Guild Wars 2

I’ve convinced my brother and my girlfriend’s sister to install the game. They’re now enjoying it more than what they thought they would.

Free to play will also be great for the pvp community to grow.

Overall, this was a well thought change, with well thought restrictions. Good job, Anet.

Ya know… it’s kinda funny how players whined that HoT shouldn’t be $50 and that the “core game” wasn’t free…

Looks like Arena.net called our bluff, folks.

chemiclord.3978:

Ya know… it’s kinda funny how players whined that HoT shouldn’t be $50 and that the “core game” wasn’t free…

Looks like Arena.net called our bluff, folks.

The consequences tho, are kinda worse than a saloon shoot-out.

Deimos Tel Arin.7391:

that would be nc soft, not anet.
nc soft decides all the money things.
anet works for nc soft.

they can still get 100% revenue for sales on their own website (buy.guildwars2.com)
they will be earning extra on sales on steam.

nc soft is just too greedy to look past that.

Except they would lose out on some potential 100% income from purchases on their website which players might instead purchase from Steam, thus giving NCSoft (you are right there, apologies) the potential for less income.

Serbianwolf.1652:

I absolutely hate this change, and I can not express amount of my hate toward ANET’s policy tonight and toward this specific free-to-play change.

I haven’t expected this announcement to be so fkd up and devastating.
But ANET did it like they always do.

This means GW2 failed as mmo, as any other that switched to F2P policy shortly after(TERA, TESO etc…). It failed because there was no end-game content in the time to entertain us vetarns, but there where made unnecessary changes to whats not broken(TP, NPE, STORY CHANGES, INVENTORY, UI).

This means that developers will receive less money hence new players will be 10 year old whining kids that will resent everyone around and poison the community.

I, who played GW2 since the very start, for 3 YEARS AND INVESTED QUITE AMOUNT OF TIME AND REAL MONEY INTO GW2 ADDITIONALLY , only to get ugly looking skin on my charr(which has worst armors out there) and middle finger in my face saying:

THANK YOU FOR INVESTING YOUR TIME AND MONEY IN US, ALL WE CAN DO IS GIVE YOU THIS SKIN. NO GEMS, NO SPECIAL ITEMS NOR ABILITY TO DECIDE WHAT I COULD CHOSE AS 3YEARS OLD GIFT + VETERANSHIP.

But hey, thanks for your money. Thank you for buying infinite SAB coin that you will never use again. Because you guys bought this game we decided to make it FREE TO PLAY so 10 year olds could join. Lets not make it even 10, no, 5 bucks. But nope, NO refunds or kitten given whatsoever.

We can expect much more toxic community , economy fall and above and community driven by 10 year olds. Thanks ANET.

DO YOU EVEN KNOW HOW I FEEL AFTER 3 YEARS OF LOVE WITH THIS GAME?

I feel so betrayed. So brutally FUC**D. All this love toward this game.. all gone….

TL;DR: Just another ex-fan that feels fkd by latest change of ANET. RIP GW2, you will be missed.

We are not owed a refund. We are not owed even the skin that we got. We paid for a game that we played, and then the game’s price changed. That is how prices work.

Plus, look at those restrictions. This is a glorified free trial. This is intended to funnel people into buying Heart of Thorns—that’s all. You lower the barrier of entry, you juice your playerbase, and maybe you retain some. It’s a good idea.

All I can say is that maybe you should take a deep breath, calm down, and think about what would happen if every company was obliged to offer refunds to people who bought their products multiple years ago every time they drop the price.

(The Infinite SAB Coin is some bullcrap, though, you’ll get no argument from me there. SAB better come back right quick or they need to refund people for that.)

Lord Kuru.3685:

1. For players who play for free, the full game is pay-to-win.
2. WvW is toast.
3. Buy HoT now… core game included for free! That was really disingenuous.

How is wvw toast? Don’t tell me you are one of those players that thinks every f2p account will be used as a wvw spy, only used to harass other players and also only be used ruin the economy.

I wvw a lot and if some spy wants to send a zerg my way when I command I say let them. More bags for me.

I think they would also have to give Valve 30% of the profits from gem store purchases. (I know that for a big publisher the 30% can probably be negociated but you get the point.)

Skabb.8714:

So what you are saying is that you dont know my experiences, my history, my knowledge or my personality? And yet you feel qualified to tell me what I should do, even without knowing what I have done? How very typical and EXACTLY my point. I get enough stupid from the people already in the game, at least those people had to do more than create a free email address to get there. I appreciate the sarcasm on your part to help support my stance on the matter.

I was not commanding, I was suggesting.

You stated the reason you were leaving is because of the potential harassment from the free-to-play players, yet, have you actually experienced this yet for GW2 as of today?

If not, then perhaps your reason for leaving was not as valid as you claimed it to be.

Skabb.8714:

DiogoSilva.7089:

I’ve convinced my brother and my girlfriend’s sister to install the game. They’re now enjoying it more than what they thought they would.

Free to play will also be great for the pvp community to grow.

Overall, this was a well thought change, with well thought restrictions. Good job, Anet.

So what you are saying is that there is no way they would play the game if it cost even a penny but since its free, no loss, and that is a good thing? HAHA

Both of them are now considering buying HoT when it comes out, if they remain interested in the game until then.

So it is indeed working as it should. Free to play is a great opportunity to hook players first and then make them spend money.

Both my girlfriend and my sister’s girlfriend have already spent some money on League of Legends too, another free game. If League of Legends wasn’t free, they would have never tried it up, because they weren’t initially interested in it.

In fact, the main reason why my girlfriend plays GW2 is because I paid her account for $10 during 75% discounts, or else she wouldn’t have tried it. Since then, she has bought, with her own money, HoT and a few gem shop items (while I got the $10 refund upon her HoT’s purchase so, technically, it has always been free to play to her).

The clear contrast between the examples I have provided and your 5-line laugh show the level of over-reaction happening in this thread. Generally, everywhere else, the community’s response has been pretty great at helping newcomers who ask for help.

DiogoSilva.7089:

Both of them are now considering buying HoT when it comes out, if they remain interested to the game until then.

So it is indeed working as it should. Free to play is a great opportunity to hook players first and then make them spend money.

Both my girlfriend and my sister’s girlfriend have already spent some money on League of Legends too, another free game. If League of Legends wasn’t free, they would have never tried it up, because they weren’t initially interested in it.

The clear contrast between the examples I have provided and your 5-line laugh show the level of over-reaction happening in this thread. Generally, everywhere else, the community’s response has been pretty great at helping newcomers who ask for help.

You are pretty right with your last paragraph. the guild im part of well one of them, went out in force and welcomed new members to the game in Plains of Ashford, it was pretty fun!

Dante.1763:

You are pretty right with your last paragraph. the guild im part of well one of them, went out in force and welcomed new members to the game in Plains of Ashford, it was pretty fun!

And I’m having a lot of fun with the people I’ve convinced to join. It’s intriguing and refreshing to have more people to talk with about GW2 in real life, and this generates a lot of interest.

runeblade.7514:

SkullProX.7083:

NO, NO, NO, NO AND NO!

because…?

SkullProX does not like the idea of GW2 base being F2P. He wishes harsher restrictions put in place or better yet, it be removed.

As to the thread, I’m going to have say no as well.

Gold sellers would just use the accounts to gain wealth and then convert to multiple stacks of the most expensive item they can get to send to players who buy gold. Or to send to their main account to TP to send off the gold.

DiogoSilva.7089:

And I’m having a lot of fun with the people I’ve convinced to join. It’s intriguing and refreshing to have more people to talk with about GW2 in real life, and this generates a lot of interest.

I wish i had people to get into the game!!!!! I really do! If my friends hadnt already tried the game before during trial periods id get them to try it now.

Alexandrovitch.2765:

yeah, guess this is where it stops for me! —- so it doesnt feel like i wasted all this time getting all these lw stuff! gj guys way to kill a game i really enjoyed. how you could not get enough money from the player base is beyond me..

And saying something like that is likely to get your account banned – might want to edit it.

I really hope this brings a ton of new players into the game. I really do think the playerbase will increase immensely, not only with the release of endgame for multiple playstyles, but with many people trying the game out for the first time and seeing how solid the game is.
One of the major complaints, if not the biggest, has always been that the game lacks endgame. I could easily see GW2 becoming the second most played mmorpg in the west.

Hello. i was wondering, if you bought GW2 before the F2P conversion do i still have the full version, or does the full version only apply to the HoT expansion?

You still have full base game.

There are now 3 types of account;

1) Free-to-play
2) Core
3) HoT

You are in the Core category and have full access to the core game with no restrictions. You can see the chart comparison of the three account types here.

All I want to know is if I do not putrchase the expamnsion do I loose things I had before the expansion.

Arreyanne.2683:

All I want to know is if I do not putrchase the expamnsion do I loose things I had before the expansion.

No

Arreyanne.2683:

All I want to know is if I do not putrchase the expamnsion do I loose things I had before the expansion.

You don’t lose anything if you don’t purchase the expansion. You just won’t have access to the majority of the new features the expansion is bringing.

(As a side question, what things have you thought you might loose with the release of the expansion?)

Skabb.8714:

I just requested a refund for heart of thorns and I will then be uninstalling. Enjoy the couple hundred dollars I spent in the last week. It will never happen again. I did not purchase an expansion to a F2P game and I will not pay for an expansion to a F2P game. If I wanted to be harassed by immature kittenbags who dont even have to purchase anything in order to harass those that did, I’d play literally any other MMO!

I take it all back. I just reviewed https://help.guildwars2.com/entries/95982157-Account-types-Free-Core-HoT and that is enough restrictions and isolation to make me happy, sorry everyone.

Skabb.8714:

Skabb.8714:

I just requested a refund for heart of thorns and I will then be uninstalling. Enjoy the couple hundred dollars I spent in the last week. It will never happen again. I did not purchase an expansion to a F2P game and I will not pay for an expansion to a F2P game. If I wanted to be harassed by immature kittenbags who dont even have to purchase anything in order to harass those that did, I’d play literally any other MMO!

I take it all back. I just reviewed https://help.guildwars2.com/entries/95982157-Account-types-Free-Core-HoT and that is enough restrictions and isolation to make me happy, sorry everyone.

Glad to hear it – welcome back.

Access to chats, guild banks, character slots i already paid for got 9 80’s would be really irritaed if they cut me back to 5 like the thing showed

Arreyanne.2683:

Access to chats, guild banks, character slots i already paid for got 9 80’s would be really irritaed if they cut me back to 5 like the thing showed

Don’t worry – you won’t lose anything. Out of curiosity, where did you read that you would lose slots?

Edit: Ah I see from the comparison chart. I highly doubt they would suddenly limit core accounts to only 5 slots, and I believe that is in reference to the starting number of slots a core account is given (whereas a HoT account could potentially have 5 or 6, which is why it is given the “5 or more”).

Hope that clears it up – I am not too great at explaining things.

best move anet made for quite some time. pvp should have been f2p from the beginning. get real guys.
your salt is my sugar.

Thank you! OMG THIS

as a veteran of 3 years im not very happy about free to play only ONLY due to the bots that will overrun the world, that’s it
but if i bought the game 2 months ago and its free now its a bummer if its 3 months what ever.

Raids
end of the world

There are a lot of restrictions to free-to-play accounts that will help reduce the number of bots we will see.

Further, new accounts created after the 28th August now require either SMS or an authenticator for their account to have access to some things, which also helps slightly.

Just wondering if any thought has been put into the character naming problem?

Since each name can only be used once, game-wide, there will soon be a shortage of (reasonable) available names.

A lot of people will download the game, make a character or two, and only play for a short time.

Interesting thought.

The number of X Sephirot X will probably skyrocket, as will the Y Cloudstrife Y, maybe up to a point when there are more cloudstrifes than actuall clouds…^^

and what exactly are the bots going to do? pool infinite amounts of gold that they can’t do anything with (no mailing of items/gold for f2p accounts, or guild bank access, and limited TP access)? I can see how this would be appealing /s

in all seriousness, I doubt we’ll see as many bots as people seem to think, there are plenty of safeguards in place (as Zalladi said), and I’m fairly sure that if those aren’t enough something will be done about it.

Tbh, we will have to wait a couple of weeks before we know how big negative/positive impact that decision had. Just be patient, then we will whine or praise

As a veteran, I really could not care one hair on a kitten’s kitten about what someone else gets three years later.

And I refuse to contemplate the brain trauma I would have to receive before I DID care about what someone else gets years after I do.

As a veteran I’m pleased to see new people enter the game. I’m pleased to see that Anet is removing another barrier to entry for people trying out the game. SWToR is free to play. ESO is free to play. Archeage is free to play. Wildstar is going free to play. Honestly how do you people think the game is going to compete. The people who were interested bought it already, and the people who aren’t interested aren’t likely to try it. If you want to see the game’s population increase, and I do, there needs to be a vehicle for that to happen.

Anet is removing entry barriers for new players. Veteran players aren’t being shafted by this. But they’d absolutely feel shafted if there were no new players and there was less and less money to make content and eventually the game just faded into oblivion.

So i’ve played over 740 hours and just bought HOT. I’m very mad because they made gw2 f2p. So it’s like i’ve paid twice as much as new f2p players. I don’t think 740 hours is worth 60$. plz reimburse me plz. I did not enjoy any of those 740 hours u know. its like im getting rekt by anet. dont rekt me moar plz. 60$ for full expac + new content and new living story pretty much too high. i get moar value playing single player rpg for 20 hours. i dont get to play with friends in gw2. where is the fun? id rather pay 15 bucks a month to play WoW + 60$ each new expac. this is dumb. or id rather play ESO and having new dlc each 6 month for over 30$. my god. i feel betrayed for playing 3 years before it went f2p. ONLY 3 years. wow! You know, i wish anet would be working for free. PLZ.

Seriously, it is a very good move by anet. New players means more fun for everyone. Restriction seems to be well though too, limiting how it will affect existing players. I was afraid new expac would split playerbase like in gw1. But this announcement made me prepurchance HOT. Now I just wish they nerf DD ele. Cya ingame.

As title suggested, I checked the FAQ and it only leaves a vague explanation “Can buy and sell items from a selected list.”
anyone knows where to find a clear list of items that can be traded by f2per in TP?

i come here wishing to see some arguments, but well…

I think they stated just common. So white weapons and armor and just t1 mats I hope

As a veteran i feel the op, btw wheres the GW1 F2P? (i totally replay it with my wife), maybe the game fail with this “new lane” maybe not, actually i dont really care, the lore on this game sucks anyway, and yes is a marketing move and they dont care for the costumer, since the updates the game was going down the hill, and maybe this is the only desperate move to go on, we live in a new world fill will people who want every single thing for free… i just hope the 100 bucks i paid for hot… oh wait 200 (2 accounts) have payed for a lot of freebee accounts…

so… this is what a call a useless post… but still your opinion matters, just hope get merged

You are totatlly right.

As a veteran player since GuildWars2 beta and GW1 beta I’m all for the core game going free to play. This was suggested back in GW1 when Factions and Nightfall came out to make Prophecies free and the need to buy the expansion that followed I don’t think there will be to much problems with gold sellers and bottling because the new free account have to have some type of authentication on it and with the chat and trading restriction I don’t see this becoming that big of a deal.

i didnt read it, i though i would loose my full game because most games would go through and do that to the players. not due to a DLC, but if they changed the game from B2P → F2P. like WoW, i have a sneaking suspicion that they will end up going F2P (they’ve started in with the micro-transactions and you can buy a token thattle give you a month or something for gold) any whoozers thanks for the replies and the help, much appreciated.

Besides all of the intelligent restrictions they’ve added…I fail to see how botting really affects my gaming experience much. I get tells from gold sellers and stuff occasionally, but that’s a quick 2 second report and i’ve yet to play a popular game with an economy that didn’t have that type thing (or worse). I dunno, maybe I am just oblivious too other players around me more than most people.

So no official/red post? apart from how nice was their decision?… GMs should love to see how the community fight over this… but wait is not our decision, the game is property of Anet and they….

Mike.3460:

Fox.3469:

Free accounts can also not send items or gold to other accounts…

My god it’s like people are literly braindead, READ THE RESTRICTIONS then comment.

1. Farm 100k Gold on a Free Account.
2. Upgrade on a Weekend and sell it for way more than the code did cost.
3. Repeat.

Oh who could possibly have tought of this.

Not to mention that there’s absolutely no limit to scam of any sort left.

This is actually an interesting argument, but allow me to expand of this.
You will need to agree to one of these two statements:
You think that anet’s anti-bot system is unreliable
You think that anet’s anti-bot system is reliable

Now, the scenario is as you said, you would farm non stop on this f2p account till it has insane riches/gear/loot. However, the only way you would ever get this to connect to the economy would be to upgrade the account (which I would argue is anet’s objective to this whole f2p ordeal).

Now, assuming you agree with the first statement, you or the gold sellers manage to get away, make some money off of this method and life’s good. But then what is the difference if you had just bought an account in the first place, botted it, made money and sold whatever to whoever?

On the other hand if you agree with the second statement then you know this plot you cooked up won’t fly.

I’m interested in your thoughts since I’m actually pessimistic of anet’s anti-bot system but other than a safety net for botting business, at the end of the day they would still buy HoT; money rolls in sooner or later.

My initial reaction to the IGN leak was pessimistic. However, after seeing the restrictions, I’m willing to see if this works out. I can always drop the game later if doom happens. In the meantime, I’m intending to enjoy myself as much as I have been.

I do not believe that free players even need access to Whipsering.

Free players that are Realm Money Traders NEED whispering and 30 second delay is meaningless with their bots. They can load up multiple accounts now and circumvent this 30 second restriction, increasing their spam to all legitimate players in the game.

Should new players require communication, they can simply join a guild with their friends and have unrestricted communication.

Forcing new players to join guilds to communicate also works in to the whole premise of going FTP. Building Communities.