Guild Wars 2

I would buy it if it didn’t have that stupid lava explosion every time i farm ore, seriously people like that…

Neural.1824:

Biggest thing holding me back on buying this isn’t the over-the-top price, it’s the character-bound issue.
If I could use it on any of my characters, I’d have bought one as soon as I found out about them.

Same here.

Dante.1508:

I would buy it if it didn’t have that stupid lava explosion every time i farm ore, seriously people like that…

Some people do.

I’m hoping for a Ninja Sickle, gain stealth from a cloud of smoke while harvesting plants.

Dante.1508:

I would buy it if it didn’t have that stupid lava explosion every time i farm ore, seriously people like that…

Really Dante? You don’t want something that looks like…oh I don’t know…an Inferno?

:)

as i have said in another molten pick thread, if people are buying the pick it should be for reasons other than long term cost saving…..

I bought it for $10, no gold was spent. The gem card I bought was at Gamestop and I had a coupon for $10 off ANY purchase. So my 1200 gem card cost around $6(tax is lame). When will I see ROI? the moment I logged in, used the pickaxe and both my son and wife wouldn’t let me play until they could use it too. Not everything is measured in monetary value, ROI can be pure and simple enjoyment. If I invest in a nice suit, and it gets me compliments my investment was worthwhile. Could the suit pay for itself in other ways? Sure, it could make an employer see me as a professionally dressed person. People need to stop seeing the pickaxe, and some other items as something you need to get your money back on. Sometimes in life you simply invest time or money into something and your happiness is all the payback you need.

If you want a ROI on the pickaxe here it is:

You bought the pickaxe, it supported development of the game. Gj.

Very few people ran to their GW2 game and bought the pick thinking “OMG I’m going to save oodles and oodles of money!”.. At very least I’m sure they bought it for the convenience (as all gem store items are) and maybe the cool effect.

Leo G.4501:

If more gathering tools are going to be introduced in the gem store, what the heck are they going to look like? We really going to chop down trees and gather berries with lava?

It could be frost sickles to match the ice theme of Living Story. Flash frozen omnomberries!.

Just an idea, but wouldn’t it be cool if you didn’t have to go to merchants to buy picks? or carry them around in your inventory wasting space. i wish there was something for that…. -_-

oh wait, they just added it. it’s a commodity, all it is. it’s not meant to save you money on picks over 8 years! Anet is just giving us something to be lazy!

You can buy Orichalcum picks for 300 karma each in Southsun Cove. So the Molten Pick is more for prestige and convenience more than price.

Mine paid instantly. And I bought 4 so far, buying 8 more tomorrow.

I bought a pick for my ranger, because lava is cool (hot?).

I’m actually thinking about getting a pick for my guardian as well, but on the other hand -since I only have two characters- if I ever get sick of the lava effect, only having one pick means I don’t have to look at it all the time.

ophidic.1279:

Ok it’s not pay to win. That is an incorrect statement. You said yourself, “convenience items”

No one is winning any harder if they don’t have to check their store of picks to make sure they have enough/proper grade. Does that mean people who buy the Mystic Forge Conduit off the trading post are also paying to win?

Do you know what winning is in this game? Aside from PVP matches, and completing the story, there really isn’t any “winning” to be had. This isn’t like APB where you can buy better more accurate more powerful weapons.

If ascended gear was gems only I MIGHT agree with you that might be pay to win, except ascended gear doesn’t give a huge edge.

P2W in other MMOs = pay to be on top, while in GW2, P2W= pay to be the first on top. And the “convenience” is a word invented by A-Net to replace the P2W as invented renown hearts to replace the kill 10 rats concept, and the scouts instead of the quest log,
They just hired a psychologist to invent words to distract people from the real thing.
Other MMOs are based on gear so that is the general idea of what a P2W is, so people think that of the endgame.
The endgame in GW2 is based on grinding skins to look better, so all they have in the shop is going around that philosophy.
Even the “we don’t think grinding is fun” from their Manifesto has turned out to be a false statement while everything in the game is based on grinding.
Look at this, you cant even finish your storyline like in a normal single player $60 game without grinding between levels.

You can farm an average of 30 orichalcum ore pieces a day. That’s an average of about 75 silver when sold at the TP. In 35 days you can earn 25 gold by farming and selling 30 pieces.

Return of investment is easily done with-in a month considering you can farm more than 30 a day and the market may pay more on certain days.

Leo G.4501:

I’m hoping for a Ninja Sickle, gain stealth from a cloud of smoke while harvesting plants.

Sylvari Sickle for me. Vines that look like hands grow up and encircle the plant node, picking the berries/leaves off the plant.

Namu.5712:

they are a company running a Free to play game.

Excuse me! Are you playing a hacked account because the last time I checked you need to buy the GW2 account and not getting it free.

8 years? To get back 10 bucks. 1 year to get back your investment? … 1 week or 1 day… Its funny how we look at money. We don’t mind spending 10 bucks on a bad movie… But 10 bucks on a game… I should buy one for each of my main characters.. at least 8 picks.

Little Old Lady.3742:

8 years? To get back 10 bucks. 1 year to get back your investment? … 1 week or 1 day… Its funny how we look at money. We don’t mind spending 10 bucks on a bad movie… But 10 bucks on a game… I should buy one for each of my main characters.. at least 8 picks.

I gotta say lots of people are very picky about this, and it really fired up a big debate. Hopefully they will release more of these and we can gather up some more cool items before the qq makes Arenanet axe the whole cool concept.

I gotta say lots of people are very picky about this, and it really fired up a big debate. Hopefully they will release more of these and we can gather up some more cool items before the qq makes Arenanet axe the whole cool concept.[/quote]

You mean I have to PLAY A GAME…. And have fun for 8 years … To get my 10 dollars worth? The people should be throwing money at Anet for the super value. What does game plus 10$ over 8 years come out to? Less than 10 dollars a year… Less than a dollar a month… How much do people spend on junkfood or something they use for only once.. bottled water… It’s a silly argument… If you defend the right to buy bottled water then surely you support this item. Or is that bottled water worth more than hours of game play?

Little Old Lady.3742:

I gotta say lots of people are very picky about this, and it really fired up a big debate. Hopefully they will release more of these and we can gather up some more cool items before the qq makes Arenanet axe the whole cool concept.

You mean I have to PLAY A GAME…. And have fun for 8 years … To get my 10 dollars worth? The people should be throwing money at Anet for the super value. What does game plus 10$ over 8 years come out to? Less than 10 dollars a year… Less than a dollar a month… How much do people spend on junkfood or something they use for only once.. bottled water… It’s a silly argument… If you defend the right to buy bottled water then surely you support this item. Or is that bottled water worth more than hours of game play?[/quote]

Bottle water costs me $1.05, and I never get that kitten 5 cents back cause I’m too lazy to bring the bottle back to the store…

PS did quotes mess up?

Geotherma.2395:

Caedmon.6798:

gimmethegepgun.1284:

Caedmon.6798:

gimmethegepgun.1284:

Caedmon.6798:

You know all those bots going around need pick axes aswell.Maybe Anet is using them in this way and hoping they all buy those axes.Since those botters already pay big cash for accounts and for the bots self..It wouldn’t surprise me if they all start buying those picks.

As has been explained before, no bot would buy the molten pick as it is ludicrously expensive for what it does and they won’t expect to get anywhere near the lifetime needed to pay it back.
Also bots mostly use hacked accounts rather than waste money buying games. They’ll certainly be happy if they get an account that has the pick on it already since that’s less gold wasted but they’re certainly not going to waste their money buying them.

Well,theyre wasting a hell of a lot of money to buy accounts,and when those get banned they simply Buy more accounts. 10$ for a pickaxe is nothing for them.They arent all hackers,most are kitten with too much money,they Buy hacked accounts buddy.

You don’t understand. They’re in it to make real money. If they spend real money on the pick, which won’t even come close to paying for itself, they’re wasting money.
It is extraordinarily cheaper for them to clean out their inventory and fill it with a ton of picks rather than buy a permanent pick. They won’t last long enough for the permanent pick to pay itself off.

I do understand,i follow their forums..i know why they do it.I also know they dont mind paying 60$ per account,and pay a monthly fee for the bot they use.These ppl lay down big cash,they do not care,They will make it back in time anyways.

They very much care about spending money lol.. Not all, but some bots are from RMT farms in countries where they are getting paid pennies(if anything) to do this. They try not to buy accounts if they don’t have to, they do everything they can to save and earn every copper they can. I’ve done enough research on them to know better than to think they would squander money on something so stupid. They won’t get this money back, even with teleporting, they will get banned and lose a lot more than they gained. It is a high risk item to be “betting” on for them.

People also need to realise that in the vast majority of cases, these gold farmers do not buy the accounts they use to farm gold. Rather, they use accounts stolen from other players. This is what normally happens when an account is hacked:

1. The hackers immediately raid the player’s bank account, empty it of all gold, sell all their mats/ectos etc. on the TP to the highest buyer (which may be why some players get expensive goods at bargain prices!). Some of this gold is immediately transferred to people who bought gold, while others are mailed to fresher hacked accounts (because multiple transactions involving large sums of gold tend to ring alarm bells at ANet, who flag the accounts for further review, and because the longer you hang on to a hacked account, the higher the chance the legal owner discovers the hack and gets ANet to reset the account).

2. If the hack is not detected (perhaps the player has left GW2 or they don’t play that often), the hacked account is now used to farm gold by teleport mining, bot farming etc. Any money earned from this is again either transferred directly to people who buy gold, or to newly hacked accounts.

The gold farmers are just like any other business; they’ll do whatever they can to cut down on expenses, and buying new accounts is a BIG expense. Now, some gold farmers are run almost like sweatshops where the owners DO buy accounts legally, and then hire workers to play the game and farm monsters/mine nodes normally (there’s rumors that some gold farming companies operate out of prisons where the prisoners are forced to farm for gold), but they are the minority. After all, workers need to be paid and can’t work 24/7. A botting program doesn’t require salaries and works non-stop.

Oh, and for anyone thinking about working at one of those places, it’s no picnic either. You have daily quotas you HAVE to meet or you’re fired. Imagine running CoF P1 almost 100 times a day, every day, and you’re not allowed to do anything else.

OP – You didn’t factor in convenience…those times you stumble on a rare node just to find out you ran out of picks.

I think ANet found a really nice balance. Yeah it’s expensive but for your money, you get an infinite use top tier gathering item and a cool visual.

For those who don’t want to spend the money, they don’t feel like they HAVE to get the item. Just think of the forum rage if players thought the advantages were so great that they absolutely had to part with a lot of gold or spend cash.

It’s a nice to have without being a must have.

Do you like pay to win games?
If not then you know why its so overpriced.
Its not needed but its really nice for lazy players expecially casual that don t want to waste time buying picks.. (huge psychological impact more than real).

Its one of the coolest things they ever put on the market…..i would ve bought with moneys to support the game if i just wasn t still angry for the ascended stuff…..

Dante.1508:

I would buy it if it didn’t have that stupid lava explosion every time i farm ore, seriously people like that…

Woaarr graphics!

kokiman.2364:

Dante.1508:

I would buy it if it didn’t have that stupid lava explosion every time i farm ore, seriously people like that…

Woaarr graphics!

Stop the graphics!

OmniPotentes.4817:

That cool molten effect can be seen from miles away in WvW. Good luck mining….enjoy the effect and the repair costs.

Sounds to me like a good way to set up ambushes. Thanks for the heads up.

Namu.5712:

To each their own if you don’t want to spend 10 bucks spend gold and get it that way.

Don’t want to spend gold or money, then I guess the item really isn’t something you wanted in the first place so why complain? lol

It is called “Feedback” or “giving your opinion”. Something forums are commonly used for. At least you did not use the word “whining”. Having a negative opinion about something and expressing it is perfectly acceptable and one of the reasons for having a forum in the first place. It also is nothing to lol over.

Some math teachers have really failed their students…

A better ROI would be to buy the 800 gems, and keep them as gems for 8 years, let inflation take hold, then trade for hundreds of gold.

doesn’t all this just explains that mining isn’t worth the chore?
if skin are everything that a pve endgame is about. than this picks count as one of those skin aswell..
would be funny though if they release a legendary node gathering tools.

It will be funny if sometime later in the year anet adds new crafting mats(for ascended stuff maybe?) and the “orichalcum grade” picks are not enough to mine it.

Marauding Scum.6728:

It will be funny if sometime later in the year anet adds new crafting mats(for ascended stuff maybe?) and the “orichalcum grade” picks are not enough to mine it.

yes it would! xD

begin
cast <lava font>
end

and its soulbound. 800 gems to get some ori cheap made tool for only one of my toons. great deal, just great.

Despite them glaringly stating “Never run out of picks again” on the gem store. Thats really there to just get your attention and obviously it works. :P

Personally I got it for the effect and convience factor since I’m an OCD miner no matter where I am. And I had personal money to waste. Since I haven’t bought gems since like halloween.

Obviously if you are looking for a return of investment from something like this it will never happen. It’s like asking for a ROI for gambling the Black Lion Chests. Never seen it ever happen in a game.

fadeaway.2807:

A better ROI would be to buy the 800 gems, and keep them as gems for 8 years, let inflation take hold, then trade for hundreds of gold.

That’s my 401k plan… bank 1000 gems a month, cash them in in 40 years, I’ll be worth billions!

Back to the topic, if you’re crunching numbers for the ROI then the pick is a bad deal. But they’ve sold a pretty good number to people who aren’t crunching the numbers, so it’s a good bet to say that you’re not the target market for it. And there will be more

But I have 8 characters, so I would need to buy 8 of these at 800 gems or 24 gold a pop, so around 190 gold What would be my ROI then :p

I like many people here got my for the conveince. I didn’t even know there was a custom effect till I used it the first time. Different strokes for different folks right? I haven’t paid for gems for anything else and always said if they made unlimitied versions of material gathering tools I’d buy them in a second…granted it took long than that since the trading post kept crashing when they release it.

So for lunch the other day I was going to go to 5 guys and get a burger. I decided to go to subway instead and get a sandwich! The day after that I decided to bring in my lunch to work rather than eat out.

Turns out I saved $10 dollars that way that I would have spent anyway on food, so I bought the cool pick! Now I ate better and feel better AND supported a game I love so you don’t have too AND have a cool mining pick. You’re welcome!

I only got one, for the character I’ve played through the Flame and Frost content on. Partially cos it seemed fitting that he’d have at least some sort of memento, and partially cos I always forget to buy picks.

The little spout of lava effect is nice too. Its like all the flashiness of a legendary weapon without any of the grind

I don’t farm nearly enough to make the price of this worth it. I can get 25 Orichalcum Mining Picks for 1 gold, that’s 2,500 uses. More then enough to last me a long time. Also, drawing more attention to yourself in WvW while you’re gathering a node, is a bad idea.

Kasama.8941:

I don’t farm nearly enough to make the price of this worth it. I can get 25 Orichalcum Mining Picks for 1 gold, that’s 2,500 uses. More then enough to last me a long time. Also, drawing more attention to yourself in WvW while you’re gathering a node, is a bad idea.

Unless you have a bunch of friends stealthed nearby and use it as a lure.

Behellagh.1468:

Who mines just 7 nodes a day? It’s not all about the daily. And then orichalcum picks are only really needed for orichalcum which is only found in the highest zoned areas and it’s pretty rare there.

When I first started I mined every darn outcropping in the zone that I could find. I battled vets to get at the one rich ore outcropping they guarded (ice imps, hate em).

Uh, I only mine just what I need to get the daily gatherer done, and pretty much everyone I have talked to does the same since most crafting materials are worth next to nothing on the TP.

Aeonblade.8709:

Behellagh.1468:

Who mines just 7 nodes a day? It’s not all about the daily. And then orichalcum picks are only really needed for orichalcum which is only found in the highest zoned areas and it’s pretty rare there.

When I first started I mined every darn outcropping in the zone that I could find. I battled vets to get at the one rich ore outcropping they guarded (ice imps, hate em).

Uh, I only mine just what I need to get the daily gatherer done, and pretty much everyone I have talked to does the same since most crafting materials are worth next to nothing on the TP.

Strange, I mine/chop/gather everything I come across and clean out the collectibles bank every few days. I usually make a gold or two for doing things that aren’t really going out of my way.

tolunart.2095:

Aeonblade.8709:

Behellagh.1468:

Who mines just 7 nodes a day? It’s not all about the daily. And then orichalcum picks are only really needed for orichalcum which is only found in the highest zoned areas and it’s pretty rare there.

When I first started I mined every darn outcropping in the zone that I could find. I battled vets to get at the one rich ore outcropping they guarded (ice imps, hate em).

Uh, I only mine just what I need to get the daily gatherer done, and pretty much everyone I have talked to does the same since most crafting materials are worth next to nothing on the TP.

Strange, I mine/chop/gather everything I come across and clean out the collectibles bank every few days. I usually make a gold or two for doing things that aren’t really going out of my way.

I can literally make more money doing other things in the time it takes me to mine most nodes. To each their own. I will say if a Rich vein happens into my path, I’ll usually mine those.

Vayne.8563:

Kasama.8941:

I don’t farm nearly enough to make the price of this worth it. I can get 25 Orichalcum Mining Picks for 1 gold, that’s 2,500 uses. More then enough to last me a long time. Also, drawing more attention to yourself in WvW while you’re gathering a node, is a bad idea.

Unless you have a bunch of friends stealthed nearby and use it as a lure.

I’m going to bookmark this and wait for the thread where people qq about being ambushed by 35 thief’s in stealth at a ore node in WvW. :P

Aeonblade.8709:

I can literally make more money doing other things in the time it takes me to mine most nodes. To each their own. I will say if a Rich vein happens into my path, I’ll usually mine those.

Eh, whatever. I don’t farm, and don’t judge my progress in terms of gold/hr. I play the game, and do various things that involve playing the game, and stuff happens. It’s good enough for me.

The other day I gained five levels on an alt by messing around with crafting for a bit. Not because I determined that I can make more money doing this than farming world bosses or something, but because I felt like it.

tolunart.2095:

Eh, whatever. I don’t farm, and don’t judge my progress in terms of gold/hr. I play the game, and do various things that involve playing the game, and stuff happens. It’s good enough for me.

The other day I gained five levels on an alt by messing around with crafting for a bit. Not because I determined that I can make more money doing this than farming world bosses or something, but because I felt like it.

That is awesome I agree, when I do gather up enough in my collections from doing the daily I do the same. Nothing like a free level or 3 just from crafting

I`m guessing the main (or only) ones that`ll gain from this are the bots that pop/vanish all over the map

I got one just to save bag space with picks, can`t swap in combat etc despite having several stacks of several ore already that I`ve no use for lol

What’s the ROI on a legendary? Considering the fact it’s nothing more than a skin too.

The problem with these calculations is that they are using a variable that is constantly in motion in their calculation for return on investment.

You cannot do that in this situation.

The price of gems in terms of in game gold constantly changes. If I buy a pick with gems I bought back in September I’d be spending a total of what? 6 gold? If I buy the pick next week and 100 gems cost me 50 gold.. what then?

The only way to determine a return on investment is via a relative value based on TIME. How much time does it take to buy new picks? How much time is used to travel to a merchant and back to mining?

If it takes 24 gold to buy the pick how much time does that take? Is there an average gold per hour valuation that can be used? If you generate 5 gold per hour that’s just under 5 hours to pay for the pick. The assumption would be that if it cost 100 gold to buy the pick then the gold per hour rate has possibly increased to 20g per hour.. IF the price of gold holds steady to in-game inflation and I don’t think that it does.

But, hey, we’re all making up numbers anyway so why not?

Five hours of game time (or no hours if you buy directly with gems with real money) would take how long to “make back” from regular mining without having to spend time replacing picks.

If it takes a minute to buy new picks and equip them (I think a minute is reasonable but this assumes that you don’t have to go out of your way to buy new picks ‘cause you forgot to and ran out in the middle of nowhere) then that’s 5*60 = 300 pick purchases to recover the time.

That’s half the value that toxmocker posted.

But, the reality is that someone might buy two or three sets of picks at a time. Or maybe they forget to buy some picks and have to spend five to ten minutes trekking back to a vendor and back. Or maybe they summon a vendor (that has an opportunity cost as well) to buy the picks or… whatever.

At the end of the day, the value of the pick cannot be determined by a return on investment calculation based on the current gold price for 800 gems. Instead, each person needs to decide for themselves if the convenience of having the pick is worth the price to purchase it.

So… What do they reckon the ROI time is for the dye packs, minis or armor skins or anything else that has been sold in the gem store to-date?

I’m just surprised that there aren’t people screaming about pay-to-win since this so clearly affects in-game finance.