Guild Wars 2

Grimm.2685:

Sadly, Arena Nets generous offer toward new players has mutated into this bile filled cesspool of greed, entitlement and miss understanding. Those that cannot understand that this was an act of generosity and not a slap in the face to all existing players are not worthy of any freebies.

ANet is no charity. Their “generous” offer is still meant to make them win money.

Well I’m not a charity either. I’m happy for new players to get a good deal. But for fairness I want a good deal too. I don’t need the same deal, just something at least slightly equivalent or that feels like it.

I agree that they are generous to give the core game for free to new players, but why not give a character slot to the loyal veterans, in comparison the core game is way expensive than a slot.

I decided to show the information from the HoT pre-purchase page and FAQ to my mother, who has been done work in the main offices wholesalers and retailers for over 30 years. Everything from a billing clerk to now running her own business.

Her reaction to the information on the HoT per-purchase page was confusion because of the lack of clarity. And the reaction to the actual facts of who does/doesn’t get the core was simply “that’s illegal”.

It certainly wasn’t a surprise to me, as I feel the same way. I do have some knowledge of the subject from working with her in recent years, but not decades of experience.

Yes, It should be Rege-narration, so he describes everything you do in morgan freeman’s voice. :P
or Possibly even Reggae-narration, and it’s Snoop Dogg/Snoop Lion narrating it xD

Grimm.2685:

Once again the point has been missed.

indeed, you keep missing it, we keep explaining it to you, but it’s not working. you just don’t want to understand.

Explodie.9428:

I was thinking, they cant change the pricing on the game anymore!

Because if they lowered it or change it, what would happen to the people who already bought it?

They know exactly who has already ordered it, and are able to refund part of that money to them. If they can offer this ridiculous refund/delete “deal” to people that had recently purchased the core game, they can do partial refunds to all pre-purchasers.

But they should really get this solved before the game goes on sale in retail stores. Handling a price change there would be a multi-company mess that would likely lead to retail stores refusing to carry their products in the future.

Grimm.2685:

Sadly, Arena Nets generous offer toward new players has mutated into this bile filled cesspool of greed, entitlement and miss understanding. Those that cannot understand that this was an act of generosity and not a slap in the face to all existing players are not worthy of any freebies.

Why it’s a slap on the face, cause not only does one has to pay 45 euros to get the expansion, but if you don’t want to delete one of your characters you need to spend another 10 euros to get another character slot to play the revenant, which is content you supposedly already bought and payed for with your 45 euros. So new gamers not only get the base game and the expansion, but older players are actively being punished financially for being in the game for too long. The choices we’re getting are, either lose progression (and time and money) on a character delete, or fork another 10 euros, effectively driving the price of the BASE package at 55 euros for many of us.

That’s not an act of generosity, that’s a slap so hard we almost lost a tooth to it.

Grimm.2685:

Sadly, Arena Nets generous offer toward new players has mutated into this bile filled cesspool of greed, entitlement and miss understanding. Those that cannot understand that this was an act of generosity and not a slap in the face to all existing players are not worthy of any freebies.

It might not be a slap in the face, but it sure feels like one. And you know the saying about a duck.

Grimm.2685:

Sadly, Arena Nets generous offer toward new players has mutated into this bile filled cesspool of greed, entitlement and miss understanding. Those that cannot understand that this was an act of generosity and not a slap in the face to all existing players are not worthy of any freebies.

It wasn’t an act of generosity, it was a cheap marketing scheme and it blew up in their face.

I feel like with a price tag that is nearly the same of GW2 at launch, the expansion would have to be comparable in size to the wealth of content the base game gave us to be on par with the great value that GW2 is known for.

The current pre-purchase pricing tiers are a huge disappointment, I already own 2 GW2 accounts, I don’t need a third… and I am not into minis, titles or Guildhall decorations.

I am hoping to see an upgrade only option for players like myself that have been playing since launch, are not interested in an additional copy of the base game, minis, titles or guildhall decorations or pre-purchasing more gems.

If an upgrade only option does not become available I will definitely not be purchasing the expansion until it goes on sale later down the road.

Unless of course Heart of Thorns turns out to be nearly the size of the original game and provides a similar amount of new territory to explore, dungeons to conquer and legendaries to lust after.

I guess only time will tell.

They’re climbing in your wallets, they’re snatching your money up
Trying to kitten us, so you need to hide your kids, hide your wife, hide your kids, hide your wife,
And hide your husband, cuz they kittening everybody out here
They don’t have to post and confess, we know what they do
We’re not buying you, we’re not buying you, so you can run and tell that, run and tell that, run and tell that, Anet, A-A-Anet.
We paid full price for Guild Wars 2 back in the day, this is so dumb, this is really dumb, for real.

Just to add my two cents to this:

Personally, I don’t have a problem with pre-purchasing. I have faith that Anet will deliver something eventually. I know some people don’t like to do it, and I wouldn’t do it for every game, but for HoT I would.

The price tag of $50: I’m not thrilled with it. I’d pay it, I just want to be sold on it. I need more information to tell me how much content I’m getting for my money.

The fact that there is no expansion-only option: I would be ok with this if it weren’t for…

The fact that existing players get nothing, and do not benefit from the “free” base game: This is the part that doesn’t sit well for me, and what stopped me from pre-purchasing already.

When GW Factions and Nightfall came out, they added character slots if you had an existing account. Not as many character slots as if you started a second account, but enough that you could make the new classes. This was a Good Thing.

When EotN came out, it was priced lower than the other campaigns. It did not add any character slots (if I remember correctly), but it also did not add any classes. The lowered price was also a Good Thing.

When Valve released the Orange Box, it included Half Life 2, HL2 Episode 1, HL2 Episode 2, Team Fortress 2, and Portal. At the time HL2 and HL2 Ep1 had already been released. If you added an Orange Box key to an account that already owned those games, you got a giftable copy you could send to a friend. This was a Good Thing.

What I’m getting at is that forcing existing account holders to buy a version of HoT, that includes a “free base game” that we will not be able to use, nor get any benefit from is a Bad Thing.

I’m not oblivious to the fact that you need to make money. You’re not making games for the sole purpose of our enjoyment. You have goals to hit and investors to impress. If you gave away a character slot with every existing account HoT you sold, you’d sell a lot less gems to people looking to add to their account. Existing players will feel they “need” that extra slot. You’d be hard pressed to find a person that doesn’t at least want to TRY the new class you’ve hyped us up about. At the same time, you have a market of existing players that are unhappy with the current options being offered to them.

Here is my suggestion: Make it so that existing players that add HoT to their account get something. This could be a character slot (I hold this is as the Best-Case Scenario, but I’m not holding my breath), it could be a giftable copy of the base game with which we could bring in new players, or (and here’s my As-Realistic-As-I-Can-Be suggestion) 400-600 gems. 400-600 gems would cover 1/2-3/4 of the price of a new character slot for the players that still need one. 400-600 gems would also be a nice bonus to any player that didn’t want another character slot. 400-600 gems would get players to buy more gems, since you’d still need more to cover the full cost of a character slot. The leftover gems would then be there, ready to spend on the next nice thing to come down the pipeline.

There are a lot of options out there, and I’m eagerly awaiting some kind of word from your team on what course of action you decide to take. If you aren’t going to change your pricing/rewards structure, you’re going to need to give a well-thought explanation on why you decided on what you did.

You can try to mislead people however you want, but at the end of the day, you’re selling people a game they already own. It’s part of the price we’re paying for the whole package therefore it’s not “free” At the end of the day, I’m paying for something I already own, and it’s insulting.

I happen to think the price would be a fair price for the expansion anyway, so I don’t really mind TOO much, but the way you’re approaching it and trying to sell it to people like they’re idiots who don’t know better honestly turns me off of the whole thing.

i must say with a bag of popcorn this could easily be my new favorite tv drama lets call it the “the woes of a player” i must say im always highly amused when i read the forums here

Day 4 of the Siege of Thorns eh..

Hi guys and dolls! Did I miss anything. A bunch of people telling us to lay off aNet, the poor buggers need the money and I’ll be giving them my money no matter what I say?

I got a grand in my cupboard that says I won’t touch HoT until this debacle is resolved in a manner I find acceptable. It’s my money. Like they keep saying to anyone who bought gems, “No gun at my head!” kitten straight.

Fix or Fallout. That’s how I see it.

hype train became hate train.

Frightlight.3796:

sanelson.4028:

Jesus Christ… I can’t even write a constructive comment right now due to all the rage I’m feeling…I’ll just come back later.

Well this is the generation of people that feel entitled to having things for free or paying less too get more. Making a good game costs money as people that want this game too continue we should be happy to do what we can to keep it going. Imagine if anet said we have decided not to release HOT and are shutting down the gw2 servers because of financial trouble would people flock to help?

That would be funny, since GW2 made more money in the 1st quarter of this year than they’ve made at any time since 2012. And if you download and read the the reports linked in the article below, you’ll see that it’s a LOT of money… Without a subscription, GW2 still managed to be the 3rd most profitable MMO per account through May 2015, and that’s on a list that includes MOBAs like LoL & DotA2 (GW2 placed above both of them, btw.)

http://massivelyop.com/2015/05/13/ncsofts-first-quarter-earnings-growth-for-guild-wars-2-further-deflation-for-wildstar/

Dawdler.8521:

And the worst thing is, how on earth can we be smarter than marketing personal that’s getting salary to plan releases like this? I mean, take your three points.

We are not smarter than them; They just think that we are dumber than that.

papry.8096:

Pretty Pixie.8603:

papry.8096:

Wolfheart.1879:

4) Communication. AKA The Famous Arenanet Ostrich Defense.

We got an answer of gayle at page 68.
We know that Ruby got called ingame.
last but the best: we have an amazing reminder of the situation on the main post.

They are communicating plenty on the issue.

Regina’s answer was posted before this blew up. Gaile’s ’We’re listening’ has not been followed up by any further comment from someone in a position to make a definite statement.

It’s the forum equivalent of saying you’ll go talk to your supervisor, and never returning to the customer.

I’m sure that Anet will never do that. They are an amazing company that always listen to their customer.

As proven by a 4k thread on a major issue to many players with no follow up for 3 days.

I’d like some of what you’re smoking, sweety.

Smallclaw.1650:

You aren’t paying more because the prepurchase tiers include the core game. The core game is included as a Free Bonus. I repeat: FREE BONUS. As was officially stated above, since many of you either failed to read it or failed to comprehend it.

Whether the tiers include the base game or not will not alter the prices.

What is failed to be understood is nothing is free. In order to make it free they have to account for there roi to ncsoft and investors. They wanted it that price to fund that return of investment. Making players feel like there are the only demographic supporting the sale. Furthermore, HoT is not there main source of profit. Gem store is. it is going to hurt anet if they market the bundle this way. Promoting new players is great but how loyal to the game will new players theehen you know players been around since head start are a sure way for future profit. I’m all for new players but not like this. I support the game and almost all for what anet does but this one was a mistake all the wayfrom transparency to veterans and that 10 $ sale. For anet to be aware that this stops here is good for me

Smallclaw.1650:

You aren’t paying more because the prepurchase tiers include the core game. The core game is included as a Free Bonus. I repeat: FREE BONUS. As was officially stated above, since many of you either failed to read it or failed to comprehend it.

Whether the tiers include the base game or not will not alter the prices.

I’ll sell you an air conditioning for 10,000$ and as a FREE BONUS i’ll add my car.
This is how this free bonus works in this case.

mrstealth.6701:

You’ll get the new wvw map, overhaul, and stronghold without HoT. Masteries I don’t expect to see without HoT, as most are related to HoT zones.

Finally some good news.
Thanks.

Smallclaw.1650:

You aren’t paying more because the prepurchase tiers include the core game. The core game is included as a Free Bonus. I repeat: FREE BONUS. As was officially stated above, since many of you either failed to read it or failed to comprehend it.

Whether the tiers include the base game or not will not alter the prices.

If an existing player purchases the game however, he does not the the “free bonus”,
or have you failed to comprehend the only complaint that makes sense

Rococo.8347:

Maybe we should all just shut up and be grateful – after all I just realised…

We get the Slap In The Face for FREE!!!!

I bet Newbies wont get one of those until Living Story Season 3

phah that really made me laugh

Smallclaw.1650:

You aren’t paying more because the prepurchase tiers include the core game. The core game is included as a Free Bonus. I repeat: FREE BONUS. As was officially stated above, since many of you either failed to read it or failed to comprehend it.

Whether the tiers include the base game or not will not alter the prices.

I agree that we simply cannot comprehend that something is labeled as free when it has a price listed directly below it!

Buy three tires get 1 free!
free detail on new car purchase!
No cleaning charge on rental returns!
This 80 page notebook comes with 20 bonus pages!
Free koolaid with cult membership!

OK…I’ve been watching this situation unfold for a while now, and I want to add my impressions to the thread. First off, I am a long time player and fan of the Guild Wars/Guild Wars2 franchise, starting with GW when it first released. I’ve always been a fan of ANet and the community…they seem to be able to find the sweet spot in MMO gaming, IMO anyways. This is not to say that they’ve always made what I think is the right decision along the way any number of times. The big difference is that, in many cases when the community voices its displeasure/unhappiness with an ANet decision it gets considered and many times adjustments/corrections are made. What differentiates ANet from the rest to me has always been the desire to establish, nurture, and improve the community. There is no question in my mind that people like Gaile, Regina, Colin, Linsey, etc. are passionate about the game and do everything they can to make it a great experience for the players.

It’s clear to me and many others in the community that the way the pre-order situation has been handled thus far is not good, moreover, it does seem to needlessly penalize veteran players. I’m pretty sure that ANet will do something to address the situation. I have no idea when or what form this will take, and I can almost guarantee that not everyone will be fully satisfied with it. Nevertheless, I am certain that they are listening and something will be forthcoming from them.

I think it’s vitally important too, to keep the particulars of the situation straight. This has nothing to do with the devs. Having worked in the IT field for over 35 years and seen a few things along the way, it’s clear that this is a marketing messup. I have no idea who could have thought that this was in any way a good strategy, except maybe from some statistical/market analysis that said that this was the way to go. It’s also clear and should have been immediately clear to all at ANet that this would cause a firestorm of protest from veteran players, and so it has. I’d be curious to know whether this decision came from above ANet…that is from NCSoft, and, if it did, was it from anyone who was in any way in close contact with the community and the ANet devs. If it was NCSoft, they need to learn from this…if it was ANet marketing, same. I cannot and will not lay any responsibility for this at the feet of the ANet devs or community managers. Anyone who does is not accurately considering the totality of the situation (not that I have any inside knowledge of what exactly did happen).

In closing, I want to say that I will purchase the expansion, and I’m grateful to the ANet devs and community managers who have worked and cared so hard over the years to make the GW franchise a great one for us, the player community.

The real kick in the junk with the beta access is for those of us who farmed portals. We got.. 1 6 hour beta staggered into 2 hour segments, for dozens of hours farming, and now.. pay $50 or more if you want beta access.

This prepurchase fiasco just makes me mad about the portals all over again.

New Players get HoT + GW2 base game for $50

Veteran Players who have GW2 already should get 1 extra character slot (same value as buying GW2 when it’s on sale recently) for that $50 for the rev class. That’d probably calm most of the complaints.

New players get additional value, Veterans get additional value. Everything balanced.

Right now, new players get additional value, Veterans get no additional value, things out of balance.

Only thing I have a problem with this whole thing, is no character slot included with the basic expansion. That’s…very stupid. Just, straight up potato. Even in Guild Wars 1, all the expansions included character slots for however many professions came with it, which is awesome! I know Anet likes to milk us for money, but this is just…sad.

I would like to reach the 100 pages, that is why I am adding my views.
I personally don’t care about the core game for free. And I don’t really care about the price (I can’t even tell how much it is in pounds). I am pretty sure it won’t be worth it, but I have played GW since gw1, had all games (even the collector versions of Factions and Nightfall even though I was a student at the time) and I can afford it now that I work.

What I do care about:
- no date yet. I mean… seriously? Did you have to get some revenues for your second quarter or something that you had to start pre purchase without any date of release?
- no extra slot. Money is not an issue but I don’t want to buy gems on top of the xx£ I will spend for HoT. This feels wrong and this “hidden” cost is unacceptable.
- the FAQ modification. Sooo not classy, guys.

So mixed feelings for me. I would like to support the game. But if I buy it, you will keep on treating me like kitten in the future.
Thank you, you have made it into a lose/lose situation.

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.

No, this is not true. If the core game was free, it would be available for download on the website right now. It isn’t. It isn’t free. They want you to buy it (again) with HoT. Ridiculous.

If the core game was a separate serial code from HoT, or if veterans could opt to buy HoT + a character slot/fluff item/ or gems, this would not be a problem. Rebuying the core game is a problem.

TOTAL SLAP IN THE FACE TO LOYAL GUILD WARS COMMUNITY. BOYCOT HEART OF THORNS ITS A RIP OFF. if you look at what they are doing they think we all love the game so much that we will pay anything for expansion that really isn’t an expansion.. they give everything to new players. They kick their loyal community to the curb, $50 for hot and core when 99% of hot players already have core game. Hmmm are we stupid or what why is everything wrapped around new players? Dont loyal players deserve anything we made the game what it is by getting our friends to play and they got their friends. We throw cash at the trading post for gems for items that are over priced. we keep it alive when alot get bored and leave. if we didnt play they would be out of business. All Anet wants to do is count us all as new players so they get a bigger check from nc soft. Gee i feel cheated. At least in gw1 when you bought an expansion for $50 you got 2 toon slots, except eye of the north which was cheaper. they should just go pay to play at this point, then maybe they would respect their community like other games like final fantasy whom caters to their veteran players. all we want really is for them to drop the core game and give us 1 toon slot and alot of us would be happier. Then atleast we get something for $50. i worked to hard and long on my toons to start over. i dont want core game cause i ale\ready have it. if i dont buy hot game over gee what a choice we get. we mean nothing to Anet and they really dont respect their loyal players at all. they just want our cash. so a couple of new maps {3} and the ability to fly. wow not good enough. If you dont buy HOT no more living story nothing. you choose