Guild Wars 2

Ive noticed for the past 2 weeks or so that the price of some precursors are slowly rising again. But this time, i noticed a trend. First off almost all precursors are taken off the TP with only 2-3 at the highest price that are left. Then every day a new precursor is put up undercutting the top 3 by 1g usually. so lets use the lover as an example. AT first lets say there was 11 lovers on the TP lowest one 250g and the highest is 500g. Then all of a sudden almost all start disappearing and the next day you see 5 lovers instead of 11 but more and more are slowly being added to the TP again at a higher price than it was before. The cheapest lover is now 485g. price manipulation at its finest?.

People are buying up the low price precursors to resell them at higher prices.

So yes, it’s blatant price manipulation. But don’t expect anything to be done about it, even though the problem (and indeed the precursor problem in general) is solved rather simply by creating a shop in LA that sells precursors for obscene prices. Then all the prices would hover close to that mark, because too much higher and they’d never be able to sell the darn things.

Y’know, if there was a change or two made to precursors, it’d clean up this whole “precursor gold mine” fast, and do something about that underutilized home instance too:

- Make Precursors account bound.
- They still drop at their obscenely low rate.
- Add in a once-per-character event/quest chain where you can wind up making decisions and those decisions cause alterations of NPCs and objects within the home instance.
- At the end of the chain, your choices determine which Precursor choice you receive as the final reward. You can pick from three, determined by three choices you make as you progress, so this prevents home instances from looking TOO similar all across the game. You want one Precursor, but the other two choices can be for just aesthetics.

I would like to see something done about this. A few months ago there was a post saying they were keeping an eye on the situation. Has that eye gone blind? Are the devs simply ignoring the problem or are they working on a solution? We’ve not had any information on the precursor systems in a long time. Something – an acknowledgement that it isn’t working – would be a good start.

I believe, like alot of other members – nothing will happen with pre-cursors. Anet are just turning a blind eye, notice no more information about the so-called Scavenger Hunt events. Basically, right now~ again, its one of the greatest problems with GW2 and its hurting the game in general.

I think pre cursors being in the 500g range is fine, the fact that they were ever cheaper is more of a problem in my view. Legendarys should be hard to make, everything is pretty easy to obtain so there needs to be something that is difficult about it, and thats where the high priced pre cursor comes in. I hope they remain high and Arenanet never start handing out welfare precursors, because the day every causal has a legendary will be sad day.
I’m sorry if this sounds elitist, I do not mean it to, although I know many will take it that way, I just have a firm view that legendarys should actually be hard to obtain.

Vavume.8065:

I think pre cursors being in the 500g range is fine, the fact that they were ever cheaper is more of a problem in my view. Legendarys should be hard to make, everything is pretty easy to obtain so there needs to be something that is difficult about it, and thats where the high priced pre cursor comes in. I hope they remain high and Arenanet never start handing out welfare precursors, because the day every causal has a legendary will be sad day.
I’m sorry if this sounds elitist, I do not mean it to, although I know many will take it that way, I just have a firm view that legendarys should actually be hard to obtain.

But they’re not hard to obtain. There is absolutely no skill barrier between you and a “legendary”, only a time barrier, because you need only gather a large number of resources. I’m by no means a great player, as WvW often reminds me, but I’m already almost a quarter of the way there myself. Does it really show off how amazingly talented I am? Well, no, not one bit. My prediction, in fact, is that a few years from now, most of the people still playing likely will have at least one so-called “legendary”, and they’ll be so common that people will be starting to use other skins just to feel different.

If you want them to be less common, you shouldn’t be looking at the price tags, because price isn’t a permanent barrier. You should be looking to implement a skill-based challenge system to restrict the flow of precursors, thereby making sure that only people who are truly talented at the game can even get one.

Just about everything on the tp that has a ridiculous price has followed the same “trend” you are seeing. You can thank the TP Leeches for that one… artificial inflation caused by kitten trading pros “playing the market like a baws with mad skillz”… but hey, anet thinks that is fine and dandy, it’s a game mechanic after all.

If you don’t like it, start a thread complaining so they can all explain supply and demand to you while they “flip” entire supplies of items for 200 and 300 percent profit. It’s legitimate brah… if they already have the money to entirely corner a single item on the market and relist it for a price to the power of 3 or 4, why not? Making money by extorting the poor is a national past time…

critickitten.1498:

Vavume.8065:

I think pre cursors being in the 500g range is fine, the fact that they were ever cheaper is more of a problem in my view. Legendarys should be hard to make, everything is pretty easy to obtain so there needs to be something that is difficult about it, and thats where the high priced pre cursor comes in. I hope they remain high and Arenanet never start handing out welfare precursors, because the day every causal has a legendary will be sad day.
I’m sorry if this sounds elitist, I do not mean it to, although I know many will take it that way, I just have a firm view that legendarys should actually be hard to obtain.

But they’re not hard to obtain. There is absolutely no skill barrier between you and a “legendary”, only a time barrier, because you need only gather a large number of resources. I’m by no means a great player, as WvW often reminds me, but I’m already almost a quarter of the way there myself. Does it really show off how amazingly talented I am? Well, no, not one bit. My prediction, in fact, is that a few years from now, most of the people still playing likely will have at least one so-called “legendary”, and they’ll be so common that people will be starting to use other skins just to feel different.

If you want them to be less common, you shouldn’t be looking at the price tags, because price isn’t a permanent barrier. You should be looking to implement a skill-based challenge system to restrict the flow of precursors, thereby making sure that only people who are truly talented at the game can even get one.

Yeah I dont disagree with that at all, thing is Arenanet just didnt go the skill route, I also expected it to me more like how vanilla wow legendarys were, now that was legendary. So as far as I’m concerned the only way to keep them from being a dime a dozen right now is the high price pre cursor, for most people 500g is still hard to obtain, so legendarys are at least somewhat rare, but not legendary status.
I can’t see much changing from the way it is right now, but maybe in the future if there is a new tier of legendarys they might actually have learned something from this, and do it the right way and add a skill barrier to them.

Vavume.8065:

Yeah I dont disagree with that at all, thing is Arenanet just didnt go the skill route, I also expected it to me more like how vanilla wow legendarys were, now that was legendary. So as far as I’m concerned the only way to keep them from being a dime a dozen right now is the high price pre cursor, for most people 500g is still hard to obtain so legendarys are at least somewhat rare, but not legendary status.
I can’t see much changing from the way it is right now, but maybe in the future if there is a new tier of legendarys they might actually have learned something from this and do it the right way and add a skill barrier to them.

Agreed.

I just think it’s a shame they didn’t implement them right the first time. Much as I enjoy the game as is, I miss the days of “when it’s ready”. This is something that should never have been done if they couldn’t take the time to do it right.

Vavume.8065:

I think pre cursors being in the 500g range is fine, the fact that they were ever cheaper is more of a problem in my view. Legendarys should be hard to make, everything is pretty easy to obtain so there needs to be something that is difficult about it, and thats where the high priced pre cursor comes in. I hope they remain high and Arenanet never start handing out welfare precursors, because the day every causal has a legendary will be sad day.
I’m sorry if this sounds elitist, I do not mean it to, although I know many will take it that way, I just have a firm view that legendarys should actually be hard to obtain.

I think that the point that a lot of people have been making is what it is that makes the legendaries hard to obtain. There are aspects of it that require committment and playing, aspects that require luck and aspects that require money.

Even if A-net handed out precursors, not every “casual” would have a legendary because they would not be able to make the gift of mastery (cant just buy obs shards, BoH, bloodstone shard or world exploration) or the gift of luck (cannot just buy obs shards for the gift of luck).

The problem a lot of people have with the legendaries is the fact that the precursors, but more importantly the legendaries themselves, can be bought with real world money through gems. There is nothing “hard” about obtaining a precursor. I am old and have a job. If my wife wouldnt kill me, I could buy a bunch of gems and have a precursor right now. I could buy a bunch of gems and have a LEGENDARY right now. The 16 year old kid kicking my kitten in WvW who can dedicate 1000s of hours to the game and has actual skill may never get even a precursor but I can buy a legendary. That doesnt make obtaining a legendary hard in the sense that you need skill to obtain one.

Sepreh.5924:

Vavume.8065:

I think pre cursors being in the 500g range is fine, the fact that they were ever cheaper is more of a problem in my view. Legendarys should be hard to make, everything is pretty easy to obtain so there needs to be something that is difficult about it, and thats where the high priced pre cursor comes in. I hope they remain high and Arenanet never start handing out welfare precursors, because the day every causal has a legendary will be sad day.
I’m sorry if this sounds elitist, I do not mean it to, although I know many will take it that way, I just have a firm view that legendarys should actually be hard to obtain.

I think that the point that a lot of people have been making is what it is that makes the legendaries hard to obtain. There are aspects of it that require committment and playing, aspects that require luck and aspects that require money.

Even if A-net handed out precursors, not every “casual” would have a legendary because they would not be able to make the gift of mastery (cant just buy obs shards, BoH, bloodstone shard or world exploration) or the gift of luck (cannot just buy obs shards for the gift of luck).

The problem a lot of people have with the legendaries is the fact that the precursors, but more importantly the legendaries themselves, can be bought with real world money through gems. There is nothing “hard” about obtaining a precursor. I am old and have a job. If my wife wouldnt kill me, I could buy a bunch of gems and have a precursor right now. I could buy a bunch of gems and have a LEGENDARY right now. The 16 year old kid kicking my kitten in WvW who can dedicate 1000s of hours to the game and has actual skill may never get even a precursor but I can buy a legendary. That doesnt make obtaining a legendary hard in the sense that you need skill to obtain one.

Yeah, thats another unfortunate thing about this game, the cash shop, I hate it with a passion, but thats something we can not do anything about and I do not expect Arenanet to change anything related to it, people will always be able to buy their way to legendarys with real money, which is just a crying shame in my book.

My 2 biggest hates in this game are the cash shop and culling, both are like a having nasty disease attached to somthing that is otherwise quite beautiful, such a pity.

Anet is probably aware of the market manipulation and just blatantly ignoring it. Having people defend anets claim that there is no market manipulation is an even bigger slap in the face. Free market isn’t so free?. inb4 people say this is what a free market is, this is a game. Period. When all people do is log on just to play the TP and capitalize and control a market instead of the actually playing game there is something fundamentally wrong with the game. It reminds me of the D3 RMAH. Even the real world has laws that protect against things like this why isn’t there one in this virtual “free market”?

Slayd.2871:

Anet is probably aware of the market manipulation and just blatantly ignoring it. Having people defend anets claim that there is no market manipulation is an even bigger slap in the face. Free market isn’t so free?. inb4 people say this is what a free market is, this is a game.

Its never been a free market its manipulated by whatever mechanisms anet use for drop rates DR etc.

Slayd.2871:

morrolan.9608:

Slayd.2871:

Anet is probably aware of the market manipulation and just blatantly ignoring it. Having people defend anets claim that there is no market manipulation is an even bigger slap in the face. Free market isn’t so free?. inb4 people say this is what a free market is, this is a game.

Its never been a free market its manipulated by whatever mechanisms anet use for drop rates DR etc.

Gw2 economist might want a word with you

Doesn’t matter what he says, the inherent mechanics of a computer game like GW2 will always mean the economy is not a free market.
Even EVE Online economy falls in such a comparison.

Economies in MMOs are way too small and way too static to be considered anything like actual economies.
No production or product innovation to mention just two major factors in why price manipulation is very easy in a game, but very difficult in a free market.

It can only try to emulate a few concepts of a free market, it will never be a free market.
And markets in games like GW2 all fall for the same manipulation as it attracts a specific segment of players who mainly care about themselves getting gold at the expense of other players.
Basically playing the economies are the last true form of ‘PvP’ in these types of games.

thats why I said “free market”.

It’s not “price manipulation” it’s price correction.

The simple fact is, precursers are VERY VERY RARE and there’s VERY VERY HIGH demand for them. That means the price is going to be very high for them. If there’s a highly limited amount of something, and someone is willing to pay more then you, why do you think you deserve one? If they were cheaper, they would all be bought up and you wouldn’t get one anyway.

The only person you have to blame is anet for making them so rare (and so RNG). Obviously, they like them rare – the more expensive they are the more people who buy gems to turn to gold to buy them so don’t expect it to change anytime soon.

If there’s a highly limited amount of something, and someone is willing to pay more then you, why do you think you deserve one?

Because this is a game, and we don’t pay to escape one harsh randian dystopia just to be put into another? What exactly is “legendary” about buying gold from the chinese farmers to get one of these in the “faster than inflation” trading post model in place right now?

BurnedToast.3781:

It’s not “price manipulation” it’s price correction.

The simple fact is, precursers are VERY VERY RARE and there’s VERY VERY HIGH demand for them. That means the price is going to be very high for them. If there’s a highly limited amount of something, and someone is willing to pay more then you, why do you think you deserve one? If they were cheaper, they would all be bought up and you wouldn’t get one anyway.

The only person you have to blame is anet for making them so rare (and so RNG). Obviously, they like them rare – the more expensive they are the more people who buy gems to turn to gold to buy them so don’t expect it to change anytime soon.

It is price manipulation. Those 15 or so dusks for sale on the TP right now? I guarantee at least 8 of them are owned by a single person. The supply of precursors is so low, It’s very easy for someone with many thousands of gold to corner the market.

What’s it matter who owns them?

The fact is, if someone is willing to pay 500g (or whatever) for something, then that is the correct price for it. If one person is buying them and selling them for a higher price, then they are simply correcting a too low price.

its price manipulation at his worst…

Its easy to see that if you follow precursor market….

Just look at huge price and offer increase to push up prices…

For ex, you see precursors jumping of 100G in 1 hours with 4-5 fake new offers…..

@burned….you want to feed gold sellers and speculators?
Its an issue…..and its quite clear to any experienced mmorpg player.
Ruin economy and the game dies….

Because this is a game, and we don’t pay to escape one harsh randian dystopia just to be put into another? What exactly is “legendary” about buying gold from the chinese farmers to get one of these in the “faster than inflation” trading post model in place right now?

It’s not a “harsh randian dystopia”, it’s basic capitalism. It’s not like you need a legendary to survive, they don’t even (for now) have better stats then a 4g exotic that you can grind out in a few hours. It’s a luxury item, not something you need to be viable.

Precursers are expensive because they are rare. They will ALWAYS been expensive as long as they are rare and there is a high demand for them. One person “manipulating” the market as you put it will correct the price faster, but even if there was no-one doing that the price would eventually correct it’s self naturally as people realized they sold for a lot and slowly listed them higher and higher.

If anet wanted to fix it there’s really only two things they could do – increase the droprate (or increase the supply in some other fashion), or artificially cap the price.

I imagine some of you want them to do the latter, but if they did that they would all be sold out instantly, and the instant any went up for sale they would be purchased, and so you personally would not be likely to get one anyway.

The thing is, you have several other factors in the background such as multiboxers, exploiters and hackers also a factor. I mean, I still look at people with legendaries and I personally automatically label them as hackers, the reason is that I’m not giving them the benefit of doubt ~ Many players acquired them illegitimately with the minority of players actually getting them totally legitimately.

Some players hired the help of entire guilds farming just so a few players (with large egos) could get them fast, a few names here stand out but I’ll refrain from posting them. However, others used more malicious methods ~ like some who got legendaries a few weeks after launch..

The problems with legendaries are simple ~ casual players, or even ‘unlucky’ players will never get them, its as simple as that. Look at how long it will legitimately take the average player to farm up 100g for just the Icy Runestones alone? Honestly, what Anet should do, is look at mail logs and ban players who have transferred large amounts of gold and also, remove that gold from the game…the problem is, this should have been done along time ago – but wasn’t.

What about the people with multiple legendaries? Even if I had a legendary item, could I prove I got it legitimately? No, I can’t ~ So kudos to all the legitimate players out there who got one.

TsukasaHiiragi.9730:

The thing is, you have several other factors in the background such as multiboxers, exploiters and hackers also a factor. I mean, I still look at people with legendaries and I personally automatically label them as hackers, the reason is that I’m not giving them the benefit of doubt ~ Many players acquired them illegitimately with the minority of players actually getting them totally legitimately.

Some players hired the help of entire guilds farming just so a few players (with large egos) could get them fast, a few names here stand out but I’ll refrain from posting them. However, others used more malicious methods ~ like some who got legendaries a few weeks after launch..

The problems with legendaries are simple ~ casual players, or even ‘unlucky’ players will never get them, its as simple as that. Look at how long it will legitimately take the average player to farm up 100g for just the Icy Runestones alone? Honestly, what Anet should do, is look at mail logs and ban players who have transferred large amounts of gold and also, remove that gold from the game…the problem is, this should have been done along time ago – but wasn’t.

What about the people with multiple legendaries? Even if I had a legendary item, could I prove I got it legitimately? No, I can’t ~ So kudos to all the legitimate players out there who got one.

If you’re automatically, subconsciously thinking “hacker” when someone has a Legendary . . . wow, I’m sorry to say I’d be really bothered if I got a Precursor by accident tomorrow (because I’m not even really trying for it) and spent the next two weeks busting my balls to get the rest of it . . .

. . . for someone to basically go: “Pfft, hacked for it” when I actually have it out.

Angry? Not really, I’d be more sad that I pulled that kind of achievement off to basically have someone say I didn’t work for it or earn it. And yet there’d be a part of me which would just understand why someone would think that.

. . . maybe that’s one of the reasons I don’t go actively looking for getting a Precursor.

BurnedToast.3781:

What’s it matter who owns them?

The fact is, if someone is willing to pay 500g (or whatever) for something, then that is the correct price for it. If one person is buying them and selling them for a higher price, then they are simply correcting a too low price.

This only works in a fluid market without much monopoly going on. There so little of each precursor going on and the number of sales are so low, and with the market manipulation there is kind of a monopoly in the sources of them that their current price isn’t their correct price.

Everyday this topic appears and everyday it ends the same way.

I guess today instead of the usual arguments I make against changing the precursor method, Ill focus on something else.

What determines skill in this game? I have done every single path in all dungeons, I go to WvW and fight players, I have done all temples even some of them solo, and I have done a lot of the events throughout all maps in this game.

Does this make me a skilled and deserving of a legendary? I do not know the answer to that question. Is what I have done in this game even that skillful? Is learning boss mechanics and how to dodge their attacks really skill?

This is the thing about Guild Wars 2. There is no skill, at all. Everything comes from learning and experience and there is little need for skill at all in this game.

This game is not Starcraft, a Moba (besides LoL), or any other game that requires skill. In those games I could learn the game and what everything does, but actually executing it is another matter entirely. This game does not have this, and thats fundamentally why this game will never be an e-sport.

So the skill argument does not exist. What could possible come up with that determines a player skills in a game where there is no skill to be had at all.

stof.9341:

BurnedToast.3781:

What’s it matter who owns them?

The fact is, if someone is willing to pay 500g (or whatever) for something, then that is the correct price for it. If one person is buying them and selling them for a higher price, then they are simply correcting a too low price.

This only works in a fluid market without much monopoly going on. There so little of each precursor going on and the number of sales are so low, and with the market manipulation there is kind of a monopoly in the sources of them that their current price isn’t their correct price.

If people are buying them, it’s the correct price. If nobody is buying them, then the seller would be losing money and would stop listing them so high. They are being sold right now, which means they are the correct price. That the correct price is higher then you want to pay is irrelevant.

As for a monopoly of the source.. errr… I don’t think that means what you think it means. Anyone is free to farm a precursor, they are just VERY rare. It’s impossible to monopolize the source since the source is any mob in the whole game (afaik) or throwing weapons into the mystic toilet forge.

There are still people out there who think that GW’2s game economy runs anything like the real economy? I’ll bet if the GW2 economist was on here posting, he/she could tell you just how different these things are and how much they’ve learned about the way that games operate. But you don’t even need an economist….anyone who has put any thought into the idea could tell you how different a game economy is from a real one.

1) There is no hard limit on the supply of any item. In the real world, all things have a finite limit, and once bought up, that’s it. In game worlds, items are only bound in terms of quantity by the number that have dropped, but the supply is potentially infinite. The only limiting factor in a game world is the demand, and since demand is virtually always high, prices can continue to increase without any concern on the part of the seller because there will always be a demand for their items.

2) Nothing is bought from a manufacturer but rather through a secondhand buyer, leading to generally much higher and less consistent prices. This is rather self-explanatory. Manufacturers generally come to some manner of agreement as to what the appropriate price of their product is, and everyone competes within a certain margin of that price (ergo why most of the top cell phone providers charge similar amounts, and the ones that offer less service have to resort to demanding less than the big guys in order to stay afloat). If you buy tickets to a football game from a stadium, they will be the same price consistently until the stadium decides that it’s time to raise it….whereas if you buy them from the scalper in the parking lot, it’ll cost you however much he feels like charging, which means it’ll cost you more (more about that further down this post) and you’ll generally not be charged the same amount twice.

3) “Flipping” is far more profitable in games than in real life. That’s not to say flipping doesn’t exist in real life, it does. But in order to flip an item in real life, you have to buy it low, fix it up (which also costs money) and then continue to invest money into maintaining it until you find someone willing to buy for your desired price. Because of this, flipping doesn’t always work out and people are forced to sell at a net loss. In a game, however, there is zero maintenance costs, and no paying to “fix it up”, so you can flip an item almost immediately or wait for a few months, and the result is pure profits.

4) There is no such thing as a “used” sale in the game world. And because of this, prices are always high. The existence of “used” sales in the real world are a form of balance against rising costs by allowing people to buy a product of slightly lesser quality in exchange for paying much less. GW2 doesn’t allow you to sell anything you’ve used before unless it’s a low equipment tier, meaning that used items don’t exist. If they did, there’d be more of them in the shops, thus a greater supply and lower prices.

5) Inflation kills game economies, whereas it’s a normal function in real ones. Inflation is built into the real world: you earn higher paychecks now than people did a decade ago, and items cost more. This is a natural thing. But in a game world, where drop rates are always the same (except in the many cases where they’ve actually nerfed drop rates), rising prices are something that can kill the game economy because the richer players will always have enough gold to afford the items, whereas the poor players will see an increasing gap in the amount they must pay for an item and their actual wallet size.

There is no “correct” price on a market. If there was, we wouldn’t need a trading post. Who would sell below ? Which buyer would overpay voluntarily ?

There is also no “monopoly”. No one is restricted from finding a precursor, or buying one. It’s just a very scarce resource.

The problem is:
We have extremely rare goods on the one hand, and a in-game currency that loses value by inflation day by day on the other hand. Comparable to the art market: A precursor is like a Renoir or a Picasso, they are very limited, you can’t reproduce them, and therefore people are buying them just for investment return.

The solution to put pressure on the market prices is a slight increase in drop rates. But I have a sad feeling, that a lot of people that are complaining, want the exclusivity of the precursor weapons maintained, and just belong to the elitist club.

critickitten.1498:

3) “Flipping” is far more profitable in games than in real life. That’s not to say flipping doesn’t exist in real life, it does. But in order to flip an item in real life, you have to buy it low, fix it up (which also costs money) and then continue to invest money into maintaining it until you find someone willing to buy for your desired price. Because of this, flipping doesn’t always work out and people are forced to sell at a net loss. In a game, however, there is zero maintenance costs, and no paying to “fix it up”, so you can flip an item almost immediately or wait for a few months, and the result is pure profits.

Your points are almost all correct except for this one.
Refurbishing something and then selling it is not the RL equivalent of “flipping.”

The RL version of flipping might be something like, buy drugs in Sth America where it’s cheap, and then sell it in the US where it’s expensive. (I had to use drugs as an example because in most other cases free trade / globalisation has flattened prices across regions.)
The cost is the transport costs to get the stuff to the US. The in game equivalent is the TP transaction tax.

Flippers do the same thing. Buy from a cheap source, and sell it to richer buyers.
Ideally you could cut out the middle man – the rich buyers get a cheaper product, the cheap source gets a better price.

But just like real life, convenience and limited information prevent this from happening. The cheap source doesn’t have a good idea of just how much people would pay for stuff, and the rich buyer doesnt have the time/motivation to watch the TP like a hawk and snap up the cheap items as soon as they are listed.

So yeah, you can foil the plans of those dastardly market manipulators, and get the cheap precursors. Just watch the TP 24/7 (or maybe write a bot to watch GWSpidy or something), and if you see a cheap precursor, buy it right away before the manipulators get to it. (from the example in the OP, it seems they dont get to it instantly either.)

Can’t be bothered? Then you’re paying for the convenience.

Timberwolf.2413:

There is no “correct” price on a market. If there was, we wouldn’t need a trading post. Who would sell below ? Which buyer would overpay voluntarily ?

There is also no “monopoly”. No one is restricted from finding a precursor, or buying one. It’s just a very scarce resource.

The problem is:
We have extremely rare goods on the one hand, and a in-game currency that loses value by inflation day by day on the other hand. Comparable to the art market: A precursor is like a Renoir or a Picasso, they are very limited, you can’t reproduce them, and therefore people are buying them just for investment return.

The solution to put pressure on the market prices is a slight increase in drop rates. But I have a sad feeling, that a lot of people that are complaining, want the exclusivity of the precursor weapons maintained, and just belong to the elitist club.

You misunderstand the concept of “correct” price. The correct price is the highest price the market is willing to bear. Any higher and people won’t buy, any lower and someone will flip the item and pocket the difference. That’s the correct price.

Inflation is actually pretty well under control in GW2 so far. You can calculate inflation (ie. the value of gold) by taking a cross section of commonly purchased items and seeing the trends in their prices. Normal item prices are mostly steady so far, so inflation is ok for now.

So why the rise in precursor prices? It’s easy to work out.
- Precursors have a mostly steady supply. People aren’t finding them more often than before.

- Greater wealth in the game: As people grind, buy gold from ANet or gold sellers, or trade their way to wealth, the richest individuals have increasingly greater resources to afford the rarest items.

- Demand: As more people hit 80 and start aiming for a legendary, as more people meet the other conditions and only need a precursor, etc, the demand goes up relative to supply.

So yes, ultimately ANet doesnt “manipulate the market”, they dictate the reality of the game. If ANet wants precursors to be cheaper, they’ll make them more common.

If you guys spent half the time you spend whining about precursor prices farming for one you would have one by now……………………………………….

Yes its TP manipulation. “playing the AH” or whatever you want to call it. AH campers and manipulators are common in every mmo but more prominent in gw2 because that or buying gold is literally the only way to make decent amounts of currency in this game thanks to drop “tuning” to shoehorn people into the gem store. The disparity between these TP manipulators and regular players in terms of wealth is almost nauseating.

Diviner.7405:

This is the thing about Guild Wars 2. There is no skill, at all. Everything comes from learning and experience and there is little need for skill at all in this game.

Interesting take . . . does that mean there is no such thing as a skilled mathematician, since you either know how to do it or you don’t? Or a skilled accountant, since it’s numbers and making sure they match up properly? Can anyone really be skilled at any game where it’s played against numbers or computers and not other people, such as a “breakout” type game, or a turn-based strategy style game?

I’d like to ask, isn’t the dodge mechanic something used with skill, since there is a timing window involved. Or is the fact you either make it or you don’t make it not skill-based at all? How would a MOBA game differ in requiring skill, since it would follow the same criteria: either you avoid it or you don’t?

Seriously, if you’re going to take a moment to make a statement like “skill doesn’t exist in this game”, you need to stop and explain a bit more. I might even agree with you, because to me . . . there is no such thing as “skill” in video games if you distill it down to “you use learning and experience” to win. Then you pretty much negate any game’s claim of skill, because “learning and experience” describes any way to actually win at a game ever.

(I hesitate because WvW or PvP seems to incorporate “skill” as you would define it, but I could be wrong. I usually am.)

You can know how dodge works here, you can know what your skills do and how their effect lands, what they do in a combo field, and what another class is going to do. Now, take people who know all of that, and tell them they have to solo some content. All of them likely won’t be able to do it. Why? Because there’s knowing something, and using it effectively, and this point you made to dismiss there being skill in GW2. There is skill here.

It’s just that most places, you can substitute overwhelming force (“the zerg”) and get the same result: victory.

“All you need is a force in as great as concentration as you can muster, and style. And in a pinch, style can slide.”

well I think it’s all about when you started for your legendary. If you started right with the beginning of the game, you had no problems to get everything you needed. The karka-event helped you to get the precursor if you didn’t get it till then.

But if you started later, like most did, well then it is nearly impossible to get a precursor cause now they are rising to infinity (yes this is exaggeration). I’m collecting since 2 months only for the precursor and I propably won’t get it ever, because with each day more people will finish their gifts and will start farming for the precursors.
So there will be thousands of offers but not more drops than now.

I’m sorry but this thread is hilarious. A bunch of people blaming market manipulators for continually buying and relisting precursors for the last 3 months. I hate to break it to you guys but if market manipulators were the only ones buying and relisting precursors then they would have gone broke months ago. The simple fact is that people are regularly buying precursors at these high prices because the prices are still below the average cost to make the precursor yourself.

You should check out the posts in the trading forum, there is a lot of insight there that explains what you are missing. GW2 spidy and similar sites are not giving you an accurate picture of what is going on.

For instance 9 dusk’s are sold every day, there aren’t only 1 or 2 dusks that sit on the TP for weeks at a time until evil market manipulators buy them and relist them. Maybe one or 2 of those is bought to later be relisted at a higher price, but most of them are just bought by players who spend more time making money in the game and less time complaining about it on the forums.

ZudetGambeous.9573 -
People are insane, forget it.
They do not understand the reasons behind the rise in prices and tie everything to manipulation.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

but most of them are just bought by players who spend more time making money in the game and less time complaining about it on the forums.

Hahaha. Sure thing buddy. You are delusional.

Only people saying precursors should stay as they are are probably the ones who made legendaries when they were mega cheap and dont want more people with them, im sorry to tell you but you are too late, a lot of people have them already and they arent that rare any more =/

I received a gold selling mail last night with something I haven’t seen before in it. They were offering precursors for real money, not only gold. Said they were the biggest supplier of these.

I did report the mail for spamming, but it is something to consider in all of this.

critickitten.1498:

Vavume.8065:

I think pre cursors being in the 500g range is fine, the fact that they were ever cheaper is more of a problem in my view. Legendarys should be hard to make, everything is pretty easy to obtain so there needs to be something that is difficult about it, and thats where the high priced pre cursor comes in. I hope they remain high and Arenanet never start handing out welfare precursors, because the day every causal has a legendary will be sad day.
I’m sorry if this sounds elitist, I do not mean it to, although I know many will take it that way, I just have a firm view that legendarys should actually be hard to obtain.

But they’re not hard to obtain. There is absolutely no skill barrier between you and a “legendary”, only a time barrier, because you need only gather a large number of resources. I’m by no means a great player, as WvW often reminds me, but I’m already almost a quarter of the way there myself. Does it really show off how amazingly talented I am? Well, no, not one bit. My prediction, in fact, is that a few years from now, most of the people still playing likely will have at least one so-called “legendary”, and they’ll be so common that people will be starting to use other skins just to feel different.

If you want them to be less common, you shouldn’t be looking at the price tags, because price isn’t a permanent barrier. You should be looking to implement a skill-based challenge system to restrict the flow of precursors, thereby making sure that only people who are truly talented at the game can even get one.

The problem with skill based, is that all it takes is some practice and everyone can do it, and it would be fun to do. Really, the only way to make sure that not everyone can get a legendary, is to make it a really boring to get for most people. Lets be honest, the only true barrier to getting a legendary is whether one deems it fun to do a major rng grind, or don’t mind doing that kind of grind despite it might be boring to them.

TLDR: Make it fun to get, everyone will get it.

well, let’s just forget about why prices are that high. There still remains the question, shall prices be that high, that just some ahrdcore farmers can manage to buy them after a few months?
But I think the prices itself aren’t the problem. The problem is the uncertainty: Will precursors at the same price in half a year? Or will they rise further so I won’t be able to buy them then.
I think if they were just sold be a NPC for 500 gold, there would still be complains about it, but not that much as there are right now.

ZudetGambeous.9573 where did you get the information that 9 dusks are sold each day?
Do you know how many lovers are sold too?

No market manipulation here guys! Legendaries and Precursors are posted by people who worked hard to earn them by farming moldy bags at pen/shelt all day! You people who think they are overpriced and are crazy! Go farm and actually put effort into the game for a few hours and you can make a thousand gold easily! If that doesn’t work you can sell your car and buy one! Take that tin foil hat off xD

^
so true.

legendaries are not even a question for me.
i just dont want to grind for them.

prefer grinding fractals which requires skills, or do pvp/wvw which requires skills, or level up an alt.

farming to me is… brainless and boring.
but to each is own.

Slayd.2871:

BurnedToast, I was expected someone like you to reply to the post. there always seems to be a TP player who feels the need to repeat the garbage that you posted. Price adjustment? rofl. doesnt even want to admit price manipulation. your probably someone who has something to lose if they fix the precursor problem and so u feel the need to defend the current way to save your profits.

I was thinking the exact same thing reading his posts..

problem is their value/rarity is so high compared to everything else that if youre lucky enough to get 1 then you can start to play the big leagues and will be able to play the TP, fully gear a toon with multiple builds exotic sets etc etc.

its just a bit “too much” imo.
but maybe its the intended design.

also if you want some gold this guy gives away gold. he makes it by playing the game instead of crying on the forums about high prices! http://www.twitch.tv/tehmaker

Surferboy.1649:

ZudetGambeous.9573 where did you get the information that 9 dusks are sold each day?
Do you know how many lovers are sold too?

From the BLTC forum, in the crystalline dust thread, John Smith commented on the amount of a few things that are sold daily, here is the quote in reference to the dusk’s and dawn’s sold in a 24 hour period:

John Smith.4610:

Not even close: 9 and 11

Here is the quote from him when someone asked if it was the same person buying and selling sparks:

John Smith.4610:

It’s different people.

Here is the quote when people asked if it was gold sellers controlling the precursor market through market manipulation:

John Smith.4610:

Ursan is correct, there are many, many players who have earned enough money to purchase or create a precursor outside of the TP.

No, the Precursor market is not controlled by goldsellers.

I think that covers pretty much every lie and fabrication in the thread, have a nice day!

hm, that is a real high number, I wonder why the prices don’t drop. I always see the same orders in the AH and the number of offers are always at 10 to 11.
But maybe it’s because GS are wanted by many and this number can’t be taken for the shortbow.
And yeah, controlled is too strong, let’s just call it magnificantly influenced.

Diviner.7405:

Everyday this topic appears and everyday it ends the same way.

I guess today instead of the usual arguments I make against changing the precursor method, Ill focus on something else.

What determines skill in this game? I have done every single path in all dungeons, I go to WvW and fight players, I have done all temples even some of them solo, and I have done a lot of the events throughout all maps in this game.

Does this make me a skilled and deserving of a legendary? I do not know the answer to that question. Is what I have done in this game even that skillful? Is learning boss mechanics and how to dodge their attacks really skill?

This is the thing about Guild Wars 2. There is no skill, at all. Everything comes from learning and experience and there is little need for skill at all in this game.

This game is not Starcraft, a Moba (besides LoL), or any other game that requires skill. In those games I could learn the game and what everything does, but actually executing it is another matter entirely. This game does not have this, and thats fundamentally why this game will never be an e-sport.

So the skill argument does not exist. What could possible come up with that determines a player skills in a game where there is no skill to be had at all.

Have to agree. Been playing MMOs as long as MMOs were a thing and there’s very little in ANY of them that could really be described as skill. Most things considered difficult in MMOs are basically just a checklist of things to do or not do. Don’t stand in the fire, do kill the adds, don’t melee the boss after he does this emote, do stand over here so you don’t agro stuff through the wall etc.

If someone tells you what to do or you read a guide, you’re already halfway to doing it. Sure it can still take some practice to do certain things right, but it’s uncommon that it takes so much that it’s really much of an accomplishment to do things successfully. Even in the case where it does take a lot of practice, such as certain WoW hard mode raids over the years, it’s really just because there’s a bigger checklist and you have to worry about everyone else knowing the checklist too.

Something like the mad king jumping puzzle does take skill, but that kind of gameplay isn’t something I think most MMO players would be interested in focusing on.