Guild Wars 2

Basically the cost of character slots is a rip off

For the price of 5 you could buy a new game account that at least you can expand the bank system with and mail stuff to one another. Am I the only one thinking buying them this way is a bit harsh?

I don’t think the price of buying characthers should be lowered – it lets you have everything on one account.

They should give you an easier time on outfits and such though. >.< If I have 10 characther slots, I should get two bag tabs for the same purchase instead of being double charged for the same. Same with costumes. Those become pricey and IMO unfairly target people with many characthers.

I don’t neccessarily think that the slot price should be lowered, but each character should have it’s own bank slots, and when you buy a character slot it should come with additional storage as a part of the purchase price honestly

I have to agree with the OP. I very much want some new character slots and it would be a guaranteed purchase from me if they were reasonably priced. But their current price is a complete deal-breaker for me.

Doesn’t it make perfect sense that 5 char slots cost as much as the game? (Which gives you 5 char slots)

Zeebok.1460:

Doesn’t it make perfect sense that 5 char slots cost as much as the game? (Which gives you 5 char slots)

I see what you’re trying to say, but I have to say no, it doesn’t make perfect sense to me. Here’s my reasoning:

Let’s say that when you bought GW2 and installed it, you spent a few minutes in character creation mode, then hit “play”, and then…nothing. That’s it. There’s no more. You just spent $50 bucks for five character slots and no content. Would you think that was money well-spent? I’m guessing not, and I’d even go so far as to say you’d be pretty upset and possibly even feel ripped off.

The price they are charging for character slots is exactly like that, only you’re just buying them one at a time instead of all at once. When the original game gives you more content by several orders of magnitude than purchasing 5 character slots, then no, I don’t think it makes sense for those 5 slots — and nothing more — to equal the purchase of an entire game.

I’m not knocking you or your opinion, mind you. I just disagree.

Cheers!

Zeebok.1460:

Doesn’t it make perfect sense that 5 char slots cost as much as the game? (Which gives you 5 char slots)

not when if you bought another game you could have twice as much bank space, something people are lacking. Especially the more toons you have to an account.

Now If buy purchasing said slot you could get more bank slots I could understand it. But you dont. So to get true value for money you would buy a fresh game.

Honestly i disagree , the price should be what it is.

Chars are important things in a MMO , to say one is worth 10$ bucks is nothing abnormal.

I don’t mind the price of additional slots (it’s a touch high but not horribly so) but I do agree with a couple of the above posters that it would be really nice if purchasing an extra slot also added a little more bank storage space for the extra soulbound odds and ends that character will accumulate.

I guess if bank-slot upgrades only come in the 30-slot variety (=600 gems) then the free bank space would be too much, however how about offering a promotional deal where you can buy an extra slot and a bank upgrade as a bundle for 1100 gems which you could list as a “20% discount” (in total), or a “get a half-price bank slot when purchasing a new character slot” promotion.

You could buy a new game account, but they won’t share anything account bound. Also, you can get gems with gold. And the price considers that too.

I won’t be against a decrease in price of anything in the gem store, but that doesn’t mean they will decrease the price just because someone suggests it.
They probably have an economic looking into such things, determining the ‘sweet spot’ at which the most people buy things with the highest possible price.

Nothing we do will probably change that, unless you conviced the entire playerbase to go on ‘strike’ and never buy anything until they decrease the prices, and believe me, you will NEVER do that, because every single game community in hat has been, is and will ever be are the very epitome of chaos.

“They probably have an economic looking into such things, determining the ‘sweet spot’ at which the most people buy things with the highest possible price.”

If in game is any indicating factor they may need someone better at finding sweet spots.

MithranArkanere.8957:

They probably have an economic looking into such things, determining the ‘sweet spot’ at which the most people buy things with the highest possible price.

Which is exactly what they should do. If it turns out that lowering the price wouldn’t result in higher profits, then they would be foolish to do so despite my personal feelings on the matter. I want this game to be financially successful, so if selling an increased number of slots at a reduced cost doesn’t result in a net gain, then keep the price the way it is.

All I can do as a customer is provide the feedback that I am interested in buying character slots, but not at that price. Where they go from there is up to them. This isn’t a huge issue for me. I’m just saying if they were to lower the price I’d probably pick up two or three extra slots. As it is, I won’t. The world keeps turning either way.

If they do lower the cost I expect to be compensated for the three slots I’ve already purchased.

As I said Id be fine with the current price if with it came more storage options. As the game gets older storage will start to get more and more sparse. unless they do something about skins being saved I can see people having banks rammed full of gear.

Awesome.6120:

If they do lower the cost I expect to be compensated for the three slots I’ve already purchased.

That’s naïve to say the least.

Prices go up and down all the time for all sorts of things. When you buy something at a price, you are paying to have it at that moment.
If the price goes down or up later, then that’ll be the price for having at that other moment.

One of the maximum exponents of that is “now vs cheap” in game prices.

For example, getting TF2 on release was about how much? Ten dollars? Less as part of the orange box. Getting it now is free. And getting ‘buyer’ status is as cheap as the cheapest item in the in-game store, which can be less than 1$ in some cases.

Awesome.6120:

If they do lower the cost I expect to be compensated for the three slots I’ve already purchased.

I wouldn’t count on that…nor would I expect it. businesses drop prices all the time, and they don’t go reimbursing their customers that have already made a purchase at the higher price, and it would be unrealistic to expect it here honestly.

Honestly … dont matter how much people ask here , i can bet these slots are selling like crazy anyway.

So will the prices drop any time soon? No , most likely they wont.

Maybe 1 or 2 years from now they will … well , i wont be asking for my money back then , i think the investment now , when i could got the names i wanted , made up for waiting years to create the chars.

In a year or two I probably wouldn’t really care. If they reduce the cost 3 months into the game I would seriously reconsider buying gems in the future.

Awesome.6120:

In a year or two I probably wouldn’t really care. If they reduce the cost 3 months into the game I would seriously reconsider buying gems in the future.

It’s kinda like buying gas. I can fill up my tank today and then tomorrow find out the price of gas has plummeted. It sucks, and it’s irritating, but…it’s life.

Honestly I don’t understand the need for more bank slots… 250 IS a lot when you include the 100 slots each character has in bags (not including additional bag slots)… thats 750 slots for 5 character 1250 slots for 10 characters… then factor in the 250 stack slots per ingredient… what is it people are hoarding?

I have a level 80 and 4 other characters made and growing. I don’t have 20 slot bags on any of them, and haven’t bought any additional bank slots… Sure there are times when I wish I had more slots. But it’s not at a point where I can’t function yet… and by the time it does I’ll have enough gems saved up (every day I convert a few silver I earned into gems) to buy a bank slot and I’ll be good to go…

Does anyone know how many character slots can we buy for one account?

I see no problem with the price of character slots. Usually the argument is based created for storage reasons anyway, that’s not the point of character slots, although they are (ab)used for that. If you want to discuss character slots on a “cents per storage slot” basis you need to re-examine your options, and possibly be less of a pack rat =P

On the other hand, if you want to make another character to play it, the cost seems fine considering you can play 5/8 classes already with the base game, most players wont like a few classes so normally you need none or few extra slots. At worst its 3 if you want one of each class, and you dont need them all now.

Considering 5 char slots = the price of the game,
and considering the game gives 5 char slots,

Or, we paid only for char slots and nothing else.
Or, we paid for char slots and content and char slots are not worth this price.

Considering the first option is wrong, well, char slots are not worth the current price… 10 bucks is what NCsoft wants for it, not the right price.

The “right” price would be like 1$ since it costs them almost nothing to store a character in their database.

But I think that it won’t change since NCsoft has paid X price to create the game and wants X + Y bucks in return. They’ll never get anything in return if they sell such things for a very low price.

@Keiran
“8 bucks is what NCsoft wants for it, not the right price.”

800 gems is $10, not $8, and that’s exactly the kind of thing companies count on when they use point systems with offset values, something I have always felt was a bit slimy and dishonest, but it’s the norm.

With that out of the way, I agree with the OP, character slots and bank tabs are a bit overpriced. As it stands I have no intention of paying $10 for a slot or 7.50 for a bank tab, but at something like $5 – $7 I’d likely buy 2 possibly 3. I do not think they should be as low as $1 though, that is a bit too low.
And if all I want is more storage space it’s more cost efficient to buy a character and slap a few bags on them, you get way more space for only 30% or so more, even if it does have a few minor limitations. (And that doesn’t even get into creating a personal guild and building up the guild storage space for yourself, but that’s 52,500 Influence by my math for the whole 250 slots)

For me I’m remembering the gw1 sales where slots and bank tabs were discounted for Christmas, or Wintersday if you’d rather, and crossing my fingers. It was a struggle not to cave in with the release of gw1 names this past week, but I could no longer think of any names I wanted.

they sold for $9.99 USD on GW1 doesent look like much of a change to me .besides its not like you cant exchange gold for gems anyway

Adine.2184:

they sold for $9.99 USD on GW1 doesent look like much of a change to me .

You are correct, but I will point out that I never purchased any character slots for GW1 either. Ever. Because I felt they were too expensive for what you were getting.

I agree with Scribe that a $5 – $7 price would be the sweet spot that would entice me to buy some. It’s not as if they have to do any work to “create” the slot, as they would with new town clothes or other products that require art resources. I still feel they are charging way too much for something that costs them nothing.

Until I feel the price is reasonable, it’s still a no-deal for me.

8g for a fresh experience doesn’t sound too bad for me.

What need to be lowered is inventory and bank slot price.

I’d break it down like this.
Extra bag slot, 150-200
Bank slot, 300 maybe 400
Char slot, 500-600

That would put them at a price point much more palatable to me. I’m more likely to create a one man guild and grind the 2500 influence to get a 50 slot guild vault than pay 7.50 for a measly 30 slots. It’s more cost efficient because I can earn that Influence doing events I love doing (I just wish one man guilds didn’t get quite a short end of the stick, but I suppose that’s the point, to discourage people from doing that instead of spending money in the gem store, which I’d be willing to do also if it were more reasonably priced to maximize storage space.)

Yes, I’m a pack rat, and no I don’t need all 8 classes now, but I’m not in the habit of deleting characters (and with so much stuff being soulbound once you get something like a legendary you’re pretty much stuck) and do want to play them all eventually. So like I said I’m going to hope maybe, just maybe there’s even a small sale over the Wintersday holiday.

I consider anything I can buy with gems (purchasable with gold I can earn just playing the game) a heck of a good deal.

But if everybody felt it was an affordable cost for another character slot… there’d be much less value in having those slots.

I have had every intention of buying more character slots in the future, but never realized how expensive they were, never really looked at the prices. That’s… disappointing, to say the least. $10 is a lot of money just to play a different profession. Of course, I wouldn’t be paying real money anyway, I’d be paying gold, but still.

I partly blame the people who buy character slots just for storage space, though. If the price of a character was too cheap people would just buy characters instead of bank space (even moreso than already anyway).