Guild Wars 2

False, it was just relocated to the AH for the extra gold revenue from transactions.

Dark Catalyst.1028:

Where’s the profit in keeping the weapon skins exclusive?

It’s because some people want to feel unique.
Some people like to believe gear can only be epic if they (and a few others) are the only ones that have it.

They did they the best of gw1 yes, the fans and the name. They couldn’t succeded without those two things.

Everything else is just a faded memory of gw1.

KarlaGrey.5903:

False, it was just relocated to the AH for the extra gold revenue from transactions.

It’s still not Spamadan, which was wall-to-wall people semi-AFK selling things. At least the Black Lion allows people to throw things into it at a price and then keep playing rather than require them to sit, repeat, and hope they can clear their inventory.

This is a wvw-related thing, but it’s also related to how Anet has changed, and how cashgrabs can be damaging to a game and its communities.

There is a special pricing system in place for the week before the upcoming wvw tournament. The top half of Gold League has the same transfer cost (2400 gems) as the bottom half of Gold League(servers that have no chance of beating the top half).

The top 2/3 of Silver League also has the same 2400 gem cost. The bottom 1/3 of Silver is free.

Bronze league’s top 4 positions have a cost of 800 gems, the rest of Bronze is free.

The situation is that it will cost you 2400 gems to get top rewards in Gold/Silver, still cost you 2400 gems to get mediocre rewards in Gold/Silver, or 800 gems to get top rewards in Bronze. You can also move to a 5-6th place server in Bronze for free, and get the same mediocre rewards as someone paying 2400 gems to get into a 5-6th place in Gold/Silver server.

The really funny part is that once the tournament starts the pricing actually moves to a much better system. Within each league places 1-3 are 2400 gems, 4-6 are 1400 gems, and 7-9 are 1000 gems.

So what’s the deal with the totally different pre-tournament pricing? My guess is that they are banking on a lot of people taking that offer of 800 gems for an easy win and maximum rewards. Throwing away the integrity of the tournament (what little wvw has left) for the sake of making a quick buck on transfer sales.

Bronze league is very likely to end up with 1-2 servers that will dominate that league during the tournament. Then after the tournament they will curbstomp their way up though a couple other tiers, till they hit a point of stability. By the time the next season/tournament comes around, they’ll likey crash back down below where they started from if they didn’t stabilize into an easy win position.

This is why I stopped doing wvw. Horrible decisions like this have done too much damage to too many servers.

mrstealth.6701:

This is a wvw-related thing, but it’s also related to how Anet has changed, and how cashgrabs can be damaging to a game and its communities.

There is a special pricing system in place for the week before the upcoming wvw tournament. The top half of Gold League has the same transfer cost (2400 gems) as the bottom half of Gold League(servers that have no chance of beating the top half).

The top 2/3 of Silver League also has the same 2400 gem cost. The bottom 1/3 of Silver is free.

Bronze league’s top 4 positions have a cost of 800 gems, the rest of Bronze is free.

The situation is that it will cost you 2400 gems to get top rewards in Gold/Silver, still cost you 2400 gems to get mediocre rewards in Gold/Silver, or 800 gems to get top rewards in Bronze. You can also move to a 5-6th place server in Bronze for free, and get the same mediocre rewards as someone paying 2400 gems to get into a 5-6th place in Gold/Silver server.

The really funny part is that once the tournament starts the pricing actually moves to a much better system. Within each league places 1-3 are 2400 gems, 4-6 are 1400 gems, and 7-9 are 1000 gems.

So what’s the deal with the totally different pre-tournament pricing? My guess is that they are banking on a lot of people taking that offer of 800 gems for an easy win and maximum rewards. Throwing away the integrity of the tournament (what little wvw has left) for the sake of making a quick buck on transfer sales.

I think that’s wrong. I think I know why the pricing is that way – to encourage people to move for free to “less populated” servers to try to even it up. Same reason they don’t mind huge queue times on top-tier servers – they want people to spread out through the other servers rather than cluster in the top three.

I wouldn’t say Anet has forgotten, they just dont care about their playerbase anymore. They release crappy broken updates over and over, and they do everything in the gemstore now. It’s just becoming another game that tries to drain as much money as possible while still hoping that the game is playable.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I think that’s wrong. I think I know why the pricing is that way – to encourage people to move for free to “less populated” servers to try to even it up. Same reason they don’t mind huge queue times on top-tier servers – they want people to spread out through the other servers rather than cluster in the top three.

That’s the one part of the deal that I think is good, but the tournament rewards incentives work against it. You can go there for free and get away from queue times or massive zergs, but that means getting less reward from the tournament.

0 gems and get the smallest reward vs 800 gems (or about 65g) to get the biggest reward. Having a near guaranteed chance at an ascended weapon (I’m assuming the “Mistforged” are ascended) helps make that a bit more worth the gold.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

mrstealth.6701:

The worst part is that we’re to a point where games don’t even have a reward system…or even gameplay mechanics in some cases. You just buy whatever you want with real money. Everything is turning into a Facebook/mobile “game” where all you do is decorate a virtual house with cash shop trinkets.

Minecraft, Terraria, Civilization 5, Dwarf Fortress . . . yes, you can do RMT in these games for items.

Wait…

OR wait, they all shipped without mechanics in place and are just existing to pull money out of wallets.

Wait, no that’s Starbound.

Careful with throwing “everything” around like that. It gets painful.

At that point, you’re just paying for access to a shopping mall to spend even more money, and a place to hang out to show off the things you bought.

I’m not claiming that GW2 is at that point, but it sure does have some aspects of it.

If it gets to the point where computer games are like that, or go the way of the mobile “wallet please?” games? I’ll go right on back to my cardboard crack. Magic: The Gathering is at least much more upfront about the fact you’ll be spending money to play beyond a certain casual level.

I actually didn’t learn the lesson of RMT until Diablo 3. RMT effectively puts the player in charge of rewarding themselves. Either through RMT or a bowl of M&Ms next to their computer.

mrstealth.6701:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I think that’s wrong. I think I know why the pricing is that way – to encourage people to move for free to “less populated” servers to try to even it up. Same reason they don’t mind huge queue times on top-tier servers – they want people to spread out through the other servers rather than cluster in the top three.

That’s the one part of the deal that I think is good, but the tournament rewards incentives work against it. You can go there for free and get away from queue times or massive zergs, but that means getting less reward from the tournament.

0 gems and get the smallest reward vs 800 gems (or about 65g) to get the biggest reward. Having a near guaranteed chance at an ascended weapon (I’m assuming the “Mistforged” are ascended) helps make that a bit more worth the gold.

I’m not 100% sure it’s “near guaranteed” since a server which gets a lot of bandwagon joins is not likely to win any better than if they were at “normal strength” . . . they can still only field the same maximum people as anyone else and bandwagoners can keep competent people on the sidelines which might make a difference.

That, and the lesson SBI learned last season in the end: of course you can be knocked off the peg if servers team up on you to keep you from the reward spots.

I guess more to the point is “near guaranteed” isn’t “guaranteed”, or at least guaranteed enough for it to make sense spending gems to transfer to, say, Blackgate.

A guild moving to Blackgate (or anything in T1) won’t have much impact or help that server do better, because they already have 24/7 player coverage/queues.

Moving to a T6 server where queues are less common and coverage gaps exist, a single wvw focused guild, or even just decent amount of individuals, can have quite an impact. Plus these servers are already clearly the top of bronze league, while SBI was on the lower end of silver league before their transfer surge happened for season one.

mrstealth.6701:

A guild moving to Blackgate (or anything in T1) won’t have much impact or help that server do better, because they already have 24/7 player coverage/queues.

Moving to a T6 server where queues are less common and coverage gaps exist, a single wvw focused guild, or even just decent amount of individuals, can have quite an impact. Plus these servers are already clearly the top of bronze league, while SBI was on the lower end of silver league before their transfer surge happened for season one.

Eh, it’s moving off topic now . . . but worth noting the idea wasn’t to fleece people so they could bandwagon, so much as it seems to be “look,just spread out, we’ll make it easy. Free. There.”

Unfortunately, it just doesn’t work. People would much rather jam into a fewer selection of high pop servers than spread out.

I see it as a bit of both trying to help balance(free moves to low ranks), but still having a tempting cash grab sale (800 gems for T6).

Getting a bit back more on topic, it is nice to see new weapon skins that are gained through actual gameplay rather than being purely gemstore items. It’s just a shame that for many players getting those requires either coughing up gems to transfer, or waiting till the next season comes around to earn enough tickets to actually get them.

I like that they added Tormented weapons to the game, it’s a nice nod to the old game. I do however not like that it’s another gemstore addition. Instead I want to see more armor and weapon skins added to the gameplay itself, such as new craftable skins and quests for new recipies. And with that I don’t mean ascended-style endless grind+timegating, I mean like the exotic armor we can craft now. That’s what I like, that’s what I’d love to see. I don’t really care about making old GW1 elites exclusive in GW2 though, and I say that as a GW1 veteran.

Nury.3062:

I understand that many players from GW1 bought and supported GW2 but don’t expect to get something from that,why should you expect to get something,and you still get an armor skin,titles,achievement points,exclusive pets for the ranger,isn’t that enough?
You should be glad they add skins from gw1 in the game,buy them to support gw2 if you want.You speak about how hard was to get those weapons in GW1…yea in GW1,this is GW2,we have here other weapons hard to get aka legendaries.This is not GW1.

If I could buy them and not have to RNG box to get them I would. The skins are a joke and a way to keep people buying keys. I would love to see more guild wars 1 skins in guild wars 2. But putting them In the gem store is taking the kitten. I’m all for supporting the game and I do. I’ve pumped £70 into the game this year already. But want I want is real additions. Not this gem store crap.

Another week, and we have a couple new items in the gemstore. A relatively small addition, $10 for a couple new armor skin pieces. But exactly what you get for this price takes me back to something I did mention earlier in this thread, the value Anet places on gemstore items. $10 sounds comparable to other skins that have been added in the past, but that is also the same price as full sets of armor.

I support Anet’s right, and need, to make money with the gemstore. Creating new content and items costs money, and selling some of those items is a good way to make money back. But I do have to question the value they associate with some of these items. The real cash cost of Black Lion weapon skins is one thing I feel is way beyond acceptable, but you can at least get those via key farming. With these new glove/shoulder skins, it’s a gem-only purchase of 2 pieces of armor, for the same price of a full 6 piece set.

It’s not the random chance/lottery price attached to weapon skins, it’s an absolute “we feel these 2 pieces are worth as much as 6 other piece sets.” Looking at this from the standpoint of a consumer getting value for their money, it just doesn’t seem right at all. From the preview in the gemstore they don’t really look like anything special, just another armor skin. So why do these 2 pieces cost as much as 15 other sets in the store?

just to give you an idea how a smaller game does bussiness:
https://store.marvelheroes.com/wsstore_en_eu/in-game-currency.html
prices are the exact opposite of the gem prices, some are even better then gem prices.
and for the record, they are all euro prices, dollar prices are accurately done.

Brutal Arts.6307:

The audience for GW1 isn’t the audience for GW2. This game is aimed at the people that would spend hundreds of dollars on farmville or other casual facebook games.

So, you spend hundreds of dollars on farmville or other casual facebook games?

Lydell.8713:

Brutal Arts.6307:

The audience for GW1 isn’t the audience for GW2. This game is aimed at the people that would spend hundreds of dollars on farmville or other casual facebook games.

So, you spend hundreds of dollars on farmville or other casual facebook games?

No, but I have spent $200 to date on various games on my iPad and “casual” games on Steam. (Humble Bundle helps keep the number up and the cost down though.) Oh, and the donation to some people doing mods for Minecraft, do I count that or not?

Lydell.8713:

Brutal Arts.6307:

The audience for GW1 isn’t the audience for GW2. This game is aimed at the people that would spend hundreds of dollars on farmville or other casual facebook games.

So, you spend hundreds of dollars on farmville or other casual facebook games?

There are clearly a lot of people that do spend money on games like this. The top grossing apps list on Google’s Play store is full of free games. At least some of which are games that put a pointless time barrier in front of you, then offer you the chance to pay and get around it. For example, playing a level spends some of a slowly regenerating “energy” bar, and once that is empty you have to stop playing and wait for it it fill back up, or pay real money for an instant refill. Other games are selling cosmetic items or other shiny digital trinkets.

I can definitely see the similarities in these games’ business models and GW2’s business model. Selling cosmetic items is exactly the same, and even before release Anet was describing the gemstore as offering “time-saving convenience items” (Mike O’Brien’s own description). The time-saving items offered by the gemstore (cash/gem>gold trade, XP/karma boosters, etc) aren’t nearly as extreme as the common mobile game tactic of ‘wait or pay’, but the core concept is similar; you can hand over cash in order to progress faster.

These mobile/Facebook games do have a lot more leeway in ‘getting away with’ these business strategies because the games themselves are generally free. Games that require an upfront purchase are usually, and rightfully in my opinion, held to a different, higher standard. I would say GW2 is definitely above the standard of many of those games, but I believe there are still some questionable aspects to the business model.

I think both GW2 and free mobile/Facebook/casual games do rely on the same type of gamer. Not necessarily the ones that are willing to throw large amounts of money at the game, but the gamers that are willing to pay for the chance to progress faster, or to just skip ahead. This is essentially paying money for absolutely nothing, or even paying to intentionally shorten/reduce the amount of gameplay time you get out of a game. Comparatively, ingame/digital items do seem more reasonable in many cases because you do get ‘something’, but the prices attached to those can quite often be absurd.

About skins, I think GW1 had more pleasant weapon looks, in GW2 weapons are too fluffy. Dragon Bone Staff, Frog Scepter, BO Staff, Voltaic, Obsidian Edge, Eternal Blade – these were my favourite

Psychol.5783:

About skins, I think GW1 had more pleasant weapon looks, in GW2 weapons are too fluffy. Dragon Bone Staff, Frog Scepter, BO Staff, Voltaic, Obsidian Edge, Eternal Blade – these were my favourite

I hated most of those skins though . . . of course, I don’t like much of the Gem Store skins either. Except for Dragon’s Jade and Tormented, I haven’t really felt a burning need for any.

Cool GW1 skins should be available for all GW2 players, and I say this even if I love more the first game than the latter.
The only thing I would complain about is how unsatisfactory it is the way this company tend to implement most of the best skins.
Store or stupid RNG seems to be the norm today, quite curious given that dungeon tokens where introduced exaclty to avoid to turn this mmorpg into a dice game.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Psychol.5783:

About skins, I think GW1 had more pleasant weapon looks, in GW2 weapons are too fluffy. Dragon Bone Staff, Frog Scepter, BO Staff, Voltaic, Obsidian Edge, Eternal Blade – these were my favourite

I hated most of those skins though . . . of course, I don’t like much of the Gem Store skins either. Except for Dragon’s Jade and Tormented, I haven’t really felt a burning need for any.

I didn’t like most of those, either. Actually, I hated quite a few of the really rare weapons in GW, but there were a lot of other nice looking skins. Eternal Blade was ok, and the Obsidian Edge was decent but too 2d/flat looking. But there were some really great looking weapons available, even if they were more common. I think GW1 just had a better looking weapons in general. I’ve had a hard time finding even a single skin I like for some weapon types in GW2.

Strangely enough, I really do like the GW2 version of the Voltaic Spear (Al’ir’aska) despite never liking the GW1 version. Maybe it’s just because it’s an underwater/melee weapon instead of a thrown land/ranged weapon. Or holding position makes its odd size/balance seem more normal.

I’m not sure if this is really related to the topic, but I think it could be something that Anet realizes and uses to make their skins more desirable. I noticed more than a couple times in GW1, and I’m sure this happens in other similar games, that some skins were wanted simply for the fact that they are rare/valuable. Weapons that were very rare, and had a very high demand, then due to updates/changes/new content releases became more common/less valuable and were suddenly unwanted. A weapon that could easily be sold for 500k+, then in just a few weeks can’t even be sold at 5k and is usually called “ugly” by the majority of players.

It just makes me wonder how many people are walking around in MMOs with weapons/armor they don’t even like, just because it’s worth a lot of money (whether that’s ‘fake’ video game money or real-world cash). I don’t really understand that way of seeing things, if I don’t like something I don’t buy it, especially if it’s very expensive. I’m happier with the variety of cheaper (and in my opinion, better looking) weapons/armors that I have now, than I would be with a couple legendary weapons.

I do see how developers could use that segment of the playerbase that holds high value/prestige over looks to their advantage. It would be easier to engineer a weapon to be rare, than to design one that is liked by wide range of people. It’s not that I see something wrong with it, just an interesting bit of gamer psychology. As long as the owner gets some form of enjoyment/satisfaction from their item, its serving its purpose.

mrstealth.6701:

I think GW1 just had a better looking weapons in general.

Actually, pretty much everything on GW1 is better looking – weapon, armor, and character design is stylish – it received so much more thought than on GW2, which usually boils down to a blob of random fluff slapped on top of what is actually a rather lacklustre basic design.
And don’t even get me started on the sheer amount of recycled armor skins, in particular helmets (easiest to notice in pvp).

mrstealth.6701:

It’s not that I see something wrong with it, just an interesting bit of gamer psychology. As long as the owner gets some form of enjoyment/satisfaction from their item, its serving its purpose.

That is not really game-specific.

KarlaGrey.5903:

mrstealth.6701:

I think GW1 just had a better looking weapons in general.

Actually, pretty much everything on GW1 is better looking – weaponry, armor and also the characters have style and are recognizable – far more thought was given to the design, so you don’t ever come across a blob of random fluff slapped on top of what is actually a rather lacklustre basic design.
And don’t even get me started on the sheer amount of recycled armor skins, in particular helmets (easiest to notice in pvp).

One big part of the style in GW1, and this is a huge factor in pvp that GW2 and many other MMOs lack, is class identification. Every profession had their own sets of armor, but beyond the individual sets was an overall style that made each profession identifiable, even if you had never seen that particular set of armor before. In GW2, it can be difficult to tell a profession from appearances alone. Unless you see skill effects or recognize a weapon set that is unique among an armor class (light armor with greatsword can only be mesmer), you need to target the player and look at an icon or active effects on them. It’s also worth noting that the profession icons were not shown on enemy players in wvw for quite a long time.

There are even situations where it is difficult to determine what class of armor someone is wearing. This is most likely with the tiny asuras, simply because it’s much harder to notice the differences in an armor style when the whole character is so small.

Repeating that concept of unique identifiers in GW2 would have been much more difficult, though. With each of 5 races, 2 genders, and 8 professions getting a set, every new armor added would require a lot more unique artwork/models/textures. I was going to multiply that out, and say 80 sets. But human and sylvari armors are the same, and norn and human females share a lot as well. Males different between human and norn because norn males have a very different physical structure.

I think Anet wanted profession to not matter as much. They thought they had made a game where you could take 5 necromancers into a dungeon, and have a similar experience (similar challenge, difficulty, etc) as a party of 5 warriors. A game where it didn’t really matter what the profession of someone you were about to attack in wvw was. It’s pretty obvious that the game did not work out to actually be like that. Profession certainly does matter quite a bit, and ease of identification in a pvp situation (primarily wvw because of numbers) is an important factor that is lacking in GW2.

KarlaGrey.5903:

mrstealth.6701:

It’s not that I see something wrong with it, just an interesting bit of gamer psychology. As long as the owner gets some form of enjoyment/satisfaction from their item, its serving its purpose.

That is not really game-specific.

I didn’t mean that as something specific to GW or GW2. I know it happens in plenty of other MMOs (I’d guess nearly all of them) and even games outside the MMO genre. Any game where rare items can be obtained and shown off to others in some way.