Guild Wars 2

I had a revalation last night. I went to a banker and he said something like “I have the best deals.” I thought that was strange til it hit me. The dang bankers are selling our stuff and replacing it crappy counterfeit items. It made sense cause the bankers sold to merchants and the crappy gear broke easy which made the armor repair guy rich.

Since the patch came into effect and armor is now free to repair I can only guess either the repair guys had a change of heart or they got busted and wouldnt give up the merchants and bankers as accomplices.

Seems legit

It’s a generic merchant dialogue line.

Anet actually did add lore to the armor repair guys… odd as it may be. That lore being that Evon hired them all so they’re now working for a wage (provided by Evon) and not by commission. Basically Evon unionized the armor repair guys across the continent.

And people say Evon’s a bad guy. :-P pffft

He is. It’s obviously a plot.

Pay the repair workers minimum wage, adventurers keep all that cash, they use all that cash on trading post trades, getting him even more money (net profit=up) from the sales tax!

It’s one massive plot to gain money and put those repair workers starving.

If that were the case, you had best stop repairing your armor. You know, as a form of protest :-P

Wow Konig… That’s actually legit! Props!

One problem with that though: repair smiths are independent contractors. If they were to enter into contract with the Black Lion Trading company, they must have something to gain. Ergo, they have been given a handsome salary in exchange for the BL’s increase in profits. Its a win, win situation.

If he unionized the repairmen, they would probably go on strike -eventually-. I mean, really. Minimum wage while fighting off hordes of zombies in Orr? Who is going to take that job? Seriously!

Not really, bullyrook. Think of ALL the repairers in the entire continent. How many of the more obscure (read: non-city) ones would get used? Very few. They would gain all if they’re serious about making this lore, as their previous income would be… very minimum.

Though the unionizing was a bit of a joke (heck, the whole thing was), those whom were rarely visited would get money now. This, of course, ignores the idea of NPCs needing to fix armor.

Coming soon to a Tyrian city near you…Walmart! Go for the savings, stay for the spectacle of a fat Norn in a tank top two sizes too small and pajama bottoms!

….the sad part is that I’ve effectively seen that many times in my life. Florida can be scary. O_o

Indeed, Florida is scary.

Why my folks wanted to move here, I’ll never know. Wait. Caves and cave diving. Right.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

He is. It’s obviously a plot.

Pay the repair workers minimum wage, adventurers keep all that cash, they use all that cash on trading post trades, getting him even more money (net profit=up) from the sales tax!

It’s one massive plot to gain money and put those repair workers starving.

No it’s even bigger than that. In fact, it’s bigger than you could possibly imagine. What if I told you that the gold we use in our currency is not in fact real gold? Would you believe me if I told you that our copper silver and gold are ALL mass produced by the Black Lion Trading Co? You better believe it baby. Take a look at your coins and you’ll find a small print that says, “Black Lion TC note.”

Our currency is not backed by any items of real value other than itself. It’s just mass produced at will and distributed throughout Tyria with little regard for matters such as inflation. Look at the cost of gems and legendary weapons compared to the prices of last year. Our worldwide currency is quickly losing its value.

The BLTC is privately owned and the company runs most of its exterior operations through privately hired merchants. The BLTC gains most of its power through loans and bonds. It gives out loans to various large organizations throughout Tyria. For example, the Iron Legion was modernized with the help of BLTC loans. Due to high interest rates, the Iron Legion pays approximately 15% of its public funding straight back into the BLTC’s pockets. To help balance out the costs of BLTC loans, Smodur the Unflinching continues to heavily invest into various BLTC bonds. All these bonds offer guaranteed interest returns and some bonds even allow the buyer to cash back the bonds at any given moment. Since BLTC can manufacture an infinite amount of currency, it doesn’t matter if bond holders profit greatly from interest. BLTC’s power stems from the supremacy of the coins. As long as coins are used by Tyrians to exchange goods, as long as Tyrians believe that this flat currency has any real value, BLTC will continue to control all of Tyria.

Just a short while ago, Scarlet challenged the supremacy of the coins. Scarlet embraced the idea of Pan-Dragonism, an ideology that encourages the cooperation between Elder Dragons and Tyrians. She gathered Tyrians and formed three alliance, molten, aetherblade, and toxic, to aid her purpose of Dragon-Tyrian unification. The BLTC sought interest in Scarlet’s large amounts of watchwork sprockets and so for a short while, Scarlet enjoyed good business with the BLTC. However, one day Scarlet rejected gold to sprocket transactions and instead offered to trade ectos-sprockets instead. The BLTC feared that the coin supremacy would be overhauled by an ectoplasm based economy. Although the BLTC already holds a very large sum of ectoplasms, they cannot manufacture ectoplasms at will. Ectos are always backed by Crystalline Dusts and are therefore more stable than the flat coin system. Fearing for their loss of economic supremacy, Evon Gnashblade orchestrated a string of false flag attacks on Tyria to demonize Scarlet. The Dragon Bash incident, Queen’s Jubilee, the Tower of Nightmares, and the destruction of Lion’s Arch was all manipulated by the Black Lion Trading Company. With the use of heavy propaganda and hired thugs (Marjory Delaqua, Kasmeer Meade, Braham Eirsson, Rox Pickheart, and many others) they managed to fool Tyria into believing that Scarlet was some evil lunatic bent on destroying Tyria. As her final act of rebellion, Scarlet awoke an elder dragon to continue on the battle against the coin supremacy after her assassination.

“Caithe, someday you’ll see. Tyria needs me.”

Doctor.1905;

Take a look at your coins and you’ll find a small print that says, “Black Lion TC note.”

You will also see that the money is also chocolate with a tin foil wrapper.

While I do belive that Evon Gnashblade is up to something with the armor repairers, it seems that after losing the elections he’s playing another game to gain power. As far as the BLTC company having so much power? yes. They have a hand in everything, it’s basically a centralized bank with no accountability. But Evon working for them? Not likely. It goes against the whole philosophy of the charr. Evon wants power.

“The charr race was forged in the merciless crucible of war. It is all they know. War defines them, and their quest for dominion drives them ever onward. The weakling and the fool have no place among the charr. Victory is all that matters, and it must be achieved by any means and at any cost”

Evon stood to gain nothing by working to defeat Scarlet. He wants power and authority, is trying to further his agenda, whatever it may be. By monopolizing the armor repair industry, he in essence controls the players. We HAVE to see them from time to time. If he was working for the BLTC, you’d start to see a reduction in instant repair canisters, until eventually they went away completely. Whatever he’s planning, it relies on the PCs becoming weaker. All that he needs to do is stop all the armor repairers from working. They still get paid, but no longer repair PC armor. Eventally all our armor is broken, and we are defenseless against what he has planned.

Or maybe he wants to conduct his business without the Lionguard commandeering all his goods even though the Captain’s Counsel is comprised of individuals just as wealthy as himself – if not more so.

^ That actually makes sense…

What’s the lore behind the anvils charging us for repairs? Coin operated? Or are anvils alive, but very sedentary, and have to feed their anvil children metal?

Ben.2685:

What’s the lore behind the anvils charging us for repairs? Coin operated? Or are anvils alive, but very sedentary, and have to feed their anvil children metal?

Those anvils are obviously ran by Rata Sum. They have the same capabilities as the waypoints, in that they can take exact change out of an adventurer’s pockets without them really noticing…