Guild Wars 2

By F2P i mean no purchase necessary for the base game, while some features would be restricted from the base game unless purchased.

What leads me to believe this is the case is (and this of course is just speculation) something that That_Shaman datamined.

Taken from the reddit post located at:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/3aug92/datamining_upcoming_features_from_the_june_22/

Is this little snippet of text.

_ Expansion
1001463_0395 Please purchase the game to unlock this feature._

Is this in reference to HoT features, or will the game be going F2P with buy to play features and aspects?

Looks like something to be displayed for someone who has the core game but not HoT.

It looks as if it will always be b2p, but with every subsequent x-pac release you will get all the previous content bundled with it. My concern is getting the big content gaps in between x-pac releases. I would hope that in the future they keep the Living World teams building that content concurrently while the other larger teams builds the x-pacs. That way there is a steady stream of content. That to me would be the most attractive way to do it.

For me, having 8 months of Gem Shop releases without content isn’t something that makes me want to play. Sure, ArenaNet needs to make money but don’t players need content? Isn’t the point of a cash shop to get paid but also the reward structure? ArenaNet puts out gem shop stuff and content. I play the content and make money and then buy the gem shop stuff with real money or I convert the gold I earned from the content they released and buy the gem shop stuff. That’s the optimal way for this to work. Why should I buy stuff if there is nothing new to play.

My concern now is instead of getting glider skins and weapons and armor sets to earn in the x-pac that we are paying money for, we are gonna be paying for the x-pac and they will release a bunch of stuff on the gem shop instead of it being earn-able in game. With how they have been handling stuff lately, that doesn’t seem altogether an unreasonable educated guess as to how things are going to go down and it’s disappointing.

Iason Evan.3806:

It looks as if it will always be b2p, but with every subsequent x-pac release you will get all the previous content bundled with it. My concern is getting the big content gaps in between x-pac releases. I would hope that in the future they keep the Living World teams building that content concurrently while the other larger teams builds the x-pacs. That way there is a steady stream of content. That to me would be the most attractive way to do it.

For me, having 8 months of Gem Shop releases without content isn’t something that makes me want to play. Sure, ArenaNet needs to make money but don’t players need content? Isn’t the point of a cash shop to get paid but also the reward structure? ArenaNet puts out gem shop stuff and content. I play the content and make money and then buy the gem shop stuff with real money or I convert the gold I earned from the content they released and buy the gem shop stuff. That’s the optimal way for this to work. Why should I buy stuff if there is nothing new to play.

My concern now is instead of getting glider skins and weapons and armor sets to earn in the x-pac that we are paying money for, we are gonna be paying for the x-pac and they will release a bunch of stuff on the gem shop instead of it being earn-able in game. With how they have been handling stuff lately, that doesn’t seem altogether an unreasonable educated guess as to how things are going to go down and it’s disappointing.

I am guessing the expansions will all just lay the ground works for the LS stuff which will follow S2’s unlock system. In theory the LS updates will be free if you are logging in each time but you had to pay to access it and if you miss an episode you get to pay twice.

Iason Evan.3806:

It looks as if it will always be b2p, but with every subsequent x-pac release you will get all the previous content bundled with it. My concern is getting the big content gaps in between x-pac releases. I would hope that in the future they keep the Living World teams building that content concurrently while the other larger teams builds the x-pacs. That way there is a steady stream of content. That to me would be the most attractive way to do it.

For me, having 8 months of Gem Shop releases without content isn’t something that makes me want to play. Sure, ArenaNet needs to make money but don’t players need content? Isn’t the point of a cash shop to get paid but also the reward structure? ArenaNet puts out gem shop stuff and content. I play the content and make money and then buy the gem shop stuff with real money or I convert the gold I earned from the content they released and buy the gem shop stuff. That’s the optimal way for this to work. Why should I buy stuff if there is nothing new to play.

My concern now is instead of getting glider skins and weapons and armor sets to earn in the x-pac that we are paying money for, we are gonna be paying for the x-pac and they will release a bunch of stuff on the gem shop instead of it being earn-able in game. With how they have been handling stuff lately, that doesn’t seem altogether an unreasonable educated guess as to how things are going to go down and it’s disappointing.

Sounds about right given the taint of Nexon.
Pay for the opportunity to pay more.
Or in the case of stuff like the copper fed salvage kit, you’re paying for the opportunity to pay to pay.

It will be a rolling expansion, so vanilla will have initial HoT stuff, with HoT being pay gated, then when expansion Y comes some of it’s elements will be added into Base+HoT, with expansion Y being the gate. My belief is that they will give a expansion a “lifespan” of possibility 2 years in which they will add content throughout, which is only accessible if you own the active expansion, then release the next.

This is why they have gotten into the habit of “adding in the base” since say when Y is released Base+HoT(full version) will just be base, and anyone buying Y will get Y+Base(core+HoT) and those who never upgrade will get HoT just 2 years late.

The problem with datamining stuff is there’s no way to get any context on it.

This appears to just be a string of text that’s been added, but we don’t know where it will appear (if it ever does), if it’s the final wording, or what else might be before and after it.

My first thought when I saw it was that they’re planning to do another free trial weekend (maybe wishful thinking since I’ve finally had some friends show an interest) and this will appear on all the things free accounts are locked out of (like buying gems, gems to gold exchange, mailing items etc.) so they can let them see what they could do if they bought the game and so it’s clear it’s not just a bug that’s stopping it.

The other, maybe more likely, possibility is that it’s for when HoT arrives and is poorly worded because it’s just temp text. People who didn’t buy the expansion will still be able to see some parts of it, like zone transitions and maybe NPCs with new services, and then this will pop up to tell them they need to buy HoT to use it.