Guild Wars 2

Something as simple as this would have been perfectly fine in my eyes.
You have the suggested amounts and you still have the ability to go for a custom amount.

For the gold side, just have it be that you type in how much gold you want and it’ll tell you how many gems it’d take, plus how much ‘bonus’ silver and copper you’d get tacked on because it isn’t a perfect conversion.

And the gem side would be as simple as typing in how many gems you want and seeing how much it’d cost.

First and foremost we really need more transparency here. Patches here seem less what new stuff we get and more what we’re going to be angry about this time. It doesn’t take a game design expert to see something like this would anger a lot of players.

Please, the next time your going to overhaul an important part of the game TELL US FIRST This is in caps and bold not to yell but to make sure it is well understood this is the #1 thing a game team needs to do. I almost feel like arena net is acting like some kid who broke their mother’s vase and is doing everything to delay their parent from eventually finding out. If our input was really wanted shouldn’t you ask us before doing something like this? I know you have CDI, but there was no CDI for this one.

Now to the issue at hand.
KISS Method; Put a gear on the top left that allows the user to pick normal(new one) or advanced(old one). Should be a simple little five minute job for a coder. Fifty seconds with no patch needed if this page is a part of the HTML part of the black lion.

I’ll say it again Anet… IF IT AIN’T BROKE , DON’T FIX IT!

Odeezee.7362:

Gaile Gray.6029:

Ok, guys. Some of you are unhappy about this change, I can see that. BUT… quite honestly, most of you are sort of (I hate to use the word) ranting (sorry!) instead of offering suggestions.

I assure you, the team leader told me not 15 minutes ago, they will listen to suggestions.

• Does that mean you get everything you want? Probably not.
• Does that mean you should suggest something? Yes, of course! Because they’re expecting player input.

So you want lower increments? Think it through and present a suggestion! You want XYZ in the interface? Post that idea. You would rather see something else? Post what you think about that other thing. Please don’t get into the whole “I’m going to kick the devs and their little dogs, too” because it’s not doing you or us any good at all.

I’m not here to apologize. I’m here to communicate and right now, the communication is coming in without a whole lot of substance. Over to you for suggestions and constructive input!

and THIS is just one of the glaring issues players have with the dev team. where was the search for input and suggestions PRIOR to launching these monumental changes? instead of collaborating with the players and moving together you want to walk you own path then wonder why there is no one following you. you literally bring this on yourselves, so i am sorry i have no sympathy for your woeful disregard for feedback PRIOR to patches. and you create such a contentious atmosphere for players that you lose any goodwill players would have afforded you and then the cycle just becomes more vicious as players become more disgruntled and with each successive patch the devs appear to be more disconnected from the needs and wants of the playerbase.

all the devs needed to do was allow players to enter the EXACT amount of gems or gold they wanted and there would have been ZERO need for anything to be simplified (which is such a cop-out and using “feedback” from tickets as a reason for it makes it even more slimey as the players cannot verify it and i bet even if there are some who were confused by it the volume was no where near enough to warrant a change of this scale). ANet what happened to you? when did development of GW2 become more about inconveniencing and alienating the player base for some quick cash instead of building upon the game you created in beta which the players could really put their support behind? /sigh

You know, particularly after ALL THE kitten they already had to deal with BARELY A MONTH AGO because of the September Feature Pack, you would think they would have been on the ball about this.

You don’t take such a monumental failure like that, then the immediate next patch go back to dropping the ball. We just asked for a little bit of give-and-take here. We want to help make this game better. But ANet doesn’t give us that opportunity. At least, not until after the fact.

This was an atrocious idea, and I don’t know who EVER thought it would fly, especially considering the very, very, VERY simple solutions that have been suggested since game launch to make the gem conversions better.

Saying “it’s simpler this way”, and “give us ideas if you don’t like it” is bullkitten if we’ve been giving them ideas for two years and they still aren’t listening.

Gaile,

Thanks for communicating, but I don’t think you’re being given useful information to relay to us.

> A lot of newer players had trouble with the interface.

I want to call bull kittens, but let’s assume the following:

> Concerns of this nature come in via tickets, when someone takes the wrong step, buys too many times, isn’t able to process the acquistion or exchange, etc.

I can’t imagine how someone would “take the wrong steps” (“I wanted to buy 400 gems, but I got confused by all the numbers and typed in 432 gems”?), but please feel free to elaborate.

The other two are not issues with the purchasing system being flexible. Those are problems with the system not responding properly due to lag or server load or someone buying while the system was recalculating costs or something. If people are double clicking and getting double orders, put in a pause so people can’t buy gems twice in a second. If the system wasn’t responsive before, then I don’t see how it’d be more responsive now just because there are fewer buttons (I’m assuming the math for the display was done client side).

> The goal was to make the Gem Store more like other shopping experiences, and if you think about it, there is more of that feel to it now.

This time I’ll stick with “bull kittens”. It looks cleaner, but it’s completely the opposite of other shopping experiences. I don’t buy $50 in Amazon bucks so I can place a 40 Amazon buck order and hold on to the other 10 Amazon buck for later in a market where almost everything is 40 Amazon bucks anyway.

This system is closer to the coin/crystal/gold system on a trash iPhone app.

> You may be surprised to know this (I know I was) but very few people bought gems at smaller denominations than the first one offered in the new system.

Why would I ever have bought 25 gems on a regular basis? That’s because new items were generally 400 gems.

People (on the aggregate) bought gems for a purpose. See something, buy something, that something is probably 400 gems. Still, if I had some left over (from the 400 gem chest or from a previous cash purchase), I might buy an odd number. Not necessarily “less than 400”, but certainly not “an even increment of 400”. I would love to see a chart, though, with “gems” on the x-axis and “number of purchases” on the y-axis (probably a log chart, since 400 is going to be high… though I’d wager that 1000 would be fairly close to 800 or 1200).

That being said, you left out a huge second aspect: selling gems. I have 405 gems. Right now, I can sell 9, 73, 364, 728 or 1818 gems. This is, I suspect, not by accident. I can’t sell the last 5 gems no matter what I do. Before, my 5 gems and his 3 gems and her 12 gems could get merged into the market and sent to someone with lots of other people’s gems so they could buy a gem store item. Now, these gems are trapped. All of these little increments are trapped amongst the players, limiting their supply in the marketplace, increasing the price, and encouraging $$→gem→item instead of gold→gem→item (not to mention making $$→gem→gold more attractive as well).

I’m fully aware that you’re a company that needs to make money, but this is a naked money grab, changing a currency that we had acquired under a different set of rules without any warning.

If the devs are happy with this pretty simplified interface, that’s fine. There’s nothing wrong with trying to idiot proof things.

If they genuinely want to fix it, it should not take much work. Simply put a custom field in. That would give the unfrozen caveman gamer simplified options while normal functioning humans can buy the number of gems that they want.

I can’t say I’m a fan. While the stated goal of making the conversion tool is easier is true to an extent, it was also not the only goal. The patch introduces some very bad “premium” style psychological manipulation into the game in an attempt to sell more gems and also brings up some concerns with the integrity of the gem market. I’m going to outline some of my concerns here.

1. The gems have to be sold/bought in specific sized batches.

This is further compounded by the fact that there are many things in the game that can be purchased for LESS than the smallest available batch purchase. This is, by now, a well known microtransactional technique that is intended to leave people with small amounts of unusable currency. Because you can no longer choose to sell just a single gem or buy just a single gem, your odds of being left with gems in your wallet is much higher, and the fact that you have some is known to encourage people to buy more. There is 0 reason to set the minimum buy/sell to anything other than one except as a psychological manipulation technique to try to convince your play base to purchase more microcurrency. This is probably my absolute largest concern, as its an early warning sign that the developer is considering unhealthy or manipulative relationships with their player base in order to monetize and is an absolutely massive step back from the old system.

2. How are prices going to be effected?

With the old system, the exchange rate is dictated by single gem price. It was relatively easy for people to buy small amounts of gems and build up to them. It was relatively easy for people to unload any excess gems they had and change it into currency. Now the barrier to entry for the Exchange is much harder. To even buy any gems now requires (at time of posting) a 76 1/2 gold investment. That’s a MASSIVE mark up from the old system to acquire some gems and is yet another attempt to discourage exchange and instead encourage people to buy currency.

On the other side of the market, the fewest amount of gems you can sell are 9 (at time of posting). That once again brings me back to my first point of saying that an alternate goal of this change is to force people to be stuck with some gems that they cannot offload easily. Since those people had been willing to pay before, those leftover gems are a manipulation attempt to get them to try to pay again.

3. Why completely remove the old system?

If the sole purpose was to make things easier, why not add this new interface on top of the old one? It gives players who were confused before a streamlined purchase menu, but doesn’t block out the ability for other users to use the more advanced feature if they wanted to. I can only think it’s because the actual purpose isn’t just streamlining the system (although it serves as a convenient explanation), but to introduce they barrier and psychological techniques outlined in my first two points.

Increased monetization through fairly unpopular (and it could be argued, somewhat unethical) were the actual desired goal of this change. Anything else that came out of it were at best additional goals, or at worst, secondary goals.
——————————————————————————————

I will be interested to see if this actually works in ANet’s favor though with increased gem purchases from whales and driving otherwise free-players to buy gems due to the insanely increased upfront cost to purchase, or whether the increased cost to buy gems with in game currency just results in fewer overall gems sales as demand for them plummets.

Edit:

And for the purpose of being constructive. Here’s what to do if you REALLY want to make it right with the community. Keep the current page, make it the default if you really want to. But add a tab or something along the top that allows players to sell or buy customs amounts of gems. You do that and everyone will be happy as a clam. You get to streamline purchases/sales for confused players (and probably make some extra cash from casual users who don’t know any better, like this seems to be intending!) and advanced players can still easily sell/purchase small gem amounts. No more rioting from the heavy users, everyone wins, although ANet has to accept a slightly more modest chunk of income than the current scheme forces the player base into.

And this is all extra annoying for me because I just bought gems with my paypal TODAY to buy outfits. Then had gems left over and went to exchange them and came across this very unpleasant surprise. >_< So now I can only exchange some of the gems and am left with a small random amount of gems I can’t do anything with instead of exchanging all of them for gold. So I didn’t bother exchanging the gems at all.

You know….I stopped playing quite some time ago, but recently reinstalled to see if the game had changed into something that’s actually fun rather than me trying to not admit I wasted $60+(forgot how many gem purchases). Unfortunately, more and more I see decisions such as this that, while makes me glad I cut my losses (relatively) early, makes me rather sad to see the direction the game’s taken. This however, combined with the NPE (that thing was bloody torture btw and should be a crime against humanity and though it adds to my frustration, I digress)…..and the dev reply to player reactions….yeah, um, no. You really think people will buy that allowing players to buy exactly the amount of gems they want (with gold) was too complicated or difficult?

Yeah this is a corporate middle finger if I ever saw one…and I’m just going to give you one back.

u n i n s t a l l

I suggest doing for gold to gems what you did for gems to gold: have the buttons be the same showing 1 gem, 5 gem 10 gem, 50 gem, 100 gem, 250 gem and their prices. This is actually WAY less confusing for the new players (you scapegoat so often) as they can easily get any denomination they need. A player may need to push a button a couple times to get larger denomination items (700-1600 priced) but now they do not end up with any rounding.

Gaile, Here’s a suggestion for the Gemshop that would also be beneficial to the community: Buy with gold option in the gem shop.

This way you cut out the middle man when it comes to getting skins, upgrades, consumables from the Gemshop. Use the current gold to gems rate and put a button next to the gem price to buy instantly with gold. If a player purchases a gem card or wants to speculate on gems to gold, then they can still buy the gems/gemcards and use them as a currency to buy from the shop. If a player doesn’t want to go through the entire process of converting gold to gems, then gems to the item they want, then they can buy with gold directly. It’s still the gold sink you wanted and there’s nothing stopping the gold purchases still counting against the gem conversion rate so there’s no crash in the gem market.

This is pretty stupid, if you’re going to put in a minimum make it something like 100. What this change is doing is what Microsoft used to have going on with Xbox Live where you buy points for something and then ALWAYS have leftovers but not enough to buy anything.

Typically when I want something that’s not 800 gems but 1000, I’ll buy $10 worth (800) and convert the other 200. Now I’ll have to convert 400, which I don’t really have THAT much gold to convert, I’m not rich, and I’ll have 200 left over that I can’t buy anything with. Or if I wanted to get BL keys I’d buy 800 gems, convert another 100, and get 10 keys for 900 gems, now I can’t do that without having 300 left over.

This was a step backwards and I don’t see how anyone thought it was a good idea, the minimum to convert should have been 50 or 100, if any at all.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Ok, guys. Some of you are unhappy about this change, I can see that. BUT… quite honestly, most of you are sort of (I hate to use the word) ranting (sorry!) instead of offering suggestions.

I assure you, the team leader told me not 15 minutes ago, they will listen to suggestions.

• Does that mean you get everything you want? Probably not.
• Does that mean you should suggest something? Yes, of course! Because they’re expecting player input.

So you want lower increments? Think it through and present a suggestion! You want XYZ in the interface? Post that idea. You would rather see something else? Post what you think about that other thing. Please don’t get into the whole “I’m going to kick the devs and their little dogs, too” because it’s not doing you or us any good at all.

I’m not here to apologize. I’m here to communicate and right now, the communication is coming in without a whole lot of substance. Over to you for suggestions and constructive input!

Gaile, you are such a dear person for this community, can’t you understand why this make us upset?…

This goes beyond a “game design” dilemma, is how you deliver your “solution” to us. In a way that negatively affects us, even if we are a minuscule vocal minority, that happens to treat with you on this forums, we are your customers too, and even if we “kick your dogs”, we are here because we care. But this changes make us feel like it is you the ones that don’t care. Even if that’s not the case, you shouldn’t have us dealing with this kind of situation, we are here to have fun, not to get angry.

I suggest this:

• Revert the system to what it was before. This won’t solve the “problems” that you claim existed with the previous system (I can see some…of that being true, but not enough to justify this change, in this way)
• Make a step in the direction of transparency and good will, even if you don’t have to ask us for every change you want to make to the game, if you care about us, you will present us the problem that you think exist, and you will take our input. Because if you had done that, you would’ve never come out with this kind of change.
• We will suggest you then, many viable options that you can already see on this thread. Be it either integrate this system and the old together (leaving us the choice, even hide the old system a bit if you are concerned about inexperienced players), or we will suggest you to put back the old system, and tweak the way you can convert currencies, for example, by letting the user set the amount he wants to get, instead what he wants to spend, and then selecting if he agrees with the price of what he wants. Or we will suggest that you add better explanations about the system, integrated to the interface, so it’s clearer to players(unfamiliar with this kind of systems) what they are doing when clicking the buttons around the converter UI.
• After that, we will repeat what we have said before, and tell you that we are not dumb, we just like your game. That we feel disrespected not just by the changes you made that affect us in ways we don’t like, but also, by the explanations you give us, because as has happened before, some changes (that even you, or Colin, seem surprised about) feel like something we didn’t ask for, nor want on our game experience. Is not that hard to understand, that even if changes are needed, the form and the consensus are important when you respect your customers.

As I’ve said before, this change make some of us (I talk for myself and some people that I play with, but I suspect this extends for more than that) feel like customers of lesser category for you. And that is sad, because at least I, look up to you guys, in many ways.

I don’t mean to offend you or anyone else that works on Anet, but honestly, if the objective is to compel me to buy more things from your cash shop, there are better ways to do it. But not this, this I find offensive, this is what I expect from other types of games, not Guild Wars 2, you have a name and reputation, take care of them.

Adelas.6598:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

And, I’m now going to start a bet how long before people remember things cost . . . mostly, multiples of 100 or 50 on the Gem Store.

Which always made me wonder why people would buy odd numbers and then be unable to use them.

5 Foil wrapped candies: 118 gems.
Bank access: 35 gems.
Total makeover kit: 350 gems.
Riding Broom: 250 gems
5 Magic find booster: 550 gems
5 transmutation charges: 270 gems
Various finishers: 500-650 gems

Purchasable amounts of gems: 800, 1600, 2800…

Tell me how those numbers on top can divide evenly into the numbers on the bottom. (okay, sure, bank access goes evenly into the biggest one… so I should have to spend $35 in real money to get an evenly divisible costing amount of bank access express items?)

. . . really? I already clarified what I said and you’re choosing to try again at the whole “hard” thing? I used the word “mostly”, edited it in specifically because of thinking about it.

Forget it. I’m out of here before someone thinks I was defending this idea.

(I’m not, it’s still clunky as hell just like everywhere else which uses it from MS points to Wii Points to mobile gaming premium currency purchases. I just stopped and thought about it long and hard, realizing I hadn’t bought gems in any other increment than 50s and/or 100s . . .)

My simple suggestion, start at 100 gems, then 200, then 400, then 800. I don’t love having to buy more gems than I might want to use, but at least make it so that I can add on a little gold to top off whatever gems I actually purchase.

400 gems to start is way way way way too high.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Bellizare.5816:

LOL, looks like torches and pitchforks time.

And Gaile, people are reacting in an understandable manner.

It’s because they are angry.

The big question in my mind, is why?

Yeah, I was thinking the same about the pitchforks and torches.

I don’t discount players when they are upset, though, and I truly understand that sometimes things hit close to home and cause some angst, anger, upset, any sort of reaction. (I’d think it was possible to have the discussion without it devolving into unpleasantness, but then, I always was an optimist! )

I asked a quick question of a team leader about the changes. I thought the answers were pretty clear so I posted them. But if you want more info, maybe there’s more to be learned and I’ll ask about that tomorrow.

To be fair to the players, you guys don’t exactly have the best track record when it comes to responding to feedback. You guys tend to take the “my way or the highway” approach to a lot of changes. I can think of quite a few examples of you guys asking for feedback, and then just throwing it out the door and I’m sure I’m not the only one who has a running list (Fractal reset, megaserver, trait/leveling changes, ascended gear, watchwork mining pick, trade post changes, a million balance related things, etc).

Please add back the option to do a custom conversion. Maybe a link back to the old interface. I do not agree the minimum should be 100. It should be whatever custom amount I want to convert. Removal of the chart is understandable, but not the ability to convert any amount we want.

Not reading all the pages to this, but will put my opinion anyway:

I don’t like the set values. If you wanted to simplify it, you should have just set the Gold to Gems as a select of how many Gems we wanted and it’d give the price. Like the Gems to Gold was in reverse (you’d set a number of Gems and it’d tell you how much you’d get back).

From all the complaints I’ve ever heard/read, it’s all be a desire for this.

Quite possibly the most depressing thing Ive heard a dev actually say. “New player new player new player”. WTF. What new players? Freaking disgusted how they literally dont care. They could have just left an “advanced” option or something. Like wtf. I honestly feel this is an indirect way of them trying to force more money out of customers. Never buying gens ever again. Absolutely terrible.

The old system was to confusing? If that’s the best excuse for the new system i don’t even know what to say anymore….

Anet. This is dissapointing on a whole new level.

Encarton.3985:

Something as simple as this would have been perfectly fine in my eyes.
You have the suggested amounts and you still have the ability to go for a custom amount.

I wouldn’t even mind if they got rid of silver and copper being involved.

I just made the UI with the same idea of yours before seeing your post. lol

To Arenanet :

It’s good to hear that you guys really listen to our feedback.

BUT…you should not only satisfy the new players but also OLD customers.

So, I (or we?) want this button that leads us to the previous UI. (As the picture shown below)

“What?! You told me this would confuse the new players?”

That’s okay.

Just do what you guys did before.

MAKE THIS BUTTON A LEVEL REWARD :DDDDDDDD

I hope this is a SOLID suggestion you guys want!!

Cheers

Also, what of those players who buy the pre-paid cards from shops? If I remember right (been a few months since I bought one of those), the number of gems you get is a fairly odd number, and certainly doesn’t fit into the new standards. Does this mean there is essentially a case of someone giving you money for nothing? Unless that person buys a lot of those cards, they will always be some loose change that can now no longer be converted to gold or topped off to the right amount to make a purchase. Either the player has to just say “forget it” and throw that portion of the money away, or buy more and more until it is useable.

I was very very ranty before, and I do apologize for that. But I am very angry about this change. I’m someone who when the mood takes me and I have spare cash, likes nothing more than to buy a shedload of gems, to the extent that I’m then constantly looking to the skies in case a Fire Drake from the North comes down to nab my treasure.

And in the times between those, I scrimp and save and get gems the hard way. if their is something on the store I want. That fabulous Count’s outfit has me positively salivating, because its cool, and could well be the piece I’m looking for to do a character I have right (been pondering through the wardrobe previews the way to go to make this guy right, then that beautiful outfit drops like manna from Heaven).

The UI is nice, and the denominations is indeed a nice way to convert nice and quick. There is nothing at all wrong with those. It is the simultaneous removal of the old system that allowed for real freedom that has done this system a crushing blow.

And again, like many of the gripes of recent months, a lot of it could have been avoided if plans were revealed before and discussed openly. Real communication is key, not just PR waffle. This year Anet has made some truly lamentable changes, all with a clear good intent, and all the furore could have been avoided if Anet just eased back off the accelerator a bit with these.

With all the recent changes there has been an awful lot of negativity. And it seems Anet just aren’t learning. They’ve identified a need (communication), but their attempts at bettering it, while certainly appreciated (much love to Gaile!), still hasn’t really addressed the underlying issue as demonstrated with this update as with many others. No communication about upcoming changes means the shock factor increases the rage. Seriously, Anet, do you look at all the anger in these forums the last few months and consider it normal?

On a purely personal and anecdotal level, I love this game, and I love the content and additions. I’ve honestly not seen a better new outfit that the Count, I love Blood and Madness (the first Halloween more, but GW Halloween has always been special and the highlight of my gaming year). But every time now I see a feature Pack on its way I wonder what things are going to get worse rather than things are getting added or improved. I genuinely think every new update will give a new problem to be overcome rather than an update to make the game even better. I have become so pessimistic about this game, that honestly for the first time this evening, I wondered if I’d still be playing regularly in a year’s time. Every update recently I’ve seen something great and I want, and every time that hope and joy is crushed by another feature that, while perhaps asked for, was certainly not asked for in the way it was implemented. Very soon enough will be enough, and I will just stop playing. The game is fast becoming something I can no longer enjoy or support, and I hope that Anet can change their ways. They can. They were great once. Why not again?

This is just a way to increase revenue. It doesn’t improve the player experience. It just lines their pockets with more money, but without them having to actually build content.

HERE’S THE FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM WITH Arena Net’s MINDSET WITH RESPECT TO NEW PLAYERS:
The devs feel the need to change the system to fit the new players rather leaving them to actually think or give them instructions.
Meanwhile: When was the last time the game was given content or changes that are beneficial to the veteran? Or something that AT LEAST keeps the new players playing?

No successful MMO pays this much attention to the newbies and punishes dedication (farming). See: Warframe.

Honestly, the fact there was not an option to simply click “custom amount” at the beginning of this change, really makes me believe this new system is exactly what was truly wanted, and not what players are now suggesting. There was the knowledge to make a simple slider to convert as much gold to gems as you wanted at the release of the game, but somehow it managed to slip the mind of literally every person who discussed this design change? Doubtful. Really doubtful.

Once again, because it’s worth driving the point home, there needs to be a way to buy and sell exact amounts of gems. Just a simple thing that brings up the old interface would be sufficient, though putting in the number of gems instead of the gold offer would be nice.

Pretty obvious that it’s a tactic to bring in more sales. If it backfires and loses them sales, it serves them right for being greedy.

How come the API call for gem prices stopped working, while every other commodity price call in the API still works? Why did you feel the need to remove the gem price history from not just the game, but all outside sources as well?

Gaile Gray.6029:

Ok, guys. Some of you are unhappy about this change, I can see that. BUT… quite honestly, most of you are sort of (I hate to use the word) ranting (sorry!) instead of offering suggestions.

I assure you, the team leader told me not 15 minutes ago, they will listen to suggestions.

• Does that mean you get everything you want? Probably not.
• Does that mean you should suggest something? Yes, of course! Because they’re expecting player input.

So you want lower increments? Think it through and present a suggestion! You want XYZ in the interface? Post that idea. You would rather see something else? Post what you think about that other thing. Please don’t get into the whole “I’m going to kick the devs and their little dogs, too” because it’s not doing you or us any good at all.

I’m not here to apologize. I’m here to communicate and right now, the communication is coming in without a whole lot of substance. Over to you for suggestions and constructive input!

We want a perfect functioning exchange like WE HAD IN GAME ALREADY. What is to suggest? How can you even suggest constructive input on a maliciously destructive update? They deleted the best thing this game had going for it and you demand no negativity? No one here fired the first shot. The transparent lies about an obvious and intentional antiplayer policy your team has taken is more negative than any upset comment that can be made here. If they were going to listen it would have been hotfixed back to the working state already and gone back to drawing board. Find one player on this planet who thinks the exchange change was positive. Right, you can’t because the update was the equivalent of taking away a child’s toy then punching her in the face for crying. If it wasn’t done for the players, then who was it for? Right, you can’t give a straight answer on that, that’s not what you’re paid to do. There’s no dire need for this change no matter what garbage is concocted about new people being confused.

A SHAMEFUL DISPLAY…….

Tranquillity.8697:

The old system was to confusing? If that’s the best excuse for the new system i don’t even know what to say anymore….

Anet. This is dissapointing on a whole new level.

Hi Gaile,

All of this could have been avoided if you would only have communicated your plans for the game, remember? This is a result of thinking what’s good for the community without caring —-- about what we may truly want.

You came back to this thread, asking if people can bring their ideas to correct this, someone said make it in 100’s not 400’s – and you gladly concluded “THERE!”

Wow, just wow. Your dev lead could not have thought of that himself before ruining the code? was that complex? could you not have asked us before you ruined the code? and if you couldn’t (and didn’t), why taunt you are “communicating” with us? or is the communication only to damage-control? will you erase my post because its unfavorable?

I hope my point is made to you, but I cannot tell, sadly.

- Kor

Gaile Gray.6029:

• A lot of newer players had trouble with the interface. That doesn’t apply to you, you’re veterans who have been around the conversion block a time or two. But newer players will benefit from the updated system.

I’m fine with changes made to make things simpler for new players.

I’m not okay with being forced to use dumbed-down versions of everything that worked fine for me because some people can’t handle complexity.

This is how I feel:

“The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren’t only equal before God and the law. They were equal in every which way. Nobody was smarter than anyone else. … All the equality was due … to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General. …
It was in that clammy month that the H-G men took George and Hazel Bergeron’s fourteen-year-old son, Harrison, away.
It was tragic, all right, but George and Hazel couldn’t think about it very hard. Hazel had perfectly average intelligence, which meant she couldn’t think about anything except in short bursts. And George, while his intelligence was way above normal, had a little mental handicap radio in his ear. He was required by law to wear it at all time. It was tuned to a government transmitter. Every twenty seconds or so, the transmitter would sound out some sharp noise to keep people like George from taking unfair advantage of their brains.”
-Harrison Bergeron, by Kurt Vonnegut
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Bergeron

Sometimes when I read PR talking about us players on the forums, saying how they know we are “passionate” about the game, and that they understand that we can get “upset” or “angst” about some things, is like we were some poor mentally unstable people that can’t manage their emotions. So patronizing.

I can understand that maybe Gaile at this point just can’t do more than what she’s doing, because I really believe that she cares about us, but then again…I really don’t need this, the fun I can have with the game (and I still do) doesn’t justify getting angry for this kind of things, I don’t need this.

You have the best community I’ve ever seen around an MMORPG, creative, educated, friendly, that care about you, look at the Guild Halls CDI, how everyone tried to be helpful, and cooperative, and wanted to share just to make something we love, better, and what we get is hit after hit, happy halloween folks, now have a punch in the face.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Ok, guys. Some of you are unhappy about this change, I can see that. BUT… quite honestly, most of you are sort of (I hate to use the word) ranting (sorry!) instead of offering suggestions.

I assure you, the team leader told me not 15 minutes ago, they will listen to suggestions.

• Does that mean you get everything you want? Probably not.
• Does that mean you should suggest something? Yes, of course! Because they’re expecting player input.

So you want lower increments? Think it through and present a suggestion! You want XYZ in the interface? Post that idea. You would rather see something else? Post what you think about that other thing. Please don’t get into the whole “I’m going to kick the devs and their little dogs, too” because it’s not doing you or us any good at all.

I’m not here to apologize. I’m here to communicate and right now, the communication is coming in without a whole lot of substance. Over to you for suggestions and constructive input!

Wow.

WTF? I can’t choose custom amount anymore? What kind of stupid joke is this??? If they don’t change this back I am quitting for good!

Spin-control to Major Tom.

I need a way to get small amounts! I’m stuck at 1 gem forever now!

Also is there still a way to redeem gem cards? I don’t see that either.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Ok, guys. Some of you are unhappy about this change, I can see that. BUT… quite honestly, most of you are sort of (I hate to use the word) ranting (sorry!) instead of offering suggestions.

I assure you, the team leader told me not 15 minutes ago, they will listen to suggestions.

• Does that mean you get everything you want? Probably not.
• Does that mean you should suggest something? Yes, of course! Because they’re expecting player input.

So you want lower increments? Think it through and present a suggestion! You want XYZ in the interface? Post that idea. You would rather see something else? Post what you think about that other thing. Please don’t get into the whole “I’m going to kick the devs and their little dogs, too” because it’s not doing you or us any good at all.

I’m not here to apologize. I’m here to communicate and right now, the communication is coming in without a whole lot of substance. Over to you for suggestions and constructive input!

If you really cared about our suggestions, you would have asked before putting the work into changing it.
I get it, rake in the bucks and pretend you care about what is being said.
It’s just odd for you to break something and then ask for our suggestions on how to fix it.

What really is needed is just that we can type in how much Gems we want to buy and then see the amount of gold it costs .. instead what we had where we had to randomly try a number of gold until we finally get the correct number of gems.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Hey there,

Here are a few tidbits from the team:

• A lot of newer players had trouble with the interface. That doesn’t apply to you, you’re veterans who have been around the conversion block a time or two. But newer players will benefit from the updated system.
• The goal was to make the Gem Store more like other shopping experiences, and if you think about it, there is more of that feel to it now.
• You may be surprised to know this (I know I was) but very few people bought gems at smaller denominations than the first one offered in the new system. That’s not to say they never did, nor that there wouldn’t be the desire to do so. But overall, the current options were selected based on player purchases in the past.
• The team is going to listen to your feedback and, if and when it’s practical and desirable, they can look towards adjusting the new system to better meet your needs.

So please keep your thoughts coming on the new system. Feel free to make suggestions but please, keeping them constructive would be very much appreciated.

BULL… This is a money grab at its core.

Protip: design content that people want to play for long periods of time (months) and you will have more players, more players = more gem purchases.

You don’t squeeze what players you do have.

Why do they keep changing the things that are good !! now I cant exchange my gold for < 400 gems !! They have written in patch notes that fixed exchange amount will remove confusion , but this is total crap.. Please Anet don’t do this !! Pls revert back to custom exchange amounts

There is zero reason to make the conversions available only in increments that don’t fit the pricing of items in the store. You have items available for 25, 35, 75, 135, etc. You even have those new foil wrapped candies in there for 118 gems. It’s incredibly difficult to believe that the costs of items were not taken in to consideration when designing the UI specific for that system, but they should be taken into account now.

Let me preface my post by saying I hardly ever converted gold to gems. My play style as well as amount of time to play lately is not conducive to sitting on hundreds of gold. Over a hundred, sure, hundreds? No. As such I have found the exchange rate of gold to gems to be absolutely ludicrously high and so I just don’t get gems that way.

That said. If I did, I would be just as upset as everyone else here.

I don’t see a good reason to pigeonhole all conversions into only those amounts. I keep seeing the excuse of “new players” being applied to every update that has degraded the gameplay and game as a whole for me. And it looks like this is no exception.

Suggestion:

Why not instead have those options as suggested “quick buy” options and still leave a field for custom amount conversions? Everyone I know who converts gems to gold does so a little bit at a time over a long period to accumulate to something they can then buy with. Buying at 75 gold a pop is frankly insulting to people who do that.

Not to mention that on the old system, you could convert to 400 gems if you wanted, but hey you could also convert to 43 if you wanted. Nobody or their style/needs were neglected.

So my suggestion is keep the new options as quick convert options and still have a field for custom conversions.

Everybody is a winner.

Gaile,

I’m positive there are data-driven reasons for this. I know the vet players are in the minority. That said…

You guys have GOT to start giving veteran players escape hatches out of these newbie-friendly UIs and user experiences. Escape hatches need to become a first-order concern.

What I mean is, if you’re going to re-design UIs (gem exchange, opening Black Lion chests) and player experiences (trait acquisition tied to world completion) specifically to alleviate player confusion, then I really need you guys to start considering how you can stop irritating me when I want to play the game I"ve been playing for two years.

I see absolutely no reason there can’t be “custom amount” inputs on the exchange thing as it stands now. I want to be able to buy traits for my low-level characters with trait points from my 80s. I want to just open up a bunch of Black Lion chests without a 10-second animation for each one.

Everyone is in here in this thread gnashing their teeth so I’m sure this post will get glossed over, but you guys are honestly wearing out my patience for this game. Everything is really slow and annoying now, which is not what I loved GW2 for up through like the April patch. I know, you need to grow the player base so more people buy more gems, etc., etc., but all I’m asking for here is that veterans are given equal consideration on these UI/UX overhauls. Keep your newbie-friendly UI re-designs, they’re fine for what they are, I get it. Just give us escape hatches.

Palador.2170:

Gaile (and “the team”),

My suggestion: Have a button marked “Set custom amounts”, that takes you to the old screen. Add a “Return” button to the old screen to take you back to the new one.

My position: I rarely buy gems with gold. I’m casual, and rarely have much gold. I blow it on gear for my alts, or getting skins in-game. Right now, I actually have less than 18 gold. But I often exchange a few gems for gold to get that last little bit I need to get something I want from the market. It works (worked) great for me. Sometimes, I’d just take any leftover gems I had when it was a small amount, and exchange them all. Now, I can’t do any of that.

My rant: This is a very clear marketing ploy, it’s online marketing 101. This is hardly the first place I’ve seen it, and I’ve never really liked it but I’ve dealt with it when I had no other choice. The problem here is, I DID have a choice, until it was taken away. This part of the game has been made more hostile and predatory towards the players. There is no denying this, even if it did come with a cleaner exchange screen. (And for what it’s worth, the new exchange screen is pretty kitten nice. I like the totals that show at the top.) People are upset, not just at this but at this on top of all the other distressing changes that have been made in the last year. Anyone surprised by the backlash this instigated really isn’t paying attention.

With due respect,
Palador

Pretty much summed up my thoughts perfectly. Good suggestion as well.

If I have 100 gems and I want to buy something for 250 gems, I am not forced to buy a whole 400 gems. This system is complete and utter nonsense. If you want to make it simpler for people all you had to do was set up a system where you type in the number of gems you want, it tells you how much gold that will cost and you hit confirm and boom done.

Card redemption is still via the trading post section and not exchange. Just below the gem number is the redeem code button. That said, given the odd numbers the cards use, it looks like at least part of the price you pay is going into Anets pockets with no benefit to you the player.

EDIT: That was to Yumiko.

Wow, this is bad news for me. Gone is the freedom of a free exchange… what with players who purchased something and still have a few gems left? They can’t buy smaller priced objects without using real money? Playing the trading post will be more important than ever now.

Obviously a money grab and insulting at the same time as the dev behind this thinks we won’t notice it. Seriously?

robotempire.2451:

Gaile,

I’m positive there are data-driven reasons for this. I know the vet players are in the minority. That said…

You guys have GOT to start giving veteran players escape hatches out of these newbie-friendly UIs and user experiences. Escape hatches need to become a first-order concern.

What I mean is, if you’re going to re-design UIs (gem exchange, opening Black Lion chests) and player experiences (trait acquisition tied to world completion) specifically to alleviate player confusion, then I really need you guys to start considering how you can stop irritating me when I want to play the game I"ve been playing for two years.

I see absolutely no reason there can’t be “custom amount” inputs on the exchange thing as it stands now. I want to be able to buy traits for my low-level characters with trait points from my 80s. I want to just open up a bunch of Black Lion chests without a 10-second animation for each one.

Everyone is in here in this thread gnashing their teeth so I’m sure this post will get glossed over, but you guys are honestly wearing out my patience for this game. Everything is really slow and annoying now, which is not what I loved GW2 for up through like the April patch. I know, you need to grow the player base so more people buy more gems, etc., etc., but all I’m asking for here is that veterans are given equal consideration on these UI/UX overhauls. Keep your newbie-friendly UI re-designs, they’re fine for what they are, I get it. Just give us escape hatches.

Just to respond to myself, a good example in the real world where companies build “special” UI feature development into work estimates is with accessibility. The number of users who need accessible features (screen readers, high-contrast colors, keyboard/tab navigation, etc.) is really small, but it’s an important contingent of users.

“Veterans” of GW2 — which apparently is the very low bar of figuring out how to post on the forums? — are the same way. Maybe a relatively small number (probably not, but I’m being generous) but an important contingent. Take us seriously. Build the time into your work estimates to include also designing small, integrated bits of flexibility so those of us who aren’t intimidated by input boxes can continue playing the game we want to.

so i bought 10 bucks of gems right, have 180 gems left and now i have to get what, 80g+ just to be able to get gems to buy something now? dont get me wrong this game is fun as , but stuff like this WILL put off players like me dropping real money into the game, and also new players getting into it.
I know you guys at arenanet might think it “confuses” new players but it really doesnt. New players are smart, they adjust really fast, its not like they cant read or understand basic things about economy.
Please Anet , from a loving fan , Up your game, this will push people away if you dont revert it back to the way it was ):

I was thinking of buying the game for 2 family members for Christmas. I’ve changed my mind. I know they’ll want gem store items and the pricing is not out of reach for me to buy with ingame gold.

I usually buy gems when I can, but, I liked being able to purchase a few here and there with in game gold to supplement the cash. Anyone who doesn’t have a bunch of cash to throw around has little chance to get Black Lion items now....I thought Anet once said they weren’t going to do that.

I’ll be honest I HATE pay-to-win type games, and this is becoming one...might be time to start looking elsewhere.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Errant Venture.9371:

Add an option buy gems in 100 gem increments instead of making 400 gems the smallest denomination possible. Problem solved.

THERE! Thank you, Errant Venture — that’s a solid suggestion with a reasonable tone. Thank you.

This does not suddenly make things all good. This doesn’t even begin to fix the fundamental issue here. It’s like raising taxes 200% and then saying “Alright, alright 150%. THERE!”.
Saying that THAT was a ‘solid’ suggestion is the same as saying that the overwhelming voice that says “the old system was fine and there’s 0 reason to have this system” is not solid.