Guild Wars 2

SoPP.7034:

In essence as a veteran player I came away feeling that non of the pre-purchase deals suited me and as a result I went away with a collective ‘hmmmph’ and still haven’t pre-purchased it.

This was my feeling as well, none of the options available suited me (a person already owning the game).

Then again, this isn’t anything new though, Blizzard themselves said WoW, for example, was like a “revolving door”, old timers leave and newcomers arrive at a steady pace, the number of die hard players who stick with the game is very small in comparison.

Just look at what they did with their latest expansion, they increased the price by tacking on a character leveling boost so that “newcomers can join the action”

Veteran players had no need for the boost (as no new races or classes were added), tough kitten, they still had to pay.

Spot the trend.

warbignime.4610:

You guys should compare WoW expansion reveal to HoT

Yes lets compare to the company that over-monetizes every product they ever made. WoW with a monthly fee, cash shop, micro-transactions and indirect gold buying and they still top it off with paid expansions… so where is that sub fee going? Sure as heck not to content updates as there have been some droughts of over a year.
Or HotS, with it’s overpriced champions and even more overpriced skins.

Anyone remember Diablo3 and it’s real money auction house? And lets not get started on Heartstone. I think SC2 is the only game Blizzard has that is very reasonably priced and monetized. But that might be because they make a ton of money from the esports aspect so they don’t squeeze the consumers as much.

HoT has shown me very little that interests me. And after the disaster year that was 2014, with disapointing hyped up products, you cannot blame people for being gun shy.

Poeple are missing the point here. The problem is not with the Veterans or the people who buys HoT and then gets core game at the same time. The problem is everyone who bought the core game since the expantion was announced because in the FAQ it stated you need the core game to be able to play HoT and they changed it yesterday when they added the core game to HoT.

Interesting note: This expantion now costs more then I paid for the core game when it was first released in South Africa also about 1/4 of my month’s salary. Also feel so bad i convinced one of my friends to buy the game last week. He is so happy with me now.

WOW provides a lot more content for $50 for starters.

I don’t think there is $50 worth of content, and not providing a character slot for that is effectively a huge “kitten you” to the whole playerbase.

But the main reason I won’t be buying HOT is that I don’t think the content that’s come out in the 2.5 years since release has been any good, so I don’t really see much value in investing any more money into the game when it’s not providing content I’m interested in playing.

It’s that simple.

Ensio.8172:

SoPP.7034:

In essence as a veteran player I came away feeling that non of the pre-purchase deals suited me and as a result I went away with a collective ‘hmmmph’ and still haven’t pre-purchased it.

This was my feeling as well, none of the options available suited me (a person already owning the game).

Then again, this isn’t anything new though, Blizzard themselves said WoW, for example, was like a “revolving door”, old timers leave and newcomers arrive at a steady pace, the number of die hard players who stick with the game is very small in comparison.

Just look at what they did with their latest expansion, they increased the price by tacking on a character leveling boost so that “newcomers can join the action”

Veteran players had no need for the boost (as no new races or classes were added), tough kitten, they still had to pay.

Spot the trend.

Learned behaviour. ;-)

scerevisiae.1972:

WOW provides a lot more content for $50 for starters.

I don’t think there is $50 worth of content, and not providing a character slot for that is effectively a huge “kitten you” to the whole playerbase.

But the main reason I won’t be buying HOT is that I don’t think the content that’s come out in the 2.5 years since release has been any good, so I don’t really see much value in investing any more money into the game when it’s not providing content I’m interested in playing.

It’s that simple.

Since you are no longer intersted in the game. Can I have your stuff?

SoPP.7034:

I had historically decided to buy HoT as soon as it was available.

When the pre-purchase rolled around I was super excited and immediately went to the appropriate web page. Then when I got there I hesitated….
In essence as a veteran player I came away feeling that non of the pre-purchase deals suited me and as a result I went away with a collective ‘hmmmph’ and still haven’t pre-purchased it.

I guess I just find it amusing that I went from a 100% yes I’ll pre-purchase to feeling indifferent and thinking I’ll probably buy it ‘when I get around to it’.

Is Anet aware of these kind of responses from people? I’m just struggling with how I’ve almost done a 180 on this.

I think thats how most people feel right about now, I know I do.

4am Im having more fun on the forums than Ive had ingame for months. Why pay $50 for Zerg Wars 2 Heart of the Swarm: Power Creep Edition when PvF content is free?

Im atleast level 7 on the forums.

Not trolling My message is a bit obfuscated but its there. They are extremely evasive about the type of content I enjoy. I simply poke a bit of fun at it.

50$ for the game. New players get a copy of the base game, but as a veteran i do not. Why do i get less than a new players?

And that 50$ doesn’t really cover it. That new Revenant profession needs a character slot. That’ll be another 10$. Bringing the price up to 60$. That’s more than i paid for GW2 on launch.

So for such a relatively steep price, and with the current climate in gaming, i’m going to be pretty critical. I don’t care about new pve content and gliders and such. Uptill now the biggest selling point in HoT, for me personally, is a new profession and specializations. Because the other things just don’t interest me as much.
And to me that’s a tough sell, 60$ for a new profession and some specializations i might or might not use.

Why do you even bother with such topics. This is like trying to insert your opinion in someone’s mind. I never played WoW for example, so i don’pt care about their expansions. How that sounds to you? Besides, even if all other mmos that exist have 50$ tag on their expansions, I still don’t care. If I don’t feel the amount of content I’d be getting is worth the money, that’s it, you won’t change my mind by whining here.
And people always take “bad” examples to compare and make their point. Why don ‘t you take games that are great and provide a lot of content ffor that money, for example, you cna get witcher 3 for that money and it’s probably few times bigger and better than this expansion.

i understand that adding the base game to the deal doesnt cost any resources (iron/woon/coal/water)which is kinda what u need to create a product, everything cant be done online. i guess the idea was that if i buy lets say the standart version i will input HOT into my main account and the 2nd gamecore i will just give away to some 1 els and that some 1 els will buy HOT. will almost be an unending cycle. WHICH IS COOL…..but….
i heared of gw1 before it came out, i was waiting for it to appear in stores, bought the 1st and every other expension they have to offier(brought friends to the game and bought extra staff) everything that a good costumer will do.
but after buying
Guild Wars 1 Prophecies/Factions/Night Falls/ Eye of The Noth
Guild Wars 2. and linked betweem them as a proof.
I deserve to be able to upgrade my GW2 core game into GW2HOT for 40$+char slot.
cuz after all AND THIS IS MOST IMPORTANT

We Are The One Who Gave Anet The RIGHT Feedback to Create This Expension
(well atleast some parts of it)

Vulcanite.3012:

Poeple are missing the point here. The problem is not with the Veterans or the people who buys HoT and then gets core game at the same time. The problem is everyone who bought the core game since the expantion was announced because in the FAQ it stated you need the core game to be able to play HoT and they changed it yesterday when they added the core game to HoT.

Interesting note: This expantion now costs more then I paid for the core game when it was first released in South Africa also about 1/4 of my month’s salary. Also feel so bad i convinced one of my friends to buy the game last week. He is so happy with me now.

While I understand and agree that those who were cheated by the FAQ have it worst than the vets, that doesn’t make the situation the vets are facing any less of a problem, the fact that they are being treated worst does not invalidate the fact that vets areally being treated bad too

warbignime.4610:

scerevisiae.1972:

WOW provides a lot more content for $50 for starters.

I don’t think there is $50 worth of content, and not providing a character slot for that is effectively a huge “kitten you” to the whole playerbase.

But the main reason I won’t be buying HOT is that I don’t think the content that’s come out in the 2.5 years since release has been any good, so I don’t really see much value in investing any more money into the game when it’s not providing content I’m interested in playing.

It’s that simple.

Since you are no longer intersted in the game. Can I have your stuff?

Can you stop asking stupid questions already ? If you can’t comprehend the idea of why people are unwilling to lay down 50 – 100$ for an xpack,so be it…But when people reply to you with Their Reasons..and your reply is ..Can i have your stuff ? That’s just pretty kitten stupid kid.

It’s not about the price. It’s a about the price for the amount of content, also known as value for your money. And from what they’ve shown so far I would be willing to give them 15$ maximum.

warbignime.4610:

IcarusMelody.5312:

OP you crazy. Anybody whose been following Heavensward knows SE has been sharing just about everything about the expansion that does not involve story spoilers.
They are adding
New race
3 New jobs
Flying mounts for aerial expansion area
plethora of new dungeons
New raids
A bulk of new story
level cap increase (new skills and traits for all classes)
New primal encounter
etc etc
And the price tag on Heavensward isnt even as high as HoT but players know what they’re getting and certainly not throwing a fit about the $40 price tag.

Folks havent seen much of HoT compared to HW. So its completely logical that everybody isnt just throwing their money at the screen.

And how much sub fee you spent on FF14? Also those doesn’t sound like more than hot at all.

$120 yearly for sub. I easily spent three times that on GW2 with gems. Major content patches in XIV every 3 months more than justify why its the only recent MMO capable of maintaining a p2p along with older established titles.

Also its off topic. I listed some common knowledge additions to a game that isnt shy about showing what the consumer is getting. This is the big problem with HoT, and why again everybody isnt that happy to immediately buy HoT right away. I know what im getting for my sub. Can you say the same about HoT’s price tag? without a doubt?
is it REALLY worth $50 with what you’ve seen of it so far?

Caedmon.6798:

warbignime.4610:

scerevisiae.1972:

WOW provides a lot more content for $50 for starters.

I don’t think there is $50 worth of content, and not providing a character slot for that is effectively a huge “kitten you” to the whole playerbase.

But the main reason I won’t be buying HOT is that I don’t think the content that’s come out in the 2.5 years since release has been any good, so I don’t really see much value in investing any more money into the game when it’s not providing content I’m interested in playing.

It’s that simple.

Since you are no longer intersted in the game. Can I have your stuff?

Can you stop asking stupid questions already ? If you can’t comprehend the idea of why people are unwilling to lay down 50 – 100$ for an xpack,so be it…But when people reply to you with Their Reasons..and your reply is ..Can i have your stuff ? That’s just pretty kitten stupid kid.

I don’t see what’s stupid about it, he said he hasn’t been intersted in gw2 content since release, so why is he playing anyway. Also I am actually being serious about wanting his stuff, I mean he is not intersted In this game at all so why let all those mats go to waste.

I was gonna buy it as soon as it becomes available but now I think I’ll just wait for release. Been playing since early access and 45 Euro seems a bit too much given the info I have on expansion at the moment.

I understand that you can put any price you want when selling something. Maybe after I get more info later on I will change my mind again.

If I didn’t own the game this would be really great pre-purchase option but since I got core game I really don’t see any incentive to buy at this moment.

Only thing that’s eating me a bit is that I managed to convince one of my friends to buy the game few months ago. If I knew they would be giving the game for free I would definitely told him to wait a bit and get it free with expansion but hey, live and learn.

karenlynn.4012:

Regina Buenaobra.6193:

To clarify: $50 is the price of the expansion. We included the core game as a free bonus to make it easier for new players to get into it.

This is a very generous bonus, and I bet new players will really appreciate it. As an existing player, I have no problem with the cost of the expansion. But as a consumer I expect to receive the same value for my money as any other customer buying the same product. So what bonus will I receive, as I won’t get the free included game?

What’s offered in HoT is a large update to the base game, with new class, new areas, new features and balance changes. Some of those changes affect wide areas (f.ex. skill rebalance) and are announced as part of base game. Some of them can be split apart (f.ex. new areas) and are bundled as an expansion. One major issue however, is the living world story.

I don’t see it feasible to keep the base game as something that will support itself as a full featured whole, because of the dynamic nature of GW2 world because much of the content comes through, or is tied to, the living world story – and the game wouldn’t make as much sense if you aren’t following it. And that has to my understanding moved to HoT.

As such, the way I see it, the combination of GW2 + HoT is the new ‘base game’ so to speak. As such it does make perfect sense to remove the option to buy the ‘old base game’ alone. And if you don’t want to sell it by itself, you have to make HoT into the new baseline.

The question is then, how do you handle that in relation to existing accounts. And it’s my belief that this has been the root of the issue. For all intents and purposes, I feel like HoT is essentially “Guild Wars 2, v2”. Pretty much like – for example – Star Trek Online has gone through various ‘seasons’, and is currently at “Star Trek Online: The Iconian War”.

The feeling of ‘wrongness’ in all this, for me at least, is probably rooted in this very thing. The feeling that I have to buy the new version of the same game, at full price.

Looking at it from the other perspective, There will probably be further ‘expansions’, (or ‘seasons’, ‘feature packs’ or however one wishes to name them). If you had to buy all of them separately, the cost would very quickly become prohibitive for new players. This is the issue that many older games have to face. The common solution is to bundle the older expansions into cheaper collection, and only ask full price of one or two latest expansions. Or in some cases, just roll the older expansions into the base game and offer them for free when one buys the game.

The problem is that GW2 is doing this prematurely. The expansion hasn’t even been released yet, or even the full range of it’s content published.. and it’s already part of a bundled deal. Worse, the only way to obtain the new expansion, is to buy the bundle. In my opinion this shouldn’t happen until the expansion is ‘old’, in general at earliest when the next expansion is out. While it’s not necessarily wrong to offer an option to buy a bundle, when you make such offer for new product, you should still have the option to buy the product alone.

It doesn’t really matter if you call it ‘the price of new product, the rest is just free bonus’, because that’s not how the buyer will perceive it. At least I don’t, and it’s my impression there’s substantial number of others who feel that way too.

Like I’ve said before, I understand it’s probably too late at this point to change most of the things – regardless of if one wanted or not in the first place (and I fail to believe that this much negative response is desirable in any way). Lots of purchases have been made already, and to do significant changes to their content post-purchase would be difficult. Taking anything away from bundles would be impossible. Even giving a reduced price option for ‘only expansion’ now would be practically impossible.

I still feel the nicest solution would be to offer something that would be seen as ‘of equal value’ to what new players receive (the base game), to those who instead link this bundle to an existing account. The most common suggestion has been ‘character slot’. Others have noted ‘bank tabs’, and less commonly various other gem store options, like ‘total make over kit’, ‘boosters’, ‘skins’, and I think some other assorted goods.

Myself I’ve pointed out it would be better to simply offer a package of gems, because this would let each individual buyer decide for themselves what gives the best value – whether it be character slot, bank tab or something else. My original suggestion was to give 1600 gems (equal to two character slots) for anyone who forfeits the base game from the bundle by linking it into existing account.

IcarusMelody.5312:

warbignime.4610:

IcarusMelody.5312:

OP you crazy. Anybody whose been following Heavensward knows SE has been sharing just about everything about the expansion that does not involve story spoilers.
They are adding
New race
3 New jobs
Flying mounts for aerial expansion area
plethora of new dungeons
New raids
A bulk of new story
level cap increase (new skills and traits for all classes)
New primal encounter
etc etc
And the price tag on Heavensward isnt even as high as HoT but players know what they’re getting and certainly not throwing a fit about the $40 price tag.

Folks havent seen much of HoT compared to HW. So its completely logical that everybody isnt just throwing their money at the screen.

And how much sub fee you spent on FF14? Also those doesn’t sound like more than hot at all.

$120 yearly for sub. I easily spent three times that on GW2 with gems. Major content patches in XIV every 3 months more than justify why its the only recent MMO capable of maintaining a p2p along with older established titles.

Also its off topic. I listed some common knowledge additions to a game that isnt shy about showing what the consumer is getting. This is the big problem with HoT, and why again everybody isnt that happy to immediately buy HoT right away. I know what im getting for my sub. Can you say the same about HoT’s price tag? without a doubt?
is it REALLY worth $50 with what you’ve seen of it so far?

You spent sub fee just to play the game and you get nothing eles, you spent gems to buy items. It’s different. Just like buying hotdog, you give him money he give you hotdog, no one own each other anything. You just can’t compare sub fee to gem store it’s two different thing.

I’m sorry ANET the price is too expensive – it needs to be 20% cheaper than it is currently listed for all editions at minimum and a character slot for the basic upgrade (which people with toons can use as a storage mule).

What are we getting:
Content:
MAPS:
Colin has already announced the amount of content being like 4-5 new maps (with 3 levels) – I hate open world maps tbh and Silverwastes/Dry-Top is not of my liking. I played the beta and am disapointed in the ‘grind-fest’ that has been presented. This is limited repeatable content as it doesnt require much skill and boils down to zerg fests.

Guild Halls – with non-repeatable instanced content to open stuff up. Most of the Guild changes will come anyways

Specilisation – Whoopie doo (I’m not impressed so far)

‘Challenging Group Content’ – Nothing has been mentioned and unless its instanced based. Dungeons were mentioned as ‘challenging group content’ in initial release. Now there is 0 development in dungeons for 3yrs despite many calls from the community to introduce new ones. These offer highly repeatable content with a progression into better skilled play over time !

Masterys – a short cut to legendarys (which will result in an epic grind fest of do x,y,z, and RNG most likely).

Living Story Part N – This is non-repeatable and frankly linear and boring after doing it the first time. People do not play this for repeatability only to grind out x,y,z item as required for AP. Miss the Living Story again (by not logging in) – you’re going to be paying for it.

Colin stated that this is not a traditional expansion with large amounts of content that we used to have when HoT was introduced

This at most is a small DLC pack – which frankly warrants a price of $20 !

Everyone in my Guild is frankly shocked at the high price of the DLC Pack (I cannot call it an expansion as its not a complete continent like Cantha – which by now frankly should be ready !).

Numerous expletives are being made by multiple people in the guild which seems to echo the forum response – these are all people who were excited to be getting HoT.

Now its turning into a mass exit of GW2 as they object to cost vs what we are getting – its more of the same old rubbish like Silverwates/Dry-Top and frankly no-one is interested in this stuff. They only did it for AP or a high-value items like queen bee on occasion.

Here’s another little bone of contention for people to mull over, especially vets. It appears to quite have escaped everyones notice. As most people know, especially vets, Guild Wars has things we classify as endgame. Stuff like skins, titles….Now remember they told us long ago and still do, that “Guild Wars will never be Pay to win!”

Follow me here.
Titles=Endgame
Endgame=Win

This being the case, I’m surprised nobody is pointing out the very very very obvious pay to win title that you get by one means only. Pay for it.

I cannot remember any precedent before this one where we have been forced to pay real money for a title. Forced for lack of a better term, to pay to win.

Just another example of aNet v.2 principles. Or lack thereof.

warbignime.4610:

Caedmon.6798:

warbignime.4610:

scerevisiae.1972:

WOW provides a lot more content for $50 for starters.

I don’t think there is $50 worth of content, and not providing a character slot for that is effectively a huge “kitten you” to the whole playerbase.

But the main reason I won’t be buying HOT is that I don’t think the content that’s come out in the 2.5 years since release has been any good, so I don’t really see much value in investing any more money into the game when it’s not providing content I’m interested in playing.

It’s that simple.

Since you are no longer intersted in the game. Can I have your stuff?

Can you stop asking stupid questions already ? If you can’t comprehend the idea of why people are unwilling to lay down 50 – 100$ for an xpack,so be it…But when people reply to you with Their Reasons..and your reply is ..Can i have your stuff ? That’s just pretty kitten stupid kid.

I don’t see what’s stupid about it, he said he hasn’t been intersted in gw2 content since release, so why is he playing anyway. Also I am actually being serious about wanting his stuff, I mean he is not intersted In this game at all so why let all those mats go to waste.

No,it’s the typical reply when someone says he’s not interested in this game,or willing to quit…Always some fool jumping in..Can i havez your stuffz instead of properly replying to what it is he was saying,i think it’s foolish.

I’m really curious what this does to aNet. Since the prices of the pre-orders where available the internet explodes.

I really hope that the’re scratching the back of their heads at this point but I’m afraid that they won’t change this..

The worst part is that I really want to play HoT and I’m 95% certain I will buy it but if this continues with the expansions that will follow, I won’t be sticking around long..

I’m currently on the fence, I have spent far to much money on this game as is and while I wouldn’t mind dropping more because I enjoyed it I’m wrestling with my morals on why they deserve it. I guess for me it will depend on their answers to the issues at hand, whether they start deleting posts and infracting/suspending people for having an opinion, if there is an apology, if they add the character slot, and lastly if they let us know what we are getting. No more beating around the bush and waiting a week for updates that are all “subject to change” I want to know what your asking me to pay for.

Breaking Bad.6241:

If you go to McDonalds and they say the cheeseburger is 20 dollars would you buy it? No? Why, you can save up 20 bucks in no time! Don’t be so cheap!

If you go to McDonalds and they say that the cheeseburger is 20 dollars would you stay there and yell at them all day? Or would you simply not buy it and move on?

Vulcanite.3012:

Poeple are missing the point here. The problem is not with the Veterans or the people who buys HoT and then gets core game at the same time. The problem is everyone who bought the core game since the expantion was announced because in the FAQ it stated you need the core game to be able to play HoT and they changed it yesterday when they added the core game to HoT.

Interesting note: This expantion now costs more then I paid for the core game when it was first released in South Africa also about 1/4 of my month’s salary. Also feel so bad i convinced one of my friends to buy the game last week. He is so happy with me now.

If he bought the game just last week, he should contact the support immediately. It’s been mentioned elsewhere that they can help you migrate the purchase into HoT prepurchase (although I assume you have to pay the cost difference, and your account may be reset so that any progress you had made in-game will be lost). Essentially it’s refund of the game you bought, and purchase of the new HoT option.

Caedmon.6798:

warbignime.4610:

Caedmon.6798:

warbignime.4610:

scerevisiae.1972:

WOW provides a lot more content for $50 for starters.

I don’t think there is $50 worth of content, and not providing a character slot for that is effectively a huge “kitten you” to the whole playerbase.

But the main reason I won’t be buying HOT is that I don’t think the content that’s come out in the 2.5 years since release has been any good, so I don’t really see much value in investing any more money into the game when it’s not providing content I’m interested in playing.

It’s that simple.

Since you are no longer intersted in the game. Can I have your stuff?

Can you stop asking stupid questions already ? If you can’t comprehend the idea of why people are unwilling to lay down 50 – 100$ for an xpack,so be it…But when people reply to you with Their Reasons..and your reply is ..Can i have your stuff ? That’s just pretty kitten stupid kid.

I don’t see what’s stupid about it, he said he hasn’t been intersted in gw2 content since release, so why is he playing anyway. Also I am actually being serious about wanting his stuff, I mean he is not intersted In this game at all so why let all those mats go to waste.

No,it’s the typical reply when someone says he’s not interested in this game,or willing to quit…Always some fool jumping in..Can i havez your stuffz instead of properly replying to what it is he was saying,i think it’s foolish.

Well, what he said is he is not intersted in this game at all. Do you think he is actually discussing the topic? I ask him for his stuff. It matters not to me how others use this sentence, that’s what I meant.

Appearently this thread is being read by Gaile and her team so here are some starter questions:

Starting Questions
1) Can we get details on the boxed versions? The FAQ is rather vague about it.
Are there any? Will there be a collectors edition (like every other MMO does out there). Do you put more effort in them than with the core game release? (At least on the level of the original GW boxed releases?)

2) How propable are changes?

3) Did you expect the backlash? How much backlash did you expect?

The Issue at hand

The inclusion of the core game devalues the expansion price, as in that it is only for new players. Older player do not benefit from it in any way.
Compairing it to other games who do something like that, you always have the option to sell your older inferior version.
Right now you are selling Guild Wars 2 2.0 and not Guild Wars 2 HoT.
(Compare it to something like Street Fighter, where you get at least 3 updates ranging from Super, Ultra and Tournament edition, you are always able to sell your old version, so it is no complete loss)

It is all about the percived value and right now it is a loss for all who already own the game, since we can only compare it to hat exist and that is the core game.
Since there is no seperate price for the expansion, even if you claim it would be 50$, it just doesn`t feel that way since there is no choice.

Players who own the game pay the same amount as new players, but get less and might even have paid more.
It is not that new players only get the new game, they also get some digital goodies as well. For example they get an armor worth 600-800 gems for free, which is another bonus players who bought at launch don`t have.

Right now the value of the game rises with the time that has passed, minus the time you enjoyed with special events. However i am talking from the “fresh start” perspective.

Of course a veteran got their moneys worth already, even shed out more money, however so far we could choose to do so.
This offer does not give us any choice.

Right now the only thing that is reasonable is in fact the 100$ ultimate edition, even though the “50$” worth of gems on stuff you can dictate the price on, since it is your monopoly is kinda iffy to begin with.

Extra round rant
The digital stuff. Is it really that much worth? The way I see it we see a lot of reused assets. Decorations, Rytlock Mini and the finisher are things that are already in the game, just repurposed. The Rytlock finisher is just boring by the way. He walks by and grabs the spear. Seriously?
The glider skin is the only thing that feels unique and even that feels like a preview for the gem-shop, basicaly saying: You will see more of them at release

I am sorry, as amazing as you devs are you really drop the ball with these things. The digital stuff in the original release was the same. Digital crap, where only 2 of 5 things had continues value. And one of them was a Mini.

To be honest the best reward you ever gave were the HoM skins and for that you had to buy and play 2-4 awesome releases.

warbignime.4610:

IcarusMelody.5312:

OP you crazy. Anybody whose been following Heavensward knows SE has been sharing just about everything about the expansion that does not involve story spoilers.
They are adding
New race
3 New jobs
Flying mounts for aerial expansion area
plethora of new dungeons
New raids
A bulk of new story
level cap increase (new skills and traits for all classes)
New primal encounter
etc etc
And the price tag on Heavensward isnt even as high as HoT but players know what they’re getting and certainly not throwing a fit about the $40 price tag.

Folks havent seen much of HoT compared to HW. So its completely logical that everybody isnt just throwing their money at the screen.

And how much sub fee you spent on FF14? Also those doesn’t sound like more than hot at all.

The Sub fee gets you patches that GW2 players could only dream about. Not even an exaggeration, take a look at FFXIV major patches. I’d almost wager that they add more in a single major patch than GW2 does in a year. The level of polish is also something that ArenaNet could simply never achieve.

As for what HW is bringing…it’s far far far more than HoT. 1 class vs 3, easy win there. HoT is bringing 1 region that’s 3 maps? HW is expanding land mass by 150%, even if HoT has more zones do you really think they are adding 150% of current landmass? The sure bet is that they aren’t, so FFXIV wins again. Trait specializations vs 10 new levels, I’d call it a wash. Glding vs flying mounts? Again a wash. Guild Halls? FFXIV got those in a patch… New SPvP mode? FFXIV is redoing PVP. New WvW zone? Well you got FFXIV there! FFXIV is also getting 50 hours of main story content, GW2 at launch barely had that so I doubt their expansion does. FFXIV has 2 new primals, GW2 doesn’t have anything remotely close to it. FFXIV is getting 8 new dungeons, GW2 cut it’s dungeon team so likely nothing. FFXIV is getting a new Raid, GW2 might be getting a raid. FFXIV is getting FC workshops, airships, and air ship missions; GW2 nothing similar. Don’t take my word for it read the HW pre-liminary patch notes:

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/e76258d6487ea30feb388f9ecc0a926fddc9eca8

If you haven’t played FFXIV at all, you cannot imagine the amount of content in that game. I’ve played MMO’s since EQ and Ultima, FFXIV hands down has the most end game content and variety. It also has the most personally challenging PvE. If you wanted to do all the dailies available alone you would spend probably 3-4 hours easy. Honestly, it makes the GW2 endgame look like a horrible work camp. The only major issues in FFXIV are PvP and class customization. The combat system is borderline, I can certainly see some preferring GW2’s better. I hate paying for subscription, but I can say that you get what you pay for and then some.

How do they manage to make a mess of things all the time!? The expansion looks cool and they are making a lot of nice changes (some debatable, but still). And I guess some ppl thought it was just “a nice thing” to do to put the core game into the exp pack. But their foresights sucks sooo hard! They should have seen this coming when they put a price like that with no new character slots and nothing extra to make the core player base and even old GW2 players feel rewarded for sticking with the game for so long. An exp pack is not mainly for the new players, it’s for the current and old players that have made this great game even better with the nice community it got. They need to keep that going and make sure they don’t kitten those ppl (us) off.

I’m looking forward to HoT and will buy it for sure. I don’t care that much about the money but it buggs me that they are so clueless at times…. :-P

@warbignime
Gems and Subcription play the same purpose.
It pays the devs and that means the game continues to build.
The difference is Gems ended up with a lot less return; then the money I use for the subscription. That alone makes me question the hell out of the price tag of the HoT expansion. The smoke and mirrors dont help Anets case at all for the price point.

Terrahero.9358:

warbignime.4610:

You guys should compare WoW expansion reveal to HoT

Yes lets compare to the company that over-monetizes every product they ever made. WoW with a monthly fee, cash shop, micro-transactions and indirect gold buying and they still top it off with paid expansions… so where is that sub fee going? Sure as heck not to content updates as there have been some droughts of over a year.
Or HotS, with it’s overpriced champions and even more overpriced skins.

Anyone remember Diablo3 and it’s real money auction house? And lets not get started on Heartstone. I think SC2 is the only game Blizzard has that is very reasonably priced and monetized. But that might be because they make a ton of money from the esports aspect so they don’t squeeze the consumers as much.

Diablo III Reaper of Souls came with a full new campaign (not as long as the original four acts, but arguably better than any of them) a new profession, two free character slots, a free stash slot, the adventure modes and the nephalem rifts. This, along with the removal of the AH, the whole revamp of the loot system and the later added seasonal ladders hughely improved a game that was in critical condition. I did almost tripled my time with DIII after the RoS expansion, and I find it totally worth of the price.

I don’t finf HoT equally appealing. No new dungeons, no radical changes in the WvW scoring system, didn’t like Stronghold, no new slots to level the Revenant (the whole star of the expansion). The best part is the Guild Halls, but I can wait months for price cuts and get access to that content later.

warbignime.4610:

People are having ridiculous expectations and it bothers me.

People are having big expectations for 50$ and it makes sense.

Fixed it for you.

Not much of a forum activist me, but I want to add my protest voice against the current marketing strategy.

I noticed that GW2, when clicking on “buy”, only will feature HoT. Hence GW2 as we knew it is not longer available for purchase separately.

As many have said before : new players will get full package for an acceptable price whereas all those who already own the game are left with an expansion that does not even provide an extra slot to create a Revenant.

Bad marketing Anet, worst I’ve seen in years. You do know how to kitten off your community.

Reconsider your strategy. Offer the expansion to players who already own the game either at a reduced price

OR

throw in some extras : either an extra character slot or enough gems to buy one from TP, an extra bank slot wouldn’t hurt either.

Distaste.4801:

warbignime.4610:

IcarusMelody.5312:

OP you crazy. Anybody whose been following Heavensward knows SE has been sharing just about everything about the expansion that does not involve story spoilers.
They are adding
New race
3 New jobs
Flying mounts for aerial expansion area
plethora of new dungeons
New raids
A bulk of new story
level cap increase (new skills and traits for all classes)
New primal encounter
etc etc
And the price tag on Heavensward isnt even as high as HoT but players know what they’re getting and certainly not throwing a fit about the $40 price tag.

Folks havent seen much of HoT compared to HW. So its completely logical that everybody isnt just throwing their money at the screen.

And how much sub fee you spent on FF14? Also those doesn’t sound like more than hot at all.

The Sub fee gets you patches that GW2 players could only dream about. Not even an exaggeration, take a look at FFXIV major patches. I’d almost wager that they add more in a single major patch than GW2 does in a year. The level of polish is also something that ArenaNet could simply never achieve.

As for what HW is bringing…it’s far far far more than HoT. 1 class vs 3, easy win there. HoT is bringing 1 region that’s 3 maps? HW is expanding land mass by 150%, even if HoT has more zones do you really think they are adding 150% of current landmass? The sure bet is that they aren’t, so FFXIV wins again. Trait specializations vs 10 new levels, I’d call it a wash. Glding vs flying mounts? Again a wash. Guild Halls? FFXIV got those in a patch… New SPvP mode? FFXIV is redoing PVP. New WvW zone? Well you got FFXIV there! FFXIV is also getting 50 hours of main story content, GW2 at launch barely had that so I doubt their expansion does. FFXIV has 2 new primals, GW2 doesn’t have anything remotely close to it. FFXIV is getting 8 new dungeons, GW2 cut it’s dungeon team so likely nothing. FFXIV is getting a new Raid, GW2 might be getting a raid. FFXIV is getting FC workshops, airships, and air ship missions; GW2 nothing similar. Don’t take my word for it read the HW pre-liminary patch notes:

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/e76258d6487ea30feb388f9ecc0a926fddc9eca8

If you haven’t played FFXIV at all, you cannot imagine the amount of content in that game. I’ve played MMO’s since EQ and Ultima, FFXIV hands down has the most end game content and variety. It also has the most personally challenging PvE. If you wanted to do all the dailies available alone you would spend probably 3-4 hours easy. Honestly, it makes the GW2 endgame look like a horrible work camp. The only major issues in FFXIV are PvP and class customization. The combat system is borderline, I can certainly see some preferring GW2’s better. I hate paying for subscription, but I can say that you get what you pay for and then some.

I played FF14, reached gear cap on my paladin the quit. Let’s face it the questing in FF14 is terrible, it almost drove me insane at lv40 ish. The problem of FF14 expansing land mass is the repayabllity, most of those land mass are levelong content ehich you only do once. Most of them are standard fetch quest too and simplified version of dynamic events, they are far easier to make than gw2 maps aka they lack depth compare to gw2 maps. Number doesn’t matter, quality does. Also most people will not go there again after leveled to max so does it matter how much land mass they expand?

Jaken.6801:

Appearently this thread is being read by Gaile and her team so here are some starter questions:

Starting Questions
1) Can we get details on the boxed versions? The FAQ is rather vague about it.
Are there any? Will there be a collectors edition (like every other MMO does out there). Do you put more effort in them than with the core game release? (At least on the level of the original GW boxed releases?)

2) How propable are changes?

3) Did you expect the backlash? How much backlash did you expect?

The Issue at hand

The inclusion of the core game devalues the expansion price, as in that it is only for new players. Older player do not benefit from it in any way.
Compairing it to other games who do something like that, you always have the option to sell your older inferior version.
Right now you are selling Guild Wars 2 2.0 and not Guild Wars 2 HoT.
(Compare it to something like Street Fighter, where you get at least 3 updates ranging from Super, Ultra and Tournament edition, you are always able to sell your old version, so it is no complete loss)

It is all about the percived value and right now it is a loss for all who already own the game, since we can only compare it to hat exist and that is the core game.
Since there is no seperate price for the expansion, even if you claim it would be 50$, it just doesn`t feel that way since there is no choice.

Players who own the game pay the same amount as new players, but get less and might even have paid more.
It is not that new players only get the new game, they also get some digital goodies as well. For example they get an armor worth 600-800 gems for free, which is another bonus players who bought at launch don`t have.

Right now the value of the game rises with the time that has passed, minus the time you enjoyed with special events. However i am talking from the “fresh start” perspective.

Of course a veteran got their moneys worth already, even shed out more money, however so far we could choose to do so.
This offer does not give us any choice.

Right now the only thing that is reasonable is in fact the 100$ ultimate edition, even though the “50$” worth of gems on stuff you can dictate the price on, since it is your monopoly is kinda iffy to begin with.

Extra round rant
The digital stuff. Is it really that much worth? The way I see it we see a lot of reused assets. Decorations, Rytlock Mini and the finisher are things that are already in the game, just repurposed. The Rytlock finisher is just boring by the way. He walks by and grabs the spear. Seriously?
The glider skin is the only thing that feels unique and even that feels like a preview for the gem-shop, basicaly saying: You will see more of them at release

I am sorry, as amazing as you devs are you really drop the ball with these things. The digital stuff in the original release was the same. Digital crap, where only 2 of 5 things had continues value. And one of them was a Mini.

To be honest the best reward you ever gave were the HoM skins and for that you had to buy and play 2-4 awesome releases.

I think read is an exaggeration all they have been doing is just putting any topic about it in this one to, in the best case notice that we are not happy. In worst not even reading one word (usually they read 5 words and interpret it completely wrong).

What if Anet put it this way.
HoT expansion only $45
HoT expansion (core included) $50
Players would still be complaining.
Personally I have been playing since release of gw2 and have bought slots. I myself already have a couple slots open across 2 different accts (together 16 toons & 4 empty).
IMO…I appreciate the hard work that the developers, programmers and artists have put into this game for my entertainment and have no problem in paying for it.
If you want the slot, spend the extra 10bucks!
If your gonna quit….do us all a favor and quit. Over the past couple days I have to listen to players “Cry me a river” about being ripped off by Anet while crafting in LA.
Bunch a freaking babies that need there wooby.

Buran.3796:

Terrahero.9358:

warbignime.4610:

You guys should compare WoW expansion reveal to HoT

Yes lets compare to the company that over-monetizes every product they ever made. WoW with a monthly fee, cash shop, micro-transactions and indirect gold buying and they still top it off with paid expansions… so where is that sub fee going? Sure as heck not to content updates as there have been some droughts of over a year.
Or HotS, with it’s overpriced champions and even more overpriced skins.

Anyone remember Diablo3 and it’s real money auction house? And lets not get started on Heartstone. I think SC2 is the only game Blizzard has that is very reasonably priced and monetized. But that might be because they make a ton of money from the esports aspect so they don’t squeeze the consumers as much.

Diablo III Reaper of Souls came with a full new campaign (not as long as the original four acts, but arguably better than any of them) a new profession, two free character slots, a free stash slot, the adventure modes and the nephalem rifts. This, along with the removal of the AH, the whole revamp of the loot system and the later added seasonal ladders hughely improved a game that was in critical condition. I did almost tripled my time with DIII after the RoS expansion, and I find it totally worth of the price.

I don’t finf HoT equally appealing. No new dungeons, no radical changes in the WvW scoring system, didn’t like Stronghold, no new slots to level the Revenant (the whole star of the expansion). The best part is the Guild Halls, but I can wait months for price cuts and get access to that content later.

Ros campain is like 2 hours, also hot brought way more feature than what you mentioned, guild hall,mastery, specs, new class, new region, adventure. yeah it blows Ros out miles away.

Alexxander.8306:

warbignime.4610:

You guys should compare WoW expansion reveal to HoT, or even ff14 heavensward. Most of MMORPG are vague about their expansion too, there are no weekly live stream about the content neither weekly detailed blog post. Just check wow MoP reveal page, all they did are listed features and a very short portion of the reveal video and that’s pretty much it. How much more do you guys want? Anet won’t tell you every detail neither but that’s the same with every game expansion ever. People are having ridiculous expectations and it bothers me.

Your logic:
https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/bandwagon
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum

debating clubs must have become really popular right now, telling by people citing rhetorical figures and techniques all the time. Cool, so you now know a few terms from rhetorics. The point being?

warbignime.4610:

You guys should compare WoW expansion reveal to HoT, or even ff14 heavensward. Most of MMORPG are vague about their expansion too, there are no weekly live stream about the content neither weekly detailed blog post. Just check wow MoP reveal page, all they did are listed features and a very short portion of the reveal video and that’s pretty much it. How much more do you guys want? Anet won’t tell you every detail neither but that’s the same with every game expansion ever. People are having ridiculous expectations and it bothers me.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/678050-final-fantasy-xiv-online-a-realm-reborn/71882448

Read that. FFXIV was not vague about anything. The games director Yoshida did a bunch of interviews, demos, and talked in-depth about things. If we are on the topic of information then you’ll know that FFXIV announced the expansion in October and then announced the release date in March. That’s 5 months. ArenaNet announced HoT in January and it’s now 6 months later with no release date announced.

Are you also trying to say Blizzard is vague about it’s expansions? They have No-NDA beta’s where players are free to talk about or even stream the game. I know for a fact that I was watching Warlords of Draenor being streamed when they only had 1-2 zones in the game so far and it was very unfinished. Blizzard is the last company you want to try comparing ArenaNet too. Blizzard lets everything in the open and takes the feedback to improve the game, ArenaNet is tightlipped about everything then doesn’t take feedback when the system they release is broken.

Not to mention WoW has constant PTR servers.

Being a Blizzard advocate here (jeez!) for the first time in years. You pay not only for addon but you know that Blizz will deliever in coming year alot to the initial release. Like 2 or even 3 times more content. And all you pay since purchase of addon is monthly fee. BUT you guaranteed to get alot for that money. It was and is true since BC till MOP (dunno about WoD – cant get myself back).

At the start of new addon development it gets whole new site and there you can check for new monsters, dungeons and even hear some music and download wallpapers and artworks. At the end you can check there for full dungeon raid info and also plans for the future raid progression and addition of factions and stuff.

Now compare what we get from Anet. A little bit here, a little bit there. It looks like grains spread around the table then a huge monolith loaf that keeps growing on your sight (like Blizz do)… SO no wonder Anet fails to deliver a bigger picture of their product. Fun thing is – it can be really solid and worth every penny BUT a random customer gets wrong impression. This leads to conclusion that it is not worth 50$!

Ihrga.8325:

Being a Blizzard advocate here (jeez!) for the first time in years.

I agree, I’ve been bashing WoW and Blizzard for some time now and tried to defend GW2, but lately it seems Anet is shooting itself in the foot with numerous bad decisions.
I’m that close to renew my sub for WoW.

Distaste.4801:

As for what HW is bringing…it’s far far far more than HoT. 1 class vs 3, easy win there.

Numbers don’t tell much, how does 1 class in FF compare with a class in GW2? How much build choice and variety does a class in FF14 offer?

HoT is bringing 1 region that’s 3 maps? HW is expanding land mass by 150%, even if HoT has more zones do you really think they are adding 150% of current landmass? The sure bet is that they aren’t, so FFXIV wins again.

They are adding 3 biomes, top, mid and bottom, so each “map” in the new region will have 3 maps on top of each other. That’s certainly more than “3 maps”. Will it be 150%? I doubt it, but it won’t be as little as people make it out to be. Also, HoT maps are more compact and content filled than regular maps. I’ll take a map like SW over 3 Brisban Wildlands any day. How are the new maps in FF regarding their content density? If it’s the same as the old maps then in the end that 150% doesn’t mean anything at all.

Trait specializations vs 10 new levels, I’d call it a wash.

Trait specs are coming next week not with HoT. With HoT we will get one elite specialization per profession that’s 25% more traits than we currently have. Are those 10 extra levels adding 25% more skills to the game? Also, masteries offer a new way of horizontal progression. Anything similar in FF?

Guild Halls? FFXIV got those in a patch…

Is there a comparisson between the two in what they offer? We will get more blogposts regarding Guild Halls in GW2 soon, but, dueling, GvG, tournaments in a PVP sandbox sound like excellent additions. Acquiring them through content (maybe part of challenging group content?), and other features that yet we don’t know about.

FFXIV is also getting 50 hours of main story content, GW2 at launch barely had that so I doubt their expansion does.

I’m sure for a new player there is more than 50 hours of main story content in GW2. If you add the variety of choices (15 different stories to choose from) then it’s even more.

FFXIV has 2 new primals, GW2 doesn’t have anything remotely close to it.

No idea what a primal is.

FFXIV is getting 8 new dungeons, GW2 cut it’s dungeon team so likely nothing.
FFXIV is getting a new Raid, GW2 might be getting a raid.

We still don’t know what “Challenging group content” is. Also, how many open world event chains is FF getting? How many open event bosses? How many zones with zone mechanics (day/night) cycle? We are also getting instanced adventures in HoT designed to test player skill and add competition in PVE. Any adventures in FF?

FFXIV is getting FC workshops, airships, and air ship missions; GW2 nothing similar.

Well we have guild missions, probably expanded/upgraded, not in the air though.

DeceiverX.8361:

I think the big issue at hand is that simply put, the content in HoT to our knowledge thus far isn’t worth the $50.00.

This.

/15charandthensome

Otis McGinty.1926:

What if Anet put it this way.
HoT expansion only $45
HoT expansion (core included) $50
Players would still be complaining.

This would be still a better way. Make it 40 and i think all whine disappears. Completely.

smitske.4912:

I think read is an exaggeration all they have been doing is just putting any topic about it in this one to, in the best case notice that we are not happy. In worst not even reading one word (usually they read 5 words and interpret it completely wrong).

At least I imagine them doing some kind of checklist to see favour vs none favor.
Or at least argument checklist.

I do not expect them going into statistics and wordcloud analysing or something.

I don’t know why people seem to think finally getting around to adding a feature that existed in the original game (ie Guild Halls) is such a big thing- they should have been in at the start.

Skill updates, etc should have been happening every month, instead they hold them all back.

Dumbing down the trait trees and restricting build choice and stat selection is being sold as an ‘expansion’.

Grinding for mastery points, 3-4 new maps which we know nothing about, a new race, the inevitable hugely buggy wvw map (first new map since launch) and one new spvp map and the usual spam 1 zerg fest mechanics.

Sounds well worth the money…..

I’ll be playing gw1 for the foreseeable future- you know, the game with guild halls, templates for builds, real teams, hard missions and no face palm one shot cheese mechanics.

Otis McGinty.1926:

What if Anet put it this way.
HoT expansion only $45
HoT expansion (core included) $50
Players would still be complaining.
Personally I have been playing since release of gw2 and have bought slots. I myself already have a couple slots open across 2 different accts (together 16 toons & 4 empty).
IMO…I appreciate the hard work that the developers, programmers and artists have put into this game for my entertainment and have no problem in paying for it.
If you want the slot, spend the extra 10bucks!
If your gonna quit….do us all a favor and quit. Over the past couple days I have to listen to players “Cry me a river” about being ripped off by Anet while crafting in LA.
Bunch a freaking babies that need there wooby.

All I see is you’re crying like a baby.

To clarify: $50 is the price of the expansion. We included the core game as a free bonus to make it easier for new players to get into it.

In marketing, what you say is irrelevant.

What matters is what potential customers perceive from what you said.

And clearly, people perceive that they are buying the core game a second time when they buy HoT. You have 3000+ messages posted in the last 24 hours or so in this thread that proves it.

You may say the contrary as much as you want. Your message is not going to pass through.

If you ( meaning Anet) don’t modify your positions, it may hurt you (meaning Anet) a lot in the long term.