Guild Wars 2

(continued from last post)

Q: So tell me, Curtis. How can they believe they’re capable of designing things that look good as a set when they CAN’T? It’s so hard to make a Charr look good, and none of their sets do. Aesthetic unity I can understand, but their aesthetics suck according to pretty much everyone who actually wears town clothes. The only possible thing they COULD value is “not having to deal with seams.”
A: Don’t call me— Whatever. In all fairness, that’s a pretty understandable thing to value.

Q: Maybe if they weren’t making a game in which appearance is so important to the players! Skins are the endgame in this game, for crying out loud! The entire Wardrobe is based on making customizing your appearance easier! Caring about seams is part of their JOB!
A: Yeah. And I think they realize that now. The thing is, this happened to be the one change they didn’t think to toss out there well in advance. But, I suspect that the end result of this whole ordeal will be that they’ll find a way to reintroduce a town clothes system.

Q: Well they need to LET US KNOW! I need to know whether to demand refunds or hold onto the hope that they’ll get their collective head out of their collective sphincter and make the stuff I paid for useable again!
A: They have two weeks to do so.

Q: And given how hard it is to extract any sort of information from them…
A: Think of it like this: If I were trying to solve a problem, would you expect me to tell you how it was coming until I’d solved it? :P

Q: I would expect you to tell me that you recognize there’s a problem and you’re working on it. We haven’t even gotten that. Right now all we’ve gotten is “We are sorry.”
A: We have gotten an answer. They’ve been talking about it.

Q: Even if they ARE working on the problem, what they SAID to us is, “There is not a problem.” So it is entirely possible that they talked about it and decided it is not a problem. (Editor’s note: This is me losing faith, largely because I was hungry and being hungry makes me grumpy.)
A: What they said is, “This will not turn out as bad as you think, but we don’t have as much leeway as you expect, either.” Largely for the technical reasons I outlined that might be the case. I’m pretty sure “you’d be surprised how many skins will be useable as armor” are weasel words for “we are frantically working to make the skins you apparently like useable as armor now after we didn’t realize we needed to.”

Q: I suppose if they’d given us a reason to believe ANY of what they said instead of using weasel words…
A: Ultimately, they have yet to mess up in a way that they haven’t made right in some way. Even with the awfulness of the Living Story’s plot, the combat of the last several updates was awesome. So, I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Q: Whatever you say… Curtis. :P
A: Don’t call me… whatever.

So, maybe that helps explain things. Or maybe it just gives the GW2 forums a disturbingly intimate view into my love life, I dunno.

Anyway, obviously all of this is speculation, and speculation that I don’t even necessarily understand and might have paraphrased poorly, but it’s speculation that helped explain to at least one layperson (me) what other people’s speculation might actually mean. Hopefully it will also provide a nice, convenient platform for ANet to use as a basis for communication, even if only to be able to confirm/deny things.

Edited to add: He would like me to note that he is also a historian, which I didn’t figure was relevant to the argument, but as he puts it, “My craft is pretty much the art of asking, ‘Why the cats would somebody do that?’ and coming up with a sensible answer.” Which actually makes a lot of sense, and now I don’t have to suspect that he’s secretly the avatar of Curtis.

Edited again to add: Apparently he didn’t want me to note that in my post, as he thinks it makes him sound like a French-word-for-shower, and also was talking out of his donkey. (Wheee translating my normally vulgar speech with my beloved into euphemisms?) He was just noting it to me. But I’m keeping it anyways because I thought it was funny.

chemiclord.3978:

Djinn.9245:

As I stated previously, it is one thing for a game company to change certain aspects of the entire game. And if you have purchased that game or a subscription to the game you are aware that these types of sweeping changes can take place. But if the game company is going to sell specific items for real money in their store, I believe that they have a certain responsibility to remain as faithful as possible to those items. It’s one thing to change some specifics about an item (storebought mining axes have a different animation for graphic reasons). But its another thing to change the fundamental usability of an item (the mining axe that was supposed to be Bound to Account is now Bound to Character). In my opinion that is false advertising and morally wrong.

I’m not going to even attempt to argue morality, as there are far too many subjective elements to it to ever really reach a consensus. I’ll cede it to you.

Arena.net, legally, however has two protections in this case that will get any complaint you file laughed right out of the courtroom.

I don’t care to argue legality (which is why I didn’t) – it actually has little bearing on this issue. The court of public opinion will be far more damaging to Anet and GW2. No one has to go to the Better Business Bureau or file a lawsuit. If Anet has a reputation of selling items in their store for real money and then fundamentally changing those items (no, it doesn’t matter to the public that they disguise it behind “gems”), then people will become reticent to purchase said items and I daresay Anet can’t afford that.

All we have to do is make it clear to the players at large that if they purchase something from the GW2 store they are flushing their money down the toilet because Anet might change that item at any time so that it is useless to them. Once players understand that, GW2 (which is dependent on store sales) is in trouble.

The problem is that I doubt Curtis CAN “confirm/deny” much, if any of that.

Development is this really weird place, where technical information is guarded like they are nuclear launch codes. I mean, you can go to any game developer and ask staff to get technical, and almost to a man, they won’t.

It’s not because they don’t think all their fans can’t understand. It’s because often they are forbidden by their contracts to discuss ANY technical details, or the reasoning behind them. And what little they ARE allowed to discuss has to go through a gauntlet of okays from a lot of suits.

Djinn.9245:

All we have to do is make it clear to the players at large that if they purchase something from the GW2 store they are flushing their money down the toilet because Anet might change that item at any time so that it is useless to them. Once players understand that, GW2 (which is dependent on store sales) is in trouble.

Then I wish you luck. I don’t think it’ll work the way you hope… but good luck.

chemiclord.3978:

You can TRY to report them to the Better Business Bureau.

You’ll be laughed at, but you can TRY.

Arena.net hasn’t done anything wrong other than make a change that bitterly disappointed some customers. If that was the bar for a complaint to the BBB, every country in the United States would be guilty of fraud.

That is the bar for a complaint to the BBB…customer disappointment.

For what it is worth there is only one country in the United States.

Many people do not seem to realize that the BBB is a company that sells membership. It is not a government agency nor is it affiliated with any government agency. Paying members tend to receive better ratings than non member businesses.

chemiclord.3978:

The problem is that I doubt Curtis CAN “confirm/deny” much, if any of that.

Development is this really weird place, where technical information is guarded like they are nuclear launch codes. I mean, you can go to any game developer and ask staff to get technical, and almost to a man, they won’t.

It’s not because they don’t think all their fans can’t understand. It’s because often they are forbidden by their contracts to discuss ANY technical details, or the reasoning behind them. And what little they ARE allowed to discuss has to go through a gauntlet of okays from a lot of suits.

Hmmmmm, point.

Okay Curtis… One blink for some of that was right, two blinks for none of that was right, three blinks for all of that was right, cough for we’ll give you back your town clothes…?

Or at least acknowledge that they see our issue as a problem, and they fully intend to address it in a hopefully reasonable time frame, without the need to get super specific since I know they don’t like that.

Preferably without coming across as “Well that sucks! So sorry for you.”

Twyll Blackleaf.9641:

Hmmmmm, point.

Okay Curtis… One blink for some of that was right, two blinks for none of that was right, three blinks for all of that was right, cough for we’ll give you back your town clothes…?

Twyll, THANK YOU for that! That was extremely helpful. I feel a bit better understanding a little more how this works.

hi everyone I just bought the the game with heroic pack. when I was in game with my thief I picked the wrong suit for my character I picked the heavy armor suit and when I confirmed it. and try to put it on i realized that I with my thief could not wear it. so my question to you all is can I transfer that armor to an other character or is there some way to make the suit useable for me? I hope some of you can answer my question.

scarfy.4029:

hi everyone I just bought the the game with heroic pack. when I was in game with my thief I picked the wrong suit for my character I picked the heavy armor suit and when I confirmed it. and try to put it on i realized that I with my thief could not wear it. so my question to you all is can I transfer that armor to an other character or is there some way to make the suit useable for me? I hope some of you can answer my question.

Probably not the right thread but…..I don’t think those skins are soulbound. So you should be able to put it in your bank and simply take it out when you make a heavy character. If it is soulbound you can use a transmutation stone to put it on a piece of armor with a white or blue lettered name and it will be account bound and able to be transferred through your bank.

chemiclord.3978:

Djinn.9245:

As I stated previously, it is one thing for a game company to change certain aspects of the entire game. And if you have purchased that game or a subscription to the game you are aware that these types of sweeping changes can take place. But if the game company is going to sell specific items for real money in their store, I believe that they have a certain responsibility to remain as faithful as possible to those items. It’s one thing to change some specifics about an item (storebought mining axes have a different animation for graphic reasons). But its another thing to change the fundamental usability of an item (the mining axe that was supposed to be Bound to Account is now Bound to Character). In my opinion that is false advertising and morally wrong.

I’m not going to even attempt to argue morality, as there are far too many subjective elements to it to ever really reach a consensus. I’ll cede it to you.

Arena.net, legally, however has two protections in this case that will get any complaint you file laughed right out of the courtroom.

Firstly, the precedent has already been set multiple times. You do not own content in game. Period. That you spent money in game does not make the content yours in any way, shape, or form.

Secondly, technically and legally, the only thing you purchased with money is gems (I can guarantee you that’s the major part of the reason why gems exist, in fact). You never actually spent money for any item in game, and that detaches you even further from any legal claim you may have for ownership of that content in dispute.

That’s the game developers play to protect their right to change their content when they see fit, without needing the approval or permission of their customers. You can hate that game all you want. You can think that it’s morally wrong and despicable and disgusting…

… But it’s pretty much legally airtight.

Complaints, either to Arena.net or any oversight group like the Better Business Bureau, will fall on deaf ears. If changing this is your policy, your best (and arguably only) option now is to walk away, and hope enough people join you. Because your only chance is to hit them in the pocketbook.

I hate to break it to you, but the law doesn’t actually protect them that much. That’s not to say they won’t get away with it (they probably will), but both of your “protections” you stated that they have are largely irrelevant.

Regarding “owning” content or not, it is irrelevant. When you pay for the USE of anything, there is a good faith assumption that the item will effectively serve its advertised purpose. As far as leased property goes, if anything, there is MORE duty on the part of the owner to actually protect its suitability for its stated purposes.

The gems are also largely irrelevant, and this issue has been visited again and again by courts. If you buy into any “intermediate” currency, like a gift card, “gems” “points” or anything else of the sort, you are still protected. In fact, it is still legally YOUR money. You can’t necessarily redeem it for cash again, but the company isn’t even allowed to claim it as earnings until you actually buy something with it.

I’m not saying anet isn’t protected here. As a matter of course they may very well be, but these are certainly not the reasons why.

chemiclord.3978:

Djinn.9245:

All we have to do is make it clear to the players at large that if they purchase something from the GW2 store they are flushing their money down the toilet because Anet might change that item at any time so that it is useless to them. Once players understand that, GW2 (which is dependent on store sales) is in trouble.

Then I wish you luck. I don’t think it’ll work the way you hope… but good luck.

The power of bad press is amazing. If everyone who is slighted by this takes to Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, and any other relevant gaming forums, you’d be surprised how effective it can be. It’s a long shot, but it’s happened plenty of times before, where enough damage has been done to the reputation of a company that they need to make good just to avoid loss. Word gets around when MMOs start having issues. It’s killed them before. If anet never makes right on this I can’t say I’d be sad if this game started dying off as well. As much as I LIKE the game, I’d rather see that happen than for travesties like this to keep happening.

Palador.2170:

Doggie.3184:

Will be be able to hide the helmet for Suits like we can with armor?

They have said so, yes.

Then if I can’t use the T0 chest as a skin or any of the vest/shirts just to escape medium skirts/coats then I guess I could always get Chef outfit then n pretend it’s Sylvari Racial~ as long as I could hide the helm of course. :P

Twyll Blackleaf.9641:

Q: But you can fight naked, and you can do Costume Brawl naked. Obviously the naked mesh is the same either way. So how do those systems work then?
A: The armor mesh is still there, but without a texture, so it’s invisible.

Q: And what about all the ones getting turned into tonics? They made brand-new meshes for all of those too?
A: Those won’t be useable in combat.

First of all, I was under the assumption that the tonics COULD be used in combat. Have they at any point said otherwise?

Second of all, you can also do costume brawl in any type of outfit, INCLUDING Town Clothes (depending on the toy/weapon). You can also use skills, environmental weapons/bundles, conjured weapons, and kits in town clothes as well as armor. If these animations already call upon the mesh, then wouldn’t there already have to be something detecting which mesh the character is using?

Alfador.7649:

The gems are also largely irrelevant, and this issue has been visited again and again by courts. If you buy into any “intermediate” currency, like a gift card, “gems” “points” or anything else of the sort, you are still protected. In fact, it is still legally YOUR money. You can’t necessarily redeem it for cash again, but the company isn’t even allowed to claim it as earnings until you actually buy something with it.

Wait, does this mean that it actually registers as an actual LOSS on their books if they have to refund gems?

I know it wouldn’t be enough of a loss to really matter, but I’m just curious as to if that’s how it works or not.

Palador.2170:

Twyll Blackleaf.9641:

Q: But you can fight naked, and you can do Costume Brawl naked. Obviously the naked mesh is the same either way. So how do those systems work then?
A: The armor mesh is still there, but without a texture, so it’s invisible.

Q: And what about all the ones getting turned into tonics? They made brand-new meshes for all of those too?
A: Those won’t be useable in combat.

First of all, I was under the assumption that the tonics COULD be used in combat. Have they at any point said otherwise?

Second of all, you can also do costume brawl in any type of outfit, INCLUDING Town Clothes (depending on the toy/weapon). You can also use skills, environmental weapons/bundles, conjured weapons, and kits in town clothes as well as armor. If these animations already call upon the mesh, then wouldn’t there already have to be something detecting which mesh the character is using?

He seemed to think they’d stated somewhere that they’d be non-combat tonics, although I’m not sure where.

The box of chocolates might be useable in armor, but all other toys for costume brawl are solely Town Clothes, aren’t they? The point about skills and such is a good one, though. Heck, some consumables that give you bundles work even with tonics. (I like to turn into a Young Karka and hold an Experimental Portal Gun because it turns super-tiny and looks like a sonic screwdriver.) If that’s the case, then I really don’t see why the few combat animations that are left— the weapon skills, class abilities, and a very few animations that happen when you’re affected by attacks like being frozen and such that aren’t also represented in Costume Brawl— can’t be made to work with the Town Clothes mesh as well. Perhaps they can, and each Outfit really is just based on the Town Clothes “fourth armor class” mesh? In that case, it would seem that ANet made them one slot instead of a paper doll solely to avoid having to bother with seams ever again in the future.

Augh, all this speculation! Facts, facts, my kingdom for some facts!

Palador.2170:

First of all, I was under the assumption that the tonics COULD be used in combat. Have they at any point said otherwise?

I’m not sure if this is definitive one way or another, but this quote from a few days back seems to imply that’s the case.

Curtis Johnson.8456:

Yes wearable in combat. There will be no non-combat equipment anymore, unless you count tonics.

EDIT: Ah-ha! It suddenly dawned on my that there was a line about it in the FAQ

Some promotional town clothing, such as the Dragon Emblem T-shirt and retired town clothes such as the hoodies, will become endless tonics which allow you to continue to wear the clothing in non-combat situations.

I lack knowledge and understanding on the technical side of things, but I was thinking… Would it be possible in the future, if outfits really are the way to go, to have every combination of the retired single-piece town clothes (with and without gloves and boots) turned into outfits, and then let us Mystic Forge the tonics into them? It’s not an ideal solution, but it’s something. Again, I have little understanding of this and am mourning my khakis.

scarfy.4029:

hi everyone I just bought the the game with heroic pack. when I was in game with my thief I picked the wrong suit for my character I picked the heavy armor suit and when I confirmed it. and try to put it on i realized that I with my thief could not wear it. so my question to you all is can I transfer that armor to an other character or is there some way to make the suit useable for me? I hope some of you can answer my question.

I am pretty sure everything you buy with gemstones or real money is account bound, so if you can’t use it with your thief, you should be able to transfer it to another character. I’m not quite sure what you mean by “picked the wrong suit”; was it one of those skins you apply to other armor to change the look? In which case, it should not have let you apply it to medium armor, and yes, the skins can be freely transferred to another character to use on heavy armor. If it’s armor you bought in game, such as Vigil armor or such, it might be soulbound. Regardless, check at the bottom of the item to see if it says “soulbound” or “account bound.” If it’s account bound (or it doesn’t say anything), you can transfer it. If it says “soulbound”, you can’t, but hold on to it anyway, because that MAY change after this upcoming patch.

Alfador.7649:

chemiclord.3978:

Djinn.9245:

All we have to do is make it clear to the players at large that if they purchase something from the GW2 store they are flushing their money down the toilet because Anet might change that item at any time so that it is useless to them. Once players understand that, GW2 (which is dependent on store sales) is in trouble.

Then I wish you luck. I don’t think it’ll work the way you hope… but good luck.

The power of bad press is amazing. If everyone who is slighted by this takes to Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, and any other relevant gaming forums, you’d be surprised how effective it can be. It’s a long shot, but it’s happened plenty of times before, where enough damage has been done to the reputation of a company that they need to make good just to avoid loss. Word gets around when MMOs start having issues. It’s killed them before. If anet never makes right on this I can’t say I’d be sad if this game started dying off as well. As much as I LIKE the game, I’d rather see that happen than for travesties like this to keep happening.

This was my point. I believe I said I’m aware that nothing can be done legally. My point was that a move like this, involving real money, deeply damages the trust and reputation of a business, and I believe, personally, that will have a worse effect on Anet than Anet currently realizes.

Big Poppa is not pleased with losing his swag

Reithe.5271:

Having read through all the Dev posts and most of the responses:

Um … Devs are kinda missing the point.

- Insisting we want towns clothes to be combat-wearable is incorrect.

- Insisting we want to look like our armor class while wearing towns clothes is also incorrect.

- Insisting we need to mix-and-match armor with towns clothes is … silly .. and incorrect.

What we want:

- To retain our towns clothes as separate, non-combat, mix-and-match items the way they are now.

Do what you want with the armor and any new armor you want. But please stop fussing with the towns clothes system. We like it because it allows us to not look ridiculous while RPing and just hanging out in relaxed settings.

Or it lets us look ridiculous when we want to look that way.

Honestly? I spend way more money on towns clothes while they’re available than I ever have on armor skins. Armor is … in every freaking game. Every single one. And we’re almost always class-restricted with it. This was one of those few games that gave us options outside our class with clothing that looked like a normal person might wear it along with some fun or silly items.

Take this away and you’re no longer even as cool as a game as old as EverQuest 2, my friends.

You’re speaking for a whole lot of people. I’ve bought town clothes too and I want the ability to wear them all the time. That’s what I want.

And I don’t give a kitten , personally, about mixing and matching them, though I agree some people do.

Wote.3627:

Palador.2170:

First of all, I was under the assumption that the tonics COULD be used in combat. Have they at any point said otherwise?

I’m not sure if this is definitive one way or another, but this quote from a few days back seems to imply that’s the case.

Curtis Johnson.8456:

Yes wearable in combat. There will be no non-combat equipment anymore, unless you count tonics.

EDIT: Ah-ha! It suddenly dawned on my that there was a line about it in the FAQ

Some promotional town clothing, such as the Dragon Emblem T-shirt and retired town clothes such as the hoodies, will become endless tonics which allow you to continue to wear the clothing in non-combat situations.

Ah, thank you. So, the new town clothes tonics are non-combat only. Got it.

I still have my other question, though.

Twyll Blackleaf.9641:

The box of chocolates might be useable in armor, but all other toys for costume brawl are solely Town Clothes, aren’t they? The point about skills and such is a good one, though. Heck, some consumables that give you bundles work even with tonics. (I like to turn into a Young Karka and hold an Experimental Portal Gun because it turns super-tiny and looks like a sonic screwdriver.) If that’s the case, then I really don’t see why the few combat animations that are left— the weapon skills, class abilities, and a very few animations that happen when you’re affected by attacks like being frozen and such that aren’t also represented in Costume Brawl— can’t be made to work with the Town Clothes mesh as well. Perhaps they can, and each Outfit really is just based on the Town Clothes “fourth armor class” mesh? In that case, it would seem that ANet made them one slot instead of a paper doll solely to avoid having to bother with seams ever again in the future.

The pirate sword makes a cannon that can be used by people in armor. More to the point, they’re about to make ALL Costume Brawl toys usable in any kind of armor. If that was a problem, they’d be doing things the hard way by doing that.

Listen to your players anet. Make good choices. Learn from your mistakes.

Dagnar has a point here. I was going to write to suggest, beg or whatever something similar.

Seems the only option to keep dyeable Town Clothes is make them into one-piece outfits. That’s the only way they can technically implement it and that way they can please that majority who wanted to use Town Clothes in combat.

All right.

I may not completely like it (I loved my mix and match options for the Winter outfit) but it is okay. At least, I can continue using them.

So. For the clothes which are going to be turned into tonics…

Curtis Johnson.8456:

The endless tonic will grant the appearance of the clothing it replaced. (along with some appropriate complimentary pieces so you’re not naked). They are new tonics, not existing ones.

Only one tonic can be used at one time.

There will be no town-clothes swap any more.. so you won’t be switching to naked.

It take that means complete clothing sets have already been designed for those clothes. Then… why not turn them into outfits which work the other ones too? I don’t think that’s a big effort! The fixed combinations have already been designed, and that way we could still dye them and be able to use them in combat. We only lose the mix- and-match feature.

Maybe it is not the best solution, but at least it is a middle point, a compromise solution in which we don’t lose everything and you only have to change one thing, and you would show us our feedback is actually useful.

Can you please consider this option? Give the clothes you’re going to turn into tonics a chance too? I really fear they will end up turning useless if they become tonics.

Pleaaaase?

So, have we gotten an official comprehensive list on which clothing pieces were turned into armor skins, outfits, or tonics? Curtis’ comments make it sound like the bulk of the Town Clothes were turned into skins, but some of the player posts say the exact opposite and I would like a more concrete answer.

Palador.2170:

Ah, thank you. So, the new town clothes tonics are non-combat only. Got it.

I still have my other question, though.

Palador.2170:

Second of all, you can also do costume brawl in any type of outfit, INCLUDING Town Clothes (depending on the toy/weapon). You can also use skills, environmental weapons/bundles, conjured weapons, and kits in town clothes as well as armor. If these animations already call upon the mesh, then wouldn’t there already have to be something detecting which mesh the character is using?

There probably is. But, there’s a difference between “combat” and “non-combat” mode. The animations might work, but they aren’t working in conjunction with damage dealing.

If I had to take a complete guess, I’d wager that combat logic is controlled by a specific system that only operates when the player is taking or dealing damage. That subsystem is probably not designed to deal with the town mesh, meaning it doesn’t know where to place objects on the player model. If that’s how it works, then it’s likely that modifying it to work with the town mesh isn’t just a matter of transposing some code, but of reconsidering a lot of assumptions about what the engine will and will not do. And changing those assumptions probably requires redoing logic in other places.

I’m not saying that’s definitely the case, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s pretty much a problem of having to rebuild a solid chunk of the game’s backend to make it work.

Djinn.9245:

I don’t care to argue legality (which is why I didn’t) – it actually has little bearing on this issue. The court of public opinion will be far more damaging to Anet and GW2. No one has to go to the Better Business Bureau or file a lawsuit. If Anet has a reputation of selling items in their store for real money and then fundamentally changing those items (no, it doesn’t matter to the public that they disguise it behind “gems”), then people will become reticent to purchase said items and I daresay Anet can’t afford that.

Considering that NCSoft took a HUGE hit in the reputation for the way they handled the COH shutdown and their history of really, really terrible customer service, there’s a sizable population of this game that are/were playing it IN SPITE of NCSoft because they trusted and liked Anet. I’m one of them, a former COH player since beta who decided to give Anet a chance despite NCsoft.

If you don’t think this is going to spread around in a negative way, especially given that there’s a large population (remember, the Save COH petitions had over 20k signatures) that’s currently boycotting and spreading NCsoft hate wherever they do ready to take ANY mistep and run with it, you are deluded. The MMO-gaming population is fairly small and word spreads. If you are seen to be kittening over your players, that grudge will last a LONG TIME. Just ask SOE.

videoboy.4162:

So, have we gotten an official comprehensive list on which clothing pieces were turned into armor skins, outfits, or tonics? Curtis’ comments make it sound like the bulk of the Town Clothes were turned into skins, but some of the player posts say the exact opposite and I would like a more concrete answer.

There’s not a comprehensive list, but with the examples they have given it seems quite clear:

1. Town clothing sets such as the Pirate Captain’s Outfit or Mad King’s Outfit will become one-piece account unlocks known as outfits which can be toggled to be displayed on your character instead of armor, even during combat. – That seems to mean all the Town Clothes which have been released as COMPLETE SETS will enter this category (Wintersday, all the Halloween ones, Pirate Captain and Cooking chef). I’m not sure about the bundle which included the riding pants, boots and gloves, since it had no shirt.

2. Most pieces sold separately, such as the Fuzzy Animal Hats or Phantom Hood, will become armor skins for the appropriate slot, usable by a character that wears armor of any type. – Due to the technical issues they’ve talked about, it is quite clear this include only the clothes which use head slots and maybe, but I’m not sure, gloves.

3. Some promotional town clothing, such as the Dragon Emblem T-shirt and retired town clothes such as the hoodies, will become endless tonics which allow you to continue to wear the clothing in non-combat situations. – That should include all the shirts and pants. It makes sense because they’re the ones which would have technical issues to be mixed with armor. That’s why they say they will add “complimentary extra clothes” so we don’t look naked when using them. And that’s why I suggested they can, then, easily convert them into outfits too.

Sonia.7910:

That should include all the shirts and pants. It makes sense because they’re the ones which would have technical issues to be mixed with armor. That’s why they say they will add “complimentary extra clothes” so we don’t look naked when using them. And that’s why I suggested they can, then, easily convert them into outfits too.

I think Videoboy was specifically referring to the “surprising” number of skins that will apparently be usable after the switch as not-tonics. We’ll probably have to wait and see on that front.

The problem is all retired town clothes such as the hoodies fall into that category. Remember which ones they are: Hoodies (they have already said those will be converted into tonics), Cherry Blossom, ruffled and country lace shirt, vests, cargos and riding pants… All of them retired, all of them using chest/leg slots… Sounds quite clear they will return as tonics, when they perfectly can make them into outfits too (after all they’re going to make them into outfit-tonics, which sounds really silly to me)

Just make every piece a dyeable tonic with a “show on / off” toggle, just the give us the diversity back. Don’t start to ruin this game plz …

Xyonon.3987:

Just make every piece a dyeable tonic with a “show on / off” toggle, just the give us the diversity back. Don’t start to ruin this game plz …

NO!

No tonics! You can only use one at a time. And they disappear when zoning (and have had many other problems in the past). I am not particularly looking forward to the “complimentary clothing” they are going to provide us with the tonics either. Everyone will look the same. There’s no diversity with tonics.

Hamfast.8719:

Xyonon.3987:

Just make every piece a dyeable tonic with a “show on / off” toggle, just the give us the diversity back. Don’t start to ruin this game plz …

NO!

No tonics! You can only use one at a time. And they disappear when zoning (and have had many other problems in the past). I am not particularly looking forward to the “complimentary clothing” they are going to provide us with the tonics either. Everyone will look the same. There’s no diversity with tonics.

There isn’t any with outfits, either, since they can only be worn in a single unmixed sheet. They’re 100% destroying diversity and the whole point of townclothes with this move.

We won’t have diversity either with “outfits”, but at least they are dyeable. So at least, let’s have all of them made into outfits. No tonics, please!!!

Sonia.7910:

The problem is all retired town clothes such as the hoodies fall into that category. Remember which ones they are: Hoodies (they have already said those will be converted into tonics), Cherry Blossom, ruffled and country lace shirt, vests, cargos and riding pants… All of them retired, all of them using chest/leg slots… Sounds quite clear they will return as tonics, when they perfectly can make them into outfits too (after all they’re going to make them into outfit-tonics, which sounds really silly to me)

The FAQ was also written before this thread really picked up. Probably before the first post even went up. Odds are good that they’ve since revisited their plans and are trying to at least come up with a stopgap solution with the time and limitations they have to work with, and I won’t be surprised if “outfits instead of tonics” isn’t at least on the table.

Curtis Johnson.8456:

Clothing was meant to offer visual options that break the class roles, however we were never completely happy with the way it was isolated from the rest of the game and still felt largely the same.

I said it before, “Thats EXACTLY how it should be”.

The Town Clothes function is amazing. It does exactly what it says on the tin. A forth armour class that all characters can wear while in towns (not in combat). Capital city and Lion’s Arch maps are non-combat maps like town clothes are non-combat clothes. Its a perfect system.
Its just a shame (but an understandable shame) that some people love their town clothes more than their armour and want to fight in them. I personally just key-bound the toggle to right CTRL and swap when im not fighting.

ArenaNet should be celebrating and promoting town clothes as one of GW2s major features, not removing it.

If we will be able to use every (even seasonal) costume in combat,i will buy every Halloween costume this year and the other costumes/ town clothing (tonics) that might appear.

Wote.3627:

Sonia.7910:

The problem is all retired town clothes such as the hoodies fall into that category. Remember which ones they are: Hoodies (they have already said those will be converted into tonics), Cherry Blossom, ruffled and country lace shirt, vests, cargos and riding pants… All of them retired, all of them using chest/leg slots… Sounds quite clear they will return as tonics, when they perfectly can make them into outfits too (after all they’re going to make them into outfit-tonics, which sounds really silly to me)

The FAQ was also written before this thread really picked up. Probably before the first post even went up. Odds are good that they’ve since revisited their plans and are trying to at least come up with a stopgap solution with the time and limitations they have to work with, and I won’t be surprised if “outfits instead of tonics” isn’t at least on the table.

Heavens hear you. They didn’t give even a hint about this in all their later replies, it seemed as they weren’t going to change anything. Hope they continue reading this thread and decide to find at least a middle point to solve this.

I tried to get on last night to do some WvW, but it just felt hollow. I gotta say, the town clothes change upset me, but I didn’t think it’d harsh my buzz THIS much.

Was thinking of getting on and doing some alt leveling today but I’m just not feeling that either. Guess I’ll just get on SWTOR or play TF2 for awhile and try to keep up hope that they’ll reverse this change.

It’s hard to play GW2 when every time I check the TP I see that I have gems and it makes me a little ill to think of the money I’ve spent with the reasonable assumption that the town clothes I bought would work as-is for pretty much forever.

Allow me to jump on the bandwagon of roleplayers who are unhappy with the current changes. Town clothes provided us with some great variety of non combat items that we won’t be able to get with the new system that doesn’t let us mix and match pieces.

Sonia.7910:

Heavens hear you. They didn’t give even a hint about this in all their later replies, it seemed as they weren’t going to change anything. Hope they continue reading this thread and decide to find at least a middle point to solve this.

It’s a way back, but Curtis did explicitly say that we’d be “surprised” at the number of skins that made the cut to be armor skins. Since there’s no reason to refer to the outfits as “surprising” since we already know what those are, that suggests to me that at least some of the town clothes skins are making the jump to armor in spite of what the FAQ says.

Shifu.4321:

You don’t need transmutes for outfits.

Johasthan.1327:

To be honest, I believe Colin already said in previous post outfits are going to be free to apply. But this changes nothing, they should keep town clothes option anyway.

You guys didn’t read the info on Town Clothes did you? Some of them are turning into regular armor skins. gg.

Something just occurred to me: while The Voice of ANet Speaking Through Curtis can’t divulge technical information due to the nature of game development or whatever… telling us why they continued to sell town clothes with a misleading description for months after they knew they were going to change them ISN’T divulging technical information. It may be divulging embarrassing information, but we’re already kinda assuming the worst anyways. Better to reveal a certain level of disorganization between designers and marketers than to let us assume that you were trying to swindle us, hm?

I sincerely hope that come Monday, we at least get to learn that much. I’d like to know if I should bother buying those Scarlet gloves and shoulders before they go away so I can use them with this new Wardrobe system that otherwise would be so lovely, or if I have to be afraid that they’ll get turned into something completely different a few months down the line with almost no warning.

DarksunG.9537:

You guys didn’t read the info on Town Clothes did you? Some of them are turning into regular armor skins. gg.

Some. Only some. Lots of individual pieces are being lost as they’re being turned into one-piece “outfits”. It’s impacting a lot of people as you can tell since we’re averaging 6 pages of outrage each day so far over the last 4 days.

Hamfast.8719:

DarksunG.9537:

You guys didn’t read the info on Town Clothes did you? Some of them are turning into regular armor skins. gg.

Some. Only some. Lots of individual pieces are being lost as they’re being turned into one-piece “outfits”. It’s impacting a lot of people as you can tell since we’re averaging 6 pages of outrage each day so far over the last 4 days.

The point of that quote being, I believe, that some items that are now Town Clothes (a “surprising number,” according to The Voice of ANet Speaking Through Curtis) will start costing us money in the form of transmutation charges, because armor will cost charges to transmute— and since Town Clothes have no stats, we’ll probably have to transmute the skins onto existing armor, using charges which cost money, unless they have the brains to do something with them like the Traveler’s armor where you could select the armor’s new stats. (Given the current state of affairs, ANet being either incompetent or malicious— I’d like to assume the former, I fear I might believe the latter— I doubt they’d do something so helpful and so unprofitable.)

In other words, it’s yet another reason to be outraged: having to pay AGAIN to apply these skins we already paid for to armor if we want to use them at all.

Twyll Blackleaf.9641:

Hamfast.8719:

DarksunG.9537:

You guys didn’t read the info on Town Clothes did you? Some of them are turning into regular armor skins. gg.

Some. Only some. Lots of individual pieces are being lost as they’re being turned into one-piece “outfits”. It’s impacting a lot of people as you can tell since we’re averaging 6 pages of outrage each day so far over the last 4 days.

The point of that quote being, I believe, that some items that are now Town Clothes (a “surprising number,” according to The Voice of ANet Speaking Through Curtis) will start costing us money in the form of transmutation charges, because armor will cost charges to transmute— and since Town Clothes have no stats, we’ll probably have to transmute the skins onto existing armor, using charges which cost money, unless they have the brains to do something with them like the Traveler’s armor where you could select the armor’s new stats. (Given the current state of affairs, ANet being either incompetent or malicious— I’d like to assume the former, I fear I might believe the latter— I doubt they’d do something so helpful and so unprofitable.)

In other words, it’s yet another reason to be outraged: having to pay AGAIN to apply these skins we already paid for to armor if we want to use them at all.

To be fair, at least the 1-79 transmutation stones will be converted over, too, but I imagine there will be those who have used up their stones and will have to pay.

Sonia.7910:

We won’t have diversity either with “outfits”, but at least they are dyeable. So at least, let’s have all of them made into outfits. No tonics, please!!!

I’d rather have them ALL made into tonics if it means I can get my gems refunded. Personally, I think they need to do the right thing and offer us returns on ANY of the townclothes that have been fundamentally altered at this point.

Asazi.7561:

Feycat.4370:

Donut.6914:

Honestly though, I would be willing to just give up on this whole debacle if ANet promised to refund EVERY SINGLE piece of town clothes. It’s ridiculous that they’re only providing refunds for some pieces of clothing when town clothes as a whole are being changed.

I actually feel the same way. I am sad that my characters will lose their individual non-combat looks and I won’t be able to regain them. But if I got my gems back for ALL the townclothes (including the multiple sets) I bought from them, I’d be willing to shrug and let it go. Then I can re-spend all those gems on the 8000 transmutation stones I’m clearly going to need in order to make this “wardrobe” work for me.

This is how I feel. All of my trust in Anet as a company is completely shattered and I’m never spending another cent in the gem store, or on anything else tied to Anet/NCSoft except for the last GW1 expansion I need. I’m incredibly angry and upset over the loss of townclothes, but obviously Anet doesn’t care about what their paying customers want or feel. But if I could get refunds on all three of my Wintersday sets, if I was assured I wouldn’t have to send in a ridiculous amount of support tickets in the hopes that they’d eventually change their mind, I’d be a lot more okay with this. I’d just give up and accept that Anet doesn’t care and look forward to the finisher and character slot I’d buy with my gems. But they refuse to even give us that one thing, one VERY reasonable thing, and that’s just absolutely appalling.

Yes. At this point, what upsets me more is not the loss of the clothes I have, but ANet’s attitude towards us. To not refund us for all the items that will be different from what we bought is incredibly poor treatment of their customers, and I am very disappointed in how dismissive they have been of our concerns. After this, I have no trust left for ANet, and I am never spending real money in the gem store again.