Guild Wars 2

For me it’s not a matter of gold. I have the gold. It’s a matter of keeping promises.

When I need to get something done at work, my boss will have a deadline. If I don’t make my deadline, I need to update my manager why I didn’t make the deadline but, more importantly, I need to give a new deadline. And stick to it.

When you tell your customer product X will be ready by Y date, you need to keep to that date or provide a new deadline. And stick to it, while keeping your customer in the loop of progress made.

It’s fundamental to consumer trust to stick to your promises. If that promise includes a deadline, you better make it happen.

Nearly one year ago we were told, after already having waited 9 months following the scavenger hunt promise, that precursor crafting would be implemented by the end of 2013 at the latest. This wasn’t any dev stating this, it came from the director himself.

So I want a new deadline, and I want to know where we stand. At this point I don’t care anymore whether the economy implodes when precursor crafting is implemented. This needs to happen. Not soon, not “we’re aware of the issue” or “this is one of our priorities but we need to get it right”, no. That’s not good enough anymore.

26 August announcement: “September 2014 Feature Pack: Improvements Galore”. The improvements listed are:

- Dungeon Instance Owner
- Crafting UI changes
- Performance updates

Don’t get wrong, these three under the hood improvements are great and all, and I appreciate that a lot of work went into them, but why galore? Could you elaborate?
The word “galore” makes me feel there’s something substantial I’m missing?

Ha! So it wasn’t removed after all.

There was some discussion about them dropping still, see the last posts here.
It’s funny btw that the most expensive item in Tyria is also the least discussed item

Chris Cleary.8017:

There are really two sides to this, and when it comes down to it, you are both right – and you are both wrong. Both sides have the right to complete the task that they set out to do (completing or not completing).

Challenging another player’s play style is the issue here, and since this revolved around an event that was designed to be completed, it is being changed so that the original design of the event can be carried out.

When something in the game (such as this event) changes negatively as this has, we need to step in and remediate the toxicity. The byproduct of this change happens to be that a champion farm is being slowed, but since that was the originating factor for the toxicity, it’s unavoidable.

I encourage players to remember that not everyone has the same goals when they play, and sometimes they will clash.

This is a really good answer. The best possible answer, in fact. The fact that you acknowledge not completing an event can be a legitimate goal blows my mind. Props to you, dear sir.

According to this guy the permanent hairstyling contracts haven’t been removed from the loot table yet. Whereas they should have been removed with the new patch.

Stop trying to tinker with the peripheral stuff (celestial) while stepping over the major issues which cause them. Celestial is not the problem. Many classes hit like a wet towel if they equip celestial.

Romek.4201:

just look at copper doubloon atm

same case

they are not worth more than 1,50 or 1,60 silver and was this for a logn time and yesterday someone buyd them out and did now buyoffer for 5 silver and sell for 10 silver^^

now he hope other people make buyoffers cause looks like very good profit and he sell than all his outbuyd copper doubloons to this stupid people^^

so dont trie to flip this atm – you will sell not on 10 silver cause nothing worth in this game so much that need copper doubloon

you will only buy the banked item from this guy to 5x the price what its worth^^

http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/24884

The price spike of copper doubloons is a direct result of the living story. People need their sunstone lumps. They’re probably just forging the lower gemstones like crazy, including copper doubloons.

I’m just puzzled this thread is still here. The OP admitted it was only created to see if it would heavily disturb the market, which it did.

xDudisx.5914:

It was actually just a test. To see how the market was going to react to my post on the forums. On gw2 spidy you can see 2 high peaks on the sell price after I posted this. This kind of prove that people TRY to manipulate stuff.

Of course people try. You don’t need this thread to prove that. That said, if you want to continue this discussion I suggest you screenshot this page and move to another forum. Because this thread will be deleted and you will get an infraction. It’s like robbing a liquor store and saying afterwards that you wanted to see if the police would come – for science, of course.

There’s a reason these forums are not a gray market.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

The most recent data I have for BLC drop rates is old. 825 keys were used by three different posters (including Samuriai, of industrial precursor-production fame).

I don’t see a single permanent contract from any of those data sets.

So it wouldn’t be crazy to estimate the chances of getting any permanent contract at 1:1,000. (If that’s the true rate, then there’s a ~43.8% chance you could open 825 and not see any drop.)

And Behellagh is entirely correct: if you really want one, save up instead of playing the lotto. Given enough gems to convert to gold and put in a ~2,300g offer for the perma-stylist, you’d have less than 26% chance to get any sort of permanent contract (assuming the odds are even as high as 1:1,000).

True story. I used at least 1k keys since launch, never saw an exotic permanent drop. Not even an unopened mystery tonic, let alone a contract.

Long story short: they were an accident. They shouldn’t have been in the game.

I think it’s safe to say the precursor drop rate is too low.
In my 3k+ hours never seen a precursor drop, either.

If your account has an asura I suggest you use that home instance (can be mined by any race). Placement of every node is easier. And closer to each other.

That said I agree it should be fixed. It’s about immersion, too. If you like the grove, it should be an easy place to mine.

Upcoming ranger changes (from live stream 25 July)

Signet of Beastmaster – This signet hampered the way rangers could spec. This signet no longer exists and all the signets have those effects baseline (affecting you and your pet). The trait that now replaced Signet of the Beastmaster is now called Predator’s Onslaught – You and your pet deal bonus damage to enemies suffering from movement impeding abilities (Crippled, Chilled and Immobilize). The damage bonus is 10% for your self and 5% for your pet.

Read the Wind – In addition to increase longbow/harpoon projectile velocity, attack speed is also increased (fire arrows fast).

Strider’s Defense – Increased the % to block from 15% to 20%

Beastmastery trait line – Remove the requirement to use specific pets with some traits. For example, Rending Attacks now bleeds with any pet crit on their basic attack. Stability training will activate with any pet when they are disabled. Intimidation Training now applies Cripple on any of your pet’s F2 skills with strikes.

Sic’ Em this skill now applies 6s of Revealed to enemies.

Entangled – Recharged of this ability reduced from 150s to 60s. Duration of the roots themselves decreased from from 20s to 5s.

Longbow
Cast times have been tightened up so you are not stuck casting something for a long time.
Long Range Shot – short range damage increased by 17%. Medium range damage by 7%. Long range damage unaffected.
Rapid Fire – Hard to use as you were stuck casting it for 5s at a time. Cast time now reduced by 50%
Barrage – Reduced cast time by 0.5 seconds.

Greatsword
For autoattack combo, damage of Power Stab (3rd skill in the chain) increased by 10%
Maul – Increased the max amount of targets from 3 to 5 while increasing the radius from 150 to 220.
Swoop now evades in the attack portion of the ability. You can be still stuck while traveling to your target.
Counterattack – Aftercast reduced – now you can respond much more quickly after landing your knockback.
Hilt Bash – Stun and daze duration of the skill have been increased from 1s to 1.5s

Axe
Axe Ricochet – Now grant might on hit. 3s base might duration. You want to hit multiple targets for max amount of might stacks.
Path of Scars – Velocity of projectile increased by 25%

Pets
Black Bear’s Enfeebling Roar slightly changed so that it no longer goes through blocks and evades but now delivers a strike.
Polar Bear’s Icy Roar has received the same sort of rework.

That would mean that if I like you and send you 2 gold, I am breaking the Rules of conduct. Because I’m transferring gold to you. So no, that’s not the purpose of that clause. The purpose of that clause is to disallow selling your account or parts of your account for real money. Which is strictly forbidden and is the bane of any MMO. This is different though, but the point is moot because of Gayle’s post. That post is an addition to the rules right there, no need to go further.

Lady Deedra.3126:

Why not put some legs on a giant black lion chest and ride that around?

Brilliant. It should have the slot machine effect on the side as well. Trrrrrrrrrr.

Or, or, what about flying around on a giant black lion key! The key itself can have a fused effect, or a ley line effect, or a dreamthistle effect…

Obtena.7952:

If precursors do get ninja-introduced

When precursor crafting get introduced there will be nothing ninja about it. A ninja moves fast, and comes suddenly when you don’t expect it. This is more like a massive steam-engine freight train with giant bells on it that is roaring its way across every part of this forum, stopping in every thread before it finally enters the Tyria’s Central Station, where a crowd has been holding giant WELCOME signs for so long they’ve become local weight-lifting champions.

Mmm. Thanks for that link! It’s surprising though because there’s nothing in the Rules of Conduct or the User Agreement that supports action from Anet as a result of such trade.

However, the moment Gayle wrote that post it generated a new rule that, as a result of the same user agreement, became binding on players once they learn of it. There’s still a world of difference between “condone” and “allow” (in terms of consequences) but I wouldn’t risk it

Im Mudbone.1437:

Inter-game trading is not allowed(even if they are from same company) and IS BANNABLE.

No it isn’t. That’s not right at all. You’re not allowed to use this forum as market place. But this trade is not even an offense. It’s not supported, so if you get scammed you’re on your own. But in no way could this even lead to a reprimand.

Would I advise it? No. But if you and a close friend would want to do this trade there is nothing stopping you from doing so.

Ensign.2189:

phys.7689:

The main reason they probably dont allow it, is it creates a sort of floor value for certain things.

Same idea, allowing them to be salvaged puts a price ceiling of sorts on those items – if exotics ever get expensive enough, buying a bunch of exotics from a vendor and salvaging them becomes attractive. That certainly wasn’t a mechanism they wanted to have sitting in the game at launch when we still didn’t know where price levels were going to end up, so they locked it out.

At least, that’s why I would have done it.

May I remind you of the context and the comparison in which it served? The “vendor” is the badges vendor, so you still need those. Now compare this against dungeon tokens. If you buy exotics from a dungeon vendor all you pay is tokens, not gold.
Both currencies (tokens/badges) require a similar time investment to acquire. But “token exotics” can forges or salvaged, and “badges exotics” can neither be forged nor salvaged (they don’t even have a sigil/rune).

Zoxea.9564:

Kodumio.1234 played 24 hours without stopping. He received the ingredient “precursor”.

Random.9876 played for 24 days, 1 hour per day. He did not get the ingredient “precursor” as prices increased.
Random.9876 continued, it replays for 24 days, 1 hour per day. He did not get the ingredient “precursor” as prices increased.

Random.9876 worked 48 hours and is not paid for his work.

Colin Johanson said:
We still plan to do both new legendary weapons, as well as a clear path (on top of the current random chance) to gain precursors which players can see their progress and understand how much work they have left to do to gain it.

It’s time to offer the guaranteed to get the ingredient “precursor” because many people work hard for NOTHING.

While what you say about Colin’s words is generally correct, I will just quote my verbatim transcription of his words in order to avoid any debate about them by others:

Buttercup.5871:

Colin Johanson: “The other thing that you’ll see this year is you will [Colin’s emphasis] see the ability to build a precursor. It’s not going to be next week, it’ll probably be – you know – as we get closer to the end of the year, but we’re absolutely going to add that support so that you can make your own precursor and feel like you’re making progress towards putting one of those together. Very likely it’s going to be through crafting, we haven’t completely finalized that, but I think it’s more than likely where that’s all going to drop in.”

Pax, 3 September 2013.
http://youtu.be/Jy7CcwnfUdU
See 13:25 to 13:50.

phys.7689:

Smooth Penguin.5294:

HHR LostProphet.4801:

I can name you one already: precursors. The supply of precursors is that low that the demand from player who have gained extreme wealth is higher tahn the actual supply. If those player wouldn’t exsist, the price would be lower. The reason why a Lamborghini is that expensive is because there are enough people out there who have the money to buy it. Otherwise the price would be lower.
And I don’t want ANet to say “Sorry, you’re enjoying traidnign too much, thus we have to stop it entirely.”. I want them to say “We appreciate that you enjoy traiding so much but we have to balance the game, so you can, once you get bored of the TP, go to other gamemodes without losing half of your income.”. Or “We appreciate that you enjoy traiding so much but there are items that should keep some prestige and if you’re able to afford one of those items every month then there is something odd.”.

That’s like telling Microsoft that they make too much money, so they should be punished for it.

This philosophical debate is now turning into a Marxism vs Capitalism one.

you are fundamentally misunderstanding marxism, and capitalism. Even though some aspects are analgous.
HHR isnt really representing for a collective, he is probably more interested in a merit based system that does not give an advantage to traders.

Some people are however asking for a more cooperative economy, while some are advocating for one that is not necessarily cooperative, but not as exploitive. See the key here is there is a great many different philosophies in play here, but the reality is the philosophy of trade in this game is drastically different from the philosophies present in other facets.

Trade in this game is about getting as much as you can from other players, with a small side of fullfilling missing niches. It is essentially PVP, by and large you gain value by taking more value from other players for less work. Its competitive, and the rewards are generally limited only by your ability to find new opportunities, and how many other people can find, and capitilize on them and how much your competition wants to be paid.
It has some good points, and it has some bad points.

Other facets of the game are specifically designed to have a very limited reward even for excellence. The hardest fights in the game reward less, or the same as the easiest fights, this is by design. The longer you work the less effective that work will be, this is by design, Anything that a lot of players do, will give less rewards, or be altered to give less rewards, this is by design. The other facets of the game are heavily controlled, limited, and designed to not let exceptional people get too far ahead, or be too beyond the norm in what they gain.
The philosophy in these parts of the game sacrifice all of that, to keep things less competitive, less elite, to smooth out the effectiveness of effeciency and non effeciency. ETC. it has its advantages, and disadvantages, some times i like it, some times i hate it.

But thing is, these two philosophies are very different, they present very different types of gameplay, If PVE was more competitive, or rewarded differently based on your skill/performance, than in and of itself would create a balance.

If trading was less competitive, and measured, with values being decided based on supply/demand/cost/etc then the game would also be balanced.

but its not, you have two drastically different philosophies behind each design, which attracts drastically different players, but they have to interact and compete/or not compete for the same resources.

this is why there is a disconnect, and will probably will always be one. The game is disconnected.

I cant go out and get large value for being the best dungeon man ever, or the top WvW commander, or the lore master, or the explorer/jump puzzle master. because they didnt want to reward the best players over the average. in PVE

By the same token, i cant expect reasonable, balanced and thought out prices, at rates that match my earnings in pve/pvp because prices are determined totally on demand and wealth distribution, because they wanted to trading to be determined by competition, essentially they wanted to reward the best players over the average, in trading.

this is compounded because everyone must TP but people can opt out of most other playstyles. IE more newbs to get ganked for profit in the trading game.

+1

Scrolling through your posts I see I have missed much. You have made some excellent, well-reasoned statements about this economy. This is yet another one.

Buttercup.5871:

John Smith.4610:

Buttercup.5871:

John, I have only one pressing question. I even created a thread on it a while ago.

Why are WvW badges treated differently, forge-wise, than dungeon tokens?

Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions.

They’re a fundamentally different item. Though I expect that’s not the answer you’re looking for. Could you elaborate a bit more on the question?

Thank you John, I’ll do my best to be brief.

Dungeon tokens and WvW tokens appear to be similar in that they reward the user for time played. You can buy stuff with your tokens or badges. Given the amount of badges/tokens needed to buy stuff, I’d say the ratio is about the same in what you get for time spent.

Now, when I buy stuff with my tokens, I can chuck it in the forge and RNG willing, Zomorros blesses me with something nice. Maybe even a precursor! Or, if I don’t like Zomorros, I can salvage the stuff bought with tokens for ectos and runes/sigils.

When I buy stuff with my badges, Zomorros doesn’t want me. He says “Go away! I don’t want any gear that you bought with your stinking WvW badges.” When I try to salvage stuff bought with badges, even my salvage kit says “what is this? I’m not salvaging this, go away!”

In a game that was intended to reward players equally regardless of the type of gameplay they choose, that seems terribly off. So I’m wondering, there must have been a good reason for this!

I can think of a good reason that policy was put in place, once upon a time when the game started, but that reason is gone now. This design choice no longer seems logical. That’s why I had hoped you could provide a logical explanation for it, if there is one.

I am grateful that you’re taking the time to answer our questions.

Wanze.8410:

I think the reasoning behind it (from Anets side) is that dungeon token acquisition is capped per day (and has DR), while Badges arent.

Thanks Wanze, I can think of many things as well. But they all no longer make sense. A badge cap certainly doesn’t, there’s so many ways I can think of to alleviate that concern. Anyway, in order to avoid setting out all my theories and huge walls of text, I thought I’d just ask.

Hi John, you seemed to have moved on to other questions and have not yet replied to my response? Working as intended?

Ayrilana.1396:

Lothirieth.3408:

Smooth Penguin.5294:

I’ve gotten multiple Precursors, and each one I didn’t buy. Everything is working as intended. The only thing that’s broken is your assumption that you’re “Entitled” to a Precursor for a low cost. This argument is similar to a Middle Class single dad wanting to buy a Lamborghini, but that car price is “broken”.

Why do you always take things to such extremes and purposefully mischaracterise people and/or their desires?

People want a more concrete way to work towards a precursor, then from you we usually get something like: “All you want to be is lazy and have things handed to you!!!!” Your trolling is tiresome.

He’s not being extreme in his example. Precursors are a luxury item like a Lamborghini. People running under the assumption that precursors should be affordable for everyone is no different than arguing the Lamborghini’s should be made affordable to everyone. People are also completely ignoring the supply and demand effects. Would you prefer that they be craftable but account bound?

Craftable: yes. Account bound: I don’t care, the result is positive both ways. And yes this requires active monitoring on Anets part on other legendary components.

To be clear I’m loaded, this is not about me wanting stuff easy. I can skip the precursor part and buy legendaries straight up. It’s me being concerned about the health of this game. The healthier the state of the game, the better it is for me. The broken promises on precursor crafting are getting increasingly hard for people to swallow.

Izaya.2906:

Zoxea.9564:

The concept of Legendary Weapon’s is: “Working hard to get ingredient, sooner or later.” Even if you put 6 months 1 year or 2. It is guaranteed, sooner or later, you get the ingredient.

Everyone has guaranteed to have sooner or later, an ingredient that has a price (extreme) increases again again and again? No, no guarantee, nothing.

For many people, get a precursor, it is to be a dog running around a tree to catch his own tail.

This ingredient with an extreme price, month after month after month is broken.

It is time to repair with craft or others because the guaranteed, today, is EXTREMELY broken.

Highest buy offer for dusk is 1300g right now. You can do 30g a day without TP flipping or hugely lucky drops, so that’s like 44 days for a precursor, and it costs roughly 1300g for the rest of the mats. That’s 3 months for a whole legendary.

You’re hugely overestimating how long it takes to get it done.

If other people can buy precursors by simply farming, it only shows that someone who is a “a dog running around a tree to catch his own tail” is simply not trying hard enough or doing it wrong.

And as soon as Anet is crazy enough to make it too easy to acquire precursors, I’m 100% sure people will be whining alot more about T6 mats/lodestones/fine mats being too expensive and other crafting non-legendary costs going sky high as collateral damage(mainly exotic and ascended grade gear which involves a greater amount of the playing population compared to legendary weapon crafters).

30g day is not the standard. I can make that by flipping but most cannot through grinding. Most adults do not have a full day to spend on a game, anyway, so you gotta think “evenings” rather than “days”. Which is 4 hours max, say 10g average per evening which includes other expenses (crafting, ascended sinks etc.) You can’t do 130 evenings straight in a row so multiply that by two or three. So now you’re looking at 1 year minimum. Except that in 1 year the price of your coveted precursor may have doubled. Oh, and we haven’t yet accounted for the other materials necessary for the legendary.

phys.7689:

heres what broken means in this context.

It means the supply of the item is not in line with demand, such that the item is a reasonable goal.

Irl, even luxury items tend to increase in production as the demand increases.

essentially, the question is, what was the goal of thier design, was it for people to be able to get a precursor after 2 months of normal play? 3 months? a year?
then they can measure and see how well it is performing to that expectation, they can also look at what type of play is closest to whatever target they were aiming for.

This.

Other than that: if you tie the goal too much to gold, it will be increasingly hard to reach for someone starting the game. That is why precursor crafting has become essential. Now you will say “but then the t6 market will simply explode”! I say baloney. Anet can regulate any component of the legendary by turning a few knobs or designing content that generates excessive amounts of the scarce material in question (such as the gauntlet farm).

Ayrilana.1396:

It’s not broken. Please research economics about supply and demand.

Oh, you mean that theory that presumes perfect competition? That one? Reminds me of what you said earlier in this thread:

Ayrilana.1396:

I’m half tempted to buy up all of the dusks and then list one for 20k so the OP can say things must really be broken.

John Smith.4610:

Serophous.9085:

I just have one question:

Why isn’t it possible to put superior runes and sigils in the mystic forge to gamble? This would at least start using up the lowest priced runes and sigils on the market, and allow us to at least try for an unsoulbound rune.

I can’t discuss the origins of why. I can say that the market isn’t in a state where it would handle changing that very well. The markets need a more fundamental change.

Off topic: I thought of a way to bring about that fundamental change. Forge 4 exotic runes for the chance of an account bound ascended rune (success!) or receive a major rune in return (failure, try again!). Not expecting any comment of course, you guys reading it is enough for me.

Giotto.2607:

id say i got 2 from 3 chests. thought it’s high rate.

Reactions like these make me sad. It’s like those people that get a precursor on the first forge, go on the forum and say “so what’s all the fuss look at me, look, I got on the first try”.

I had a similar experience as the OP. About 150 chests, and 1 fossil to show for it.

John Smith.4610:

Buttercup.5871:

John, I have only one pressing question. I even created a thread on it a while ago.

Why are WvW badges treated differently, forge-wise, than dungeon tokens?

Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions.

They’re a fundamentally different item. Though I expect that’s not the answer you’re looking for. Could you elaborate a bit more on the question?

Thank you John, I’ll do my best to be brief.

Dungeon tokens and WvW tokens appear to be similar in that they reward the user for time played. You can buy stuff with your tokens or badges. Given the amount of badges/tokens needed to buy stuff, I’d say the ratio is about the same in what you get for time spent.

Now, when I buy stuff with my tokens, I can chuck it in the forge and RNG willing, Zomorros blesses me with something nice. Maybe even a precursor! Or, if I don’t like Zomorros, I can salvage the stuff bought with tokens for ectos and runes/sigils.

When I buy stuff with my badges, Zomorros doesn’t want me. He says “Go away! I don’t want any gear that you bought with your stinking WvW badges.” When I try to salvage stuff bought with badges, even my salvage kit says “what is this? I’m not salvaging this, go away!”

In a game that was intended to reward players equally regardless of the type of gameplay they choose, that seems terribly off. So I’m wondering, there must have been a good reason for this!

I can think of a good reason that policy was put in place, once upon a time when the game started, but that reason is gone now. This design choice no longer seems logical. That’s why I had hoped you could provide a logical explanation for it, if there is one.

I am grateful that you’re taking the time to answer our questions.

Wanze.8410:

I think the reasoning behind it (from Anets side) is that dungeon token acquisition is capped per day (and has DR), while Badges arent.

Thanks Wanze, I can think of many things as well. But they all no longer make sense. A badge cap certainly doesn’t, there’s so many ways I can think of to alleviate that concern. Anyway, in order to avoid setting out all my theories and huge walls of text, I thought I’d just ask.

In the EU we have a dry top guild [DT]. In that guild, I never have any trouble getting to a t4 or t5 map, might be worth a shot if you’re interested in doing dry top content more frequently.

Purple Miku.7032:

Buttercup.5871:

In a group setting warrior dps is nearly always better. A ranger is conditioned to solo play from the get-go because of his pet that absorbs damage. That’s why he usually has two bears, a longbow, no spotter, and no frost spirit. Rangers need to understand that group play is nothing like solo play. Everything is different: weapons, traits, utilities, pets.

This is so stupidly incorrect.

Warriors have one of the worst DPS in group settings actually, as all other classes are able to push ahead when they’re under the effects of perma-fury and banners + might.

The only place in which warriors excell over almost all other classes is solo settings because of their incredible self-buffing capabilities. Warrior is literally the only class capable of reaching 100% crit chance by themselves and one of the few classes capable of maintaining almost permanent fury as well, bar a few seconds of downtime in between cooldowns. As well as that, warrior is also one of the easiest classes to maintain 20-25 stacks of might in a solo setting as well.

If you want a good example/demonstration of this, name one class besides a warrior or a thief that’s capable of soloing Brie at the end of Arah P2 before the terminal is destroyed. Not even an ele can do it anymore, since FGS + LF was nerfed.

Ehhhh, what? Not just incorrect, but stupidly incorrect? Thanks man, nice to meet you, too.

So you consider empower allies builds (group power buffing + vulnerability stacking) or phalanx strength builds (the latter having mediocre personal dps but gives the group 25 stacks of might without real effort) to provide inferior dps to the group as a whole than a ranger’s spotter + frost spirit? Really? Or did you understand me to refer to individual dps within the group only, which makes no sense because we’re talking about which class is better for the dps of the group as a whole? (Which also leaves me wondering, why are you talking about other classes pushing ahead under the effect of banners when we’re discussing the choice between a warrior and a ranger?)

Faowri.4159:

Buttercup.5871:

So basically, you want armor to be devoid of gender. Because of the lore and all.

Nope, that’s not what I want (or said) at all. I would like armour to stop being gender-essentialist – that is, enforcing standards upon people because of arbitrary gender choice.

I’ve got no problem with armour being conservative or revealing, or having skirts or trousers, or having a bowtie or a ribbon, or any other traditionally “gender-specific” motif (that actually has nothing to do with your sex or gender and is all socially dictated). I have a problem with armour being completely different (and in many cases completely inaccessible) depending on that option you picked at character selection.

What I’d like to see, and the link in my sig explains more, is some basic design tenets being put in place so that armour is not substantially different between the two genders. This doesn’t mean taking away armour or making it all “male by default” armour. It just means taking a design and making it available for both genders. That’s it.

Traditionally masculine or feminine stuff doesn’t need to go away to achieve this – it just needs to be available for both genders, so players can decide what their character wears, instead of someone else’s preconceived notions of what’s acceptable for a particular gender.

Ok, this post is more balanced and I see more what you mean now. I disagree though on one single item in this post that lies at the heart of this discussion (in bold): that gender choice is arbitrary. It almost never is.

For me, the discussion is a bit moot because I tend to only like one or two pieces of the armor sets I bought (which is almost all). Mix and match all the way.

Faowri.4159:

Buttercup.5871:

Faowri.4159

It’s a real shame; I thought GW2 would be the MMO to really push being progressive on the gender front.

Wait. Waiiiiiiiiiit right there. What? You have to elaborate here because if any company did everything right in this respect, it’s Anet. The only other company that is on the forefront on this issue is Bioware. Anyway, you cannot blurt out such sweeping statements and not back them up.

I certainly can.

Much was made during pre-release of progressive elements to the game, and yes, as I mentioned in my post, Anet were successful in some areas. But they don’t follow through. I guess the best way I can sum it up is that the ideas are there, but they are failed by stereotypical sexist MMO implementation.

For example: when the sylvari were introduced and their lore and culture started to trickle out in interviews and blog posts, they made heavy mention of the lack of traditional gender roles. The sylvari are supposed to see gender as no more significant or defining than hair or skin colour – it’s a physical attribute with no social ramifications.

This sounded awesome.

Unfortunately, the game mechanics do not support this. The sylvari have no traditional gender roles but you cannot wear male armour on a female sylvari or vice versa. There are character customisations specific to the female models or male models. You see how the lore clashes with the game implementation, making this shallow gender-progressiveness at best?

Likewise, when the charr and asura were revealed and we first saw the female charr and asura, I was super excited because here was a great example of no gender dimorphism and sexualisation of the female of the species.

But they can only wear male armour. They are male by default. Male is normal armour, female armour is other. It’s exceptional, and assumed to be sexualised or inappropriate for everyone else by default.

Then there’s the fact that we had to fight tooth and nail pre-release to get anything but ‘barbie’ physiques for the female humans (and there are still no well-built or muscular builds available), and after more complaining we got one token older female face, and one token ‘black’ face preset added.

Don’t even get me started on the lack of armour diversity and revealing armour for male characters. I’m tired of seeing male characters look like they were dressed by overprotective mothers who think they might catch a chill if they leave anything but their face exposed.

For every great step Anet takes forward (inclusion of non-hetero romance, prominent female lead characters, races who in principle do not embody heteronormative standards or have no supposed sexism in them/mock the sub-groups that encourage sexism), they take three back with the lore vs game mechanics and gender restriction clash.

So basically, you want armor to be devoid of gender. Because of the lore and all. Or in the alternative, you want there to be revealing male armor. There is such armor btw, but I do agree the choice is limited (I saw pit fighter, gladiator, barbaric, feathered pieces, and a few gemstore skins).

I disagree that showing gender, or strongly accentuating gender, is a bad thing. It’s a bit the feminism of the 80s mentality where women had to fight for recognition and show they mattered and started dressing like men. Many thought that “equality” included wearing the same clothes as men. That should not be necessary anymore. The strongest of women these days are often very feminine. And that’s a good thing; they’re women, not men.

I have 2 sylvari female characters. Had I not been able to dress them up femininely I would not even play them. Yes, I know the lore for the Sylvari, but frankly I don’t care. If I’m going to spend hours looking at her I want her to look elegant and feminine. Aesthetics is a powerful thing: look at legendaries, people are willing to spend hundreds, or even thousands of hours behind a screen so that they can get a bundle of flashy pixels. Anet knows this and caters to this very well.

Faowri.4159

It’s a real shame; I thought GW2 would be the MMO to really push being progressive on the gender front.

Wait. Waiiiiiiiiiit right there. What? You have to elaborate here because if any company did everything right in this respect, it’s Anet. The only other company that is on the forefront on this issue is Bioware. Anyway, you cannot blurt out such sweeping statements and not back them up.

If it did show more skin than pole dancers I would have bought it. At least pole dancers don’t wear baggy pants.

On a sidenote, did you know that poledancers are trying to lobby for pole dancing at the Olympics? Awesome.

You can also wear a wizard or wintersday outfit. Not exactly heavy armor either. It’s the design of outfits, they are meant to be used by all, regardless of weight class.

In a group setting warrior dps is nearly always better. A ranger is conditioned to solo play from the get-go because of his pet that absorbs damage. That’s why he usually has two bears, a longbow, no spotter, and no frost spirit. Rangers need to understand that group play is nothing like solo play. Everything is different: weapons, traits, utilities, pets.

Hi Wanze, I know you mean well, but try and let John do the answering. The thread is inflating rapidly and as you said yourself, we need to keep this short and manageable for him/her. Thank you!

Ehhhhm. If there are so few buy orders, why are prices on buy orders all hovering around the 70g mark and sell orders at the 90g mark? That’s the highest we’ve seen thus far; only tormented weapons came close to these averages.

They are, therefore, insanely popular. This is mostly due to the spacy sound effect when ley line weapons are unsheathed. It sets them apart from all other black lion weapons.

John, I have only one pressing question. I even created a thread on it a while ago.

Why are WvW badges treated differently, forge-wise, than dungeon tokens?

Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions.

@Obtena, I transcribed exactly what Colin said. Verbatim. With a link and a timecode to where he said it. I even gave the date of the interview. What more do you need? Why should you have to recall anything when it’s right in front of your nose? Just look at the interview.

You are right, of course Colin didn’t say anything was broken. But he did say this:

Colin Johanson: “The other thing that you’ll see this year is you will [Colin’s emphasis] see the ability to build a precursor. It’s not going to be next week, it’ll probably be – you know – as we get closer to the end of the year, but we’re absolutely going to add that support so that you can make your own precursor and feel like you’re making progress towards putting one of those together. Very likely it’s going to be through crafting, we haven’t completely finalized that, but I think it’s more than likely where that’s all going to drop in."

Pax, 3 September 2013.
http://youtu.be/Jy7CcwnfUdU
See 13:25 to 13:50.

The question is wrong. The TP is not broken.

But the droprate and mystic forge return rate of precursors is broken. I can afford them, but I’m not the norm. Smooth penguin is not the norm. Those defending these prices are wealthy and have profited from the TP for at least a year.

Precursor prices are clearly not right.

I do agree with above posters that precursor crafting needs to happen. Waiting further is not good for this game, there’s too much focus on one item now. That’s never healthy, for any game.

DrDivine.5378:

It kinda made me curious, are there people who actually use ranger on a GS? Or is ranger mostly outclassed?

There. I fixed the question for you.

Did you open a chest recently? It even looks like a slot machine now. The whole gambling experience is intended. Remove the BL ticket from the BL chest loot table, and no one will ever buy a key again. It won’t happen.

Even if Anet would be remotely interested in this idea, you’d better add a zero to your cost proposal. And replace the word “ticket” with “bundle of ticket scraps” (RNG included, gives 2 to 5 scraps).

Oh noes! I thought it was lies at first, but then I verified that on 7 July she indeed tweeted that was her last day at Anet

Community managers like her are really hard to find, let alone replace. She’s top notch, I have no doubt she’ll be successful wherever she decides to go next.

maha.7902:

Make eternity, sell it, get a juggernaut.

What this guy said.

You’ll unlock twilight and rake up more dough than you need to buy the juggernaut.

chewienl.9804:

A summoning stone, to be able to summon players to your side. Only Works out of combat and is asura made btw

Note: summoning stone highly unstable. Use at own risk. During various tests, subject summoned a mother-in-law.

So essentially you want me to level all my eight characters – again – so they can (again) unlock new traits to be able to do everything an “ascended” or “finished” character can do?

No. Just no. This treadmill mentality has got to stop.

The way of the flip. Mmm. There is such a way.

When you play new content, you will see that temporarily, a lot of items X, Y and Z are generated with that new content. You know that most likely, this will not continue and supply will drop and prices will rise afterwards. Take for example the back skins from the gauntlet content. All the catcher and rose skins, zephyr backpack and even the lyssa recipes doubled in price within 2 weeks.

Another example. When you see the black lion company do something, think about what it will mean for TP prices. If people buy more keys – because they are on sale – what will that do? Minis from black lion chests plummeting? Check. Mystery tonics plummeting? Check. By looking at gw2tp.com you will see that this always happens during a key sale, but that after the key sale the prices recover.

In other words: buy low, sell high. And realize by playing content what it does for TP prices, and anticipate. It’s really not that hard.