If it were practically possible to obtain the Chaos of Lyssa back piece recipe through game play to begin with, hardly anyone would use real money to buy it (with gold traded for gems bought with real money). Just be patient. Believe me, as a Mesmer and big fan of Lyssa since GW1, I really want one, too. When the buy orders drop, that’s when the drop rate will rise.
This is even proven with the game itself. Sales have fallen since launch (as is to be expected with any game), and since then it has been offered at half price multiple times. If it were offered at half price to begin with, that’s exactly half the game’s initial sales that the developers, investors and publishers would have missed out on. Instead, they aimed higher and we were just as eager to buy. Some waited because we didn’t see a point in spending that much, or didn’t want it that much, but the majority either pre-ordered (I needed that 3-day head start!) or bought it at $60 USD.
As the game gets older, fewer people are willing to pay as much for it, so they lower the price. The same is true with this and any status symbol or ‘new thing,’ in-game or not. It’s economics and capitalism translated into a 3D world. NCsoft is ArenaNet’s publisher and investor, and real-world cash is their motivator so they give us what we want – shiny objects to play with.
Something I’ve wondered about these shinies: do we actually want them to be widely accessible, or do we need to be one of the special few who has one when most others don’t? Does it bother us that Legendaries don’t require game play to obtain, or that they no longer make the owner as ‘special’ as they first did? There is a difference.
Everyone wants to be recognized, but there is a line between human need for validation and learned entitlement.
NCsoft’s focus is business, not game development (which is neither inherently bad, nor good, just is), and the game and items in it are products, not powerful weapons, protective armor, or symbols of achievement.
It can be tough to realize for those who play the game for immersion and escapism, and to feel the safe sense of innocence a virtual world with established rules can provide. I’ve been there, and I am sorry.
However, real life knows no bounds. We inflate the market (by purchasing gems to trade for in-game gold, or through exploiting or hacking) and therefore encourage those responsible for game monetization to develop the game to focus increasingly on microtransactions and gold sinks rather than on game balance and new zones to explore.
The player base is only offered what it has collectively indicated it will purchase.
That isn’t to say I am okay with how the game economy works (I’m not), or that I don’t disagree with some of the game’s development. It was promised early on that real world money would offer no greater stat advantages than in-game currency, but we have things like armor-reduction/regeneration/speed/damage ‘boosters’ that can only be obtained through chests or direct gem purchases – of course, technically, you could earn in-game gold, buy the gems, and then buy the stat boosts or chests and keys, or farm keys to open chests, but that’s a gray area and a different discussion.
“Creating a microtransaction system that doesn’t upset or alienate your player base is straightforward once you clearly define what’s in-bounds and what’s out-of-bounds.”
- Mike O’Brien, May 2012, http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/21/guild-wars-2-interview-monetization/#s:guildwars2-16
btw please don’t move or close this post, moderators. I worked hard to make sure I wasn’t inflammatory or disrespectful, and even though I started with the Chaos of Lyssa back piece, I felt this topic dealt more with overall game ideas. I’d just like there to be less strife in the game and on these forums.