Guild Wars 2

I talked a friend into purchasing HoT for the first time, thinking it included everything so far. What he found is that it does not include LS3 episodes 1-3, which much be purchases for an additional 200g each (total 600). Episode 4 apparently comes with the purchase.

What’s up with this. Is this something I missed? I’ve owned the basic game and HoT since their respective launches?

That’s an unpleasant surprise, since the friend is not inclined to purchase anything from the gem store.

Yeah the living season episodes (except for season 1 which isn’t available at all) are all free IF you log in while they are active. If not, you have to buy them per episode. I make sure to log in every few weeks if I take a break just to make sure I unlock any new episodes for later play.

It’s definitely a crap practice, and not worth the money to buy it. But that’s the way it is for all the story steps. Of you’re not on to claim the story, you will have to buy it. :/

You have to have logged in when the episode was freshly released to get that episode for free. Episode 4 is the currently released episode so your friend got it for free. You have owned the basic game and HoT since release, and logged in often enough to get the LW episodes for free.

Your friend should play the game as long as he enjoys it. To avoid spending more dollars on the game, get gold to convert to gems. Avoiding crafting and selling the mats will help with building up a gold reserve.

Crafting is needed for legendary and ascended weapons, but they aren’t much better than exotic weapons, which can be purchased with karma.

Of course, my friend could not log in during those times, as he only started yesterday, from scratch.

So not only do the expansions need to be purchases, as I expected, but even mini-content stuff needs to be purchased too for new starters?

Michael.9403:

Of course, my friend could not log in during those times, as he only started yesterday, from scratch.

So not only do the expansions need to be purchases, as I expected, but even mini-content stuff needs to be purchased too for new starters?

For everyone new, yes

If he doesn’t want to spend cash, he can convert gold to gems and buy that way.

Michael.9403:

Of course, my friend could not log in during those times, as he only started yesterday, from scratch.

So not only do the expansions need to be purchases, as I expected, but even mini-content stuff needs to be purchased too for new starters?

Only content that was released before purchase. After purchase, content (with the exception of expansions) is free. Of course, all Living World Season Episodes (except Season 1, which is not available for play for anyone at this time) is obtainable at no real cash cost utilizing the Gold-to-Gems exchange. Nowadays, Gold is not especially difficult to obtain, and previously, once Seasons are over, one can purchase Episodes in a bundled package at a discount.

If you are especially concerned, send your friend some Gold to exchange to Gems, once the exchange rate drops back down. I’m sure your friend won’t need to access Living World Season 3 for some time.

Seems pretty fair to me. Good luck.

Think about it this way: ANet charges gems for the Living Story and gives veterans a loyalty reward of exactly enough gems to get the LS without cost to them.

I’m not a big fan of the practice, since I think it does exactly the opposite of what ANet hoped for by bundling the core game with the expansion: it separates the community, rather than uniting it.

All the same, it seems completely fair for a business to want to charge for new content and to incentivize players to (a) buy sooner rather than later and (b) login in more frequently.

DeanBB.4268:

If he doesn’t want to spend cash, he can convert gold to gems and buy that way.

I have done that the entire game. Gold is very easy to come by and I’ve bought bank slots to total 14, full shared memory, characters up to 13 from whatever the startup number was, a lifetime pass to Royal Terrace, and a number of 1-of items.

Still, that represents a lot of hours, and after a day of basically getting organized, he’s not there. When I offer to fund it for him, he opines that I could have just bought the account for him, ran him up to Super Hero Extraordinaire, bought all the good stuff, and told him how good whatever I’d named his character had done. I.e about the same answer as any true gamer who plays himself to the top would have given.

None of the LS come bundled with the any purchase. They are either free if you log in during that initial time, or you have to pay (new or veteran, it is the same cost to catch up). LS1 is the exception as that has gone, possibly for good.

I’m not overly keen on the way this is presented, in part because it is unclear to new players unless you venture onto the Wiki or Forums, but also because it makes it hard to recommend the game to people at times when you have these additional costs which aren’t full expacs to try and explain as well.

FWIW, you can absolutely purchase the episodes for in-game gold (via gem conversion), so you don’t have to spend more real world money to eventually be able to go back and get them.