Guild Wars 2

Borghal.1635:

Then we can all differentiate our wealth more or less only by how much time we spend playing and not have to worry about being effective or not in a freakin’ causal game all the while experiencing all the game has to offer.

LOL I’m not the one missing the point…

Gold is the currency of choice because it’s easy for anyone to get gold. Those with more time can grind through the game for gold, those with less time can buy it with gems. Take this away and your ability to buy stuff in the game depends on your time available, giving the advantage to students/unemployed players with little money but lots of time.

This works for a sub-based game that collects $15 a month from everyone, but not for a cash shop game that collects $0 from most players and $1000s from a minority. The players with money go away because they don’t have time to grind the game, then the money goes away and then the game goes away.

I know you came to the discussion kind of late, but the same people have been saying the same things for over 20 pages now, and it still doesn’t make their statements true.

phys.7689:

Players want cool stuff but they dont necessarily want to be merchants, just take a look at diablo which sold 2.7 million in first week, one of the biggest changes to the game was the destruction of the auction house. What does this tell you about player behavior TP dominance and profit?

Yeah, a broken TP and an economy that spiraled out of control, that’s a good example to keep pulling out, instead of all the other games that worked the way they were supposed to.

As far as “working as intended” goes, you still have not shown that there is a problem, JS has said at the very beginning of the thread that he does not see any evidence of a problem. But he will reconsider this if you can demonstrate that there is a problem, with or without numbers.

Um, if there’s no evidence of a problem and everything is working as intended, did you ever consider that maybe Anet devs are satisfied with the way things are going? If you can’t show that there is a problem, why should they change anything?

People have been saying “I don’t like it… I can’t prove it’s bad or tell you how to fix it but I know it’s bad and you need to fix it.”

My response is… if you can’t tell me why it’s bad or how to fix it, what do you expect to happen?

The complaint in diablo 3 and gw2 is exactly the same. The amount of complaint on the forum on the topic is roughly the same too.

I don’t think it is exact the same though, since one is a mmorpg with more activity while one is an arpg in which it is more important to make farming treasure the core part of the game.

And obviously playing gw2 is at least a bit more rewarding. I spend hundred of hours farming and flippers make more money than me in 1 minutes. At least it isn’t that bad in GW2.

tolunart.2095:

My response is… if you can’t tell me why it’s bad or how to fix it, what do you expect to happen?

I dont’ know. Since you obviously don’t care about the same 5 people complaining. I’m not sure why the same 1 or 2 people telling people there’s no problem matter.

laokoko.7403:

tolunart.2095:

My response is… if you can’t tell me why it’s bad or how to fix it, what do you expect to happen?

I dont’ know. Since you obviously don’t care about the same 5 people complaining. I’m not sure why the same 1 or 2 people telling people there’s no problem matter.

That’s a rather tit for tat argument … his question is legit. There really isn’t anything to discuss if people can’t even frame the discussion in way where constructive debate can happen. This requires someone to go beyond quoting their opinion.

laokoko.7403:

tolunart.2095:

My response is… if you can’t tell me why it’s bad or how to fix it, what do you expect to happen?

I dont’ know. Since you obviously don’t care about the same 5 people complaining. I’m not sure why the same 1 or 2 people telling people there’s no problem matter.

You’re right… neither of us are going to cause the situation to change. But only one is trying to change anything.

laokoko.7403:

The complaint in diablo 3 and gw2 is exactly the same. The amount of complaint on the forum on the topic is roughly the same too.
.

I never played D3 and it’s been a while since I read about the crash there… but wasn’t there something about players selling stuff for real money? And if the situation is the same, why hasn’t inflation spiraled out of control leading to GW2 crashing? Things are actually working as intended, as confirmed many times by JS. You remember him, right? The guy who is in charge of keeping things working as intended…

Obtena.7952:

laokoko.7403:

tolunart.2095:

My response is… if you can’t tell me why it’s bad or how to fix it, what do you expect to happen?

I dont’ know. Since you obviously don’t care about the same 5 people complaining. I’m not sure why the same 1 or 2 people telling people there’s no problem matter.

That’s a rather tit for tat argument … his question is legit. There really isn’t anything to discuss if people can’t even frame the discussion in way where constructive debate can happen. This requires someone to go beyond quoting their opinion.

I already told him. People complaining is the problem. And there are no less people complaining about gw2 economy compare to amount of people complaining in the diablo forum.

tolunart.2095:

phys.7689:

Players want cool stuff but they dont necessarily want to be merchants, just take a look at diablo which sold 2.7 million in first week, one of the biggest changes to the game was the destruction of the auction house. What does this tell you about player behavior TP dominance and profit?

Yeah, a broken TP and an economy that spiraled out of control, that’s a good example to keep pulling out, instead of all the other games that worked the way they were supposed to.

As far as “working as intended” goes, you still have not shown that there is a problem, JS has said at the very beginning of the thread that he does not see any evidence of a problem. But he will reconsider this if you can demonstrate that there is a problem, with or without numbers.

Um, if there’s no evidence of a problem and everything is working as intended, did you ever consider that maybe Anet devs are satisfied with the way things are going? If you can’t show that there is a problem, why should they change anything?

People have been saying “I don’t like it… I can’t prove it’s bad or tell you how to fix it but I know it’s bad and you need to fix it.”

My response is… if you can’t tell me why it’s bad or how to fix it, what do you expect to happen?

i already told you why its bad.
earning at different rates creates different rewards per effort

JS said prove that competition is real.
I cite prices as proof.
If desire is universal across multiple economic classes (say 1/10 players rich or poor want an item)
then the items velocity will show how many rich versus poor players are competing in the market.

for example
item costs 400 gold
player A earns 20 gold a week
player B earns 200 gold a week

every player A who buys the item needs 20 weeks to buy the item
every player B needs two weeks to buy the item
supply and velocity of item is 40 per week that sell

players of the type A cannot keep up with the supply of the item. 40 items are created a week, but type a players only earn enough in 20 weeks, this implies with demand being the same, that 38 of the 40 are being sold to player B. If you are a seller, you are going to sell at a price that meets player Bs needs, not A. Player A prices are suboptimal.

tolunart.2095:

I never played D3 and it’s been a while since I read about the crash there… but wasn’t there something about players selling stuff for real money?

Yes, and it was perfectly legal to do so because Blizzard set that up, and it worked as intended, because Blizzard got a cut of the profit from each successful sale. Blizzard set it up that way on purpose, and it did what it intended to do, which was bring them more money.

And then the game collapsed. Oops.

tolunart.2095:

laokoko.7403:

The complaint in diablo 3 and gw2 is exactly the same. The amount of complaint on the forum on the topic is roughly the same too.
.

I never played D3 and it’s been a while since I read about the crash there… but wasn’t there something about players selling stuff for real money? And if the situation is the same, why hasn’t inflation spiraled out of control leading to GW2 crashing? Things are actually working as intended, as confirmed many times by JS. You remember him, right? The guy who is in charge of keeping things working as intended…

It’s ok. I dont’ take people more credible just because they have a tag.

It’s not like I listen to the goverment. Just because they keep telling people things are ok and apparentment the president in my country only have 9% people left supporting him.

tolunart.2095:

laokoko.7403:

The complaint in diablo 3 and gw2 is exactly the same. The amount of complaint on the forum on the topic is roughly the same too.
.

I never played D3 and it’s been a while since I read about the crash there… but wasn’t there something about players selling stuff for real money? And if the situation is the same, why hasn’t inflation spiraled out of control leading to GW2 crashing? Things are actually working as intended, as confirmed many times by JS. You remember him, right? The guy who is in charge of keeping things working as intended…

they got rid of real money trade first, then they got rid of fake money, completely killing the AH. they sold an expansion after doing this and sold 2.7 mil in one week.
The key here is the crash wasnt the real problem, the real problem was the AH was creating playstyles that didnt really encourage actually playing the game much, and reduced the WOW factor of good drops, which is essentially the whole point of Diablo.

Essentially, AH economy was detracting from gameplay reward structures/design. In taking it away they made huge sales, and had many people say the game overall feels much better and much more rewarding. They also tweaked reward structures in ways that you cant tweak rewards if you have an AH, like increasing drop rates, and better rewards for specific content, that can be repeated as much as people want.

tolunart.2095:

Borghal.1635:

Then we can all differentiate our wealth more or less only by how much time we spend playing and not have to worry about being effective or not in a freakin’ causal game all the while experiencing all the game has to offer.

LOL I’m not the one missing the point…
…
I know you came to the discussion kind of late, but the same people have been saying the same things for over 20 pages now, and it still doesn’t make their statements true.

Maybe my bad for discussing a different point than the thread title…

Why would the people with money go away? I think they have good reason to go away now, the gem to gold exchange is ridiculously low what with current TP prices.

My comments about equalizing gold gain were about ingame activities, I think I even pointed it out somewhere. I’m all for people buying ingame gold with rl cash, what I don’t like is ingame playstyles with wildly variable profits. Also I don’t want to hamper TP trading per se, I just wish that I could choose from multiple paths if I went for optimum gold gain in this game.

Borghal.1635:

Why would the people with money go away? I think they have good reason to go away now, the gem to gold exchange is ridiculously low what with current TP prices.

What?

The gold-to-gems rate has been getting worse for anyone wanting to grind gold in the game then trade them for gems. But at the same time the gems-to-gold rate gets better because each gem has been buying steadily more gold over time. So if you have cash and want to buy gold instead of grinding then the situation is better now than at launch.

Gene Archer.8560:

tolunart.2095:

I never played D3 and it’s been a while since I read about the crash there… but wasn’t there something about players selling stuff for real money?

Yes, and it was perfectly legal to do so because Blizzard set that up, and it worked as intended, because Blizzard got a cut of the profit from each successful sale. Blizzard set it up that way on purpose, and it did what it intended to do, which was bring them more money.

And then the game collapsed. Oops.

Good to know that. Among the suggestions I’ve seen was that players should be able to sell gems directly to each other instead of using an exchange rate. That would be an incredibly bad idea and will cause the economy to crash.

phys.7689:

i already told you why its bad.
earning at different rates creates different rewards per effort

Jim and Bill both run dungeons when they play the game. Both make 10g/hour.

Jim runs dungeons for 10 hours a day. Bill runs dungeons for 2 hours per day.

A month later, Jim has 3000 gold and buys the precursor and mats to make Twilight. Bill only has 600 gold and can’t even buy the precursor.

Obviously, this is a problem because every time Bill sees Jim with Twilight, he feels bad. Therefore the only solution is to change the game so that no player can play more than 2 hours per day. That way no one feels bad because they can’t make enough money to buy stuff.

Welcome to online gaming, where sometimes other people have better stuff than you do.

tolunart.2095:

Gene Archer.8560:

tolunart.2095:

I never played D3 and it’s been a while since I read about the crash there… but wasn’t there something about players selling stuff for real money?

Yes, and it was perfectly legal to do so because Blizzard set that up, and it worked as intended, because Blizzard got a cut of the profit from each successful sale. Blizzard set it up that way on purpose, and it did what it intended to do, which was bring them more money.

And then the game collapsed. Oops.

Good to know that. Among the suggestions I’ve seen was that players should be able to sell gems directly to each other instead of using an exchange rate. That would be an incredibly bad idea and will cause the economy to crash.

What difference does it make beside no one will speculate Anet is manipulating the price.

I seen other games let the players trade it themself. Nothing happened. I’m pretty sure many games let the players sell the whatever ruby, diamond, or currency themself.

D3 had a dual auction house system, one for in game currency and one for real money. But in a game where the goal is to acquire items with the best stats, being able to simply buy them than earn them sort of gave the game a “God Mode” where you could steamroll through content if you spent some cash. On top of that the in game economy had no real currency sinks and hyper inflation made items on the in game currency auction house resemble Zimbabwe’s inflation.

Ah, Zimbabwe, where everyone’s a billionaire! Kinda makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Until you find out that a loaf of bread costs 100 billion…

tolunart.2095:

Good to know that. Among the suggestions I’ve seen was that players should be able to sell gems directly to each other instead of using an exchange rate. That would be an incredibly bad idea and will cause the economy to crash.

Doesn’t matter. It worked as intended.

I remember an article about how you could get the highest Zimbabwe bill for essentially peanuts. Always kinda wanted one as a piece of history.

Gene Archer.8560:

tolunart.2095:

Good to know that. Among the suggestions I’ve seen was that players should be able to sell gems directly to each other instead of using an exchange rate. That would be an incredibly bad idea and will cause the economy to crash.

Doesn’t matter. It worked as intended.

Breaking the game is the very definition of “not working as intended.”

phys.7689:

i already told you why its bad.
earning at different rates creates different rewards per effort

JS said prove that competition is real.
I cite prices as proof.
If desire is universal across multiple economic classes (say 1/10 players rich or poor want an item)
then the items velocity will show how many rich versus poor players are competing in the market.

You have not proven anything. People like expensive European sports cars. Poor people cannot afford expensive European sports cars. They can either get more money, or realize they will never own an expensive European sports car. They are, understandably, not happy about this. The people who make and sell expensive European sports cars don’t really care.

You’re just repeating your opinions and claiming that this is the obvious truth. It’s not, and I’m done taking anything you say seriously.

tolunart.2095:

Breaking the game is the very definition of “not working as intended.”

The system did exactly what it was intended to do. It allowed players to sell items to one another with real money and Blizzard got a cut of the profit. It worked as intended.

It’s just that in working as intended, it destroyed the game. It still did what it was supposed to do, though. It still worked as it was intended to work. A side effect just came with that and snowballed with other problems into causing the game to straight up implode.

No.

tolunart.2095:

What?

The gold-to-gems rate has been getting worse for anyone wanting to grind gold in the game then trade them for gems. But at the same time the gems-to-gold rate gets better because each gem has been buying steadily more gold over time. So if you have cash and want to buy gold instead of grinding then the situation is better now than at launch.

I had not studied how it was in the past, I just looked at the current state and thought – is it worth it to buy items on the TP with $ instead of gold? The answer is a clear and resounding NO at the current exchange rate.

As things are now, a weapon skin costs up to 75$, a legendary weapon ~300$. That is INSANE pricing. For 300$ I could have that legendary as a real life sword on my wall…
EDIT: not to mention that the beloved “easier to work for $” argument is starting to fall apart at this pricing point. At minimum wage where I live you would need to spend 60-70h working for what would take you 100h to farm in game.

I would consider it favorable and more in line with the cosmetic microtransaction system, if the ratios were reversed, i.e. you got more gold for your irl cash than you get irl cash/gems for gold.

tolunart.2095:

No.

Yes.

tolunart.2095:

Jim and Bill both run dungeons when they play the game. Both make 10g/hour.

Jim runs dungeons for 10 hours a day. Bill runs dungeons for 2 hours per day.

A month later, Jim has 3000 gold and buys the precursor and mats to make Twilight. Bill only has 600 gold and can’t even buy the precursor.

Obviously, this is a problem because every time Bill sees Jim with Twilight, he feels bad. Therefore the only solution is to change the game so that no player can play more than 2 hours per day. That way no one feels bad because they can’t make enough money to buy stuff.

Welcome to online gaming, where sometimes other people have better stuff than you do.

There is another “solution”; boost supply. Change the game so that completing the Personal Story gives you a Precursor of your choice. Make it so that all Vets drop Loot Bags as guaranteed loot. Elites drop non-Exotic Champ bags. This should vastly boost the supply in game. Getting your fancy skin then becomes a question of “when”, not “if”.

Of course, this “solution” means that just about everybody would have a Legendary or some other formerly exclusive item, so I imagine a fair number of players would now consider the game “ruined” if they enjoyed having stuff that few other players have. (I honestly don’t care what other people are using, so it wouldn’t bother me in the slightest.) The other potential side effect is that it could also cause player attrition once players achieve their goals and then move on to other games, which would be bad for ANet from a business perspective.

For both reasons, I doubt ANet would ever take this route. The current system is a compromise, as things in life so often are.

Zaxares.5419:

For both reasons, I doubt ANet would ever take this route. The current system is a compromise, as things in life so often are.

Exactly so. It’s just not possible to please everyone, for every player that enjoys the benefits of the TP and being able to buy expensive items, there’s a player who is jealous because he can’t. And five more who just don’t care one way or the other.

Changes are not made based on the volume of complaints on the forums. They take these complaints and discuss them, surely, but decisions are made based on what’s best for the game as a whole, not just “the squeaking wheel.”

tolunart.2095:

phys.7689:

i already told you why its bad.
earning at different rates creates different rewards per effort

Jim and Bill both run dungeons when they play the game. Both make 10g/hour.

Jim runs dungeons for 10 hours a day. Bill runs dungeons for 2 hours per day.

A month later, Jim has 3000 gold and buys the precursor and mats to make Twilight. Bill only has 600 gold and can’t even buy the precursor.

Obviously, this is a problem because every time Bill sees Jim with Twilight, he feels bad. Therefore the only solution is to change the game so that no player can play more than 2 hours per day. That way no one feels bad because they can’t make enough money to buy stuff.

Welcome to online gaming, where sometimes other people have better stuff than you do.

Did you miss the different rewards per effort part? Bill won’t feel that sad because he knows that Jim simply put more time into the game and he could achieve the same thing without changing anything about how he plays, it’s jsut a matter of hours clocked in. Their reward per effort is identical.

tolunart.2095:

phys.7689:

i already told you why its bad.
earning at different rates creates different rewards per effort

JS said prove that competition is real.
I cite prices as proof.
If desire is universal across multiple economic classes (say 1/10 players rich or poor want an item)
then the items velocity will show how many rich versus poor players are competing in the market.

You have not proven anything. People like expensive European sports cars. Poor people cannot afford expensive European sports cars. They can either get more money, or realize they will never own an expensive European sports car. They are, understandably, not happy about this. The people who make and sell expensive European sports cars don’t really care.

You’re just repeating your opinions and claiming that this is the obvious truth. It’s not, and I’m done taking anything you say seriously.

i have proven as you say that the TP earning disparity creates a get more money or get out system, as you yourself has said. I have also proven that people who sell items market them to the highest bidder, and thus the people with more money when the supply is small.

You have agreed with everything i say
you agree TP earns more
you agree you either l2p TP or dont have things
you agree that people selling items sell them based on TP earners prices.

the only difference is you think this is all a good idea for the game.
you are not saying that wealth distribution to certain playstyles doesnt effect the gameplay and player experience of everyone else, you are merely saying its ok, because they should either l2p the TP or not have anything.

Borghal.1635:

I had not studied how it was in the past, I just looked at the current state and thought – is it worth it to buy items on the TP with $ instead of gold? The answer is a clear and resounding NO at the current exchange rate.

As things are now, a weapon skin costs up to 75$, a legendary weapon ~300$. That is INSANE pricing. For 300$ I could have that legendary as a real life sword on my wall…
EDIT: not to mention that the beloved “easier to work for $” argument is starting to fall apart at this pricing point. At minimum wage where I live you would need to spend 60-70h working for what would take you 100h to farm in game.

I would consider it favorable and more in line with the cosmetic microtransaction system, if the ratios were reversed, i.e. you got more gold for your irl cash than you get irl cash/gems for gold.

Those $ for gold prices are about half of what it was around launch, when 1 gold bought 100 gems or somesuch. Come back in six months and a Legendary will “cost” about 70% what it does now in gems converted to gold. A year from now it will be $100 instead of $300.

As time goes on, more players accumulate gold and want stuff from the gem store, so the gold-to-gems exchange gets worse as more players pump gold into the exchange. As they do this the opposite exchange becomes more attractive as each gem you buy for real money translates to more gold.

When they designed this system they knew what they were doing.

Zaxares.5419:

tolunart.2095:

Jim and Bill both run dungeons when they play the game. Both make 10g/hour.

Jim runs dungeons for 10 hours a day. Bill runs dungeons for 2 hours per day.

A month later, Jim has 3000 gold and buys the precursor and mats to make Twilight. Bill only has 600 gold and can’t even buy the precursor.

Obviously, this is a problem because every time Bill sees Jim with Twilight, he feels bad. Therefore the only solution is to change the game so that no player can play more than 2 hours per day. That way no one feels bad because they can’t make enough money to buy stuff.

Welcome to online gaming, where sometimes other people have better stuff than you do.

There is another “solution”; boost supply. Change the game so that completing the Personal Story gives you a Precursor of your choice. Make it so that all Vets drop Loot Bags as guaranteed loot. Elites drop non-Exotic Champ bags. This should vastly boost the supply in game. Getting your fancy skin then becomes a question of “when”, not “if”.

Of course, this “solution” means that just about everybody would have a Legendary or some other formerly exclusive item, so I imagine a fair number of players would now consider the game “ruined” if they enjoyed having stuff that few other players have. (I honestly don’t care what other people are using, so it wouldn’t bother me in the slightest.) The other potential side effect is that it could also cause player attrition once players achieve their goals and then move on to other games, which would be bad for ANet from a business perspective.

For both reasons, I doubt ANet would ever take this route. The current system is a compromise, as things in life so often are.

looking at diablo iii, everyone having a legendary isnt that much of a problem. there more legendaries to get, and more synergies to try, and every so often Bliz releases new ones.

phys.7689:

i have proven as you say that the TP earning disparity creates a get more money or get out system, as you yourself has said. I have also proven that people who sell items market them to the highest bidder, and thus the people with more money when the supply is small.

You have agreed with everything i say
you agree TP earns more
you agree you either l2p TP or dont have things
you agree that people selling items sell them based on TP earners prices.

the only difference is you think this is all a good idea for the game.
you are not saying that wealth distribution to certain playstyles doesnt effect the gameplay and player experience of everyone else, you are merely saying its ok, because they should either l2p the TP or not have anything.

Ok, you proved the things that were already accepted and acknowledged, and fail to prove that any of this is bad, which is the premise of the entire thread.

Congratulations. You proved that water is wet, and failed to prove that drinking water is bad for your health.

tolunart.2095:

…

When they designed this system they knew what they were doing.

That does nothing for players now, though – which is what I think matter most. Even if the prices drop – 70% of 300$ is still a ridiculous amount for a cosmetic skin. LoL for example has its income also based on cosmetics and the most expensive skins go for less than 30$, most costing under 10$ and their production value is somewhat similar to GW2 skins. Thanks to that kind of pricing I have already pumped about 200$ into the game one skin at a time, because the skins feel like ok value for money. I can honestly say I will never spend more than a new game’s worth (50/60$) for a single skin in any game and thus will probably never give Anet any money for their skins, only for functional stuff like character slots.

You say the price will go down over the years. I say, given the current saturated MMO market, there is a good deal of probability I won’t be a regular in this game in 3-4 years, so if the prices drop by then, Anet will still see no money from the likes of me.

Borghal.1635:

tolunart.2095:

…

When they designed this system they knew what they were doing.

That does nothing for players now, though – which is what I think matter most. Even if the prices drop – 70% of 300$ is still a ridiculous amount for a cosmetic skin. LoL for example has its income also based on cosmetics and the most expensive skins go for less than 30$, most costing under 10$ and their production value is somewhat similar to GW2 skins. Thanks to that kind of pricing I have already pumped about 200$ into the game one skin at a time, because the skins feel like ok value for money. I can honestly say I will never spend more than a new game’s worth (50/60$) for a single skin in any game.

You say the price will go down over the years. I say, given the current saturated MMO market, there is a good deal of probability I won’t be a regular in this game in 3-4 years, so if the prices drop by then, Anet will still see no money from the likes of me.

So what’s the problem?

Legendaries are not supposed to be bought with real money. If you do the intended process and collect the materials and farm for a precursor drop (or play the Mystic Forge to get one) then it takes an insane amount of time and effort for what amounts to a fancy skin.

Show me a player who got a Legendary through his credit card and I see someone with more money than brains.

Any way you look at it, the end result is not worth the work that goes into it. Which is why I’m not upset because I don’t have a Legendary weapon – I don’t want one. I think it’s a waste of time and effort when I could be doing things I think are fun.

Now, I think the rate at which they release new weapon and armor skins through the gem store is a bit slow. After a year and a half they should have three or four times as many skins for sale there. That would encourage people to buy gems. Legendaries do not.

tolunart.2095:

So what’s the problem?

Didn’t I explicitly state what the problem is? Why yes, I did. I’m not gonna post the same words again. At this point I just feel you cherry-pick what you like to respond to.
Or if you can honestly say you don’t understand the words, I will then try to rephrase.

tolunart.2095:

Legendaries are not supposed to be bought with real money. If you do the intended process and collect the materials and farm for a precursor drop (or play the Mystic Forge to get one) then it takes an insane amount of time and effort for what amounts to a fancy skin.

Legendaries are on the TP for gold, you can buy gold through gems. Of course they are intended to be bought for money, as one of two possiblities of acquiring them. If they weren’t intended as such, they would be accountbound.

Anyway, I wrote about Legendaries as the top tier skins of the game as comparing them to the top tier of another game that has similar financing yet manages to keep it reasonable.
Personally I don’t want a legendary either. Same as you, I think the cost is not worth the effort. I am not upset about not getting one. Personal feelings have nothing to do with the topic being discussed, which is something you and others keep forgetting and saying things like “it works for me”, “I’m ok with it” etc.

I also wrote about other skins. Skins that you can only obtain via lottery or buying them from somebody who won the lottery. Those skins also cost a lot more.
Yet you totally ignored that part and went arguing straight for the legendaries.

Btw…

tolunart.2095:

Show me a player who got a Legendary through his credit card and I see someone with more money than brains.

Seriously? What about someone who likes the game, such money is no bother to him, and he doesn’t want to waste time in the game by farming and would rather enjoy other aspects of the game. Does that person then have a lesser brain?

Feel like this is getting personal which is a disaster for any serious discussion and besides it is getting rather late (or soon? hah).

KISS: ‘Rare’ items as well as released skins on the TP are too expensive both for non-hardcore gamers and people with some $ to spare (ironic considering that the latter are the people Anet should want to cater to). The only ones to profit from this situation are people who like to play the TP and do it well and people who can afford to full-time-job farm, and that is bad.
Solution: difficult and unclear. Maybe even not possible.
That doesn’t mean we can’t discuss the depth of the issue though.

I express my opinions, my personal feelings about the issue.

I don’t understand why this is a problem for you. Really, I don’t. Also, this is waaaaay off topic for a thread about the TP, not the gem store. I really, honestly, absolutely don’t care if you think that gems to gold conversion is a bad deal. So, whatever.

Borghal.1635:

Feel like this is getting personal which is a disaster for any serious discussion and besides it is getting rather late (or soon? hah).

KISS: ‘Rare’ items as well as released skins on the TP are too expensive both for non-hardcore gamers and people with some $ to spare. The only ones to profit from this situation are people who like to play the TP and do it well and people who can afford to full-time-job farm, and that is bad.
Solution: difficult and unclear. Maybe even not possible.
That doesn’t mean we can’t discuss the depth of the issue though.

KISS: your opinion, not an objective truth.

Solution: correct.

Discussion: there is nothing to discuss.

tolunart.2095:

I express my opinions, my personal feelings about the issue.

I don’t understand why this is a problem for you. Really, I don’t. Also, this is waaaaay off topic for a thread about the TP, not the gem store. I really, honestly, absolutely don’t care if you think that gems to gold conversion is a bad deal. So, whatever.

It is not affecting me personally. My endgame goals are not those of acquiring Twilight and a Zephyr armor set. I settle for collecting dungeon sets because that gives me the feeling that I’m accomplishing something instead of just stockpiling gold and mats. I would welcome more content acquirable solely through playing the game, but that is a matter not for this thread.

What we’re discussing here is a problem I feel worthy of discussing because:
I care for this game.
I care for game mechanics in general.
I am of the opinion that economics should not be overshadowing gameplay.
I fear steep prices like these drive people away from playing more or buying gems (granted, this one is sort of personal as I am using myself as an example as I already explained in the LoL comparison)

If you don’t care about these things, why post so much? Besides, I’m trying to say it’s not an issue of I feel – you feel, rather of how thing really are. I don’t think it’s a bad deal. I go and compare it to another similar deal and conclude upon evidence that it indeed is a bad deal.

Borghal.1635:

If you don’t care about these things, why post so much? Besides, I’m trying to say it’s not an issue of I feel – you feel, rather of how thing really are. I don’t think it’s a bad deal. I go and compare it to another similar deal and conclude upon evidence that it indeed is a bad deal.

I often ask myself the same question, but I refuse to answer me.

You said that you haven’t researched the exchange rates over time, you only looked at what they are right now.

Right now the rates for buying gems and converting to gold are around the best it’s been in the history of the game. If this is such a bad deal, what about at launch, when buying a Legendary would have cost $700 or more, or perhaps even $1000?

Whether this is a good deal or a bad deal is subjective, not objective. It is your opinion that it’s a bad deal. It’s my opinion that it’s a good deal because Anet didn’t even have to offer this service, and because the rates have changed over the last year and a half to heavily favor those converting gems to gold rather than the other way around.

We disagree, and I believe the source of the disagreement is your inexperience with this particular situation. If you had bought gems a year or so ago and converted them to gold, you would look at the exchange rate now and realize that it is so much more beneficial to you to buy gems now to exchange for gold compared to a year ago.

I find it incredibly easy to make gold in this game, I wander around doing stuff and loot falls into my pockets. So I don’t feel the need to buy gold.

tolunart.2095:

You said that you haven’t researched the exchange rates over time, you only looked at what they are right now.

Right now the rates for buying gems and converting to gold are around the best it’s been in the history of the game. If this is such a bad deal, what about at launch, when buying a Legendary would have cost $700 or more, or perhaps even $1000?

Whether this is a good deal or a bad deal is subjective, not objective. It is your opinion that it’s a bad deal. It’s my opinion that it’s a good deal because Anet didn’t even have to offer this service, and because the rates have changed over the last year and a half to heavily favor those converting gems to gold rather than the other way around.

We disagree, and I believe the source of the disagreement is your inexperience with this particular situation. If you had bought gems a year or so ago and converted them to gold, you would look at the exchange rate now and realize that it is so much more beneficial to you to buy gems now to exchange for gold compared to a year ago.

I find it incredibly easy to make gold in this game, I wander around doing stuff and loot falls into my pockets. So I don’t feel the need to buy gold.

What you’re doing is you’re glorifying what is essentially a case of out of the fire, into the frying pan. Better =/= good. I do not deny the situation is better than it used to be. However, it still remains bad as proved by the LoL comparison (and frankly, right now I don’t recall coming across a game with microtransactions where a single piece of content would go for that much, including those rip-off kittenty things like Clash of Clans and similar smartphone nonsense).

As an aside, I would love to know where and how you wander. I didn’t start counting my money in golds until my first char was 80 and even now, after 207 hours of ‘wandering’ with him, if I wanted something pricier, I would have to spend all of my 207 hours’ earning on it. And it would still have to be under 100g.
So if it’s not a secret, I would like to know what you consider as “wander around” and “easy to make gold”. The whole point of this thread of late is that those two activities seem mutually exclusive in this game.

Borghal.1635:

What you’re doing is you’re glorifying what is essentially a case of out of the fire, into the frying pan. Better =/= good. I do not deny the situation is better than it used to be. However, it still remains bad as proved by the LoL comparison (and frankly, right now I don’t recall coming across a game with microtransactions where a single piece of content would go for that much, including those rip-off kittenty things like Clash of Clans and similar smartphone nonsense).

What are you talking about?

Look at the gem store. There are and/or have been weapon and armor skins offered for sale for less than 1000 gems per item. 1000 gems is about $12 and is the cost of an infinite-use gathering tool. Entire armor skin sets are 800 gems ($10) and armor pieces or weapon skins are around 400 – 600 gems each.

Legendary weapons are intended to be a long term goal for the most dedicated players and are not sold through the gem store! They were not intended to be bought with gems, the fact that you do so indirectly doesn’t mean anything.
They were intended to take players many months to obtain and as such are not an example of gem store products.

If you’re talking about the claim tickets for weapon skins, they went through several different versions before settling on the current method. Since this method has been in place for about a year it seems that Anet thinks it’s a good idea. They sell keys to Black Lion chests that have a random assortment of items, including tickets and ticket scraps. You don’t buy the weapon skins directly, they are prizes and a motivation for buying keys. And yes, they sell a lot of keys. Not to me, I think it’s a terrible deal, but obviously it motivates a lot of people to try their luck.

I think you are simply looking at this from the wrong angle, and jumping to some very strange conclusions. This is not a debate, you appear to be confused and I’m trying to help you understand something.

Borghal.1635:

As an aside, I would love to know where and how you wander. I didn’t start counting my money in golds until my first char was 80 and even now, after 207 hours of ‘wandering’ with him, if I wanted something pricier, I would have to spend all of my 207 hours’ earning on it. And it would still have to be under 100g.
So if it’s not a secret, I would like to know what you consider as “wander around” and “easy to make gold”. The whole point of this thread of late is that those two activities seem mutually exclusive in this game.

Gold is a generic term for in-game currency. Copper adds up to silver which adds up to gold. People just say “gold” because it’s confusing for one person to be talking about copper while another talks about silver. I use the term interchangably with “money” when talking about in-game currency.

Gene Archer.8560:

tolunart.2095:

No.

Yes.

This isn’t an argument, it’s just contradiction.

Help! I’m trapped in a Monty Python skit!

Behellagh.1468:

This isn’t an argument, it’s just contradiction.

Hooray for Monty Python? Prefer Mel Brooks, myself.

Borghal.1635:

tolunart.2095:

Should players be locked out of the game after 2 hours online per day? Because it’s not fair that someone should be able to collect loot all day long while you’re at …

Oh it’s not about that at all. You’re missing the point so much it hurts considering how many times it has been stated.

What we would like to see is lesser income disparity between the ways of making money in the game. I would see an ideal point where you have an average way of making money and any other way differs in potential only by +-50% in that you’re not gimping yourself by selecting a playstyle, therefore the only income gate that remains is time, which all players have in common.

Say you have…
1) harvesting and selling – 6gph
2) crafting – 12gph
3) doing dungeons – 10gph
4) world bosses – 12gph
5) PvP/WvW rewards – 7gph
etc etc
So that not one of these paths is worse off by more than double in comparison to a different one.

Then we can all differentiate our wealth more or less only by how much time we spend playing and not have to worry about being effective or not in a freakin’ causal game all the while experiencing all the game has to offer.

I think you just widely overestimate the average profit being made as tp merchant.
Personally, I already stated that I estimate my account wealth to be in the region of 50-60k gold and people said i make too much gold on the tp. But I also clocked more than 6k hours, so my hourly rate is less than 10 gold, which seems pretty much in line with other ways of earning gold.

Wanze.8410:

I think you just widely overestimate the average profit being made as tp merchant.
Personally, I already stated that I estimate my account wealth to be in the region of 50-60k gold and people said i make too much gold on the tp. But I also clocked more than 6k hours, so my hourly rate is less than 10 gold, which seems pretty much in line with other ways of earning gold.

But what about the guy in map chat who said he makes 1000g an hour without leaving Rata Sum? Surely he is a reliable source of information and would never exaggerate his TP profits to impress people!

Wanze.8410:

Borghal.1635:

tolunart.2095:

Should players be locked out of the game after 2 hours online per day? Because it’s not fair that someone should be able to collect loot all day long while you’re at …

Oh it’s not about that at all. You’re missing the point so much it hurts considering how many times it has been stated.

What we would like to see is lesser income disparity between the ways of making money in the game. I would see an ideal point where you have an average way of making money and any other way differs in potential only by +-50% in that you’re not gimping yourself by selecting a playstyle, therefore the only income gate that remains is time, which all players have in common.

Say you have…
1) harvesting and selling – 6gph
2) crafting – 12gph
3) doing dungeons – 10gph
4) world bosses – 12gph
5) PvP/WvW rewards – 7gph
etc etc
So that not one of these paths is worse off by more than double in comparison to a different one.

Then we can all differentiate our wealth more or less only by how much time we spend playing and not have to worry about being effective or not in a freakin’ causal game all the while experiencing all the game has to offer.

I think you just widely overestimate the average profit being made as tp merchant.
Personally, I already stated that I estimate my account wealth to be in the region of 50-60k gold and people said i make too much gold on the tp. But I also clocked more than 6k hours, so my hourly rate is less than 10 gold, which seems pretty much in line with other ways of earning gold.

most people have not come anywhere close to 10 gold per hour overall sir, you have just demonstrated your richness, and your out of touchness with the common mans world. imagine if you will having 1000-2000 hours and your account wealth is in the region of 1000 gold. this is the normal player.
this means you have 10 times the money per hour they have. and things you seek to obtain are 10 harder for them to obtain.

im estimating, but JS has all the numbers, he can give us the average value of hours played-wealth obtained.