Guild Wars 2

I am sure my thread will be deleted and mean warned cause its not the kinda topic anet wants discussed on there forums. I do ask everyone act polite and be respectful. I like to have a genuine and honest discussion about the current state of the game and where its headed.

I have noticed over the past few month’s they have been adding more and more cosmetic item’s to the GEM store. Which is fine except they are not balancing these cosmetic updates on the gem store with in game updates of equal quality.

The idea behind GW2 was to have a game with no vertical progression. Instead the entire game would be based around a horizontal progression. Where the only things you would have to grind for where skin’s.

That’s fine I can understand taking the game in that direction. Instead of the main focus being armor which is easy to get it was getting skins. Having a rare, exclusive, good looking armor/weapon skin is the entire focus of the game. That is why people go for legendary.

Lately they have released all new skin sets on the GEM Store for 800 gem’s while releasing very little if any new skins to the player population. They have also released RNG based weapon skins and RNG based dye’s both cosmetic upgrades.

With the game revolving around cosmetics and not armor its self adding these items to the Gem store in such large quantity’s essential makes the game P2W. This is almost the equivalent of a standard MMO adding top tier armor that can only be obtained thought differentiate content to there in game store.

Maybe the focus should be switched on the gem store maybe they should add more stat item’s that are easily obtainable anyway to the gem store. Maybe a generic set of exotics for 800gems. That can be gotten for new alts or toon’s would be far more appropriate then the current trend of cosmetic items in this game.

Actually, putting the t3 human cultural in the gem store is perfectly consistent with a typical vertical progression game like GW2.

In a horizontal progression game uniqueness and exclusivity are generally reserved for gear skins. The high-end skins are what take the most grind and/or effort. But as of November 2012 GW2 officially became a vertical progression game. And as such, it’s not the look of your gear that matters, but the stats on them. High-end gear is now defined by MAX stats, NOT by unique appearance.

And while it’s true that in games like WoW or LotRO (and now GW2) max stat gear typically also has unique skins as well, it’s also true that the appearance of that gear is merely a secondary reward soon to be rendered meaningless whenever the next tier of max stat gear is introduced.

So given that GW2 is in no way unique to the MMO genre, and merely represents the latest incarnation of typical vertical progression games, offering popular skins in the gem store is perfectly in-line with the games new (but traditional) philosophy.

OP, “Pay to Win” in this game, just like WoW, would be the introduction of higher-stat based gear in the gem store. What you’re thinking of is a horizontal progression game, but that’s not GW2.

I think his argument is that in a game where it is all about acquiring cool looking skins, “win” = “skins”. So buying those skins is PTW.

yeah, the Pay2Win argument is only valid if you gain an advantage from gem-store items. So far, it is simply looks. Looks in the gem-store I don’t mind. If they start selling special skills, or special weapons with exotic or better stats….then you will see me find a new game pretty quick.

Skins are not Pay2Win, Skins are Pay2Lookpretty…which is fine, at least the skins have a unique looks where everyone can say…look at that guy, he paid for that armor whether it is through gem purchase or gold / gem purchase.

Cosmetic armour skins =/= P2W.

For starters, when it comes to cosmetics, that’s going to vary from person to person. Does that mean if I don’t like the armour in the gemstore, I’ll never win?

angelpaladin.7921:

With the game revolving around cosmetics and not armor its self adding these items to the Gem store in such large quantity’s essential makes the game P2W.

If you can provide proof that the gem store skins are superior in appearance to the skins available in game your point will have merit.

Did anyone kick you from the party because u don’t have gem shop armor? No.

They are going in the wrong direction with skins. When they introduced town clothes, they didn’t want to create the GW1 problem of everyone wearing costumes, which outshined the hard to get armor. With the rate they’re currently going, it’s going to be the same thing.

They never said there would be no vertical progression though. A possible level cap increase was talked about almost a year prior to release, which basically confirmed vertical progression back then. Later, they confirmed they wanted vertical progression but they didn’t want to make it a focus. Instead, they want to drag it out, by, for example, releasing ascended gear over the course of a year, rather than a month, only to have a new tier available in 3.

Maybe I am mistaken but Pay 2 Win to me means paying for what is essential endgame content. Two me the endgame in Guildwars2 would be the dressing up and looking fancy.

angelpaladin.7921:

Maybe I am mistaken but Pay 2 Win to me means paying for what is essential endgame content. Two me the endgame in Guildwars2 would be the dressing up and looking fancy.

Pay to win is not, “paying for…endgame content,” its paying to win said content. If Pay to win was paying for endgame content then buying an expansion in a game like WoW would be pay to win.

Ashen.2907:

angelpaladin.7921:

Maybe I am mistaken but Pay 2 Win to me means paying for what is essential endgame content. Two me the endgame in Guildwars2 would be the dressing up and looking fancy.

Pay to win is not, “paying for…endgame content,” its paying to win said content. If Pay to win was paying for endgame content then buying an expansion in a game like WoW would be pay to win.

Buying a expansion to unlock new content is extremely different then paying for that expansion then paying a little more for all the armor to be unlocked for you. When you play a game like World of Warcraft you do Heroic level raids for the gear. The gear makes you more powerful thus its the end game. In GW2 your grind gold for skin’s or now you pay real money for your end game item’s.

Pay 2 win would be paying for an ascended weapon, fancy skin or not. To most, getting BIS gear would be considered end game.

BobbyT.7192:

Pay 2 win would be paying for an ascended weapon, fancy skin or not. To most, getting BIS gear would be considered end game.

Agreed.

The OP has confused Gw2 with a horizontal progression game, where unique skins are in themselves the BiS gear.

League of Legends is p2w because skins are also not for free. Lol.

BobbyT.7192:

Pay 2 win would be paying for an ascended weapon, fancy skin or not. To most, getting BIS gear would be considered end game.

That’s just it the way GW2 was designed there is no BiS gear. The game is not so much about gear as it is looks.

Example. I can be level 80 go into a dungon with a group with out any gear on. We can beat the place we just have to time skills and dodges correctly. There are people who solo Arah PT2 Gear is not the focus of this game.

angelpaladin.7921:

Ashen.2907:

angelpaladin.7921:

Maybe I am mistaken but Pay 2 Win to me means paying for what is essential endgame content. Two me the endgame in Guildwars2 would be the dressing up and looking fancy.

Pay to win is not, “paying for…endgame content,” its paying to win said content. If Pay to win was paying for endgame content then buying an expansion in a game like WoW would be pay to win.

Buying a expansion to unlock new content is extremely different then paying for that expansion then paying a little more for all the armor to be unlocked for you. When you play a game like World of Warcraft you do Heroic level raids for the gear. The gear makes you more powerful thus its the end game. In GW2 your grind gold for skin’s or now you pay real money for your end game item’s.

Ahh, you said pay for end game, not pay for end game items. My apologies for taking that too literally.

Still if one can provide any proof that gemstore skins are superior to in game skins the point might hold up. If not, and it is not possible to prove such, then one cannot pay to win with cosmetics.

Keep in mind also that GW2 has vertical progression so one could make the point that cosmetic horizontal progression is no longer the intended focus for endgame.

angelpaladin.7921:

BobbyT.7192:

Pay 2 win would be paying for an ascended weapon, fancy skin or not. To most, getting BIS gear would be considered end game.

That’s just it the way GW2 was designed there is no BiS gear. The game is not so much about gear as it is looks.

Example. I can be level 80 go into a dungon with a group with out any gear on. We can beat the place we just have to time skills and dodges correctly. There are people who solo Arah PT2 Gear is not the focus of this game.

Agree BIS gear is not really needed for most content today, but doesn’t mean it’s not there. For most, gear is more important, and if you start selling that on the gem store then anet’s in a world of hurt.

For ages before the game launched, the fan based discussed what should and shouldn’t be in the cash shop.

During that entire period, no one ever said cosmetic items should be off limits.

Cosmetic items do NOT constitute pay to win.

And since gold can be converted to gems, it’s not really any different then grinding gold for any other skin.

One of the things arenanet got right was their gem store. This is not a pay to win game. I think you are confused. Pay 2 win means you spend real $$ to gain power over people that don’t spend real money. I.E. I could spend, for example, 10 dollars in the cash shop of an MMO, to get superior weapons and gear that is not otherwise found in the rest of the game. And by superior, I mean stat wise. If there is no way to obtain that gear in game, and the only way to get the superior statted gear is through the cash shop, that is pay to win.

For GW2, you spend $$ in the gem store for skins that have zero impact on a characters power.

Unless you plan on walking around Lion’s Arch like a runway model.

angelpaladin.7921:

BobbyT.7192:

Pay 2 win would be paying for an ascended weapon, fancy skin or not. To most, getting BIS gear would be considered end game.

That’s just it the way GW2 was designed there is no BiS gear. The game is not so much about gear as it is looks.

Example. I can be level 80 go into a dungon with a group with out any gear on. We can beat the place we just have to time skills and dodges correctly. There are people who solo Arah PT2 Gear is not the focus of this game.

Umm there is most certainly BiS gear, it’s the best gear that you can get. For most slots it is ascended. As for your examples, that does not mean that gear isn’t a huge factor. If you go naked into any dungeon you’re probably going to die a whole lot, the run is going to take absurdly long. There are some dungeon paths that lend to soloing and others not so much. This is the same in every MMO. Even in Vanilla WoW, known for it’s gear treadmill, there were dungeons that you could run with a naked group or solo. There were raid bosses that could be soloed if you had the time. That however does not mean that gear isn’t a major aspect of the game.

There have been some P2W items in the gem-store like the politic vote doubler, SAB infinitive coint and the Instant Trait Reset however thats by itself not the point.

People seem not to realize that what winning is in PvP, fluff mainly is in PvE and there is a lot of fluff.

The bigger problem however is that the gem-store focus is bad for the game. Many bugs have been in since the beta and many important required addition of missing features (like guild management tools) have not been added simply because in the short run they do not seem to benefit gem sales. Any patch, content and addition you get is based on “how we get people to buy gems” not “how to get a better game”.

The temporary content meaning temporary items in the gem-store is an example and there are many people who do not like that (so it’s bad for the game). If you would make a game better you add a barber in the world and let people cut there hair for 15 silver (that’s really something that improves the game) but if you want to sell gems you make a gem-store item you can buy to change your hair. There are many examples like that.

Anet should have done what they did with GW1. Focus on regular expansions as there main resource for income. Selling some extra bank slots and character slots (while keeping a normal gold > gem rate) in the gem-store to generate some extra income is no problem but the moment the gem-store becomes the focus the games gets to suffer. It’s exactly that reason why I don’t like F2P games, and looking at what Anet does now everything looks more and more like a F2P game where the company behind the game tries to make money with micro transaction. Why then charge money for the game in the first place?

I totally understand they need to make money but they should have done it with expansions. GW2 did not become much better during it’s lifetime (yes there where additions that improved the game, but they don’t out-way the patches that made the game worse. The opposite) in fact it’s a game where the patches resulted in making a game worse.

In many threads Anet has been warned about this trend with the patches making the game worse in stead of better but Anet simply did not listen and it even seems like they still don’t get it. See this video http://migration.guildwars2.com/en/ not talking about the video itself but what they are saying. No grinding and every 2 weeks updates. It’s the grind and the living story where many many many people are complaining about. Using this in an way to get people proofs they simply don’t get it.

Recently I noticed that even many of the core players (those that have never a critical word about the game and have been playing contently since release) have been logging in less and less. Most will come back but getting away and staying away from a game begins with the first ‘break’ from it.

We are at a point where I am not even sure if an expansion would still work. We might have passed that point, but maybe if they come with a really really big expansion that does not only add a new area a new race and the other normal stuff you expect in an expansion but also makes many other big changes to the core (think about making it really one big world in stead of instances, adding mounts, making chairs sit table, adding raids, promising to fix many of the issues like mobs that run back, putting a barber in the world (and the other gem-related stuff thay should be in game) and fixing guild tools (like I mentioned before) and promising to start focusing on expansions again. Maybe that then they have a change that an expansion will be able to turn the tight but honestly I don’t see them doing it, eventually Ncsoft will lose interest (so there will not even be the money for an expansion) and the game will keep degrading.

ANet seems to take the P2W issue seriously. With the exception of a few boosts (that no one seems to get excited about), there is nothing in the shop that boosts individual performance within the math that drives the game. Since the ongoing service that is the game has to be funded, the company has to sell something. I don’t mind the GW2 shop. I don’t buy RNG items, but since I can resist the temptation, RNG cash shop doesn’t bother me. Cash shop skins don’t bother me.

That said, I’m capable of analyzing trends. Cosmetics were supposed to be the carrot for endgame in GW2, as the OP notes. There were a lot of skins available in game at launch, including the prestige skins, which were order, racial, and dungeon. However, it should be well known to developers that MMO customers are voracious, particularly at endgame. For the cosmetic endgame to succeed, there needed to be a continuous infusion of hard-to-get skins obtained through content. Other than the back-piece-skin-of-the-current-update, little cosmetic progression has been added.

I’ve been feeling for a while that cosmetics were being asked to do “too much” in GW2. To me, using a prestige armor skin as the basis for a gem store skin is a tacit admission that the HP endgame has moved away from cosmetics as its driving force.

If only these new skins had looks worth caring about.

Paying real money to acquire items that don’t even improve one’s performance sounds more like pay to lose. What a waste of money.

Now if the store sold potions that increased your damage, or powerful weapons/armor and things of that nature, that would constitute pay to win.

angelpaladin.7921:

Ashen.2907:

angelpaladin.7921:

Maybe I am mistaken but Pay 2 Win to me means paying for what is essential endgame content. Two me the endgame in Guildwars2 would be the dressing up and looking fancy.

Pay to win is not, “paying for…endgame content,” its paying to win said content. If Pay to win was paying for endgame content then buying an expansion in a game like WoW would be pay to win.

Buying a expansion to unlock new content is extremely different then paying for that expansion then paying a little more for all the armor to be unlocked for you. When you play a game like World of Warcraft you do Heroic level raids for the gear. The gear makes you more powerful thus its the end game. In GW2 your grind gold for skin’s or now you pay real money for your end game item’s.

So…what can they sell in the gemstore then?

If they sell actual stated gear, then obviously that’s P2W.
According to this, if they sell cosmetics, then its P2W as well.

So what’s not P2W that they can sell in the gemstore then? Only useless stuff which no one would want? That’s a great business plan right there.

You can buy gems with in game money. It’s expensive, but that’s only because some people must be spending a lot of in game money on gems to push the price up.

Anet deserve all the money they can get from the gemstore.

They don’t charge a monthly sub, yet pay for all the server and maintenance costs, and provide updates and new stuff every 2 weeks (by keeping a large full time development team).

As long as they never put stuff that gives you an actual advantage in combat there then I’m totally happy.

yes its p2w whit the skins in any game they are given tro new content new dungeons raids and so on but here u buy it from the store

I guess it’s an advantage and considered P2W if you’re on a roleplay server.

I think the OP either has a bizarre concept of ‘winning’… or of ‘paying’.

Not sure which, but the entire premise of the thread is kind of ludicrous.

I recently read a thread where a guy admitted to spending more than $1600 in the gem store!!! Does that give him an advantage over me? Perhaps marginal, if he used that toward a legendary or ascended weapon, otherwise no. Does it make him a better player that someone who is similarly speced and spent the time to earn whatever gear? I don’t know, but I can tell you who I’d rather have in my party.

Let’s get one thing straight though. The items in the gems store are cosmetic only, with the exception of certain things like boosters, res orbs, repair canisters, harvesting gear, etc. That said, EVERYTHING that is available on the trading post is also available in the gem store through the gem to gold conversion…semantically, this is no different than being in the gem store…it’s just an extra step. Now, because the TP items are available to everyone with enough gold in hand, GW2 is not pay to win, because that gold can be earned through playing the game. I would classify GW2 as a “pay-for-an-early-advantage” game. I still don’t like the gem to gold conversion and believe it causes unnecessary inflation in the market, but it’s certainly not pay to win.

Wow OP, you should try out for the Olympics, with those kind of logical leaps you would be sure to win.

Onisuo.8607:

What exactly do you win for looking pretty in guild wars 2? Are you saying that all I have to do is buy pretty armor from the gemstore to win?

Pay2Win what?

Pay2Win the fashion contest?

Seriously though, I think a lot of people aren’t really thinking critically about this T3 vs Flamekissed stuff.

You could always buy gems and convert them to gold to buy a set of cultural armor. It costs you about $25 at the current conversion rate, which I believe is about the same price to buy something like the sparkly mounts that WoW sells.

I’m not sure why so many people think that T3 armor is such a hard to attain vanity item, especially when they compare it to legendaries. You can get a full set of T3 for about 119 gold compared to a legendary, which will often cost AT LEAST ten times that amount.

angelpaladin.7921:

…I have noticed over the past few month’s they have been adding more and more cosmetic item’s to the GEM store. Which is fine except they are not balancing these cosmetic updates on the gem store with in game updates of equal quality….

Game. Set. Match.

I agree with the rest of your points as well. Except the Pay2Win part. Technically speaking you are not getting “stat” gains directly from the gem store. As you said, progression is cosmetic here – ANet was very clever with how they worded their criteria for acceptable items in cash shop, well played ANet, well played.

He would have a point, IF the game was based on horizontal progression. In such a game, if looks are the only “reward”, having all looks only available through the shop would be sort of P2W.

Luckily, GW2 is all about the grind for BiS items in a very vertical progression. Therefore, the whole argument of the OP is invalid.

Hail to the ascended grind, it saved us from grinding just for the looks. Can’t wait to tell my wife and kid to gtfo, so I have enough time to grind ascended armor.

Thank you vertical progression! At least I do not have to ask myself, what fun things I could do in GW2 anymore…

Frankly I don’t think the OP knows what P2W means. Play2Win means you have a tactical advantage in gameplay by paying real money. Looking pretty does not give you that advantage. None of the items in the store give you that advantage. The only tactical advantage I really see is the halloween outfits that give you good skillset for constume brawl, but those are hardly P2W either.

I was roaming in WvW when I stumbled across an enemy Guardian that was decked out in fresh Gem store gear. It was at that point that I laid down my weapons and surrendered—there was no way i could compete with his beauty.

P2W i agree with OP.

Browsing this forum every few weeks is as much fun as was playing the game. This community is comedy gold. I wish anet all the best in the future, a succesful GW2 occupies the crazy and keeps them away from other games :P

While it’s indeed interesting to note that the cash stop has become the primary source for obtaining skins in a game that has been advertised as being all about collecting skins, that hardly makes it Pay to Win.
But yes, I am actually wondering what we’re still playing the actual game for, if everything desirable can be obtained in the cash shop and nowhere else. Except backpieces and helmets (which I am utterly not interested in, as none of my characters ever display helmets, shoulders, and backpacks), not many skins drop in the actual in-game content. At least both my main characters wear cash shop armour as this is the only gear in the game I find not to look horrible…

Kimyrielle.3826:

While it’s indeed interesting to note that the cash stop has become the primary source for obtaining skins in a game that has been advertised as being all about collecting skins, that hardly makes it Pay to Win.
But yes, I am actually wondering what we’re still playing the actual game for, if everything desirable can be obtained in the cash shop and nowhere else. Except backpieces and helmets (which I am utterly not interested in, as none of my characters ever display helmets, shoulders, and backpacks), not many skins drop in the actual in-game content. At least both my main characters wear cash shop armour as this is the only gear in the game I find not to look horrible…

this nails my point completely P2Win traditionally meant boosters or gear that gave you the ability to beat end game content. Anet has no end game content in the traditional since the end game content is the skins you get.

I think the op is saying he wants the game to become pay2win. He wants to add stat gear to the gem shop which currently has gear that does not affect game play. He wants to add gear that affects game play, thus making it a pay2win game. Amirite?

angelpaladin.7921:

I have noticed over the past few month’s they have been adding more and more cosmetic item’s to the GEM store. Which is fine except they are not balancing these cosmetic updates on the gem store with in game updates of equal quality.

Putting items on the gem store is an gold-sink. It takes gold out of the economy and decreases inflation. In that sense, it’s actually a positive thing.

Plus it’s not P2W since cosmetics don’t give you a gameplay advantage over other players.

Don’t see P2W here. Well, except new gathering boosters. It’s a bit OP.
GW2 is actually more like a bit of “Grind for months to buy useless s…t, just because this is the only way to feel that you achieved something in game”.
So it’s “G4M2BUSJBTITOW2FTYASIG” system.

Avster.1935:

angelpaladin.7921:

…I have noticed over the past few month’s they have been adding more and more cosmetic item’s to the GEM store. Which is fine except they are not balancing these cosmetic updates on the gem store with in game updates of equal quality….

Game. Set. Match.

I agree with the rest of your points as well. Except the Pay2Win part. Technically speaking you are not getting “stat” gains directly from the gem store. As you said, progression is cosmetic here – ANet was very clever with how they worded their criteria for acceptable items in cash shop, well played ANet, well played.

ANet was very clever with how they worded their criteria for acceptable items in cash shop, well played ANet, well played.

How is that then well played? The criteria Anet sets are not law nor do I have to agree with them.

I prefer the dungeon armor sets to anything that’s in the gem store.

Does that mean I can never win? Or simply that I can’t pay to win?

Skins aren’t Pay2Win. Also, feel free to buy them with in-game money.

GW2 will never be a P2W game, because there is nothing to win. The game is a “skin” based game, everyone stats are basically exactly the same on some general scale, making the game very balanced. You merely skin your character to the way you like, that has been the central idea behind the way the game has been played, and probably the central flaw as well.

So it’s P2W because if I don’t buy skins I will be kicked from a dungeon or something? Kitts why did someone not tell me this sooner I’m out of here.

Wait for it

looking pretty does not = P2W

Aesthetics are 100% subjective. Gear with higher stats is indisputably better than gear with lower stats. It’s basic math. There’s no unit of measurement for attractive armor because there’s no consensus on what is and isn’t attractive.

Right now the only characters whose looks I’m happy with are wearing armor available in game. I also enjoy playing those characters the most because I enjoy their appearance. Skins aren’t end game for me. End game is when I turn the game off to do something else. Either you enjoy something or you don’t, and if you don’t, why bother pursuing anything in the first place?

So far, there’s still more armors available in game than in the store. The only difference is they’ve been there since the beginning. Whether or not they are of equal or lesser quality is, again, 100% subjective.

I do have one gem shop armor. I bought the gems with gold that I earned in game.