Seems like ANet overlooked a major flaw

Seems like ANet overlooked a major flaw

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Posted by: Minos.5168

Minos.5168

The benefit to setting up GW1 as being primarily instanced was the minimal server costs (really just for towns).

They’ve designed GW2 as mostly persistent, so there’s bound to be higher server costs and they’ll have to find ways to recoup those costs.

The people that ArenaNet is now catering to will not likely be very apt to pay $10 for some new skin… They’ll be like “Why am I paying for skins? I don’t even want to grind for a skin. They need to sell me gear with better stats.”

What happens when they start selling more powerful infusions (or including them in Black Lion chests)?

This is why stat-grind was a bad idea. They’ve started catering to people that want a free-to-play MMO with vertical progression, rather than stick to the horizontal progression (where they had their niché market).

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Posted by: Apathy.6430

Apathy.6430

So many leaps in logic

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Posted by: Minos.5168

Minos.5168

They’ve essentially lost anyone that bought the game based around horizontal progression.

I, for one, am not likely to ever again buy any gems (and, I’ve already spent more on gems than I would have on a comparable subscription.)

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Posted by: greg.3792

greg.3792

Server costs are tiny compared to labor costs.

tiny…

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Posted by: InfiniteRetro.9865

InfiniteRetro.9865

its not server costs dude, its bandwidth. THAT is the kicker. something most f2p diehards fail to realise hence why f2p is a fail design.

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Posted by: Rakuren Kenshou.7689

Rakuren Kenshou.7689

They’ve essentially lost anyone that bought the game based around horizontal progression.

I, for one, am not likely to ever again buy any gems (and, I’ve already spent more on gems than I would have on a comparable subscription.)

I bought the game based around horizontal progression. I loved GW1 and wanted to see a mix between GW1 and some more conventional MMO as well as some new ideas.

They haven’t lost me. I don’t mind ascended stuff. And I don’t mind spending gems on things I like (I’ve only done it once so far).

I’ll be honest though, if “ascended” becomes a yearly thing, where each year they release a new king of gear “tier” with slightly higher stats, it will probably bother me.

But at the same time, I’m willing to look at the game as a whole. If they keep rocking out dynamic quest style content, new areas, and new content in general (for free might I add), I will certainly stick around either way.

“I reject your reality and substitute my own.”

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Posted by: Reaver.9256

Reaver.9256

They’ve essentially lost anyone that bought the game based around horizontal progression.

I, for one, am not likely to ever again buy any gems (and, I’ve already spent more on gems than I would have on a comparable subscription.)

I bought the game based around horizontal progression. I loved GW1 and wanted to see a mix between GW1 and some more conventional MMO as well as some new ideas.

They haven’t lost me. I don’t mind ascended stuff. And I don’t mind spending gems on things I like (I’ve only done it once so far).

I’ll be honest though, if “ascended” becomes a yearly thing, where each year they release a new king of gear “tier” with slightly higher stats, it will probably bother me.

But at the same time, I’m willing to look at the game as a whole. If they keep rocking out dynamic quest style content, new areas, and new content in general (for free might I add), I will certainly stick around either way.

Every expansion will have new higher stat loot, and I’m sure even more in between. They stated no new tiers as in rare-exotic-legendary. WOW hasn’t had a new “tier” as they describe it since the base game legendary tier was added I believe(haven’t played in years).

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Posted by: NastyPiggy.2046

NastyPiggy.2046

its not server costs dude, its bandwidth. THAT is the kicker. something most f2p diehards fail to realise hence why f2p is a fail design.

Not really, maybe in the 90s, but since the 2000s, bandwidth for companies isn’t that big of a concern.

Think of it this way, Netflix can charge 8 bucks a month for unlimited streaming(and that uses WAY more bandwidth then an MMO)… and they’re making a ton of money.

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Posted by: Minos.5168

Minos.5168

And keeping servers up and running requires employees to be monitoring them (and on-call, in the event that a server crashes).

Even if you neglect the additional costs from running a server, they’ve still got a full staff of people working on the game.

I mean, why does any MMORPG need to make money? To pay the employees (and make money for shareholders).

Obviously there’s higher costs with a persistent game where so many more things can go wrong. (Pretty much all the NPC bugs/glitches get fixed —for a while-- when the servers reset. If there was instancing, this would happen whenever an instance is created. This is just one example.)

My point being: The people ArenaNet has decided to cater to are the same group of people that are wondering “Why do Legendaries take so long to craft when there’s no notable benefit (beyond looks)?”

ArenaNet’s current gem store selection involves:
A) consumables that aren’t really necessary
B) character slots (but with vertical progression, you’re going to likely favor fewer characters over many since it’ll require grind to get them all Ascended gear)
C) bank tabs and bag slots (of which, you can only purchase so many)
D) skins/costumes that provide no real benefit in the game
E) Gems → Gold

Why would someone that didn’t want to grind for a legendary purchase skins (with real money)?

The skins were the main feature that I remember from the GW1 store. Character slots and bank tabs were great… but you’d only purchase those up to a certain point.

The GW live team kept adding new costumes to the store every few months. I’d imagine that was/is their main source of income after the release of EotN.

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Posted by: InfiniteRetro.9865

InfiniteRetro.9865

its not server costs dude, its bandwidth. THAT is the kicker. something most f2p diehards fail to realise hence why f2p is a fail design.

Not really, maybe in the 90s, but since the 2000s, bandwidth for companies isn’t that big of a concern.

Think of it this way, Netflix can charge 8 bucks a month for unlimited streaming(and that uses WAY more bandwidth then an MMO)… and they’re making a ton of money.

um dude thats movie streaming vs having actual game servers. /facepalm.

anyway. bandwidth is what costs, and since anet cannot back up anyones hacked account with whatever was stolen then i’d take a sub fee if it ensured that security.

anyone that plays an mmo and the company has no way of restoring their entire account are wasting their time.

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Posted by: Sollith.3502

Sollith.3502

I’ve played my share of f2p’s and its not really like what is described in the OP. Hell, the f2p’s I have played are Nexon hosted games, the company that everyone likes to bash on, and it’s not like what has been described. I think you are thinking of Perfect World or something… but not all f2p’s are pay to wins.

Here is the cost at most for two f2p games I have played (unless you just like to waste money):

Vindictus
20$ for enhancement runes (gets you a +10 weapon easily on average; +8’s sell on the market for fairly cheap and they are also viable end game)
Player skill can make up for a lot in this game (high enhancements aren’t necessary, but hey some people need that feeling of progression, because they lack actual skill lol)

Dragon Nest
No real need to pay for anything, but I do buy skins in game. Armor/weapon stats are scaled in PvP, so it’s not necessary (the best pvpers in DN are probably some of the poorest players in the game lol). Player skill can make for a lot in this game as well, but having a decent weapon can help in dungeons (similar to Vindictus).

Having a good gachapon can help make money in a game; especially when there are special cosmetics you can’t really get anywhere else in them. In Dragon Nest wings and mounts are a powerful draw to their gachapon (Dragon Eggs or something, and you can’t even use mounts in actual dungeon runs lol), which makes them a ton of money.

You don’t have to have a pay to win setup in order to make money, but I’m sure it can make a quick buck in the short term before everyone abandons ship lol.

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Posted by: Rakuren Kenshou.7689

Rakuren Kenshou.7689

Every expansion will have new higher stat loot, and I’m sure even more in between. They stated no new tiers as in rare-exotic-legendary. WOW hasn’t had a new “tier” as they describe it since the base game legendary tier was added I believe(haven’t played in years).

Yes, I’m quite sure that each expansion will feature new loot at the highest stat. It’s only the tiers I’m worried about.

Just like half of the forum can choose to read everything negatively, I can choose to read what the company posts as positive. New high stat gear, as in new gear which has the highest stats currently available.

Sounds good. Roughly just translates out to new gear. New skins = awesome.

Really is just coming down to an argument of RAW vs RAI. Do we have to try to decipher everything everyone says down to the letter and make conspiracy theories about everything?

“I reject your reality and substitute my own.”

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Posted by: Minos.5168

Minos.5168

I’ve played my share of f2p’s and its not really like what is described in the OP. Hell, the f2p’s I have played are Nexon hosted games, the company that everyone likes to bash on, and it’s not like what has been described. I think you are thinking of Perfect World or something… but not all f2p’s are pay to wins.

Here is the cost at most for two f2p games I have played (unless you just like to waste money):

Vindictus
20$ for enhancement runes (gets you a +10 weapon easily on average; +8’s sell on the market for fairly cheap and they are also viable end game)
Player skill can make up for a lot in this game (high enhancements aren’t necessary, but hey some people need that feeling of progression, because they lack actual skill lol)

Dragon Nest
No real need to pay for anything, but I do buy skins in game. Armor/weapon stats are scaled in PvP, so it’s not necessary (the best pvpers in DN are probably some of the poorest players in the game lol). Player skill can make for a lot in this game as well, but having a decent weapon can help in dungeons (similar to Vindictus).

Having a good gachapon can help make money in a game; especially when there are special cosmetics you can’t really get anywhere else in them. In Dragon Nest wings and mounts are a powerful draw to their gachapon (Dragon Eggs or something, and you can’t even use mounts in actual dungeon runs lol), which makes them a ton of money.

You don’t have to have a pay to win setup in order to make money, but I’m sure it can make a quick buck in the short term before everyone abandons ship lol.

I’m merely stating that their current methods of monetization don’t seem like they’ll last. Especially considering that most people were greatly disappointed by the BLC Halloween gear and Consortium chests. (You could get most Consortium chest stuff from the TP for vastly cheaper than taking your chances with the chests.)

Selling costumes/skins won’t appease the subset of people that “need” gear progression for a “proper” end-game.

They’ll have to do like you said Vindictus does, and sell infusions that give you an extra +5 to stats and agony resistance (beyond whatever the max-level infusion will give)

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Posted by: Rakuren Kenshou.7689

Rakuren Kenshou.7689

They’ll have to do like you said Vindictus does, and sell infusions that give you an extra +5 to stats and agony resistance (beyond whatever the max-level infusion will give)

They won’t sell actual gear on the gem store. They won’t sell runes on the gem store. That isn’t what the gem store is for.

If you’re going to start assuming things like that, let’s see how much further we can take this.

“They are going to have to start selling legendaries on the gem store, because people really want them and they are hard to get.”

“They are going to sell an option where you automatically become level 80 without working, because new players don’t want to have to “grind” to get to level 80."

“I don’t want to actually play a game, so instead, I can pay 4000 gems and suddenly become “king of the game”. I will own everything and be able to force any player to do anything I want. Someone can buy this title from me by paying 4500 to the gem store."

There is a difference between a misread manifesto and “giving players an advantage by using the gem store”.

“I reject your reality and substitute my own.”

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Posted by: Reaver.9256

Reaver.9256

Every expansion will have new higher stat loot, and I’m sure even more in between. They stated no new tiers as in rare-exotic-legendary. WOW hasn’t had a new “tier” as they describe it since the base game legendary tier was added I believe(haven’t played in years).

Yes, I’m quite sure that each expansion will feature new loot at the highest stat. It’s only the tiers I’m worried about.

Just like half of the forum can choose to read everything negatively, I can choose to read what the company posts as positive. New high stat gear, as in new gear which has the highest stats currently available.

Sounds good. Roughly just translates out to new gear. New skins = awesome.

Really is just coming down to an argument of RAW vs RAI. Do we have to try to decipher everything everyone says down to the letter and make conspiracy theories about everything?

The way I see it happening now is they’ll be releasing the new ascended set over a long period of time, where a game like WoW will have 2-3-maybe 4 rare tier sets in that same time. There will be vertical progression, but it’s at a much much slower and lower pace than other games. It’ll also be much easier to get the gear than something like having to raid a lot in WoW. As a fan of vertical progression it sounds really good to me. Someone who likes horizontal progression probably still won’t love it, but it’s not gonna be a really that hard to keep up in the long run.

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Posted by: Danikat.8537

Danikat.8537

One thing no one seems to have pointed out yet is that a lot of people have been practically demanding (or literally demanding) skins to buy in the gem shop.

No they don’t like adding a gambling element, but there has been a lot of demand for skins as a straight purchase. So I don’t think you need to worry about skins they do offer not selling.

Danielle Aurorel, Dear Dragon We Got Your Cookies [Nom], Desolation (EU).

“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”

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Posted by: Shilian.5873

Shilian.5873

maybe we just don’t see the big picture, could it be that they want an endless recycling circle of ppl that buy the game, play it for 2 month and then rage quit?
if everyone on the planet plays gw2 for 1 day it’s a win for them

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Posted by: Rakuren Kenshou.7689

Rakuren Kenshou.7689

The way I see it happening now is they’ll be releasing the new ascended set over a long period of time, where a game like WoW will have 2-3-maybe 4 rare tier sets in that same time. There will be vertical progression, but it’s at a much much slower and lower pace than other games. It’ll also be much easier to get the gear than something like having to raid a lot in WoW. As a fan of vertical progression it sounds really good to me. Someone who likes horizontal progression probably still won’t love it, but it’s not gonna be a really that hard to keep up in the long run.

Agreed. They are basically trying to please everyone.

If you want to play a game with zero grind. Done. Play through level 1-80. Do your story, do dungeons, explore the map, play a little PVP and WvW on the side. You’ve probably just played enough of the game to easily make it worth your money. And I doubt you’re doing playing yet.

If you want to play a game with a little grind, work on getting max exotic equipment (maybe even two sets if you want to have a few playstyle options). Most of this will come from the exploring you did above. Level your crafting skills up, again, most of the materials come the adventuring you did above. Possibly a little grind, but very little. And certainly not necessary.

If you want to grind a lot and get REALLY COOL items, then you can do that too! Work through FotM to get ascended gear! And over the course of months (maybe even years), gather the equipment necessary to forge your legendary weapon!

They are giving everyone options. But instead of seeing that, a huge number of players instead seem to read this…

“Ignore personal story, it’s stupid. Has nothing to do with max gear. Dungeons are cool, if you want the title or need to farm tokens for the skin you want. Fractals are neat, but I ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO have max level gear because I don’t want to reduce the speed of my runs by even a minute! I have to do it as fast as I can. After I get pure ascended gear, I will get my lengendary by grinding as hard as I can for 1 WEEK. And then I will be perfect, and nobody will ever be able to be better than me because this game does not offer higher stats or new loot. So I will always be perfect, for years to come, and me being perfect will make this game non-boring and super interesting to me for years to come!”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own.”

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Posted by: Volomon.9147

Volomon.9147

its not server costs dude, its bandwidth. THAT is the kicker. something most f2p diehards fail to realise hence why f2p is a fail design.

Not really, maybe in the 90s, but since the 2000s, bandwidth for companies isn’t that big of a concern.

Think of it this way, Netflix can charge 8 bucks a month for unlimited streaming(and that uses WAY more bandwidth then an MMO)… and they’re making a ton of money.

um dude thats movie streaming vs having actual game servers. /facepalm.

anyway. bandwidth is what costs, and since anet cannot back up anyones hacked account with whatever was stolen then i’d take a sub fee if it ensured that security.

anyone that plays an mmo and the company has no way of restoring their entire account are wasting their time.

Actually I think Nasty is right, I mean streaming via Netflix or some other service is like up to 8gb (compressed) streaming for a 1080p video. The Bandwidth for these games like WoW and stuff really was never a problem even in the 90s. Where the subscription was $9.99 average. Look at Call of Duty for instance although they use Peer to Peer in most instance except for BO2. They still run dedicated servers.

The bandwidth requirement for a game is only heavy during patching and updates. What are you sending to their servers nothing but clicks and keyboard presses. Basically stuff that can be broken down into binary. Your not streaming entire movies back and forth and your not streaming the video graphics that you see on your PC. Even still a company can still stream that level of graphics for $9.99 a month and more than covers the bandwidth. These games use to run off of 56k modems. So there’s not really much bandwidth there. In fact there is really no EFFECTIVE BANDWIDTH requirement there is only the need for a lagless connection or (no losses). Your not really sending anything and your not receiving anything except position updates, loots, and other very minimal stats.

Free servers use to be the average thing, they’ve only recently started charging money for these kinds of things with rented servers ala Counter-Strike and have become mainstream to the point where people accept a price for them with Xbox360 and it’s services.

So in conclusion your wrong.

(edited by Volomon.9147)

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Posted by: xiede.8543

xiede.8543

um dude thats movie streaming vs having actual game servers. /facepalm.

anyway. bandwidth is what costs, and since anet cannot back up anyones hacked account with whatever was stolen then i’d take a sub fee if it ensured that security.

anyone that plays an mmo and the company has no way of restoring their entire account are wasting their time.

A couple years back, Netflix was eating almost a third of the peak North American downstream traffic.

http://investor.activision.com/results.cfm

Go dig through their financials. You will find that server and bandwidth is really a blip on the actual financial radar… and let’s face it… it’s WoW… you’d expect that it would be a lot more then it is.

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Posted by: Hobocop.1508

Hobocop.1508

Bandwidth costs are footnotes in the financial reports for these companies.

Most ongoing costs are paying personnel to maintain these services.

Just check NCSoft’s Q3 earnings report. Bandwidth costs are placed into the ‘other’ category, hardly even significant enough to warrant it’s own classification.

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Posted by: Volomon.9147

Volomon.9147

Really bandwidth is nothing these days, Google has been rolling out 100GB networks. Granted it’s only in Kansas so far but bandwidth will continue to go down in price.

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Posted by: arcaneclarity.5283

arcaneclarity.5283

Server and bandwidth costs would be the roughly the same regardless if GW2 was persistent or not. In fact, it could have very well went up with major instancing since everything happening on the server would have to be replicated for each individual instead of just once for 500 or so people.

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Posted by: Minos.5168

Minos.5168

Server and bandwidth costs would be the roughly the same regardless if GW2 was persistent or not. In fact, it could have very well went up with major instancing since everything happening on the server would have to be replicated for each individual instead of just once for 500 or so people.

Instancing takes the burden of “hosting” off of the server and places it on the players. ArenaNet only had to actually host the town hubs.

This is why Diablo and Starcraft don’t charge anything for Battle.Net access (and Guild Wars was initially designed by people that designed those).

One player “hosts” the instance and everyone else’s machine just copies it.

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Posted by: Infernia.9847

Infernia.9847

They could make their Gem store something worth checking on a daily basis, something worth paying money for Gems.
At present the Gem store is lackluster at best as far as personalization goes or any offering for that matter. Where are the skins for town clothing or armor skins, weapon skins, the ability to simply add a specific color to a weapon?
More mini-pets, break down mini-pets into smaller groups so that people who are aiming for specific types know they have a higher probability of getting one.
Even better, offer a ranger pet that is holiday specific. <- that was a bit corny but I’ll bet it would sell.
Give people good choices and they will pay for them.

Blackgate : Level 80 Ranger, Necro, Guardian, Warrior
Devs: Trait Challenge Issued

(edited by Infernia.9847)

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Posted by: arcaneclarity.5283

arcaneclarity.5283

Server and bandwidth costs would be the roughly the same regardless if GW2 was persistent or not. In fact, it could have very well went up with major instancing since everything happening on the server would have to be replicated for each individual instead of just once for 500 or so people.

Instancing takes the burden of “hosting” off of the server and places it on the players. ArenaNet only had to actually host the town hubs.

This is why Diablo and Starcraft don’t charge anything for Battle.Net access (and Guild Wars was initially designed by people that designed those).

One player “hosts” the instance and everyone else’s machine just copies it.

Sorry, but you are wrong. If it was host side, it would be easily hackable to the point they could just copy all the magical items they want. Everything is still server side, regardless if it is instanced or not.

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Posted by: Asglarek.8976

Asglarek.8976

They’ll have to do like you said Vindictus does, and sell infusions that give you an extra +5 to stats and agony resistance (beyond whatever the max-level infusion will give)

They won’t sell actual gear on the gem store. They won’t sell runes on the gem store. That isn’t what the gem store is for.

If you’re going to start assuming things like that, let’s see how much further we can take this.

“They are going to have to start selling legendaries on the gem store, because people really want them and they are hard to get.”

“They are going to sell an option where you automatically become level 80 without working, because new players don’t want to have to “grind” to get to level 80."

“I don’t want to actually play a game, so instead, I can pay 4000 gems and suddenly become “king of the game”. I will own everything and be able to force any player to do anything I want. Someone can buy this title from me by paying 4500 to the gem store."

There is a difference between a misread manifesto and “giving players an advantage by using the gem store”.

That was the whole point of the manifesto. Gear would not determine a characters power level skill would thats exactly why exotics we easily attained and legendaries were exotics with fancy skins so if AN had adhered to their manifesto it wouldnt pf matter if you could buy a premade, fully exotic level 80 because we were all suppose to be the same gear wise.

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Posted by: Minos.5168

Minos.5168

Sorry, but you are wrong. If it was host side, it would be easily hackable to the point they could just copy all the magical items they want. Everything is still server side, regardless if it is instanced or not.

I wasn’t saying that you were completely disconnected from ArenaNet. You needed a constant connection to continue to play (much like you do with Diablo and Starcraft).

This connection allows them to ensure that you don’t modify the instance through hacking. This is why D3 prevents offline single-player.

That doesn’t mean Blizzard hosts every D3 single-player game. That’s just absurd thinking on your part. Likewise, ArenaNet doesn’t have to “host” instances to make sure you aren’t cheating. You “join someone else’s game” when playing multiplayer.

I’m not going to bother arguing about this any further… since it’s not at all related to my argument.

My primary argument is that they have costs (and these costs are higher than GW1).
They need to cover these costs (in addition to paying off whatever investments were made to cover development).

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Posted by: arcaneclarity.5283

arcaneclarity.5283

Sorry, but you are wrong. If it was host side, it would be easily hackable to the point they could just copy all the magical items they want. Everything is still server side, regardless if it is instanced or not.

I wasn’t saying that you were completely disconnected from ArenaNet. You needed a constant connection to continue to play (much like you do with Diablo and Starcraft).

This connection allows them to ensure that you don’t modify the instance through hacking. This is why D3 prevents offline single-player.

That doesn’t mean Blizzard hosts every D3 single-player game. That’s just absurd thinking on your part. Likewise, ArenaNet doesn’t have to “host” instances to make sure you aren’t cheating. You “join someone else’s game” when playing multiplayer.

I’m not going to bother arguing about this any further… since it’s not at all related to my argument.

My primary argument is that they have costs (and these costs are higher than GW1).
They need to cover these costs (in addition to paying off whatever investments were made to cover development).

Do you even know what hosting is?

Costs may or may not be higher. Technology advanced, both in things like dynamic events and world size, but so has bandwidth and servers. The one common theme of the internet is everything has become cheaper. When Neverwinter Nights Online was out in the 90s, you paid an hourly rate. Bandwidth and server space was really expensive.

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Posted by: Volomon.9147

Volomon.9147

Sorry, but you are wrong. If it was host side, it would be easily hackable to the point they could just copy all the magical items they want. Everything is still server side, regardless if it is instanced or not.

I wasn’t saying that you were completely disconnected from ArenaNet. You needed a constant connection to continue to play (much like you do with Diablo and Starcraft).

This connection allows them to ensure that you don’t modify the instance through hacking. This is why D3 prevents offline single-player.

That doesn’t mean Blizzard hosts every D3 single-player game. That’s just absurd thinking on your part. Likewise, ArenaNet doesn’t have to “host” instances to make sure you aren’t cheating. You “join someone else’s game” when playing multiplayer.

I’m not going to bother arguing about this any further… since it’s not at all related to my argument.

My primary argument is that they have costs (and these costs are higher than GW1).
They need to cover these costs (in addition to paying off whatever investments were made to cover development).

No offense Minos but I don’t think you know what your talking about. Especially with D3, they do host every single game. They keep graphs of every single loot item you get everything. They use these metrics to find bots and hackers. What your thinking is you run your connection they check you for hacks ect ect,. like it was punkbuster or something but that’s not how it works their running the whole environment there absolutely 0% of that content that is on your side. When you get loot your running off of a server side loot table. Everything is server side the random spawns, everything. That’s part of how they prevent you from hacking.

D3 is the worst example you could use since they have the money to provide extra services on their servers like the metrics and graphing. They have individual servers for their auction house, servers for cross game communication Wow TO D3 for example. Not only do they host all those games but they also have servers for all the extra services.