Guild Wars 2

Nope. I’m not really into lottery games.

VoxShatterfall.5470:

I have a feeling there is some type of US consumer law that says a person needs to display the content of an unknown lotto like package, exactly what a person could win ect (but not having to reveal the chances of receiving each particular item).

Like WotC releases a card list for every MTG set they release, contests / sweepstakes list all possible prizes that they are giving away, Lotteries list their cash prize levels.

The only industry that doesn’t show the prizes before hand is the entertainment industry like wheel of fortune, lets make a deal, or the weird one that you open 1 of 3 doors (all to “heighten” the excitement and entertainment value). “Deal or no Deal” doesn’t count as they have all the values known already.

It would be nice if we got a chime in from ANET before someone buys $100 USD of keys (I personally would only spend gold on keys).

The difference between wheel of fortune, let’s make a deal, etc. is that those shows don’t require you to initially bet money to participate. Lotto and BLC stuff do. That’s the issue.

Okuza.5210:

IMHO, random equates with “scam” and “rip-off”. Proponents will no doubt argue that it’s fun to open a chest and see what might pop out. And, if it’s fun for you, go for it. If you’re looking for the cheapest way to obtain a particular item, though, buy it on the TP.

I’ve opened maybe a couple hundred chests during my time playing GW2 and never once seen anything even close to approaching the value of a single key on the gem shop come out. Thankfully, I’ve never spent a gem on a key — only used in-game keys.

My best advice would be to never ever buy a key using gems.

Not sure how you got over 100 keys without buying them. I have yet to see 1 drop from the world. Just the personal story ones are all I’ve ever gotten without buying them.

Mkalafut.1273:

Okuza.5210:

IMHO, random equates with “scam” and “rip-off”. Proponents will no doubt argue that it’s fun to open a chest and see what might pop out. And, if it’s fun for you, go for it. If you’re looking for the cheapest way to obtain a particular item, though, buy it on the TP.

I’ve opened maybe a couple hundred chests during my time playing GW2 and never once seen anything even close to approaching the value of a single key on the gem shop come out. Thankfully, I’ve never spent a gem on a key — only used in-game keys.

My best advice would be to never ever buy a key using gems.

Not sure how you got over 100 keys without buying them. I have yet to see 1 drop from the world. Just the personal story ones are all I’ve ever gotten without buying them.

You can make 7 keys for about 4g and that’s all I’m going to say.

After the Halloween fiasco never again!

Mkalafut.1273:

Not sure how you got over 100 keys without buying them. I have yet to see 1 drop from the world. Just the personal story ones are all I’ve ever gotten without buying them.

You can convert Commendations at the vender for Black lion keys, and you can get commendations from using candy corn amulets in the mystic forge.

I have never spent gems on chests yet, for any event, and I do not intend to for this one. If they allow me to buy the item I want directly, with gold or gems, then ill get it. If I want it ! Simple.

Nah. I only pay for collectables and unlocks.

I’m not paying for costumes unless they are unlocks, and I’m not paying for miniatures unless I can get them directly.

Random chances are a waste.

I’m not going to gamble, so while I’ll definitely buy much in the gem store, it’ll only for things that I know I’ll actually get, not 1/1000000 chance at something good.

As I have so far, really. I’ve spent quite a lot of money on the gem store… and not bought a single chest

Zohar.4576:

No, they lost my trust in regards to chests perhaps permanently. That said if they offer costumes I can buy, chances are I will buy them because that’s what I thought the purpose of the cash shop was (not a stupid lottery). Sell costumes on the shop = I’ll buy them.

Put costumes in chest = I’ll never buy a chest.

I feel the same way. Direct purchase of the items I want? I’ll spend as much as need be to get the items i want for all my characters I want to buy them for. Random Loot from a chest lottery? No thanks.

Why not offer both? Then the people that want to put it to chance that they might end up with what they want cheaper can buy chests and those of us who don’t like being jerked around can just buy the items we want directly?

Mkalafut.1273:

Not sure how you got over 100 keys without buying them. I have yet to see 1 drop from the world. Just the personal story ones are all I’ve ever gotten without buying them.

I don’t have an exact chance, but it feels like there’s about a 50% chance of getting another key when opening a chest. I’ve opened very long strings of chest after chest with just a single starter key. IIRC, about 7 chests is the longest and 3 is pretty common. BTW, map completions give keys. For a long time, I thought all map completions gave keys, since I always got them. Either the chance has changed recently or it’s just a high chance and I was lucky. I have 5×80 characters. That’s a lot of map completions and story keys.

I used to save keys, too. So, I actually saw how many I had earned before burning through them. The first time I saw one and heard chests were “random reward”, I banked the key and kept that up. My thinking at the time was that the rewards might be scaled to the character level and thus waiting until 80 to open would be better. So, I had a relatively large pile of keys to burn through all at once during the halloween event.

I can’t recall the exact number in the stack. More than 50, less than 75? About that. The rest are a guess based on the number of extra keys I got during openings.

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More on topic for the OP, if you think about how they balance the gem:gold trading feature, it would make no sense for them to ever make key-spamming a viable means of making a profit in game. Chests are thus likely to always remain a “sucker bet”.

OTH, I can visualize the chest-dev reading this and saying “Oh, really? Watch this!” and making chests temporarily very profitable before returning them to their usual cash-sink status. Gotta trot out a woolly bully now and then to show the herd that not every one ends up shorn.

VoxShatterfall.5470:

I have a feeling there is some type of US consumer law that says a person needs to display the content of an unknown lotto like package, exactly what a person could win ect (but not having to reveal the chances of receiving each particular item).

The problem is, even if this was true, you are not buying the boxes directly like you would buy a lottery ticket. You are buying a virtual currency (which has the amount displayed aka conversion ratio). What you do with the virtual currency is up to you.