Guild Wars 2

So I was thinking, sometimes after a while, I manage to get a full black lion ticket.
Now, lately, there hasn’t been much of value of in the weapons trading post, and all the good skins are so old they cost 5 tickets by now, which is kind of insane.

So I was thinking, now that the stormbow came out, I thought, hey, thats a nice skin.
And it so happens I have a black lion ticket that I won’t be spending on any of the current BL-weapon skins anytime soon. So here’s my idea, and please don’t shoot it down without proper counter argument:

Exchange a black lion ticket for anything from the cosmetics tab of the Black Lion store with a gem value of, but not exceeding, 600 gems.

This seems like a fair trade since it costs averagely 20-25 keys to make 1 ticket, which at its most expensive equivates 20*125=2500 gems.
What’s the public opinion on this idea?

One argument against it is key running and map clearance which get you “free” tickets. For example, right now I have 7 tickets from doing the above, for which I didn’t pay a single thin dime. With your idea I could change them into items valued at 4200 gems or $52.50. Which would be $52.50 in lost sales for ANet.

Just hold on to the ticket. They have new weapon skins once or twice a month.

Amaimon.7823:

… and all the good skins are so old they cost 5 tickets by now, which is kind of insane.

I never really understood why this is. To get a full set of skins in the 5-ticket department, it would take around 75 Black Lion Tickets to complete this achievement.

My ears, that’s crazy!

Amaimon.7823:

Now, lately, there hasn’t been much of value of in the weapons trading post,

40 gold minimum for a single ticket seems like “much of value” to me. Mind you, it’s not as good as the 120g/ticket we used to see, but then again, there’s a ton of people like yourself hoarding tickets for “just the right set”.

Amaimon.7823:

Exchange a black lion ticket for anything from the cosmetics tab of the Black Lion store with a gem value of, but not exceeding, 600 gems.

At best, BL tickets are worth ~400 gems in theoretical value, using the historical price of ~100-120g per ticket. Today, you’d get maybe 100-120 gems.

Amaimon.7823:

This seems like a fair trade since it costs averagely 20-25 keys to make 1 ticket, which at its most expensive equivates 20*125=2500 gems.

That doesn’t sound like a fair trade. It’s basically saying you can buy BL keys without risk, since you’re guaranteed to be able to return BL tickets for gem-equivalent items.

BL keys aren’t designed to guarantee value — they are lotto tickets and the value is entirely in the entertainment one gets from anticipating the possibility of a valuable drop among the junk that everyone usually gets.

In other words, if you don’t want the BL weapon skins, convert them to whatever existing skins are worth the most per ticket, sell those on the TP and then do what you like with the gold.
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Amaimon.7823:

Amaimon.7823:

… and all the good skins are so old they cost 5 tickets by now, which is kind of insane.

I never really understood why this is. To get a full set of skins in the 5-ticket department, it would take around 75 Black Lion Tickets to complete this achievement.

Which is why no one does that. Anyone interested in 5-ticket skins can buy five of the current 1-ticket skins and sell those; the proceeds are more than enough to purchase the desired skin (if you price/choose wisely). Using aggressive buy orders…

• 28 tickets can be converted to various Embellished skins and sold for a net value of 1,000g (after fees). That’s enough to afford:
• The full set of Soaring skins costs ~970g, although it would cost 48 tickets, since it’s 3 each right now.
• Full Balthazar ~680g or 75 tix (currently: 5 per)
• 7 other sets can be acquired for under 1,000g, including Crimson Lion, which can’t be bought for BL tix

tl;dr savvy traders won’t spend tickets on old skins sets (although there are some niche exceptions); they’ll buy outright on the TP (perhaps converting 1-ticket skins to gold to defray expenses)