Guild Wars 2

I see people praising ArenaNet for getting rid of a ton of bots, but i also see people lamenting the fact that without bots, all the prices of rare materials go up. This whole time i was rooting for them to ban all the botters, but this new issue about messing up the market is interesting.

Were bots good for lowering prices, after all?

How could you all not see this coming?

Well, think about it this way. Prices are going on up on materials so if I sell stuff I can make more money. This gives me more money to spend on things that people make or want to sell. I am also more likely to try to get materials to sell to others.

No matter what happens, it is better to put the gold in the hands of the players and not in the hands of companies that sell gold.

well seeing as how t6 crafting mat prices have gone up 5-10x what they were i would call that bad, they need to adjust drop rates now that the bots are gone, supply is low, and demand is increasing

Mad.1932:

well seeing as how t6 crafting mat prices have gone up 5-10x what they were i would call that bad, they need to adjust drop rates now that the bots are gone, supply is low, and demand is increasing

Then real people will step up to fill that demand once they figure out the sell prices are actually decent now.

Ualtar.5047:

Mad.1932:

well seeing as how t6 crafting mat prices have gone up 5-10x what they were i would call that bad, they need to adjust drop rates now that the bots are gone, supply is low, and demand is increasing

Then real people will step up to fill that demand once they figure out the sell prices are actually decent now.

Or they get frustrated and quit going for things that require mats that are 30+ silver. Real people are never going to out bot the bots.

Bots are never good. Ever.

Even the tangential benefit people get does not outdo the damage they do in the long run.

If they relax the DR (now that all the bots are gone, it’s not needed, right?) so it keeps supply up that will help keep prices down, and not make it so painful to have some fun crafting.

Though I will say I have been spending some time with my main gathering mats for my second alt so she can craft her own gear as she moves up, and the DR already seems a bit less painful. Though that might be an illusion a second time trough with this stuff, anticipating the DR and also skipping out to enjoy WvW, which I didn’t do as my main came up.

I would definitely support removing the DR again.

Let players be players.

I miss the bots at the moment. The prices are through the roof ever since they left.

It definitely feels grindier without a bot DE train to follow around while leveling my many alts. Of course, the smarter solution would be to raise droprates and scale the difficulty properly, not invite the botters back.

Of course they were not good. They diminished everything they contacted and effected. If prices have gone up it means your income will as well to allow you to buy items at a price based upon a fair playing field not one manipulated by cheats.

They got rid of the harvesting bots now they need to get rid of the shopping bots apart from vanilla which we realise there are only 5 pods in the game most things on the TP are available in thousands. The only thing keeping the price high is people/programs buying and reposting items at a higher price.

btw: love your sig Corvindi

Ty. Feel free to steal.

There’s always a transition period in any economy when this occurs. The bots have flooded the market with millions, millions, of items that have artificially depressed prices. There’s little to be done but to wait until those items either fall off the market, are bought up, are actually removed by ArenaNet, and so on.

With that said, I’m a crafter – it’s one of my favorite things to do in any MMO – and right now, it’s a waste of time. Across my alts, I’ve maxed out five professions (weaponsmith, armorsmith, chef, jeweler, huntsman) and I’m working on the other three professions. I don’t do this because I’m making tons of gold – quite the opposite, in fact. I’m doing it because there are achievements connected to maxing out professions, and because it’s easier to make gear than to buy it at this point thanks to the skewed economy.

I don’t think this was anticipated. The most wasted profession of all, cooking, was so hyped that you were subjected to a special in-game warning before you took the profession – and yet it’s useless because none of the items produced by that profession are needed, or even desired, during normal gameplay. About the only thing I can sell are the materials for that profession – and even that’s a waste of time, given the huge volumes and depressed prices – unless I want to spend my days cranking out nothing but Omnomberry Bars, this game’s version of Mandalorian Wine, and try to somehow price them lower than the grinders that managed to stock tens of thousands of omnomberries before ArenaNet closed down the various exploits early in the game’s admittedly short history.

Bots are never and never will be good . Anyone who says otherwise has very flawed ethics

I wonder how much our market prices are influenced by active traders (those who are buying for resale, and selling more than what they personally farmed).

In particular, we can only place buy and sell orders, no options or short sales. So the pressure from our army of traders is all positive.

Games are almost always better with bots. The only time they are a problem is when encounters are set up so that bots can monopolize the spawn and make it impossible for anyone else to do. Considering that isn’t an issue in GW2, I miss the bots.

I don’t care about inflation or money selling or anything like that. The only reason companies are able to make doing that is because of how stupidly long it takes to get items in mmos. The bots wouldn’t exist if the game developers didn’t create the demand.

The pve farmers don’t care about that because they are just doing what they love, and they benefit from bots getting banned because their crap is worth more.

Sadly, those of us who don’t enjoy farming get the short end of the stick with prices that are 10x what they were with bots and no items of our own to sell to make up for it.

It’s dumb, but there’s nothing you can do about it. Most people who play MMOs are just pve’ers who love farming all day long and don’t like competing with bots, and MMO companies sure as hell like cutting out the companies making a profit off their game.

dreztina.4820:

Games are almost always better with bots. The only time they are a problem is when encounters are set up so that bots can monopolize the spawn and make it impossible for anyone else to do. Considering that isn’t an issue in GW2, I miss the bots.

I don’t care about inflation or money selling or anything like that. The only reason companies are able to make doing that is because of how stupidly long it takes to get items in mmos. The bots wouldn’t exist if the game developers didn’t create the demand.

The pve farmers don’t care about that because they are just doing what they love, and they benefit from bots getting banned because their crap is worth more.

Sadly, those of us who don’t enjoy farming get the short end of the stick with prices that are 10x what they were with bots and no items of our own to sell to make up for it.

It’s dumb, but there’s nothing you can do about it. Most people who play MMOs are just pve’ers who love farming all day long and don’t like competing with bots, and MMO companies sure as hell like cutting out the companies making a profit off their game.

They can’t properly balance the economy with bots around.

Bots necessitated the DR and other aspects which made it harder for anyone to farm.

If they manage to stabilize the bots at a low enough number, they can increase the drop rates and fix things.

They used to be really bad for the game. It was part of my daily game day to report each and every one of them, painstakingly, to protect ANet revenue and the health fo the game.

Now? Now, I don’t know. Depends on how cutthroat they get with pushing the cash shop by drying out the gold and cranking up the grind for stats, in which case i’ll hope the bots and gold sellers screw them over really good. Their attitude in the coming months will tell me if bots are good or bad.

You’ll see the “bubble burst” on the high end mat prices before long.

Many are needed in large quantities to make ascended backpieces, infuse them and all that. There won’t be more demand for that than there is right about now. You figure before long other stuff will show up, diverting attention and spreading demand around (Maybe ascended earrings are added next and they use different things). Or other ways appear to obtain them, wvwvw or whatever.

If the prices on them raise much more, you’re going to see a lot more people farming the stuff to sell it (or even use it themselves. Regardless, if they get it for themself, they aren’t buying it, demand goes down). That’ll lower the price.

Let’s be clear.

The apparent overpricing is a transitional state. When GW2 launched blue craft mats typically sold for around the 1 silver mark, subsequently 1 gold wasn’t really all that much, even a relative lowbie had a few gold before they left the starter zone.

Bots crushed that and drove the same materials we used to trade for 1-2 silver down to 10-20 copper. People complain the T3 gear is too expensive, but this only because the value of your gold is subject to inflation/deflation.

The market is now returning to it’s “normal” levels; this sucks for us because we used to trade items for way less so inflation has kicked us in the pocket. However from now on, all those T5 and T6 materials you find can be sold for way more and the equilibirum is restored. And as an added bonus that T3 cultural gear everyone claims is stupidly expensive is suddenly a lot more attainable.

well funny is, the more price rises, the more you will have to pay. the more you will have to farm, greed, greed everywhere.

As a community we should instantly set every single stuff price to it’s current 5% = everyone rich, no one has to farm, no bots, no goldseller, no hacked account, everyone happy.

why we do the same error of governments in a videogame and then complain about being robbed by them on real life is out of my mind. :P

it’s very clear that Anet realized the reason people had easy early legendaries was because the materials weren’t as hard to get as people thought. All they had to do was grind gold/karma and buy the underpriced mats from the TP.

Personally I liked them until it was time to actually go do a zone, then you just saw 500 rangers running around and it got annoying.

The only thing I don’t like right now is the prices of wood/metal have gone down because there is no way to convert them into other things without rare materials.

Bots and RMT in general lead to in game inflation, wave a magic wand (or use the ban-hammer) and make the botters and RMTers go away – the market will restabilise itself however will take time.

For those sitting there trying to make a decision regarding whether or not bots are good – stop trying to “armchair” an answer as there have been numerous examples of online economies being examined by actual economists and currency trade experts.

Utilising Google to turn these studies and papers up and reading them will assist most people come to a conclusion (supported by actual evidence and reasoned deliberation) that it they impact negatively upon the economy, ultimately making the market participation basically impossible without engaging in RMT.

In short – will you think bots are good when real life salary will impacts on ones abiliy to maintain a viable market presence? Are you in a position to buy market participation rights, or setup a bot farm of your own in order to comete?

We don’t need bots, but the T6/ecto drop rate is really too low for farming stacks of 250. Something needs to be adjusted because right now because the 250 requirement is just over-the-top.

Adine.2184:

Bots are never and never will be good . Anyone who says otherwise has very flawed ethics

Oh they can be good. Just not in this game.

They make splendid target practice in shooters though.

Won’t be good. Bot can bring more materials but they will bring even more gold into market, eventually everything’s price will go up.

Ualtar.5047:

Well, think about it this way. Prices are going on up on materials so if I sell stuff I can make more money. This gives me more money to spend on things that people make or want to sell. I am also more likely to try to get materials to sell to others.

No matter what happens, it is better to put the gold in the hands of the players and not in the hands of companies that sell gold.

The problem you have here is that the items you are buyin also go up in prices so its a loose loose situation even if you get more money you are still loosing.

If they remove DR there’s a great chance we’ll get hit by a storm of ‘improved’ bots anyway. DR is the countermeasure in-game.

The market will settle. You can still make plenty of cash from the TP by selling mats. Doing lower level areas, for instance, will net you plenty of crafting mats that sell for a lower amount but are easy to collect. That’s how i’m making my cash. Not to mention it’ll bring the higher level characters out of LA and repopulate the lower level areas

I find farming difficult with hordes of bots running back and forth gobbling everything up. It would be much easier to farm for myself if there weren’t the bots there taking everything. So to answer your question, I find it better to get rid of the bots and farm for myself than to just buy everything off the trading post and make botters rich.

Hello,

Bots are not a good thing for a game at all, as it is a breach in the game mechanics.

Furthermore, such activities are prohibited in Guild Wars 2, like in most games for a reason.

This thread is now locked, thank you for your understanding.