Guild Wars 2

As title says, what do you guys think?

I know that I was hacked about 3 months after Gw2 was released back in 2012 and lost all my characters when that happened. Sadly I can’t remember my character’s names and have tried Gw2 to try restore them but sadly they couldn’t.

No. I like that I’m rewarded for every character that I have which has been the case since GW1. Just look at those dyes that we got. Would you want only one or as many as you have characters that are that old?

I prefer the system as it is and how it has worked since the start of GW1. I’m not sure it would prove popular to change a system at this point which would undoubtably screw over a great deal many people who have characters awaiting their rewards.

I agree with the Ayrilana and Randulf. It was this way in GW1, and I liked it then. I like it in GW2, as well. I’m sorry that you lost your old characters, though.

If it meant that I’d get the next year’s reward for the character I created a week ago along with all my other toons, then sure, why not? Hey, shouldn’t that new toon then get like 4 birthdays all at once?

Naw, I think we’re good as-is.

Unfortunate about losing your chars, but I can’t agree that account birthday presents are good. For one thing, the 3rd year presents with the dye selections aren’t the same as the 4th year. My younger chars will eventually get the 3rd year dye selections to select the dyes it doesn’t have from those and then the 4th year dye choices. Bypassing 3rd and 4th year presents means no free dyes from those options.

And then of course there’s my key runner who would be getting the upcoming 5th year present in spite of only being a few days old. That doesn’t feel right.

Yeah, I’m just going to go ahead and give this a thumbs down.

An account birthday gift AS WELL AS character birthdays would be most welcome.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

And then of course there’s my key runner who would be getting the upcoming 5th year present in spite of only being a few days old. That doesn’t feel right.

If they had account gifts, it’d be for the account, not every individual character. Imagine the current implementation, except the account itself was treated as a character.

So people now want even more free rewards given to them?

Healix

If they had account gifts, it’d be for the account, not every individual character. Imagine the current implementation, except the account itself was treated as a character.

Understood, but it’s way too late to make such a change without the peasants revolting.

Seems to me that the OP’s concern is: they started in 2012, but they don’t have any characters that are over 4 years old. They’d like to change that.

The thing is, it doesn’t make sense to adjust the entire game (and invent new mechanics) just for a few special cases, no matter how deserving. Even if it were a good idea to switch presents to be account-age, it would still be a lot of resources to make the change… and there are so, so many other things that so, so many more of us would enjoy so, so much more.

@OP I’m really sorry your account got hacked and also that you still feel the repercussions today. I urge you to work with support to see if there’s maybe something else they can do to help you, without having to change parts of the game itself.

Healix.5819:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

And then of course there’s my key runner who would be getting the upcoming 5th year present in spite of only being a few days old. That doesn’t feel right.

If they had account gifts, it’d be for the account, not every individual character. Imagine the current implementation, except the account itself was treated as a character.

So you’re saying instead of multiple gifts each year, one per character there’d be only one birthday gift per account? I don’t think that’s what the OP was asking for. My understanding of what he is asking for is a birthday gift per char that’s tied to the account birthday. (Make the gifts plural apply to the account age not the account get a gift, singular, that’s the account age) If he was asking for what you suggest that solution to his problem of not having characters of max age would be very unpopular. People would only be able to choose one dye out of multiple choices each year and never get another chance unless they repeat the same present year after year. That makes his suggestion even worse. Who would want such a restrictive, repetitive change to birthdays that removes choices, not adds them.

Blude.6812:

An account birthday gift AS WELL AS character birthdays would be most welcome.

There is such a thing. For the fourth birthday we got a cultural backpack and had to choose just one of the five skins. We don’t yet know if we’ll get a shot at a second skin this year. Anyway, that is account on top of individual character ones.

Though it does require having gotten a character to 4 years, I admit, it’s not purely based on account age.

Healix.5819:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

And then of course there’s my key runner who would be getting the upcoming 5th year present in spite of only being a few days old. That doesn’t feel right.

If they had account gifts, it’d be for the account, not every individual character. Imagine the current implementation, except the account itself was treated as a character.

So, one present instead of many? No, thank you.

Well, most MMOs give b-day gifts based on account age or to anyone who’s online during the celebration. The reason why people like GW2’s system is because 1.) they got used to it in GW1 and/or 2.) they get more gifts this way (more characters).

However, there are people like me who have been here since beta but never got a birthday gift because of various reasons. Like, I am a mainoholic and I have rerolled my main every year so far because: I didn’t like my profession, didn’t like my race, didn’t like my name, wanted a server transfer (which is free if you delete every character), lol.

I recently got my 1st b-day gift on my Necro and now I have maxed crafting and world completion so hopefully I will stick with this character. :P Yeah, it’s kind of crappy that I’ve been here since beta and I’m so behind on b-day gifts BUT on the other hand, I saved money on name change and server transfer which is nice! XD I don’t actually NEED any of the b-day gifts, I can live without them. I could be upset but it’s not really worth it to whine over virtual items. I would still enjoy GW2 even if I never got free stuff.

3 years ago one could claim ignorance but what exactly is the excuse now?

I think people are completely misunderstanding the OP. It’s clear to me that what he meant is that each char you have would still get a yearly birthday present on each one year anniversary of that char’s creation. The only difference would be that the yearly birthday presents would be based on account age, not the age of the character getting the present. A char that is a few days old would not get a birthday present. That’s really just absurd. There would be no account-based birthday present, they would be given to characters on their birthdays.

I think basic idea is definitely worth considering but there’s a lot to consider.

I have been playing GW2 since the beginning. At the beginning I created the 5 toons my account gave me. With HoT I added 4 more toons. So about the time my first 5 toons were getting 4th year presents, my 4 new toons were getting 1st year presents. That’s 4 completely useless Mini Queen Jennahs and 4 completely useless level 20 boosts. I currently have 17 level 20 bosters taking up two inventory slots because they don’t all stack together. I have 1 level 30 booster (I used 4 on the new toons). I have 4 level 40 boosters (got them after my 4 new toons were way past 40, not sure what happened to the 5th, maybe I used one but then I should have another 30). So I probably need to just delete the 20s and the 30 becuase with the 40s I’ll NEVER have any use for the 20s or 30s. Best part is I have more 20s and 30s coming which will be completely useless.

Second year present has the birthday blaster which would be way more useful to the newer toons on my old account. Third and fourth have the dye packs and teleport to friend. Fourth also has the Birthday card.

I’m not really sure what the best solution is, but it’s definitely worth some consideration and discussion. For example, if they let you pick any year up to the age of the account, each toon could only select a given year once. In other words, on toon could not pick fourth year multiple times. Another possible solution would be to give us something to do with the useless items. Maybe let us Mystic Forge the extra Mini Queen Jennas? Forge or trade the many excess Experience Scrolls?

You are all wrong. The OP is like “I lost all my characters when I got hacked and they didn’t restore them for me, so now I get no presents. So I want them to change the present to account so I can get a present. and all of you other players with multiple characters, well, too bad, will get only one present per account”.
Nice.

Well I think they did start account birthdays in a small way with the one time backpacks.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

So you’re saying instead of multiple gifts each year, one per character there’d be only one birthday gift per account?

That would be one way of doing it, if they never had birthdays to begin with.

What I meant however was that the account itself would act as an additional character. It would be exactly as it is now, with your characters having their own birthdays, plus your account would also be treated as a character and receive one.

Healix.5819:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

So you’re saying instead of multiple gifts each year, one per character there’d be only one birthday gift per account?

That would be one way of doing it, if they never had birthdays to begin with.

What I meant however was that the account itself would act as an additional character. It would be exactly as it is now, with your characters having their own birthdays, plus your account would also be treated as a character and receive one.

That’s one possible interpretation of what the OP said. However since it’s unclear what the OP meant, we’ll need to wait to see if he comes back and clarifies his post.

Anyandrell.6238:

You are all wrong. The OP is like “I lost all my characters when I got hacked and they didn’t restore them for me, so now I get no presents. So I want them to change the present to account so I can get a present. and all of you other players with multiple characters, well, too bad, will get only one present per account”.
Nice.

The OP is certainly upset that they were hacked. Adding figurative salt to their figurative wound, it means they aren’t getting the same presents that they would have gotten without being hacked.

To me, that’s a completely legit concern.

On the other hand, asking ANet to change the mechanic to solve that issue seems unreasonable to me. It doesn’t matter to me if every character gets account bound gifts or if it’s just one; the game doesn’t need to change every time someone has been wronged or disappointed.

The OP has an individual concern; the tool for addressing individual concerns is a support ticket. If they don’t like the resolution, they should appeal to a supervisor.

No way that would be absolutely stupid. I have 32 characters today. That means 32 birthday gifts every year, instead of 1. Why would i want that???

Anyandrell.6238:

You are all wrong. The OP is like “I lost all my characters when I got hacked and they didn’t restore them for me, so now I get no presents. So I want them to change the present to account so I can get a present. and all of you other players with multiple characters, well, too bad, will get only one present per account”.
Nice.

That bit didn’t really make much sense … unless OP quit the game afterwards it just means it is just 3 months later. Compared to the people that started the game 2 or 3 years after release that is relatively short.

It also seems like OP waited 4+ years to attempt character restoration?! O_o

The Account Restoration Tool was not implemented until after December of 2012. Thus, no account restorations could be given for losses before that date (at least, in the past). Maybe, they have to tools to go back further now; maybe not.

Good luck.

Khisanth.2948:

Anyandrell.6238:

You are all wrong. The OP is like “I lost all my characters when I got hacked and they didn’t restore them for me, so now I get no presents. So I want them to change the present to account so I can get a present. and all of you other players with multiple characters, well, too bad, will get only one present per account”.
Nice.

That bit didn’t really make much sense … unless OP quit the game afterwards it just means it is just 3 months later. Compared to the people that started the game 2 or 3 years after release that is relatively short.

It also seems like OP waited 4+ years to attempt character restoration?! O_o

They didn’t used to have character restoration. It was added to the game around August of last year.

Customer Suppport can undelete characters

That is still either waiting a very long time to ask for the restoration or waiting a long time to write he that post.

Khisanth.2948:

That is still either waiting a very long time to ask for the restoration or waiting a long time to write he that post.

Well, it’s always possible he asked back then and was refused an account rollback and didn’t know of the change that allowed character restoration until recently.

Excellent idea. I don’t understand how anyone can be against it save for special snowflake mentality. Not everyone parks a single character from the beginning.

Vyrulisse.1246:

Excellent idea. I don’t understand how anyone can be against it save for special snowflake mentality. Not everyone parks a single character from the beginning.

There’s nothing “special snowflakes” about not wanting to have your annual rewards cut by a minimum of 80%.

Thanks for everyone replying.

Basically I don’t know how to put this so I don’t know if its a good idea or bad one, but I played head start however about a week after I got bored and uninstalled. I actually don’t know when my account was hacked since I only returned when I made my mesmer back in 2013 I think, which I had to get my account back which I lost those character’s I started with in headstart.

Then I quit again and came back a few weeks ago and saw that GW2 Support can finally restore characters which they have been really helpful restoring my deleted mesmer, but they cannot seem to find my character I made when playing headstart as sadly I don’t even remember the name, but I know it was a Sylvari Ranger.

So I kinda just felt left out since I am missing Year 3 and Year 4 birthday gifts which I would of had if I didn’t lose my account.

But I understand all you guys, and I can see it being a useless Idea. I didn’t really think of the birthday gifts for characters properly. I just thought it would be nice to have Account Birthdays instead of Character birthdays, since having say 6 characters with 6 birthday blasters rather one birthday blaster account bound. I dunno :/

RoseofGilead.8907:

I agree with the Ayrilana and Randulf. It was this way in GW1, and I liked it then. I like it in GW2, as well. I’m sorry that you lost your old characters, though.

i wish we got tradeable random everlasting tonics though like we did in GW1’s later years
it was brilliant that if you stopped playing for awhile you could come back and get a nice bit of extra cash from several characters birthdays

ZomBie.8156:

I played head start however about a week after I got bored and uninstalled. …

… I actually don’t know when my account was hacked
… I made my mesmer back in 2013

… Then I quit again
… came back a few weeks ago

You barely played the game, quit it twice, and yet expect ANet to spend developer time to help you out, in a manner which provides no significant benefit to those who haven’t quit the game at all?

You don’t see that as… awkward?

ZomBie.8156:

So I kinda just felt left out since I am missing Year 3 and Year 4 birthday gifts which I would of had if I didn’t lose my account.

I remain sympathetic — there’s no question you’d have an extra year or two of rewards. And I feel bad that you were hacked; no one should have to suffer that.

Then again, if you hadn’t quit the game and uninstalled, you would have noticed when you were hacked, so you might not have “lost” as much time.

Vyrulisse.1246:

Excellent idea. I don’t understand how anyone can be against it save for special snowflake mentality. Not everyone parks a single character from the beginning.

Who do you think is asking for special treatment?

• The majority of long term players who have more than one toon since they started playing? The status quo suits them just fine.
• Or folks like the OP, who quit the game or somehow didn’t “park a single character from the beginning” for other reasons?

Again, the OP’s situation is different because they were hacked. But even that’s not enough of a reason to change an entire mechanic, just to suit the small subset.

In other words, the people asking to change the system are the ones asking for special treatment.