Guild Wars 2

Free to play is normally defined as no cost for the game or monthly fees. This is true here, however unlike subscription MMOs that later went to F2P, instead of numerous paywall lockouts for content and classes, or a literal subscription fee called VIP membership, ANet simply implemented additional level unlocks and limitations on chat. Those limitations are more trial like but this isn’t a trial.

A determined F2P player could level an 80 and play all game modes.

Sometimes it’s nice and fast but often it’s like browsing on a single core Pentium 4, with only 1GB of memory, in Chrome, on XP.

They do have unrestricted access to /say. But /say has a radius and that means a RMT spammer is less effective. The level 10 restriction until entering a race city and 35 for LA means time has to be spent before their message can spammed to a large enough group to be worth the time it takes before they are shut down.

The restrictions aren’t meant to eliminate it entirely, it’s to place an additional burden on RMTers while not preventing an F2P player from interacting with other players nearby. It’s a tight line to walk but I think it can work.

And yes, ANet’s F2P does resemble other games trial accounts and that’s because ANet yet again is redefining what F2P means. In other games it’s usually paywalls for anything but basic content and classes with your choice to either pay a monthly VIP (but lets be real, subscription) fee or rent/buy permanently particular features that’s been blocked. So GW2’s F2P resembles more of a trial but with no maximum level cap or bank limitations. Just a few additions level cap unlocks to when you can do something

Now hopefully players will be able to play the game enough to determine if they enjoy it, and if they do, chafe at the limitations placed on them that so they would either by HoT or move along.

Yes, we have the chicken littles who spin every worse case scenario they can think of on how hoards of F2P accounts will run roughshod on vets and drive them from the game. That might happen but I’ll doubt it. Any F2P trolls will get put down and in the end we will see a lot of new players to reinvigorate the game.

And the negative nellies will simply move onto the next big thing to be negative about along with the doomsayers and those wanting GW2 to be just like GW in every possible way.

Yeah, considering how advance (cough) the forum software it. It’s probably all or nothing.

For those who didn’t see or only heard about it on POI, check out her Facebook page to see her Golem.

https://www.facebook.com/EnaylaCosplay

Lord Kuru.3685:

Behellagh.1468:

And Lord Kuru you’ve ignored what anybody has said about what is allowed in chat. Role an F2P account and play it. It really isn’t as horrific as you’ve suggested.

Plus ANet has to balance the F2P experience with the Vet experience of RMT spammers flooding the world as well as threats to the game economy.

I did roll one. I wanted to level so the first thing I tried to do was ask if any events were going on. And guess what, I couldn’t. Luckily I know where events might be happening but a new player has no idea what’s going on.

And for those who wish to feel superior because you gave Anet $10, go ahead. But if F2P drives new players away, the game suffers as a whole and in the end your experience will suffer.

Anet should just bite the bullet and have real live human beings taking care of chat abuse reports in real time because not being about to communicate in an MMO is ridiculous.

Well funny I could use /say and I could /whisper strangers once every 30 seconds. Nobody is disagreeing that map is disabled but localized chat does work.

And Lord Kuru you’ve ignored what anybody has said about what is allowed in chat. Role an F2P account and play it. It really isn’t as horrific as you’ve suggested.

Plus ANet has to balance the F2P experience with the Vet experience of RMT spammers flooding the world as well as threats to the game economy.

CorrynnStarr.7942:

really??/ blue electro dye anyone? who the kitten would pay that for a dye….. it does not encourage selling at a fair price at all… its a crap shoot until someone makes a buy and an average is started. plain and simple.

I’ve seen 5 sales since the 3rd birthday gift dropped as more players are concerned that the buyer pool will dry up so they are trying to sell and undercut one another.

And yes, when it’s a seller’s market, like the real world, the price can be extreme. And if you don’t mind posting a high price and wait with the hope someone will eventually buy it, then fine, that’s your choice.

Quarktastic.1027:

Behellagh.1468:

I thought they could whisper to anybody but only once per 30 seconds unless both friend one another.

But only if the other player is in the same map. They can’t cross-map whisper, though I don’t know how it works.

Makes sense.

KittensWithClaws.3097:

This is not a rage quit, not looking for sympathy, but thought the story was just interring to share as a marketing decision.

I bought GW2 (base game) for $10 in mid April and did not update because of the crazy Anet policy that said I could get a full refund for HOT but lose all my progress which was a lot. Hence decided not to to play GW2 seriously.

Fast forward to today. With the birthday celebration I jumped back in and decided to go HOT since now I can get my $10 off of HOT and keep all my progress since they revised the update. But wait! It seems there was a small window (two weeks?) that would let me get the refund.

Interestingly players that bought before December can upgrade to HOT and anytime, but for some reason Anet wants me to pay $10 more now for HOT if I update than totally new players. For a game that has not come out yet!

I can not make up my mind if this is a bad marketing plan or just greed. it just seem strange that do not want a lot more money for buying HOT and gem store purchases.

Anyway I will play with my $10 game with no more complaints, not going to buy gems to support a company that want to charge me more than new players. There a re lot of other companies that want me to play their games

Oh yea I now I missed the dead line so it is my fault.

Yes it is. They published the refund for players who bought the game between the HoT announcement and the pre-purchase announcement on June 22nd for players wanting to buy HoT (only those players that buy both through ANet). Players had roughly 5 weeks to buy HoT and get a rebate on the core price.

Yes it took them almost a week to hammer out and announce the policy but they did offer it. You chose either to ignore the game’s website, the patch loader which had the news, most MMO and PC gaming websites covering that announcement. Or you thought it was too much of an unknown to buy HoT. Either way it’s on you and not some “crazy Anet policy”.

Guilds are now entirely cross server including common bank access. No separate banks or duplicated infrastructure if a guild was multiserver.

Play core game for free and if you want to upgrade you will get everything for one “low” price.

And the timing for F2P aligned with the ship date announcement of HoT. So the F2P crowd knows when the expansion comes out for real.

Also the include of the core game for pre-purchase is why would a new player buy an expansion ahead of time without being able to play the current game?

And it also encourages sellers to list at a price that is likely to sell rather than a rush to undercut one another the way bidders do on the opposite side. Well, that’s why that fee is non-refundable where bids you get back in full.

I thought they could whisper to anybody but only once per 30 seconds unless both friend one another.

First it forces them to buy gems if they want gem shop items.

Second they can’t drive the exchange rate up by buying gems.

Third if they sell their bought gems for gold, it helps the paid players by lowing the exchange rate.

I think the restriction is right on the money.

They listed what will be in this beta weekend and rangers and engineers aren’t in there.

960 gems for the entire menagerie.

Once he makes an account the account page as the download links, win or mac.

The bank is the octopus, crafting is the starfish and the TP is the shell just left of the jellyfish/Grand Piazza.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/pre-purchase-community-address/

We want to be clear about our business model for future expansions now that we are approaching our first paid expansion for Guild Wars 2. We believe that to keep the game dynamic and vibrant with a constantly growing community, it should be as easy as possible for new players to get into Guild Wars 2. For Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns, we didn’t want the core game’s price to be a factor in a new player’s decision to begin playing Guild Wars 2. In the future, if we release further Guild Wars 2 expansions, we plan to offer all of the prior expansions, the core game, and the latest expansion for one single purchase price.

Glovebox.5724:

Okay, it seems like people are incredibly misinformed. THE BASE GAME IS FREE other than some restrictions, THERE IS NO LEVEL RESTRICTIONS. I swear can’t people read these days?!

That’s not it, they still insist they’ve been cheated between this and that HoT comes with the base game.

Well there is a shorter list of categories for F2P when they go to the TP. Don’t know if there are items missing from within those categories. The API doesn’t return a field for F2P excluded.

Limit 5 of each.

Can they be used as forge fodder?

I know, but without posting rights and no search, I can’t imagine all that many bothering.

Perhaps if this was a sticky would it would help.

They’ve simply said that there are restrictions for particular items. To my knowledge nobody has looked to see what is excluded.

What did you try to buy or sell?

Well thank God we don’t have clerics in the game then.

And as others have said, not a cross.

Nice overview!

Now if F2P players figure out to read this board on the forum.

Substance E.4852:

Face it, it’s because Anet doesn’t want them back. Same for the glasses and sun glasses.

And that is a possibility I brought up. In which case this thread is pointless and only gives players a false hope that they could change ANet’s mind. But if this is the case ANet will never definitively tell us those will never return. So they string you all along.

Their disinterest still may not be malicious, just unimportant compared to everything else they want to do.

“For you, the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me, it was Tuesday.”

But in SWTOR you couldn’t do anything without being wacked in the head with a pay wall. That doesn’t exist here. You aren’t accosted by the cash shop because you want to be another race or a particular profession or to bypass something that a fully paid account doesn’t have to deal with. That’s a big difference.

I play three other MMOs as F2P and the restrictions are oppressive not to mention P2W power boosts and extreme quick leveling. All those games have a subscription like VIP level that allows you to bypass most of that crap. Big difference.

Dinks.2478:

Behellagh.1468:

Yes but NEVER sold as armor skins. They were removed when they were town clothes.

The notion that ANet been sitting on these and are refusing to release them is absurd, there must be a reason for not bringing them. Maybe there were clipping issues that they don’t have to time to fix. Maybe it’s because they feel it’s more profitable for the gem store’s asset devs to work on another outfit for 700 gems than do whatever is needed to release these pieces as skins.

If they thought it would be profitable, they would have been out already. Who knows, maybe they are holding them for the 2nd half of the sale.

Allow me to say it one more time because you’re clearly missing the point. They don’t have to do anything to release them as skins because they’re already skins.

And it doesn’t mean they hadn’t found problems when they were allowed to be used as skins otherwise why haven’t they offered them yet? It’s been over 18 months. What? They forgot they had them?

There’s a reason. We don’t know why. They let you and players who want the Buddy Holly/hipster glasses twist in the wind.

Yes but NEVER sold as armor skins. They were removed when they were town clothes.

The notion that ANet been sitting on these and are refusing to release them is absurd, there must be a reason for not bringing them. Maybe there were clipping issues that they don’t have to time to fix. Maybe it’s because they feel it’s more profitable for the gem store’s asset devs to work on another outfit for 700 gems than do whatever is needed to release these pieces as skins.

If they thought it would be profitable, they would have been out already. Who knows, maybe they are holding them for the 2nd half of the sale.

It’s still buy to play for the expansion. It’s still buy to play for unrestricted core access. It’s F2P for anyone who don’t mind the restrictions or was unwilling to pay fifty dollars to see if they like it.

Vets will always burn out and leave an MMO, even if it’s only until the next expansion. No amount of new content can prevent that. But a feature of every MMO is an engaged player base. Nobody is willing to play an MMO with low population maps. Unless is suppose to be post-apocalyptic and almost everyone is suppose to be dead.

So you have to keep bringing in new players. MMO player churn is a recognized phenomenon which was why Sony came up with the station pass for their subscription games. You get tired of one, move to another. So what’s the barrier to entry for new players, besides the time commitment? Cost. That’s where F2P succeeds.

Now unlike most F2P dren out there our game doesn’t cripple access to content, professions, level cap or bank. This makes it very attractive to give it a try. Sure limited character slots, bag slots, chat limits and TP trading restrictions should be enough to encourage purchase while not so restrictive that it’s aggravating.

But if you want to play the “new” version of the game aka HoT, then you have to buy to play it. And between the F2P limits and the additional features that the expansion has that should be enough to make sales from this influx of players looking to try it out.

Why Dinks? I’m not lying when I say it was NEVER sold as an armor skin.

And they aren’t the only bit of headgear from the old town clothes that hadn’t been turned into actual skins. There must be a reason why they never made the schedule including the possibility that it no longer fits into their view of Tyria.

But I’m sure there are players waiting to make their own Nachetania. So keep on asking for them, just don’t insist that what you are asking for was once offered as such because they weren’t.

Yes, as a piece of town clothes, never as an armor skin. There is no such thing as pieces of town clothes anymore.

Should it remember for each outfit? Sure, perfect world. Otherwise it’s notepad time.

Now I don’t run with multiple armor sets so does armor remember how it’s dyed when swapped?

It’s better than just a title.

Substance E.4852:

Wanze.8410:

Substance E.4852:

Wanze.8410:

velmeister.4187:

Any remotest, faintest, slightest possibility of it showing up as an item that I can purchase during this anniversary sale?

No.

Bunny Ears were never released as an armor skin an Anet since stated they will only release outfits in the gem store from now on, no armor skins.

Pretty sure they meant full armor sets. They have released quite a many hats and a couple sets of shoulders and gloves.

They didnt introduce any new armor pieces after they made the announcement in a blog post, only to offer outfits from now on in the gem store.

And when was this post made?

May 28th this year.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/hidden-arcana-developer-spotlight-on-crystin-cox/

Well after HoT was announced. One could see that announcement as saying we are putting armor in HoT as in-game rewards. I mean after all we haven’t seen any new content added to the core game since then.

nexxe.7081:

GW2’s F2P model is still too restrictive. There’s no point restricting players from going to Lion’s Arch or Divinity’s Reach by level. Gold spammers can’t use map chat anyway.

It’s to slow down RMT spammers from going to locals full of players at specific locations. They can’t roll a character, run into the race city to the TP or Bank and start spamming in local. Sure it doesn’t take long to get to 10 from scratch but it is yet one more way to make it less trivial to crank out another RMT spammer who will get shut down within minutes of spouting.

But didn’t WoW do this last year as a patch before WoD was released? Everyone suddenly got all the expansions, even if you only had the base game, for free?

Here the business model is a question of how much enjoyment you got between to time you buy it and the time it becomes included in the next paid expansion. Note paid expansion. Nowhere is anyone suggesting that a core account will suddenly get the next expansion for free. A player must buy an expansion to get all the previous ones.

So if you don’t miss playing whatever is in HoT until the next expansion, then it’s a good plan to skip. But I believe the feeling is that if you are a vet, you will buy the expansion so you can continue to play with your mates who also bought the expansion.

The inclusion is simply to lower the barrier to entry for new players and MMOs always need new players.

Armor skins take more time than an outfit to test.

forum bug, she’s on it.

Coulter.2315:

nathan goossen.9546:

wel i think they nead to make 2 mods hard and casual i want todo it to experince it as wel for fun thats whats game about anyway so why does only 1% of ppl most be capable of doing it while the rest stayes in the dust lol thats not fair

99% can’t do it =/= casual pugs can’t do it. No one is asking for something only 1% of people can do.

Actually that’s what the hardcore have been asking for. They want content and especially rewards from content that only the elite of the elite can get. That means account or even character bound rewards that can’t be traded, bought or acquired another way. They want to flaunt their eliteness.

If PUGs repeatedly get their face smashed they hardcore is happy. Now once a guide/video gets posted and a PUG can get on the same page and succeed, then the hardcore can get upset all over again.

dane.4638:

briggah.7910:

dane.4638:

Koteda.5238:

What does it mean that masteries are not for core game accounts?

It means that you cant use any of Anets new work unless you buy the game all over again…..

So what you are saying is if I buy 2 core version I get masteries? Hey i bought the game twice right?

If you bought the core and you buy hot at the same price as people who buy hot including core you just bought the game all over again

Didn’t this argument burn out back in June? Guess not. Some people just have axes to grind.

I was in Queensdale/Jade Quary at the point where characters pop in and nobody is asking anything. I’m even shooting cake at them and nothing. Put out a bobblehead lab and nothing. I got like one LOL last night. And there was a handful of vets there waiting to help.

Mine was waiting when I logged in an hour or so ago.

It makes me look tiny.

It’s already been preloading.

Because sale doesn’t and hasn’t here, meant only discounts. As their post said there will be items on sale, items returning and new items. They don’t need to put a returning item on sale to draw buyers.

Sales aren’t about giving buyers a deal, it’s about making more sales. In this case the question is would reducing the price 20% increase sales by more than 25% so the same amount of gems are spent? Plus would it reduce future sales in the next return cycle? Then you have the motivation to drain gems and gold from the playerbase so they would be more likely to buy gems with cash, which at the end of the day is all that matters.

So would it be nice? Sure. Gonna happen? Nope.

Going in with a PUG in any instanced content is a choice. Don’t want to, show up with a raid team from your guild or friends list. Nobody, anywhere, suggests that the only way to play this is you sign up and get assigned with a random group of players.

So the choice is ultimately yours who to play with.

meeflak.9714:

“Hardcore” player here.. I only call myself that because of my ridiculous amount of time in game and knowledge of it.

I hate the elite ist mentality and thankfully it isn’t too Much of an issue in gw.

Raids should definitely be puggable “casuals” should definitely be allowed to clear raids.

All players should be able to include themselves in all content.
Such a silly argument

jk

Just a flesh wound.3589:

The price for the silver fed was 500 gems before this. I know they said returning old items but couldn’t they at least take 100 gems off the price on their BIG ANNIVERSARY SALE?

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Silver-Fed_Salvage-o-Matic

It’s returning. Returning items don’t go on sale, only existing.