Guild Wars 2

I have to wonder if the gem shop is the motivating factor behind such a sweeping change as the “instant 2,000 people to dragon rank”

Why would they randomly decide to do this at this point in time? Did they literally not put much thought into it when the game first came out? Was it that difficult for them to do the math to calculate how long it would take to get to rank 80?

I believe that some money cruncher at anet had a brilliant idea. I think it went something like this:

Dev A: “…we’re not making much money off of pvp…. what can we do to entice them? Well the finishers we are selling aren’t selling as much as we’d like… WHY won’t the pvp’ers buy them?”

Dev B: “They are really attached to their exclusive rank finishers”

Dev A: “…Well what if they weren’t so exclusive anymore? We would probably sell a lot more finishers from the gem shop. People want to be exclusive and this would really give them the only other option, especially if 80% of the active pvp community immediately had max rank”

Seriously, I would rather they DELETE rank and let us keep our current finishers than implement a system where BEARS literally SKIP: Shark and Phoenix and over night become Dragons en masse.

Perhaps you disagree but regardless of whether or not this was planned, it’s going to greatly increase the sale of finishers in the gem shop.

John Smith I’m calling you out. ]:<

ill humor this post and say that finishers do sell well, cause WVw and pve players buy them.

Lord Hammer Hand.4815:

ill humor this post and say that finishers do sell well, cause WVw and pve players buy them.

Great. That has nothing to do with the fact that this update alone will greatly increase the sales of finishers to pvpers who normally would avoid them in favor of their cherished rank. Coincidence? I think not.

I’ll go so far as to gamble the dragon finisher is mediocre at best.

I can see your point Lux. I feel that while the wardrobe change initially seems like a good idea, I can see how they’ll sell transmutation charges for people’s gems/ RL monies. I guess we’ll have to wait and see how time consuming it will be to earn these charges before coming to a full conclusion.

But back to your point. It’s a pretty simple idea really. Lower the rank point requirements and you lower the value of the reward. But as I’ve mentioned in the past, this is what Arenanet has done consistently through their designs over the course of a decade. They make things challenging for a time but ultimately pander to the casual players because getting them to play their content by actually fixing the real issues is “too hard”.

IIvIIozzie.9250:

I can see your point Lux. I feel that while the wardrobe change initially seems like a good idea, I can see how they’ll sell transmutation charges for people’s gems/ RL monies. I guess we’ll have to wait and see how time consuming it will be to earn these charges before coming to a full conclusion.

But back to your point. It’s a pretty simple idea really. Lower the rank point requirements and you lower the value of the reward. But as I’ve mentioned in the past, this is what Arenanet has done consistently through their designs over the course of a decade. They make things challenging for a time but ultimately pander to the casual players because getting them to play their content by actually fixing the real issues is “too hard”.

Yeah, it’s an unfortunate trend.

Regardless of whether or not the gemstore/sales to pvp players had -any- influence on it, there’s definitely a possibility they will more than likely profit from this.

I appreciate your input on the matter.

Lux, I think you can take off your tin-foil hat now!

Remember, they were originally going to remove rank all-together. Instead, they are making rank something that allows some pvp progression in the intermediate term. If people decide they want dragon rank, and it causes them to try out pvp and get hooked – then this change worked perfectly.

The kind of prestige you want is going to come through eventual ladders. Soon™.

BlackBeard.2873:

Lux, I think you can take off your tin-foil hat now!

Remember, they were originally going to remove rank all-together. Instead, they are making rank something that allows some pvp progression in the intermediate term. If people decide they want dragon rank, and it causes them to try out pvp and get hooked – then this change worked perfectly.

The kind of prestige you want is going to come through eventual ladders. Soon™.

I’d rather them remove rank like they planned than instantly hand out 2,000 dragon rank finishers.

With how great they have been (sarcasm) with every update since release I just can’t wait to see what they have in store for us with ladder rewards (sarcasm).

:D

Tinfoil hat or not, this “pvp update” is going to increase sales and remove 1 of 2 things that were pretty much exclusive to the pvp community.

The PvP only player base is so small I’m sure that’s definitely not the reason lol. Most PvP players play the other modes as well. Why do you think they added all these rewards and systems that interconnect PvE/WvW and PvP? You really think finishers was the reason? It was probably because everyone was screaming for it to happen. They could’ve just removed ranks like they said they were going to in the beginning.

Cush.4063:

The PvP only player base is so small I’m sure that’s definitely not the reason lol. Most PvP players play the other modes as well. Why do you think they added all these rewards and systems that interconnect PvE/WvW and PvP? You really think finishers was the reason? It was probably because everyone was screaming for it to happen. They could’ve just removed ranks like they said they were going to in the beginning.

It makes more sense than any alternative explanation that I’ve heard. It’s simple, really: “how do we further monetize the least profitable game mode?”

What other explanation makes more sense? By all means I’m not attached to this theory and that’s the point. I want to know WHY it happened.

After hearing these ridiculous changes I would not be surprised if the higher ups thought: “we can potentially increase stomp finisher sales by 8% if we hand out dragon ranks at 50? Done. Code it up and pretend like it’s a reward.”

This is coming from the dev team that confessed: “we removed glory a month in advance so pve players wouldn’t come in and farm skins to unlock”

…ummm… what? If a pve player could come into pvp and farm skins and unlock a lot of them I have 2 things to say:
1) Who cares what crappy skins they can unlock in 1 month
2) They probably deserve whatever crappy skins they can unlock in 1 month

Logic like that from their lead economist leads me to believe that something as ridiculous as this theory is possible.

Everything, even Wolf finisher is in my eyes still more exclusive than any finisher from the gem shops.

Those have absolutly nothing to do with you progression in the pvp system. They may look cool, but there’s 0 prestige in them.

No, this is simpler. You want new semi-casuals to try PvP. They are not going to do so if the barrier to getting ranks is that high. Essentially, it can’t take them a year to “catch up” or they will just get frustrated with the whole experience outside of the player who just wants to get some new dungeon loot.

So a decision gets made, keep the uber hard core players happy or appeal to the MASSIVE number of casuals who you may be able to anchor into pvp with a unified system of rewards, playstyles etc.

After all, this is hardly the only change. You have dungeon loot available as well as skins that can be used in PvE and new runes/sigils that reflect what people use in other modes coming. Look at this change as part of the whole.

I have gotten three finishers off the gem store for use in pvp and wvwvw(mostly pvp). I exchanged gold for gems, and boom there that is. Before the I only play pvp, so i dont have gold is said….you can earn gold in pvp now. This theory is debunked.

I’m actually concerned if they plan to increase the money(loot maybe?) rewards from matches, preferably won. Since the game is now 100% based on gold as currency and we will have to buy gems in PvP (most will do it by exchanging) it’s quite logical to increase the outcome earned in PvP.
Maybe not raw cash, but some loot bags (Champion Bags?) for winning matches. PvPers could gather materials pretty fast and then craft something n PvE/sell materials for gold. It should also interest PvP players in PvE at least a bit

My issue isn’t with the new rank system. I am personally fine with that. My issue is that there is no progression after level 80. It is almost like saying that once you hit level 80, the game is over for you. It shouldn’t be the approach in PvP.

I’d like to see ranks above 80, and new rewards added as people continue to progress.

Think about it for a second. Only a handfull of pvpers have the exclusive finishers. Do you really think that this entire change will be implemented so the rank 60s (like what? 20-25 active ones tops) and 70s (all 5 of them lulz) will buy more finishers? Sure sounds like a cashcow to me….right?

This doesnt mean that i agree with it. I think everyone including the most hardcore should be on a journey to a higher rank. Capping it off likes this makes the journey faster and less interesting.

IIvIIozzie.9250:

I can see your point Lux. I feel that while the wardrobe change initially seems like a good idea, I can see how they’ll sell transmutation charges for people’s gems/ RL monies. I guess we’ll have to wait and see how time consuming it will be to earn these charges before coming to a full conclusion.

But back to your point. It’s a pretty simple idea really. Lower the rank point requirements and you lower the value of the reward. But as I’ve mentioned in the past, this is what Arenanet has done consistently through their designs over the course of a decade. They make things challenging for a time but ultimately pander to the casual players because getting them to play their content by actually fixing the real issues is “too hard”.

The only thing I disagree with is that they gave us a way to earn trans. charges in PvP because ArenaNet is stinkin cool.

Also, to the OP: What I just typed in the above paragraph goes for your finisher theory as well. The truth of the matter is that more people felt that progression was super slow in PvP compared to the rest of the game. They sped it up. If veterans are upset by that, well that is their opinion. I am a vet too. I am rank 49 and have spent hundreds of hours playing PvP, not too mention the thousands of hours I have spent in PvE. This change is great. The people that are upset because they can’t be the only ones with a finisher is like PvE people being upset that others are allowed to get Legendaries. It’s the epitome of selfish hipster MMO mentality. The “I had it before everyone else” mentality and therefore that makes them stand out or something. It doesn’t. It’s a game and ArenaNet are rewarding people that have put a lot of time and effort into the game and that is it. There is no underlying conspiracy. No lessening of the value of it. It’s more accessible to more people and that is better for everyone. Besides, The PvP rank bar isn’t a measure of skill, it’s a measure of time. The PvP Rank Bar is the equivalent of the PvE XP Bar.