Guild Wars 2

Back in 2010, when information about dye was being released, the following statement was made:

The dye hues themselves will be unlockable through various means, both in-game and out. Once you unlock the color, it will be available across your entire account, not just the individual character.

http://www.arena.net/blog/live-and-let-dye-kristen-perry-on-the-gw2-dye-system

What caused you to change that? I can honestly say that I was really excited over the dye system when I heard about that, finally not having to worry about having alts and repurchasing the same expensive dyes. But when I got into GW2 I was greeted with a very different, more Asian grinder style dye system that required the exact same dye be purchased across multiple toons. It was a major let down, to say the least.

Does anyone know the reason this was changed?

It is a very boring idea for long term play because once you’ve unlocked the palettes on your first character, it become a useless game feature forever.

Haishao.6851:

It is a very boring idea for long term play because once you’ve unlocked the palettes on your first character, it become a useless game feature forever.

There’s nearly 400 dyes, aren’t there? With some being more rare than others. I’m just curious how close anyone is to unlocking them all.

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

Edge.4180:

Haishao.6851:

It is a very boring idea for long term play because once you’ve unlocked the palettes on your first character, it become a useless game feature forever.

There’s nearly 400 dyes, aren’t there? With some being more rare than others. I’m just curious how close anyone is to unlocking them all.

Do you need to unlock them all? I mean at the end of the day there are some dyes that are barely distinguishable from each other once applied to armor or clothing.

I am fine with the dyes being character based, its a long term game. It seems that some players want every dye unlocked for all of their characters within a few weeks. Who cares if it takes 3 years or 3 weeks?

Dyes are also craftable, so having them character bound is going to add some long term viability for crafters making some coin out selling dyes. If it were account bound, the dyes, no matter how rare they were would eventually and very quickly become worthless.

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

Pro tip: if they didn’t make money the game wouldn’t be around. Nothing in life is free my friend.

m

JoxerNL.3752:

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

Pro tip: if they didn’t make money the game wouldn’t be around. Nothing in life is free my friend.

Im confused why your trying to explain something so basic and simple to me?
Did you assume i was complaining?
I was being blunt, as that seems to be the only way to get through to people on these forums.

And please dont assume your my friend, i detest such fake messages of other people posing as such.

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

The dyes you can buy with gems are the same you can buy, find, craft in game.
You can’t even know what you’ll get. So there’s even big chance that you spend money to buy dyes and get some that you already have or are worth nothing more than a few copper on TP.

Whats funny is that with the old method, there were supposed to have palettes that are only exclusively available on Gemstore and nowhere else. But that was fine right?

Selling dye packs that give your random dyes that drop in game is because they want your money though.

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

Can’t talk for others, but for me it didn’t worked, because I would buy colours if it would be for all characters, but since it is only for one character I will not buy because it seems to be not worth it.

Salt.4621:

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

Pro tip: if they didn’t make money the game wouldn’t be around. Nothing in life is free my friend.

This is true, but I don’t think anyone has really considered just everything they’re doing to make money.

1) This dyes thing
2) Dropping a kittenload of Black Lion Chests and marking them as fine to trigger an impulse to buy keys or manipulate someone’s OCD who can’t stand to leave them locked
3) All the diminishing returns. They are only in the game to make you fed up with the crap loot you’re getting and resort to buying gems and converting to gold.

I am willing to bet that every feature that goes in to the game is built around a principle of the player needing to spend more money in the cash shop.
I love this game and I love everything in it, but I think the way ArenaNet handles things is incrediblykitten poor.

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

Huh…if that was true…why bother making discoveries or crafting available from your bank?

Money money money.

Personally I like it this way, I get to sell more dye.

But hay if they change it, ill still get to sell dye, so either way win win

Yes I prefer dyes be usable by all toons on an account! I’ve already spent over a $100 dollars on dyes from the gem store thinking they were usable by all toons on my account…

Vorch.2985:

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

Huh…if that was true…why bother making discoveries or crafting available from your bank?

Doesn’t lose them money to do so? >_>

Does it really matter ? Who cares about dye anyway…

It makes for a better game economy when dyes are rarer and what better way to make them rarer than to make them per character .

it makes the dye economic more alive since dyes are not a consumable that can be used only once like GW.

Edge.4180:

Haishao.6851:

It is a very boring idea for long term play because once you’ve unlocked the palettes on your first character, it become a useless game feature forever.

There’s nearly 400 dyes, aren’t there? With some being more rare than others. I’m just curious how close anyone is to unlocking them all.

I am not playing nearly as much as a lot of people will be, my highest level character is level 69, but that character has every fine quality dye, more than half of the masterwork dye, and a reasonable number of the rare dyes (20ish).
I’m sure there are people who already have them all, and outside of the last few extremely expensive blacks and whites, I’ll have them all fairly soon myself.

2) Dropping a kittenload of Black Lion Chests and marking them as fine to trigger an impulse to buy keys or manipulate someone’s OCD who can’t stand to leave them locked

Don’t blame the game if there are crazy people like that, also no the game is not designed around needing to use the CS at all, the only time I bought gems was when I had spare cash and bought 2 storage expansions, did I feel it was needed? Not in the slightest, I just did it to support the game and I wanted more space, I didn’t need it.

Spicyhash speaks the truth:

“I am willing to bet that every feature that goes in to the game is built around a principle of the player needing to spend more money in the cash shop.”

Everything is geared to steer you to the cash shop, this is just another example of it. GW2 is one giant gold sink.

Seems like instead of prolonging the system by making it character bound, they could have added more exotic dyes, instead. How about gradient dyes, and that sort of thing? There are much more fun ways to extend the system, and even monetize it, instead of just gutting it.

Unfortunately I’m one of the players that doesn’t log 90+ hours per week. So gaining 4 or 5 dye a week is a major improvement to my spectrum. I do not want to waste what little time and energy I have into farming dyes for EACH toon. I whole heartedly support account-wide dye options. If you believe having dyes character-bound is the correct way to go, I would need a valid reason why…

Haishao.6851:

It is a very boring idea for long term play because once you’ve unlocked the palettes on your first character, it become a useless game feature forever.

I’m more worried about the market for them crashing if they make them account bound. Right now the unidentified dyes score about 6s on the market. If they became account bound, they would pay out significantly less.

The last thing we need is for the economy to get even more borked than it already is.

Understandable Hickeroar, but you also have to take into account the number of new players who will not have any dye. The market for dyes will never vanish and the ‘hit’ that the market would take would be mild at worst.

@Mitissa
The hit would be mild? Sorry, but I don’t think so, we won’t have an absurd influx of new players forever to keep demand reasonable. It would very much ruin the purpose of having a dye market. Most dyes are ridiculously cheap either way, we don’t need account-bound ones.

Haishao.6851:

It is a very boring idea for long term play because once you’ve unlocked the palettes on your first character, it become a useless game feature forever.

I agree.

its rather funny because in the beta it was account based when i first started getting dyes i noticed it was changed to character only it does suck

Well the orginal information was from 2010 and they reserved the right to change any feature of the game in development. Also yes the dyes were account based during the betas but they were also account bound. The community wanted to make dyes tradeable and asked ANET to do this, but this would result in the dye in the gem shop useless. While the current system also does this to a degree making the dyes unlock for the character only preserves the market for dyes for the players as well makes buying dyes from the gem store. Just the fact that the dye was changed to tradeable will hurt the sales of dye from the gem store.

Dyes are like 50c on the TP.

Not to sound like a giant fanboy pollyanna (obviously this limitation is intended to encourage Black Lion purchases), but as someone leveling five alts I actually kind of enjoy choosing which character’s individual palette a new color should go in.

Earth tones for my ranger, sunset colors for my mesmer, silvers and greys for my guardian … but who gets this blue? It’s fun.

Common dyes are cheap on the TP. Rare ones are very expensive. Unidentified ones are somewhere around 6s.

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

This guy got the right answer.

I hope you realize that by making them character bound it led to them making them tradable.

By making them tradable they’re probably selling A MASSIVE amount less.

Why would I gamble at buying dyes when I can buy the one I want right away?

Auto.3426:

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

This guy got the right answer.

Except you can craft dyes via cooking (free) and even better you can buy the dye you want from the TP (still free) or buy a unidentified dye from the TP (free also).

I don’t see a problems with dyes as they are now.

cause it’ll keep people playing, If you unlock them all on one character then you don’t have to worry about it, BUT if you have to do it on them all then..yes there are people who will do this. It’s a cheap way to get people playing longer

If they wanted to string people along and make money in the cash shop, why didn’t they keep the dyes the way they originally were obtainable.

“players were required to obtain Colorful Dye Seeds that required cultivation back in the “Home” area. Cultivation took either 24 real world hours, or the purchase of an item from the Gem shop. Once cultivated it would drop a soulbound, unidentified dye; that dye would unlock a new color. This system has since been replaced."

Thats like the basis of Zynga’s get rich quick with farmville scheme, it’ll keep people who have to get them all playing for over a year and people who can’t wait will use the cash shop AND it actually gives some kind of use for the home instance.

Auto.3426:

JoxerNL.3752:

@OP : Because they figured they could sell dyes in their cash shop.
Making Money > Catering to Players

This guy got the right answer.

Let me requote myself

Haishao.6851:

The dyes you can buy with gems are the same you can buy, find, craft in game.
You can’t even know what you’ll get. So there’s even big chance that you spend money to buy dyes and get some that you already have or are worth nothing more than a few copper on TP.

Whats funny is that with the old method, there were supposed to have palettes that are only exclusively available on Gemstore and nowhere else. But that was fine right?

Selling dye packs that give your random dyes that drop in game is because they want your money though.