation.

I thought that was great at the time.

Three weeks later, everyone had a complete collection of ‘rare’ spawns. In fact, it got to the point that people were giving them away as gifts. You could put them in fight clubs – they were disposable and they had no value anymore. The awesome had died. A very real and special part of the game had died. There was no longer a year long personal quest to find a rare spawn – put a quarter in the vending machine and receive your item – next please.

In a world full of ezmode gaming, participation ribbons, and so forth unfair is becoming a very rare and precious thing. Unfair is a golden opportunity for some special things to happen. Unfair is something that should be savored because it’s an increasingly rare commodity in a market packed full of spoiled players who view MMORPGs as vending machines for trinkets.

I can go buy a dozen different MMORPGS out there right now where they’ve got all kinds of fair – all kinds of guaranteed success for sale. I’d rather stay here. WTB more unfair please.

Unfair is a beautiful thing.’’

Written by: Winthrop

@Dogblaster Why didn’t you just say you was all for elitism and gold sellers, instead of just putting it into a story with detailed quotes that nobody cares about! You’re post was just as useless as what I’m posting here.

based on the interview on twitchtv it doesnt look like the patch has anything to do with precursors.

From a person who has dumped over 1500g in the Mystic Forge, all i can say is: there is a good reason why precursors cost 300g+ because it takes roughly 250g-300g on average to obtain a precursor from the forge (talking about Dusk Dawn in particular since i am only doing the 4x GS method which is guaranteed GS output.

Well said, Dogblaster. I like the piece you quoted.

Obviously, everyone has their own opinion on the matter — some people believe they should get a pellet when they push the lever, each time, every time, and that’s a fine and valid position. Others enjoy the thrill of pushing the lever, knowing each time they could get a pellet, or they may not — also a fine and valid position. Slot machines, lottery games, and raffles all exist because many people enjoy the activity despite (or perhaps because) the “odds” are against them.

Legendary skins are intended to be desirable (and, judging by the number of posts on this topic, they are), and what Dogblaster was pointing out was that part of the desirability will most likely fade if the system is changed to make them easier to acquire; in any game with even a hint of a competitive element, it’s reasonable to expect some persons to want to showcase their achievements, not just in triumphing against the game, but in doing so better/faster/luckier than their peers.

While this was called “elitism” by silleh, I really cannot agree with that — it’s the nature of competition. Every athlete at the Olympic games is arguably among the best on the planet, and in any given event every single one of them may successfully complete the course/obstacle/challenge placed before them — a triumph many people could not do. However, we only award the top three with a place at the podium. Regardless of how well everyone else did, or how hard they tried, the field of athletes are absolutely not recognized equally, nor should they be.

This analogy only carries so far for two reasons. One, a legendary is intended to be /difficult/ to achieve, but NOT necessarily intended to reflect a player’s “skill” per se (note that this in no way diminishes the “bragworthiness” of having one – the difficulty in obtaining it is sufficient). Two, unlike the Olympics, there -is- a guaranteed method of obtaining a legendary. If you want the precursor, and you dislike games of chance, you can purchase one. Full stop.

If you believe the precursors are too expensive, that’s not AN’s fault — that’s your fellow players, who are (naturally) trying to get the most coin they can for one (supply and demand). As for the allegations that “gold farmers are the ones who have the precursors on the TP”, just like anyone else, if you feel the prices are too high simply don’t pay it. They gain nothing by keeping the item listed for a too-high price, and prices WILL come down as more enter the economy and nobody buys them past a certain price. The reason why something is priced at 300g is because someone already paid 280g for the last one.

I hope the method of acquiring these weapons is not changed; while it means it will be harder for me to get one (I do not have a precursor today), that doesn’t really bother me — eventually, I’ll get one, or I’ll shoot for something I like more if one appears. I don’t feel entitled to have one, there are no better stats on it than the exotic weapon I presently have so I don’t “need” to get one to be competitive…it’ll be a nice vanity skin when and if I complete it.

And on the day that happens, I will run around Lion’s Arch swinging it and relishing every love/hate whisper I get on the matter, a victory that will taste all the sweeter if I’m the only person doing so. Because I am a unique snowflake, and my Internet Purple makes me >> the guy next to me. Etc etc. Such is the nature of competition.