Guild Wars 2

Pretty sure they might actually be trying to force stabilization on the exchange. They don’t want to stop people from converting, that would be stupid. But by making it harder to get gold they encourage people to put Gems back into the pool to get gold, lowering prices.

I don’t play for loot. Playing for loot in this game is absurd. Just like playing for loot in almost any sandbox is pretty absurd. Acceptable loot is easily accessible and even plentiful. I also don’t play this game to “win” all the money, because that seems to be the actual definition of loot here. We’re not talking about gear drops, or quality of gear, but the amount of gold whatever drops can be converted into. It’s sort of kind of neat to be “rich” in a video game, but ultimately to what end? What are you doing with all the gold?

I haven’t been restricted from killing anything, just how tough a portion of those things are, and to my knowledge the story hasn’t changed.

So the run down is, I don’t see the problem. It’s a lot of QQ for nothing important.

Mirta.5029:

It’s so that people would buy gems and convert them to gold. This is on one of their official advertisement pages.

D: I thought picture that was photoshopped trolling and then I actually saw it on the website. Disgusting.

I just wish some of the loot I did get wasn’t 99% trash items, meaning that I might actually put it to use.
Majority of stuff I get sits there till I stop a moment and flood the TP/Merchant sell and then move on. Almost nothing has any value* at all.

*Value: A unique skin that I like, something worth a reasonable profit to combat my constantly falling behind on the rate of inflation, stat/level match for my character WITH fitting the design of my character (getting a human designed piece of armor for an asuran not only makes my character look silly, but ruins the “Awe!” factor of an item that might actually match the stat setup I’m looking for – not that that has ever happened yet though).

*Value 2: At level 80, blues and greens have no purpose nor value to them, yet that’s about all I find. Which makes killing anything that doesn’t have a loot bag a waste of time and effort.

Loot is a key part of the MMORPG genre.

Mirta.5029:

It’s so that people would buy gems and convert them to gold. This is on one of their official advertisement pages.

I thought this was a troll post… but it is actually on the website… Anet is just terribad at this point.

Kal Spiro.9745:

Pretty sure they might actually be trying to force stabilization on the exchange. They don’t want to stop people from converting, that would be stupid. But by making it harder to get gold they encourage people to put Gems back into the pool to get gold, lowering prices.

I don’t play for loot. Playing for loot in this game is absurd. Just like playing for loot in almost any sandbox is pretty absurd. Acceptable loot is easily accessible and even plentiful. I also don’t play this game to “win” all the money, because that seems to be the actual definition of loot here. We’re not talking about gear drops, or quality of gear, but the amount of gold whatever drops can be converted into. It’s sort of kind of neat to be “rich” in a video game, but ultimately to what end? What are you doing with all the gold?

I haven’t been restricted from killing anything, just how tough a portion of those things are, and to my knowledge the story hasn’t changed.

So the run down is, I don’t see the problem. It’s a lot of QQ for nothing important.

People see bling and they want it is all. Also, they still think that getting ascended/legendary is going to make them OP (and they want that – it is the WoW, RIFT, TERA problem). And yes, I agree, it is all QQ’ing for nothing.

I think they want the prices to drop in the TP as right now they are ridiculous.

Real money → Gems → Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

Its always been there, ever since the first real money RNG chests (first October/Halloween). And it doesn’t seem to ever end.

Mirta.5029:

It’s so that people would buy gems and convert them to gold. This is on one of their official advertisement pages.

They are posting that to combat Gold Sellers not for the reasons you think. I honestly wish they would stop advertising it is doing more harm then good now.

Only time I bought gems was when I wanted the phoenix armor skin. The rest of the skins look just bawful and ever since they started including obligatory 0.001% droprate items from chests(with the alternative of buying the things from the gemstore) I just stopped supporting it.

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

Mirta.5029:

It’s so that people would buy gems and convert them to gold. This is on one of their official advertisement pages.

There posting that because it’s a viable option now. Don’t forget this is on the post advertising what to spend gems on. It’s been ANet’s viewpoint that you spend cash on gems. That side of the exchange, the gold to gem side, is a necessary evil to pay for the gem to gold side.

Dusty Moon.4382:

Kal Spiro.9745:

Pretty sure they might actually be trying to force stabilization on the exchange. They don’t want to stop people from converting, that would be stupid. But by making it harder to get gold they encourage people to put Gems back into the pool to get gold, lowering prices.

I don’t play for loot. Playing for loot in this game is absurd. Just like playing for loot in almost any sandbox is pretty absurd. Acceptable loot is easily accessible and even plentiful. I also don’t play this game to “win” all the money, because that seems to be the actual definition of loot here. We’re not talking about gear drops, or quality of gear, but the amount of gold whatever drops can be converted into. It’s sort of kind of neat to be “rich” in a video game, but ultimately to what end? What are you doing with all the gold?

I haven’t been restricted from killing anything, just how tough a portion of those things are, and to my knowledge the story hasn’t changed.

So the run down is, I don’t see the problem. It’s a lot of QQ for nothing important.

People see bling and they want it is all. Also, they still think that getting ascended/legendary is going to make them OP (and they want that – it is the WoW, RIFT, TERA problem). And yes, I agree, it is all QQ’ing for nothing.

I think they want the prices to drop in the TP as right now they are ridiculous.

If they want prices to drop then they should increase drop rates and fix certain recipes to not be absurd, silk and silver dubs being the 2 biggest culprits. But instead they have done the exact opposite. The truth is they like the prices high and they like low drop rates and they like having few ways to make gold, so that buying gems looks like a better alternative. Would you like to grind 100hrs for the item or just buy some gems. They know what they are doing and many of the players know what they are doing also.

Gold sinks. Why do you think you now have to pay to start an event? Because Anet has no idea how to creatively handle gold in the economy other than “Pay me to access this content!”

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

Amen!

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

But did you know that you can give great content and people will buy from the gem store out of loyalty to the product instead of putting content exclusively in the gem store and saying “Buy it or no new content?”

City of Heroes did it. It was quite profitable, too. Everything in the store could be accessed in the game, but players were so loyal to Paragon that they would buy from the store because it supported their beloved game. I know because I spent hundreds of dollars in the store on stuff I didn’t really need.

Lobo Dela Noche.5127:

Dusty Moon.4382:

Kal Spiro.9745:

Pretty sure they might actually be trying to force stabilization on the exchange. They don’t want to stop people from converting, that would be stupid. But by making it harder to get gold they encourage people to put Gems back into the pool to get gold, lowering prices.

I don’t play for loot. Playing for loot in this game is absurd. Just like playing for loot in almost any sandbox is pretty absurd. Acceptable loot is easily accessible and even plentiful. I also don’t play this game to “win” all the money, because that seems to be the actual definition of loot here. We’re not talking about gear drops, or quality of gear, but the amount of gold whatever drops can be converted into. It’s sort of kind of neat to be “rich” in a video game, but ultimately to what end? What are you doing with all the gold?

I haven’t been restricted from killing anything, just how tough a portion of those things are, and to my knowledge the story hasn’t changed.

So the run down is, I don’t see the problem. It’s a lot of QQ for nothing important.

People see bling and they want it is all. Also, they still think that getting ascended/legendary is going to make them OP (and they want that – it is the WoW, RIFT, TERA problem). And yes, I agree, it is all QQ’ing for nothing.

I think they want the prices to drop in the TP as right now they are ridiculous.

If they want prices to drop then they should increase drop rates and fix certain recipes to not be absurd, silk and silver dubs being the 2 biggest culprits. But instead they have done the exact opposite. The truth is they like the prices high and they like low drop rates and they like having few ways to make gold, so that buying gems looks like a better alternative. Would you like to grind 100hrs for the item or just buy some gems. They know what they are doing and many of the players know what they are doing also.

I get plenty of nice drops and have no issue with what is going on with drops. People are going for bling and IT SHOULD cost. That is the issue and why the champ trains in lowbie areas were nerfed. People would run that all day and get the money they need. If you want bling it should be HARD to get. Right now it was too easy to make money. I know about 7 different players that have 6 legendaries each. Think about how much gold that is – it is too easy to get them and that is why they nerfed the drops.

People don’t understand that – bling, in this game, is about working for it as it is optional – now you have to work for it if you want it.

Ashadow.6874:

I am not sure if they realize. But there are only three huge reasons anyone plays a video game:

Loot. (Fun for people who loves shinies, and gives them something to do.)
PvE/PvP. (Fun for the people who just want to kill everything. And be challenged.)
Story. (Fun for the people who love immersion and suspension of reality.)

This is an erroneous statement. Please change “video game” to MMO.
I don’t play Street Fighter for loot.
I don’t play Deus Ex for PvP.
I don’t play TxK for story.

cainejw.7142:

Gold sinks. Why do you think you now have to pay to start an event? Because Anet has no idea how to creatively handle gold in the economy other than “Pay me to access this content!”

This statement is blatantly false.

cainejw.7142:

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

But did you know that you can give great content and people will buy from the gem store out of loyalty to the product instead of putting content exclusively in the gem store and saying “Buy it or no new content?”

City of Heroes did it. It was quite profitable, too. Everything in the store could be accessed in the game, but players were so loyal to Paragon that they would buy from the store because it supported their beloved game. I know because I spent hundreds of dollars in the store on stuff I didn’t really need.

What Content is from the gemstore only? Am I missing something? I see lots of toys and styles and what not, but that’s not content, that’s bling as another poster put it.

mtpelion.4562:

cainejw.7142:

Gold sinks. Why do you think you now have to pay to start an event? Because Anet has no idea how to creatively handle gold in the economy other than “Pay me to access this content!”

This statement is blatantly false.

So, how have they creatively handled gold in the economy other than paying said gold to access content? If you know a statement is false, please provide examples showing it is false. I really would be interested to know how Anet has created a gold sink that is not “Receive content for gold.”

What Content is from the gemstore only? Am I missing something? I see lots of toys and styles and what not, but that’s not content, that’s bling as another poster put it.

Skins and items. I term this as content because Anet themselves said that endgame in GW2 is cosmetic. As the end game is content, and the end game is cosmetic, therefore content is cosmetic.

Jerus.4350:

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

Amen!

Did you know another game was able to ditch the RMAH and still make money and please the customers. They could make money and keep the game running and not nickel and dime us. They ditched the buy to play/expansion model for the free to play nickel and dime model not because it doesn’t pay the bills, they ditched it because the nickel and dime model shows higher profit margins for less work. Meaning they can pump out kitten LS updates that disappear every two weeks rather than work on real content. So they would rather make a little more money and have an inferior product. This is what makes me mad, this game could and should be a much better game but they aren’t trying to make the best game they can, they are trying to make as much money as they can.

cainejw.7142:

mtpelion.4562:

cainejw.7142:

Gold sinks. Why do you think you now have to pay to start an event? Because Anet has no idea how to creatively handle gold in the economy other than “Pay me to access this content!”

This statement is blatantly false.

So, how have they creatively handled gold in the economy other than paying said gold to access content? If you know a statement is false, please provide examples showing it is false. I really would be interested to know how Anet has created a gold sink that is not “Receive content for gold.”

The false statement is that you have to spend gold to start the event.

And the primary gold sink in this game, by a huge margin, is trading post fees.

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

And did you know that the content does not necessarily have to be free. It is called an expansion. People have been asking for it long ago.

WasAGuest.4973:

I just wish some of the loot I did get wasn’t 99% trash items, meaning that I might actually put it to use.
Majority of stuff I get sits there till I stop a moment and flood the TP/Merchant sell and then move on. Almost nothing has any value* at all.

*Value: A unique skin that I like, something worth a reasonable profit to combat my constantly falling behind on the rate of inflation, stat/level match for my character WITH fitting the design of my character (getting a human designed piece of armor for an asuran not only makes my character look silly, but ruins the “Awe!” factor of an item that might actually match the stat setup I’m looking for – not that that has ever happened yet though).

*Value 2: At level 80, blues and greens have no purpose nor value to them, yet that’s about all I find. Which makes killing anything that doesn’t have a loot bag a waste of time and effort.

Value is relative. Even more so in GW2, because stat progression hits a plateau relatively early and the one of the primary ways to distinguish yourself and feel a sense of reward is cosmetics. If legendary weapons dropped like blues and greens then it would certainly lose it’s “awe factor” for many people, at least myself. Salvage your blues and greens for magic find and top end crafting materials which can be sold and the income contributed towards that next look or armor you want so much.

cainejw.7142:

mtpelion.4562:

cainejw.7142:

Gold sinks. Why do you think you now have to pay to start an event? Because Anet has no idea how to creatively handle gold in the economy other than “Pay me to access this content!”

This statement is blatantly false.

So, how have they creatively handled gold in the economy other than paying said gold to access content? If you know a statement is false, please provide examples showing it is false. I really would be interested to know how Anet has created a gold sink that is not “Receive content for gold.”

What Content is from the gemstore only? Am I missing something? I see lots of toys and styles and what not, but that’s not content, that’s bling as another poster put it.

Skins and items. I term this as content because Anet themselves said that endgame in GW2 is cosmetic. As the end game is content, and the end game is cosmetic, therefore content is cosmetic.

If this was Barbie’s my lil pony dress up I might agree but its not this is an mmorpg.

i have not seen any game that gives 24/7 endless champ grind(which is still exist in the game like eotm and frostgorge) so you can make lot of gold and buy everything you want without spend a single euro on the game and guess what get multiple legendary weapons which last forever. in all other TRIPLE A mmo i have played and playing, there is limit to grind(dungeon, raid, daily and weekly etc) for high end gear of current tier of the game and some of the stuff can be gained only through cash shop with real money.
and people are still whining here, we want more.

cainejw.7142:

mtpelion.4562:

cainejw.7142:

Gold sinks. Why do you think you now have to pay to start an event? Because Anet has no idea how to creatively handle gold in the economy other than “Pay me to access this content!”

This statement is blatantly false.

So, how have they creatively handled gold in the economy other than paying said gold to access content? If you know a statement is false, please provide examples showing it is false. I really would be interested to know how Anet has created a gold sink that is not “Receive content for gold.”

What Content is from the gemstore only? Am I missing something? I see lots of toys and styles and what not, but that’s not content, that’s bling as another poster put it.

Skins and items. I term this as content because Anet themselves said that endgame in GW2 is cosmetic. As the end game is content, and the end game is cosmetic, therefore content is cosmetic.

Well that makes sense. I don’t really agree with that use, while it is logical, it kinda ruins the meaning of content. What am I supposed to call new things they add in for me to do if it’s not ‘content’.

/shrug, I’d be kittened if my buddy told me “hey we got new content” and it turned out it was just a new mini in the black lion.

With the introduction of champion purses, champion loot became imbalanced when players embarked on a certain style of play (zergs on non-scaling content). The players noticed this and immediately took advantage of this in large numbers. The designers noticed this and corrected it months later. So the loot bags have now been fixed for exactly the same reason that the players went there in their droves. For some reason players deny this sensible explanation and come up with ridiculous plots and agendas about the gem store. There is no conspiracy, no hidden agenda, just game balancing.

….i play an mmo for the game, really don’t care about the loot at all……young players these days….

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

They could try actually selling things in the gemstore at an honest price without gambling, and not allow them to be bought with in-game gold. Which would have been any intelligent and honest persons way of handling it in the first place.

League of Legends has been so successful because it just took certain things and said, ‘these are going to cost money, end of discussion’, and then it made those things well enough that players would spend money on them. And its success cannot be overstated. There is nothing wrong with having certain things that cannot be earned by in game farming. That philosophy not only earned LoL a lot of money, but it continued to drive them to make better and better ‘for sale’ content rather than cutting corners, like copy-pasting new face models and not even doing full armor sets.

Everything that is right under LoLs system is wrong in GW2’s, which simultaneously and continually punishes everyone. Those who would like to purchase things from the gemstore for real money get jipped by RNG and corner-cutting because the items are designed and priced knowing that ANet isn’t guaranteed any money off their sale because of gold to gem conversion. And simultaneously those who would like in-game rewards are constantly suffering from drop nerfs because the developers have to control how much gold in-take players can make in order to make gemstore sales and control the exchange rate.

And to add to all that, this system encourages gold sellers, not prevents them. No idea who at ANet thought this system would work that way, but it’s nonsense. Anet has to push people to convert gems to gold just to make ends meet. And when it comes down to it, they are never going to compete with the prices of the gold-sellers. This games monetization system has made the gold-seller market more appealing and profitable.

This system is broken, I rarely say such woebegone things, and think very little in design cannot work based on mechanics alone. But in my opinion GW2s monetization system is flawed beyond functionality, it needs to be removed and a new system put in its place where ANet can know they will have consistent financial intake and allow players to have their in-game rewards without that intake being negatively affected.

Blizzard removing the RMAH from D3 was a huge surprise to me. They were willing, as a business, to remove a source of income from the game and totally revamp the rewards to drastically increase the quality of the gameplay experience. Part of it was probably to generate hype and increase sales for Reaper of Souls, but still they pretty much restored my faith in them as a company.

I’m not sure Anet can afford to do the same thing though. They aren’t nearly as big as Blizzard, and NCSoft has dominion over them, whereas Blizzard is pretty much free to do what it wants.

Who still plays for loot with all the gold selling going on?

Conncept.7638:

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

They could try actually selling things in the gemstore at an honest price without gambling, and not allow them to be bought with in-game gold. Which would have been any intelligent and honest persons way of handling it in the first place.

League of Legends has been so successful because it just took certain things and said, ‘these are going to cost money, end of discussion’, and then it made those things well enough that players would spend money on them. And it made, a lot. There is nothing wrong with having certain things that cannot be earned by in game farming. That philosophy not only earned them a lot of money, allowing them to expand the game, but it has continued to drive them to make better and better ‘for sale’ content rather than cutting corners.

Everything that is right under LoLs system is wrong in GW2’s, it simultaneously and continually punishes everyone. Those who would like to purchase things from the gemstore for real money get jipped by RNG and corner-cutting because the items are designed and priced knowing that ANet isn’t guaranteed any money off their sale because of gold to gem conversion. And simultaneously in-game rewards are constantly being nerfed because they have to control how much gold in-take players can make in order to make any gemstore sales and control the exchange rate. And to add to all that, this system encourages gold sellers, not prevents them. Anet has to push that people need to either buy gems to get items or gold in order to make ends meet. And when it comes down to it, they are never going to compete with the exchange rate of the gold-sellers.

This monetization system is broken, I rarely say things this extreme, but they need to remove this entire system and start over.

I applaud you. If the anet devs would just look at what works and doesn’t work for other games we would not be having these talks. Honestly I don’t think they care though as they are making a crap ton of money doing it this way and every change they make seems only to be for more monetization like with the new trait system.

Lobo Dela Noche.5127:

Jerus.4350:

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

Amen!

Did you know another game was able to ditch the RMAH and still make money and please the customers. They could make money and keep the game running and not nickel and dime us. They ditched the buy to play/expansion model for the free to play nickel and dime model not because it doesn’t pay the bills, they ditched it because the nickel and dime model shows higher profit margins for less work. Meaning they can pump out kitten LS updates that disappear every two weeks rather than work on real content. So they would rather make a little more money and have an inferior product. This is what makes me mad, this game could and should be a much better game but they aren’t trying to make the best game they can, they are trying to make as much money as they can.

I just can’t share your opinion. I don’t feel nickel/dimed at all.

City of Heroes did have exclusive skins in their cash shop. Older ones that originally bought as “DLC” before the game went F2P. True if you were a long time subscriber, you could get the new costume items with tokens which you got one per month of play after it went F2P and you still paid monthly.

Then there was the costume set in our version of a BL Chest but the odds were published, higher and the more of the set you got the better the chance on the remainder (they were account unlocks and not sellable so you got piece A, piece A gets removed from the reward table). But the real rare item from that was a non-combat pet. We didn’t have anything near the selection GW2 has so it was a big thing.

cainejw.7142:

kratan.4619:

A R W E N.6895:

Azrael.4960:

Real money -> Gems -> Gold conversion has been part of the game from day 1, didn’t you know?

But did you know that the focus on gemstore is actually increasing so much?

But did you know that their jobs depend on people spending in the gem store and not just providing free content?

But did you know that you can give great content and people will buy from the gem store out of loyalty to the product instead of putting content exclusively in the gem store and saying “Buy it or no new content?”

City of Heroes did it. It was quite profitable, too. Everything in the store could be accessed in the game, but players were so loyal to Paragon that they would buy from the store because it supported their beloved game. I know because I spent hundreds of dollars in the store on stuff I didn’t really need.

It was also a sub game. People feel more loyal if they pay to play monthly. This is a pay once play as much as you like game. People feel that they are ‘entitled’ to it – different attitudes in different games.

Mirta.5029:

It’s so that people would buy gems and convert them to gold. This is on one of their official advertisement pages.

Indeed and it’s just as suspect of a practice as the RMAH was in Diablo III. I never was comfortable with the idea of legitimizing what is essentially gold selling but it is what it is.

Hopefully they will eventually come to their senses and stop this madness. After all, Blizzard did.

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

Who still plays for loot with all the gold selling going on?

I do, so that I can buy gems with gold and improve my account. So, I certainly don’t agree with the OPs idea to get rid of my ability to do that.

Xenon.4537:

Blizzard removing the RMAH from D3 was a huge surprise to me. They were willing, as a business, to remove a source of income from the game and totally revamp the rewards to drastically increase the quality of the gameplay experience. Part of it was probably to generate hype and increase sales for Reaper of Souls, but still they pretty much restored my faith in them as a company.

I’m not sure Anet can afford to do the same thing though. They aren’t nearly as big as Blizzard, and NCSoft has dominion over them, whereas Blizzard is pretty much free to do what it wants.

activision has dominion over blizzard. I think it all comes down to is does the company want a product that will last for years or do they want a product that makes money in the short term. Blizzard realized that D3 was done for if they didn’t change things and that having something they could sell for the next 10 years like D2 was in their best interest. I don’t think anet cares if gw2 dies in NA/EU as they have china and a new mmo they can work on. So I think they will nickel and dime as much as they can till it dies.

Fungalfoot.7213:

Mirta.5029:

It’s so that people would buy gems and convert them to gold. This is on one of their official advertisement pages.

Indeed and it’s just as suspect of a practice as the RMAH was in Diablo III. I never was comfortable with the idea of legitimizing what is essentially gold selling but it is what it is.

Hopefully they will eventually come to their senses and stop this madness. After all, Blizzard did.

ya know I didn’t care about the buying gems with gold as it brings in more revenue for anet and we all know there will be gold sellers in every mmo. But I don’t understand why its so hard for the companies to leave it at that and not try to squeeze more money out of it. Why do they have to fiddle with loot drops, gold income, and crafting recipes? Like with D3 I’m not sure why they didn’t just fix drop rates, why did they also have to remove the RMAH and the normal AH. Is It because the companies can’t control themselves so the only way to not mess with the game is to remove the temptation?

sorudo.9054:

….i play an mmo for the game, really don’t care about the loot at all……young players these days….

Same here. If I make enough to keep me in siege wvw, I’m a happy camper. But the loot frenzy in this game…sheesh.

sorudo.9054:

….i play an mmo for the game, really don’t care about the loot at all……young players these days….

Do you think being condescending make you sound intelligent or enlightened? What exactly does ‘i (<- common ’I’) play an (<-MMO doesn’t start with a vowel) mmo for the game’ mean? That’s the most useless argument I’ve ever read-‘I watch Godzilla for the movie’ or ‘I read Lord of the Rings for the book’. This post would have actually possibly been valuable if you first dropped condescending tones at the door and second explain what ‘the game’ is. For instance:
“I play a mmorpg for the online community/story/lore-the mechanics/flair don’t interest me as much”…a fair point…but still utterly irrelevant to people who are interested in the things you aren’t interested in. Also…if you don’t care about mechanics/flair then any changes would mean nil to you…so why does it bother you again?

Raf.1078:

sorudo.9054:

….i play an mmo for the game, really don’t care about the loot at all……young players these days….

Same here. If I make enough to keep me in siege wvw, I’m a happy camper. But the loot frenzy in this game…sheesh.

Really? Someone has to point out the differences between motivation for a pvp player vs a pve player (yes yes some pve players only play for the lore)?

I don’t want to live on this planet anymore.

Lobo Dela Noche.5127:

Xenon.4537:

Blizzard removing the RMAH from D3 was a huge surprise to me. They were willing, as a business, to remove a source of income from the game and totally revamp the rewards to drastically increase the quality of the gameplay experience. Part of it was probably to generate hype and increase sales for Reaper of Souls, but still they pretty much restored my faith in them as a company.

I’m not sure Anet can afford to do the same thing though. They aren’t nearly as big as Blizzard, and NCSoft has dominion over them, whereas Blizzard is pretty much free to do what it wants.

activision has dominion over blizzard. I think it all comes down to is does the company want a product that will last for years or do they want a product that makes money in the short term. Blizzard realized that D3 was done for if they didn’t change things and that having something they could sell for the next 10 years like D2 was in their best interest. I don’t think anet cares if gw2 dies in NA/EU as they have china and a new mmo they can work on. So I think they will nickel and dime as much as they can till it dies.

Quick correction: NCSoft has a new mmo to work on, not Anet (if you are thinking of Wowstar). Anet has no control over that, it’s developed by Carbine Studios.

I don’t personally believe Anet is this shallow. I think NCSoft kind of has their hands tied. NCSoft is Korean and Activision is US, so maybe I’m biased but I think that is the reason Blizzard was allowed to make such a drastic change to their game (in addition to Blizzard being much bigger, older, and generally more successful than Anet, not to mention Blizzard has many many more IPs and sources of income than Anet).

I’m scared NCSoft would sooner shut down GW2 than radically restructure its monetization. They already shut down like 3 other MMOs they weren’t satisfied with.

As others have said, ANet is focusing more and more on the gemstore side of the game and less on the actual game(lets be realistic: the wardrobe patch should have been there on day1).

When their 2 latest ads feature a bullet point of “get more gold” and suggest you RM → gems → gold…it’s not hard to see where the future of this game is heading.

Lobo Dela Noche.5127:

If this was Barbie’s my lil pony dress up I might agree but its not this is an mmorpg.

An MMORPG where the developers stated that cosmetics and skins are the end game.

Well that makes sense. I don’t really agree with that use, while it is logical, it kinda ruins the meaning of content. What am I supposed to call new things they add in for me to do if it’s not ‘content’.
/shrug, I’d be kittened if my buddy told me “hey we got new content” and it turned out it was just a new mini in the black lion.

Content is still content even if it’s just a skin. Content’s an umbrella term for storyline, items, zones, skills, etc. It’s all content. I think the problem is that gamers think content must be meaningful storyline they can play through.

It was also a sub game. People feel more loyal if they pay to play monthly.

COH was a free to play game with a sub option. You could play the entire game without sub, but it definitely wasn’t as fun as with a sub. You could get pretty much everything in and out of game.

We didn’t have anything near the selection GW2 has so it was a big thing.

I disagree, but I also think Paragon handled the Paragon store much better than Anet is. Anet is treating the store like Nexon treats theirs. You have game content and store content. Paragon at least allowed you to get a vast majority of things in the game along with the stipend. Anet’s pretty much created temp content for us to play for free while creating permanent content to pay, in my opinion.