Guild Wars 2

Ayrilana.1396:

Rauderi.8706:

Ayrilana.1396:

Players can get obsidian shards from there at a rate of 1 commendation for 5 shards. Sometimes the large bag is available letting you get 10 shards per commendation. I don’t see anyone making a fuss about them being available from a guild vendor.

Not every system added will be available to all players. If it were map rewards then players who don’t have the time to farm events would be left out. It also doesn’t help that the coins would likely not be that plentiful to begin with or as frequently available.

Anyone can be a member of a guild that does guild missions. It’s just one other source that can affect a larger percentage of the playerbase while giving them another reason to do guild missions.

It also allows players to get more mystic coins than from map rewards or increased daily frequency. There are several timegated in place to prevent a sudden flooding of the market and we can be sure that there will be future recipes that require them putting a strain on supply. If the price drops too much, Anet just has to release a new recipe for a skin that requires 50-100 mystic coins.

Oby shards are available everywhere. It’s a waste of commendations to buy them. I horfed up 200k karma on a whim to buy them. Oby shards are not equivalent.

Just because guilds are available, it doesn’t mean that’s a good place to put that extra content. A person who can’t do map rewards isn’t going to have time for guild missions either.
“Okay everyone here? Bob’s not here. Let’s wait for Bob.”
“brbbio”
“Ready check?”
“Okay, at trek location, anyone else showing up? I’ll wait.”
“Is everyone done with race? No, okay every help with race.”

Missions are not as fast as you think them to be.

Mystic Coins would be better served in a more generalized location. Laurel, Pact, Karma vendors, whatever. Even as map rewards, it would serve the population better as a windfall to everyone participating than locking it behind guild membership. Not a terribly difficult lock, honestly, but there are a lot of guilds that just aren’t.. good. I’m lucky I found a few that are pleasant and drama free.

As I stated before, guild missions take about an 1-1.5 hours to do and you get 12-15 commendations. How long does it take to complete one full cycle of map rewards? You’d probably only have like 3 or so coins available per cycle.

The problem with what you’re suggesting is that you will flood the supply with them.

Don’t quibble just to quibble. I already said a once/day purchase, so please actually read.

Where the details differ is in the currency. I’d actually be leery of having Mystic Coins as map rewards, there are several other currencies available to all players, and that’s what should be used to promote extra purchases.

Noted above, Chris has a strong point and some internal data to back it up. Which means it’s likely ANet is going to do some further data collection and decide what to do from there.

Malediktus.9250:

I enjoy the high price of mystic coins

I’ll admit to being selfish here. I sell more coins than I use, so I’m not exactly eager to lower their value. [/disclaimer]

Still, we could stand to have a secondary, limited acquisition system in place. As it is right now, we get 20/month. That alone has me re-thinking any sort of vendor purchase, even with daily purchase controls.

Major Domo.9250:

A psychologist would be giddy over this instant- versus delayed-gratification scenario..

- A tradable item that every player basically has equal access to, regardless of skill level
- Said item gives no real mechanical advantage, only used in luxury/vanity crafting
- Only two acquisition methods – the slow faucet (free) or the trading post (market value)

The price is what it is because everyone has the same slow but reliable access, some players must have it all RIGHT THIS BLOODY INSTANT, and some others see this as an opportunity to profit off of group A’s indifference and group B’s impatience. A unloads an otherwise worthless item for gold, B gets the latest greatest shiny, and C reminds us of something about fools and their money.

Somewhere out there, John Smith is giggling and adding another chapter to his book.

/2copperstakeitorleaveit

That’s the basics of it, is it not? :P

The sudden siphoning of coins isn’t entirely cosmetic, as Legendary weapons and the elite spec Ascended require them, and those are best-in-slot gear. Not to say you can’t get BiS by other means, but it does have a mild power component.

Chris Cleary.8017:

Most of this price increase revolves around players that are pushing the value up due to the players willingness to pay more. If players are willing to pay more for an item, it’s going to keep increasing until eventually it hits a ceiling for the commodity. We’ve seen the same thing occur with numerous commodities over time.

Right now there is a consistent supply of mystic coins entering the game (way more than are being consumed) and churning through the trading post at a very slow rate. Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped.

In retrospect, this is actually causing the daily login reward to be worth significantly more to players who wish to convert mystic coins to gold.

I don’t think it’s fair to say ‘people are willingly paying more’ when you tacked mystic coins almost everywhere into recipies which are used frequently to drain supply.

Just look at the HoT legendaries, if you actually want to wait and do it with login rewards you’re waiting for years.

In fact, players are sort of forced to just deal with the higher price. The majority wouldn’t be so ‘willingly’ and more ‘if i really must…’ if you’d asked them…

If politicians say ’it’s fine’ while waving their hand that doesn’t mean a certain issue will just poof away – Please don’t ignore coins. You did the same with other items which rose to hilarious prices (leather anyone?) until you finally agreed that there are issues…

Akuni.8604:

Chris Cleary.8017:

Most of this price increase revolves around players that are pushing the value up due to the players willingness to pay more. If players are willing to pay more for an item, it’s going to keep increasing until eventually it hits a ceiling for the commodity. We’ve seen the same thing occur with numerous commodities over time.

Right now there is a consistent supply of mystic coins entering the game (way more than are being consumed) and churning through the trading post at a very slow rate. Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped.

In retrospect, this is actually causing the daily login reward to be worth significantly more to players who wish to convert mystic coins to gold.

I don’t think it’s fair to say ‘people are willingly paying more’ when you tacked mystic coins almost everywhere into recipies which are used frequently to drain supply.

Just look at the HoT legendaries, if you actually want to wait and do it with login rewards you’re waiting for years.

In fact, players are sort of forced to just deal with the higher price. The majority wouldn’t be so ‘willingly’ and more ‘if i really must…’ if you’d asked them…

If politicians say ’it’s fine’ while waving their hand that doesn’t mean a certain issue will just poof away – Please don’t ignore coins. You did the same with other items which rose to hilarious prices (leather anyone?) until you finally agreed that there are issues…

His usage of the word is consistent with its definition. Players are not forced to craft legendaries or other items that use mystic coins. They simply willingly choose to do so because it is something that they want. They may not like the price of coins but if they still purchase them then the price wasn’t beyond what they were willing to pay for.

Mystic coins have a tonne of sinks with no way of gaining more other than through login rewards. Nevermore, for instance, is something I’ve been slowly working towards, but it requires mystic clovers (~240 mystic coins) plus an extra 250 mystic coins. I’d also like to complete Dark Harvest, The Northern Wind and Winter’s Presence. Each of these also require large amount of mystic coins. Any other ‘prestigious’ weapon will also contain these coin sinks.

Players aren’t ‘willing’ to pay more for a ‘commodity’. It’s necessary for things like weapon collections or legendaries, so of course, the price goes up. Everyone wants legendaries, lots of people like to complete their special collections.. so why not make them more achievable by introducing another way to obtain the coins?!

You already have ecto requirements for a lot of things, which is a gold sink on its own. Currently if something requires mystic coins and ecto, it’s pretty much double the price it used to be. Whilst that might be okay for old players – I started playing late November or so. Didn’t buy the game until late December. I don’t have enough coins for anything I’m working towards and the amount of gold required, in addition to the gold needed for everything else, just makes things so much harder.

Hanhula.9381:

Mystic coins have a tonne of sinks with no way of gaining more other than through login rewards. Nevermore, for instance, is something I’ve been slowly working towards, but it requires mystic clovers (~240 mystic coins) plus an extra 250 mystic coins. I’d also like to complete Dark Harvest, The Northern Wind and Winter’s Presence. Each of these also require large amount of mystic coins. Any other ‘prestigious’ weapon will also contain these coin sinks.

Players aren’t ‘willing’ to pay more for a ‘commodity’. It’s necessary for things like weapon collections or legendaries, so of course, the price goes up. Everyone wants legendaries, lots of people like to complete their special collections.. so why not make them more achievable by introducing another way to obtain the coins?!

You already have ecto requirements for a lot of things, which is a gold sink on its own. Currently if something requires mystic coins and ecto, it’s pretty much double the price it used to be. Whilst that might be okay for old players – I started playing late November or so. Didn’t buy the game until late December. I don’t have enough coins for anything I’m working towards and the amount of gold required, in addition to the gold needed for everything else, just makes things so much harder.

If they are paying the higher prices then they are willing to pay the higher prices.

Personally, I’ve never felt that the old “but you don’t have to do anything in this game” argument is much of an argument at all.

Some people may be willing and able to pay those prices, that’s great, for those who can’t afford those prices it just puts these legendaries out of reach. That players so easily manipulate these markets to put the coins out of reach of newer players is hindering those other players enjoyment of the game.

I find it hilarious all the 1%‘ers demanding that the government (anet) reduce the price of their luxury goods so that poor people can’t get ahead and only they can afford the items they want.

I suppose it’s just like real life.

Shiyo.3578:

That’s strange, doesn’t supply and demand usually mean that if there’s more items going up for sale than are being bought, the item cannot go up in price no matter what?

What he said basically means 2 things, most of the coins generated end up in the material storage and never consumed for crafting or sold in the trading post, because the casuals basically forget about them after hitting “deposit all”, or they are oblivious of their worth, and secondarily, there are players who have hoarded vast amounts of coins when they were dirt cheap, and some of them have not been listed on the trade house yet.

So, while the supply is greater than the demand technically, most of the supply is not being put up for sale.

Pifil.5193:

Personally, I’ve never felt that the old “but you don’t have to do anything in this game” argument is much of an argument at all.

Some people may be willing and able to pay those prices, that’s great, for those who can’t afford those prices it just puts these legendaries out of reach. That players so easily manipulate these markets to put the coins out of reach of newer players is hindering those other players enjoyment of the game.

It is as there is a difference between something you need to play the game versus something that you want. The vast majority of equipment in this game is mainly for cosmetics. You can craft ascended equipment, use the ascended skins, and be just as effective as those using the same stats with their legendary equipment.

Yes, as prices increase, more and more people will opt out of buying the coins. That’s how things tend to go. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that new players are put out of reach as that implies something to being unobtainable. Since players can get at least 20 mystic coins a month, they can still obtain the legendary weapons; although at a slower pace than if they were to buy from the TP.

Nothing is out of reach. If you want to make gold and craft your legendaries you can do so in a couple of months easily. It’s just that some just don’t know how and only rely on liquid gold earnings, and for some of those that do know, spending most of their playtime chopping wood is not what they want from a game.

Ayrilana.1396:

Akuni.8604:

Chris Cleary.8017:

Most of this price increase revolves around players that are pushing the value up due to the players willingness to pay more. If players are willing to pay more for an item, it’s going to keep increasing until eventually it hits a ceiling for the commodity. We’ve seen the same thing occur with numerous commodities over time.

Right now there is a consistent supply of mystic coins entering the game (way more than are being consumed) and churning through the trading post at a very slow rate. Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped.

In retrospect, this is actually causing the daily login reward to be worth significantly more to players who wish to convert mystic coins to gold.

I don’t think it’s fair to say ‘people are willingly paying more’ when you tacked mystic coins almost everywhere into recipies which are used frequently to drain supply.

Just look at the HoT legendaries, if you actually want to wait and do it with login rewards you’re waiting for years.

In fact, players are sort of forced to just deal with the higher price. The majority wouldn’t be so ‘willingly’ and more ‘if i really must…’ if you’d asked them…

If politicians say ’it’s fine’ while waving their hand that doesn’t mean a certain issue will just poof away – Please don’t ignore coins. You did the same with other items which rose to hilarious prices (leather anyone?) until you finally agreed that there are issues…

His usage of the word is consistent with its definition. Players are not forced to craft legendaries or other items that use mystic coins. They simply willingly choose to do so because it is something that they want. They may not like the price of coins but if they still purchase them then the price wasn’t beyond what they were willing to pay for.

And that is exactly what I meant – If you say ’there’s no issue’ then there still is an issue. You just decided to ignore it.

People aren’t ‘forced’ to be unique with their skins… in gw2… where skins and expression of oneself is key… what is left if you strike going for skins? Pvp mostly i guess? Nevermind that there are better balanced pvp games.
Skins are the thing for post-80. In a sense players ARE forced to get them. It depends if you want to play the game 100% or not.

I’m not even trying to take your comment seriously. Why should I if you only look at 50% of the picture.

RabbitUp.8294:

Shiyo.3578:

That’s strange, doesn’t supply and demand usually mean that if there’s more items going up for sale than are being bought, the item cannot go up in price no matter what?

What he said basically means 2 things, most of the coins generated end up in the material storage and never consumed for crafting or sold in the trading post, because the casuals basically forget about them after hitting “deposit all”, or they are oblivious of their worth, and secondarily, there are players who have hoarded vast amounts of coins when they were dirt cheap, and some of them have not been listed on the trade house yet.

So, while the supply is greater than the demand technically, most of the supply is not being put up for sale.

Or they think “these things accumulate at a glacial pace and are used in most of the recent cosmetics crafting, I had better save mine for when I really want something”. Just pointing out that “forgetfulness” and “obliviousness” are far from the only explanations. =)

Typical anet response, create the problem, deny it and shift the blame.

Lets be real here for a second.

Anet pushes the demand for an item, and then controls the supply as well. So in what world does the player have anything to do with a high demand item that has a limited supply? You have 2 options, one is wait over a year for your dreadfully slow intake of mystic coins for ONE item and two is to buy them at whatever price the market demands because you have to there is only one other slow and unrealistic way to get them.

So what do we do? We ask for anet to make changes and what are we told? That it is our fault? I guess I am the crazy one.

Akuni.8604:

People aren’t ‘forced’ to be unique with their skins… in gw2… where skins and expression of oneself is key…

What’s funny is legendaries skins are a lot less unique than most of the much cheaper skins out there. There are flashy, that’s for sure, but compare the number of people using Bifrost, to something like The Crossing for example. At this point, having a legendary means you either have a lot of hours on your back or that you have a credit card.

Akuni.8604:

Ayrilana.1396:

Akuni.8604:

Chris Cleary.8017:

Most of this price increase revolves around players that are pushing the value up due to the players willingness to pay more. If players are willing to pay more for an item, it’s going to keep increasing until eventually it hits a ceiling for the commodity. We’ve seen the same thing occur with numerous commodities over time.

Right now there is a consistent supply of mystic coins entering the game (way more than are being consumed) and churning through the trading post at a very slow rate. Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped.

In retrospect, this is actually causing the daily login reward to be worth significantly more to players who wish to convert mystic coins to gold.

I don’t think it’s fair to say ‘people are willingly paying more’ when you tacked mystic coins almost everywhere into recipies which are used frequently to drain supply.

Just look at the HoT legendaries, if you actually want to wait and do it with login rewards you’re waiting for years.

In fact, players are sort of forced to just deal with the higher price. The majority wouldn’t be so ‘willingly’ and more ‘if i really must…’ if you’d asked them…

If politicians say ’it’s fine’ while waving their hand that doesn’t mean a certain issue will just poof away – Please don’t ignore coins. You did the same with other items which rose to hilarious prices (leather anyone?) until you finally agreed that there are issues…

His usage of the word is consistent with its definition. Players are not forced to craft legendaries or other items that use mystic coins. They simply willingly choose to do so because it is something that they want. They may not like the price of coins but if they still purchase them then the price wasn’t beyond what they were willing to pay for.

And that is exactly what I meant – If you say ’there’s no issue’ then there still is an issue. You just decided to ignore it.

People aren’t ‘forced’ to be unique with their skins… in gw2… where skins and expression of oneself is key… what is left if you strike going for skins? Pvp mostly i guess? Nevermind that there are better balanced pvp games.
Skins are the thing for post-80. In a sense players ARE forced to get them. It depends if you want to play the game 100% or not.

I’m not even trying to take your comment seriously. Why should I if you only look at 50% of the picture.

Players are not forced except by their own wants. They don’t have to farm every skin in order to play the game 100%. Many people could simply be happy with the existing looks that they have for all of their characters with no need to change them. Unless a player is also doing both sPvP and WvW regularly, I wouldn’t consider them “playing the game 100%” as you put it.

I’m not looking at only 50% of the picture.

Rashagar.8349:

RabbitUp.8294:

Shiyo.3578:

That’s strange, doesn’t supply and demand usually mean that if there’s more items going up for sale than are being bought, the item cannot go up in price no matter what?

What he said basically means 2 things, most of the coins generated end up in the material storage and never consumed for crafting or sold in the trading post, because the casuals basically forget about them after hitting “deposit all”, or they are oblivious of their worth, and secondarily, there are players who have hoarded vast amounts of coins when they were dirt cheap, and some of them have not been listed on the trade house yet.

So, while the supply is greater than the demand technically, most of the supply is not being put up for sale.

Or they think “these things accumulate at a glacial pace and are used in most of the recent cosmetics crafting, I had better save mine for when I really want something”. Just pointing out that “forgetfulness” and “obliviousness” are far from the only explanations. =)

Those that think this way are also the ones that are going to end up buying some from the trading house and then eventually use them for crafting, reducing the available supply. I seriously doubt a good number of players are sitting on their coins for a year or so that it takes to get them from login rewards alone until they can get enough to craft what they want.

In either case, if they wanted to offer a solution to the problem, the best way would be to make coins available through methods that you actually have to work for. That way, a lot less end up in the hands of “oblivious” players, as you put it and even some of them would eventually become curious and check the trading post if they were getting coins as high-tier rewards.

I’m not surprised the majority of Mystic Coins are sitting idle. I can’t remember if I’ve ever actually used a Mystic Coin for anything. I’ve been playing since launch, I have three accounts and over the years I’ve collected thousands of the things. Literally. I have 1300 on my second account that I’m logged into as I write this and probably more on the main account. The third account has a few hundred.

My banks are totally stuffed with things like this that I have no use for but which I might, conceivably, have a use for someday. I could sell them but I don’t spend much gold other than to buy new character slots one in a while – and, inevitably, more storage – so I don’t really feel much incentive.

I guess I might think of selling some of the coins now the price is so high. I certainly would if it went to a gold apiece. If the price drops suddenly and I get stuck with them then it could be mildly annoying. I wish I’d sold my vast silk stockpiles a few weeks ago. I should probably sell my leather on the same principle.

In the end, though, it doesn’t really matter. I’ll be no worse off than I was.

@Arilyana

No it’s not. It’s a complete non-argument thrown up time and again as a catch justification for just about anything? Don’t like X? Well you don’t need X to play the game! It’s lazy and dismissive and normally followed by equally tired old “entitlement” claims. I’m not attacking you personally here BTW, I just don’t think it’s a worthwhile addition to discussions.

Regardless, it’s not about need or want in this case, is about what’s an appropriate level of expenditure of time and effort (time is money, as they say) for something that is on the one hand cosmetic and on the other hand one of the relatively few end game goals in the game. Personally, I feel that most of the goals added in HoT are simply gold/material sinks turning the expansion into a bill/checklist.

That said, the prices are below 50s at the moment so maybe the market is actually “correcting” and as you say you get 20 a month, I just personally think that goals should be achievable in game directly through play rather than by the logging in “waiting game”/or TP purchasing especially given how easy it is to manipulate the markets here.

Edit: spelling etc. I hate my phone

Saying you don’t need a cosmetic item in a game that was specifically marketed as a horizontal progression game where cosmetics are the goal is kind of a ridiculous statement to make, that on top of my previous post makes Cleary’s response a direct insult to the community.

Pifil.5193:

@Arilyana

No it’s not. It’s a complete non-argument thrown up time and again as a catch justification for just about anything? Don’t like X? Well you don’t need X to play the game! It’s lazy and dismissive and normally followed by equally tired old “entitlement” claims. I’m not attacking you personally here BTW, I just don’t think it’s a worthwhile addition to discussions.

Regardless, it’s not about need or want in this case, is about what’s an appropriate level of expenditure of time and effort (time is money, as they say) for something that is on the one hand cosmetic and on the other hand one of the relatively few end game goals in the game. Personally, I feel that most of the goals added in HoT are simply gold/material sinks turning the expansion into a bill/checklist.

That said, the prices are below 50s at the moment so maybe the market is actually “correcting” and as you say you get 20 a month, I just personally think that goals should be achievable in game directly through play rather than by the logging in “waiting game”/or TP purchasing especially given how easy it is to manipulate the markets here.

Edit: spelling etc. I hate my phone

So because I cannot afford a Lamborghini in real life means that something is unfair? It’s a luxury items just as legendary weapons are as well as other skins. The vast majority of the game doesn’t require you to have these skins. It’s just something for you to work towards as a long term goal. You can continue to dismiss it and claim that it is a non-argument all that you want, but it doesn’t make it so.

As I said, these are longterm goals. If Anet wanted them to be earned in the short term, they would have added more faucets to the materials. Yes, legendary weapons are gold/material sinks but they’ve been like that since launch. Other desirable skins have also followed the same pattern too.

Mystic coin prices fluctuate and have for quite some time. By this weekend, prices could be back up again. They could be even higher later this summer when we get legendary armor.

Dinks.2478:

Saying you don’t need a cosmetic item in a game that was specifically marketed as a horizontal progression game where cosmetics are the goal is kind of a ridiculous statement to make, that on top of my previous post makes Cleary’s response a direct insult to the community.

No wonder the Devs don’t respond often when making a factual response explaining what you see on the trading post is construed by someone as an direct insult.

Dinks.2478:

Saying you don’t need a cosmetic item in a game that was specifically marketed as a horizontal progression game where cosmetics are the goal is kind of a ridiculous statement to make, that on top of my previous post makes Cleary’s response a direct insult to the community.

Need =/= Want

Ayrilana.1396:

So because I cannot afford a Lamborghini in real life means that something is unfair? It’s a luxury items just as legendary weapons are as well as other skins. The vast majority of the game doesn’t require you to have these skins. It’s just something for you to work towards as a long term goal. You can continue to dismiss it and claim that it is a non-argument all that you want, but it doesn’t make it so.

As I said, these are longterm goals. If Anet wanted them to be earned in the short term, they would have added more faucets to the materials. Yes, legendary weapons are gold/material sinks but they’ve been like that since launch. Other desirable skins have also followed the same pattern too.

Mystic coin prices fluctuate and have for quite some time. By this weekend, prices could be back up again. They could be even higher later this summer when we get legendary armor.

Since when is a game supposed to reflect real life? Offering an escape from reality is one of the main aspects of gaming and fiction in general.

This whole “you don’t need this” is pretty much baseless. You don’t need this skin, you don’t need this item, well guess what, you don’t need to play the game at all in the first place. Gw2 is no player’s job, they play to have fun, and telling them that they have to work to have fun is stupid.

And I’m saying as someone that got a legendary by doing nothing but chopping wood for a month, and guess what I took a break twice as long to recover from such a tedious experience. I would much rather be rewarded for playing the game itself than interacting with trees.

Ayrilana.1396:

So because I cannot afford a Lamborghini in real life means that something is unfair? It’s a luxury items just as legendary weapons are as well as other skins. The vast majority of the game doesn’t require you to have these skins. It’s just something for you to work towards as a long term goal. You can continue to dismiss it and claim that it is a non-argument all that you want, but it doesn’t make it so.

And you can continue to claim that it is a valid argument but that doesn’t make it so regardless of the ludicrous real-life “examples” you bring in.

You bring up Lamborghini’s? Really? You’re making my point that it’s a ridiculous, lazy, dismissive non-argument for me.

Pifil.5193:

Ayrilana.1396:

So because I cannot afford a Lamborghini in real life means that something is unfair? It’s a luxury items just as legendary weapons are as well as other skins. The vast majority of the game doesn’t require you to have these skins. It’s just something for you to work towards as a long term goal. You can continue to dismiss it and claim that it is a non-argument all that you want, but it doesn’t make it so.

And you can continue to claim that it is a valid argument but that doesn’t make it so regardless of the ludicrous real-life “examples” you bring in.

You bring up Lamborghini’s? Really? You’re making my point that it’s a ridiculous, lazy, dismissive non-argument for me.

It’s not required. Do you need the BiFrost skin in order to do anything in this game? Do you need Twilight in order to do fractals? No. They are just skins. The stats can be obtain much cheaper through ascended. Players have different opinions on what skins are desirable to them. What they go for is simply which skins that they want.

And this is drifting away from the topic.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

I find it hilarious all the 1%‘ers demanding that the government (anet) reduce the price of their luxury goods so that poor people can’t get ahead and only they can afford the items they want.

I suppose it’s just like real life.

It’s not the conspiracy you outline. (Though I do see 1%ers actually say “I have this and I don’t want others to have it.” It’s kinda creepy.)

It’s more that the +2 standard deviations of monied individuals simply have more money to pay the higher prices, and as they continue to do so, they out-price those who can’t afford it. As they’re competing among themselves for supply, those with less assets can’t keep up.

But yes, very analogous to real life. :P

Rauderi.8706:

But yes, very analogous to real life. :P

Except that in real life I don’t get 20 [insert valuable luxury item] dropped into my mailbox every month just for waking up.

mtpelion.4562:

Rauderi.8706:

But yes, very analogous to real life. :P

Except that in real life I don’t get 20 [insert valuable luxury item] dropped into my mailbox every month just for waking up.

Valid point.
I wish to start getting [20 Valuable Luxury Item] in my mailbox. I might have to set up a PO box for all the diamonds people will send to make this happen.

As it is, I’m still kicking myself from when I did a fire sale of the ruddy coins while I had a 500 stack in my bank. After a single legendary (curse you, clovers…), I dropped a good 200 of them, so I’m still building up again, but after about 300-400 in inventory, I’ll be selling again while the prices are worth it.

Ayrilana.1396:

And this is drifting away from the topic.

You’re right, let’s agree to disagree because I’m sure we’ll never convince one another.

Rauderi.8706:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

I find it hilarious all the 1%‘ers demanding that the government (anet) reduce the price of their luxury goods so that poor people can’t get ahead and only they can afford the items they want.

I suppose it’s just like real life.

It’s not the conspiracy you outline. (Though I do see 1%ers actually say “I have this and I don’t want others to have it.” It’s kinda creepy.)

It’s more that the +2 standard deviations of monied individuals simply have more money to pay the higher prices, and as they continue to do so, they out-price those who can’t afford it. As they’re competing among themselves for supply, those with less assets can’t keep up.

But yes, very analogous to real life. :P

If you can’t afford a luxury item then you should aim for a less prestigious luxury item. There are skins in this game for anywhere from 20c to 5000g. There is no reason, expectation or argument you can show me that says Anet should reduce the value of some items just because YOU can not afford them. Plenty of people CAN afford these items and are willing to buy them. This means they deserve these skins. Just because you can’t doesn’t mean there is a problem.

High value mats that are acquired by every player is one of the best ways to give wealth to poorer players. They can’t, (and shouldn’t) aim for top tier skins, so selling those mats to earn gold is in your and their best interest. This allows them (and you) to aim for mid tier skins and get all their ascended gear. Once you have those you can start to aim for high tier skins and save your money for those more expensive items.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

I find it hilarious all the 1%‘ers demanding that the government (anet) reduce the price of their luxury goods so that poor people can’t get ahead and only they can afford the items they want.

I suppose it’s just like real life.

Hardly, if you take your argument there and apply it to the game, so a new player gets 20-30 coins a month (depending on fractal rewards) if they sell all them coins they are making 10-15gold ( at current market rates ) there are faster ways to make gold than that.

The issue at hand is the price sky rocketing on an item that is time gated, and a few guilds who have the power to control the pricing, you cannot have a dynamic pricing on an item that is restricted on its supply, its not like other items needed, Anet are adding more and more items that require these coins yet with not extra supply.

If when released legendary armor needs coins also ( esp if its per piece rather than set ) you watch them coins in 1-2g each.

As for the argument about its only a skin, Anets entire game model is based around skins, if people didn’t push for these skins or fancy skins for weapons/armor this game would be dead in the water, why do you think there own store is full of skins, and new skins every few weeks,

The only advantage for Anet to not increase supply is to force people to buy gems and convert to gold to afford the ever increasing cost of this time gated material, I refuse to do that, I will go without an item before I do that, I wont fund players who where able to buy massive supply and push the prices up.

Pifil.5193:

Personally, I’ve never felt that the old “but you don’t have to do anything in this game” argument is much of an argument at all.

Some people may be willing and able to pay those prices, that’s great, for those who can’t afford those prices it just puts these legendaries out of reach. That players so easily manipulate these markets to put the coins out of reach of newer players is hindering those other players enjoyment of the game.

Players don’t manipulate prices “so easily” — they try and then the market corrects, as was pointed out by Chris Cleary above. What new players are you thinking of that can afford anything else in the legendary process, for which Mystic Coins alone are going to be a burden?

The fact is that mystic coins are only used in premium skins and luxury collections, things that have only ever been accessible by those with coin to burn melt. There’s no set price that is ‘right’ for mystic coins.

Perhaps ANet should have added so many new sinks for the coins without also considering increasing the faucets. But perhaps we shouldn’t be so concerned that some things that used to lack value finally have some.

Chris Cleary.8017:

Most of this price increase revolves around players that are pushing the value up due to the players willingness to pay more. If players are willing to pay more for an item, it’s going to keep increasing until eventually it hits a ceiling for the commodity. We’ve seen the same thing occur with numerous commodities over time.

Right now there is a consistent supply of mystic coins entering the game (way more than are being consumed) and churning through the trading post at a very slow rate. Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped.

In retrospect, this is actually causing the daily login reward to be worth significantly more to players who wish to convert mystic coins to gold.

In normal situations, thats how supply and demand works but I believe your logic to be flawed till some point due to the vitality of the item. They are critical components in many things that can’t be bypassed. If you want a legendary (which would be an end game in terms of gear grind), you have no choice but to buy them. It’s like some merchant hoarding water in a drought (well, not as critical!!!) while govt keeps the water supply limited saying “oh our stats show that there is more than enough water in the state/country”. With not enough supply of water, you would turn towards the merchant and merchant would drive up the pricing.

Sure, one would pay the price the coins since they need that legendary done but the gold did come from somewhere and now the person who was planning to buy 2 things can buy only 1. While hoarders would only hoard more feeling secure and drive up prices. In last 5 months, the price has gone up by almost 400%.

Chris Cleary.8017:

Most of this price increase revolves around players that are pushing the value up due to the players willingness to pay more. If players are willing to pay more for an item, it’s going to keep increasing until eventually it hits a ceiling for the commodity. We’ve seen the same thing occur with numerous commodities over time.

Right now there is a consistent supply of mystic coins entering the game (way more than are being consumed) and churning through the trading post at a very slow rate. Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped.

In retrospect, this is actually causing the daily login reward to be worth significantly more to players who wish to convert mystic coins to gold.

The issue is that currently, mystic coins are unlike almost all other commodities in the game currently. Mystic coins CANNOT with any reliability have their supply purposefully increased by the playerbase (aside from daily logins, you only have the periodic mystic forge daily and a small chance at them from fractals. I have gotten 5 total since the most recent reward change doing T4 almost every day). In a real economy, the high price of an item fosters a search for alternative sources or alternative products to serve the same purpose. That mechanism doesnt function in a game.

When price goes up and demand goes down (ie some people are no longer willing to pay the market price) it necessarily because more players are opting to NOT engage in a category of content. The supply a single player can potentially generate for their own use is far, far below the actual uses available to that player. There is not any other material that gates such a variety of items to this extent. Perhaps its considered selfish in this case, but I do not want to rely on other players skipping content in order for me to make certain items.

The very fact that “Most of this price increase revolves around players that are pushing the value up” and “Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped” is just an admission that current state of mystic coins is simply serving as a “rich get richer” mechanism, and that since its just a “retrospect” the login reward value is just a silver lining.

There are absolutely ways to maintain the value of mystic coins while increasing the amount obtainable to individuals who would like to use a good number of them. Whether it be effort of some kind or a recipe revolving other materials that hold value but are themselves more farmeable, it is not outside the realm of possibility to maintain a price of almost 50s per coin while allowing players to actually create supply in response to the continually rising price.

I’d be using a whole lot more mystic coins if they weren’t so expensive….

There’s a reason more people are flipping them to raise prices rather than buying to use them.

Chris Cleary.8017:

Right now there is a consistent supply of mystic coins entering the game (way more than are being consumed) and churning through the trading post at a very slow rate. Most of the coins on the market are ones that have been flipped.

Because at current prices it’s frankly too expensive to consume! So people hoard it for that one item they might make in the future when they finally get enough of them.

The problem is not a “consistent supply” that’s being stretched out throughout the players, but rather the inconsistency of available sources to get these. At the moment we have 3 sources:

- Trading Post

- Sometimes daily (“Mystic Forger”)

- And daily logins

From daily login u can “amass” 20 Mystic Coins in a month. While Daily Mystic Forger is somewhat semi-common, you get 1 coin per.

So basically when u need a stack of those, you either have to cash out on TP or wait a really long time. And it’s just another unneeded time gate for many people that want to craft things.

It’s just those time gates are getting a little annoying whenever you want to make anything these days.

Chris Cleary.8017:

If players are willing to pay more…

They’re not willing. They’re forced to as there is no other alternative to get them!

Seera.5916:

SkullProX.7083:

I don’t like the way this community is thinking… so if something gets too expensive, you wan’t to lower the price right away? Joke…. 65s is not a lot anyways, and there are other methods to get mystic clovers, go play some pvp or www and finish the reward tracks, you get 2/track or 7 at the non-repeatable ones. Oh you actually have to work for that, not like pressing F on sw cf? I’m sorry, but we are talking about legendary weapons which should be exclusive…

It’s not just that the mystic coins are increasing in price. It’s the reasons behind it and players feeling that the equilibrium price for mystic coins is higher than it should be.

ANet lowered the supply when they went from the old daily system to the daily login reward system by 1/3. You used to get 365 coins per year if you did the daily every day. Now you get about 260 coins per year. A loss of about 100 coins.

Then they added the new legendaries with HoT. All four of the new legendary weapons require a full stack of Mystic Coins AND 77 Mystic Clovers. Which on average DOUBLES the requirement of Mystic Coins needed.

So that makes people wonder if ANet miscalculated what that would do the price of Mystic Coins and if they overshot the price they were aiming to get Mystic Coins to.

The best solution is to increase the supply somehow. The only problem is since the main usage of Mystic Coins is to make legendary weapons any reduction in price in a major component may lead to higher demand for the other legendary weapon ingredients. Such as T6 mats, which some have experienced a drastic price increase already. Namely Vials of Powerful Blood.

So if the equilibrium price increased, those who hoarded it might sell more, since it’s more appealing to sell it for more. I got like 400 in my bank, and i’m not willing to sell any rn, if it goes to like 80s-1g then i would sell it. That increased supply and then price will get lower again… let the market sort it out itself, untill it’s not like you can’t find any mystic coin anet shouldn’t interfer like they did with resonating silvers… that was just a joke… 50s>5copper…
Same in real life… why do you think some luxury goods are expensive? Because it’s rare? What if a food will have shortage? You can’t just complain at governments to lower the prices by increasing supply, since there is no land…
So the price is perfectly fine, until an item will have a huge shortage only then should it’s supply modified.

Romo.3709:

Chris Cleary.8017:

If players are willing to pay more…

They’re not willing. They’re forced to as there is no other alternative to get them!

They do have another alternative: waiting. They accumulate mystic coins from the daily login and daily achievement. Players are making the choice to purchase the coins at that price so they are willing to pay for them at that price. Those who are not would not be buying them at all when they’re at that price.

Romo.3709:

Chris Cleary.8017:

If players are willing to pay more…

They’re not willing. They’re forced to as there is no other alternative to get them!

Put down a lower buy offer and sit on it. According to your logic, if the price goes down then everyone will sell (which is exactly backward, but I digress), so if everyone puts the price down, then you’ll get what you want.

Ayrilana.1396:

They do have another alternative: waiting.

I would hardly call ~30-40 coins a month an alternative…

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

Put down a lower buy offer and sit on it. According to your logic, if the price goes down then everyone will sell (which is exactly backward, but I digress), so if everyone puts the price down, then you’ll get what you want.

My logic never specified anything about selling, so not sure where you got that from. What I’m saying is at the current system you can get only about 30-40 mystic coins a month, which is way too low for the amount of things the coins are used.

Romo.3709:

Ayrilana.1396:

They do have another alternative: waiting.

I would hardly call ~30-40 coins a month an alternative…

It is an alternative; although, not a great one if you’re in a rush to acquire mystic coins.

Ayrilana.1396:

Romo.3709:

Chris Cleary.8017:

If players are willing to pay more…

They’re not willing. They’re forced to as there is no other alternative to get them!

They do have another alternative: waiting. They accumulate mystic coins from the daily login and daily achievement. Players are making the choice to purchase the coins at that price so they are willing to pay for them at that price. Those who are not would not be buying them at all when they’re at that price.

The question becomes “what is a reasonable wait?” After perusing the forge recipes for Mystic Coins, I noticed a wild swing in the number required (some 30ish, some 100+) for the exotic weapon skins. So anywhere from roughly 6 weeks to 5 months for one gear piece, or accelerated with purchases.

The potential 5-month wait is really irksome, but at least the coin requirement is a static one, and they can be purchased piecewise. If you’re making 2-10g per day, buy 1-5 Coins, and you’re still getting there faster. Sure, it sucks, but it’s steady, definable progress.

Maybe just maybe its time to kill flipping and relisting of items by having all items purchased on the TP bound to account upon pickup.

Then maybe we can get rid of the silly notion that the trading post is used for anything other than a commodities exchange. Because it sure as heck isn’t used for proper trading between players.

Flipping is an important part of the TP.

Romo.3709:

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

Put down a lower buy offer and sit on it. According to your logic, if the price goes down then everyone will sell (which is exactly backward, but I digress), so if everyone puts the price down, then you’ll get what you want.

My logic never specified anything about selling, so not sure where you got that from. What I’m saying is at the current system you can get only about 30-40 mystic coins a month, which is way too low for the amount of things the coins are used.

Lets try this gain:

Romo.3709:

Because at current prices it’s frankly too expensive to consume! So people hoard it for that one item they might make in the future when they finally get enough of them.

Hoarding = Not selling.

You’ve somehow come to this strange conclusion that when things are really valuable, people don’t sell them. This is generally the opposite of what happen: when prices go up you enter into the sellers market, where people cash in and sell their coins. This is done for two reasons: first because the coins have a high value when compared to other items in the game, and second because the price of coins will inevitably drop. So you cash in your coins now, knowing that you can just buy them back at a cheaper price in the future, or fearing that the coins you have will lose value and you will miss the opportunity to make gold.

Ayrilana.1396:

Flipping is an important part of the TP.

It’s also an innate problem with the current state of the TP, that is being abused by the minority.

So, why not fix said issue ?

TexZero.7910:

Ayrilana.1396:

Flipping is an important part of the TP.

It’s also an innate problem with the current state of the TP, that is being abused by the minority.

So, why not fix said issue ?

How is it a problem?

Rauderi.8706:

Ayrilana.1396:

Rauderi.8706:

Ayrilana.1396:

Players can get obsidian shards from there at a rate of 1 commendation for 5 shards. Sometimes the large bag is available letting you get 10 shards per commendation. I don’t see anyone making a fuss about them being available from a guild vendor.

Not every system added will be available to all players. If it were map rewards then players who don’t have the time to farm events would be left out. It also doesn’t help that the coins would likely not be that plentiful to begin with or as frequently available.

Anyone can be a member of a guild that does guild missions. It’s just one other source that can affect a larger percentage of the playerbase while giving them another reason to do guild missions.

It also allows players to get more mystic coins than from map rewards or increased daily frequency. There are several timegated in place to prevent a sudden flooding of the market and we can be sure that there will be future recipes that require them putting a strain on supply. If the price drops too much, Anet just has to release a new recipe for a skin that requires 50-100 mystic coins.

Oby shards are available everywhere. It’s a waste of commendations to buy them. I horfed up 200k karma on a whim to buy them. Oby shards are not equivalent.

Just because guilds are available, it doesn’t mean that’s a good place to put that extra content. A person who can’t do map rewards isn’t going to have time for guild missions either.
“Okay everyone here? Bob’s not here. Let’s wait for Bob.”
“brbbio”
“Ready check?”
“Okay, at trek location, anyone else showing up? I’ll wait.”
“Is everyone done with race? No, okay every help with race.”

Missions are not as fast as you think them to be.

Mystic Coins would be better served in a more generalized location. Laurel, Pact, Karma vendors, whatever. Even as map rewards, it would serve the population better as a windfall to everyone participating than locking it behind guild membership. Not a terribly difficult lock, honestly, but there are a lot of guilds that just aren’t.. good. I’m lucky I found a few that are pleasant and drama free.

As I stated before, guild missions take about an 1-1.5 hours to do and you get 12-15 commendations. How long does it take to complete one full cycle of map rewards? You’d probably only have like 3 or so coins available per cycle.

The problem with what you’re suggesting is that you will flood the supply with them.

Don’t quibble just to quibble. I already said a once/day purchase, so please actually read.

Where the details differ is in the currency. I’d actually be leery of having Mystic Coins as map rewards, there are several other currencies available to all players, and that’s what should be used to promote extra purchases.

Noted above, Chris has a strong point and some internal data to back it up. Which means it’s likely ANet is going to do some further data collection and decide what to do from there.

Malediktus.9250:

I enjoy the high price of mystic coins

I’ll admit to being selfish here. I sell more coins than I use, so I’m not exactly eager to lower their value. [/disclaimer]

Still, we could stand to have a secondary, limited acquisition system in place. As it is right now, we get 20/month. That alone has me re-thinking any sort of vendor purchase, even with daily purchase controls.

Major Domo.9250:

A psychologist would be giddy over this instant- versus delayed-gratification scenario..

- A tradable item that every player basically has equal access to, regardless of skill level
- Said item gives no real mechanical advantage, only used in luxury/vanity crafting
- Only two acquisition methods – the slow faucet (free) or the trading post (market value)

The price is what it is because everyone has the same slow but reliable access, some players must have it all RIGHT THIS BLOODY INSTANT, and some others see this as an opportunity to profit off of group A’s indifference and group B’s impatience. A unloads an otherwise worthless item for gold, B gets the latest greatest shiny, and C reminds us of something about fools and their money.

Somewhere out there, John Smith is giggling and adding another chapter to his book.

/2copperstakeitorleaveit

That’s the basics of it, is it not? :P

The sudden siphoning of coins isn’t entirely cosmetic, as Legendary weapons and the elite spec Ascended require them, and those are best-in-slot gear. Not to say you can’t get BiS by other means, but it does have a mild power component.

If people need more coins they should buy more accounts. I got 30 accounts so I produce way more coins than I can use for myself

khani.4786:

I’d be using a whole lot more mystic coins if they weren’t so expensive….

That might be part of the reason ANet is comfortable with the current prices. These are used in the mystic forge to produce luxury items, so they represent an interesting way to allow small portions of wealth to switch from the 10% to the 90%.