Guild Wars 2

Victory For Kittens.7806:

Great, so no need to expect our rewards before next week, i dunno how you guys can do such bad work, rly you are disapointing, you found the “bug” 2 days ago but still nothing ? i’m really impressed by your wvw teams & your communication.

How many large scale MMO-project have you worked on and coded?

juno.1840:

I already explained how it’s different. Now it’s your turn to research P2P and B2P — the difference should become clear after you read up on it a bit.

I am aware of the difference.
But how is paying once every two weeks to access content really any different from paying once every month to access content?

You don’t HAVE to pay a subscription either, but if you don’t you won’t have access to the content.

Afkjosh.3912:

The most simplistic answer here would be to TEST THE CONTENT BEFORE RELEASE.

Why do people keep assuming that things aren’t tested?

And why to people keep assuming that you actually can test everything in the exact same way as it would be on live?

juno.1840:

You are not paying a subscription — it’s not even a pretend subscription. You are buying content. If that content comes out every two weeks then you buy it every two weeks. Again this is only if you want to buy it.

P2P is a subscription model where you pay X-dollars every month regardless of what the game developers release. If they release nothing you still pay X-dollars.

Seriously, google is your friend. Do a search on P2P and B2P to educate yourself a bit.

Paying for episodes is a B2P model (although much more granular than the expansion pack method).

But if I want access to all content, I will basically be forced (with your system) to pay ever second week in order to access that content. How is that any different from having a subscription that I pay in order to access content?

penelopehannibal.8947:

It’s not P2P because you do not have to pay for anything. All you have to do is log on once every two weeks. That’s all. Just log on. You don’t have to take part at the time of logging on, you can just log on, load a character, log out, and come back in another two weeks. Is that really that difficult? I think not.

I think this new step is a good thing. Don’t forget, not only would you get an episode for free if you log on at the time, but you can also convert some gold into the 200 gems, and I’m sure most people can raise that in less than two weeks just playing the game as normal.

I understand and like the coming system.
The person I quoted however is advocating that EVERYONE will HAVE to pay. no matter if they log in during the events initial release or not. And doing that WOULD make it P2P.

juno.1840:

Except that you would not pay if there was no new content — so it’s still a B2P. In addition you would only buy it if you want to play it (crazy, I know).

So if I would want to play new content, I would basically have to pay a subscription in order to experience it.
How does that not make it P2P?

Flytrap.8075:

It honestly amazes me that this was not sorted out further in advance.

I get that kitten happens; no one expects for updates to go perfectly every single time. However, the WvW season was seven? weeks long and the only thing that ANet had to get right was the reward distribution and they couldn’t even handle that.

And how would you sort something out before you even know it would happen?

Melwann.1587:

This new way to make money is a shame!!

You mean except the fact that they won’t really make much money on this from the majority of the active players?

They could of course have forced everyone to pay, but since they don’t I don’t really see the issue.

weskay.9217:

I’m not a huge fan of the current 200 gems system. This shouldn’t affect me much (or at all) since I am usually online on a daily basis but I am someone that always sympathizes for new players and yet again, I feel for them about this. If a new player starts a year after the launch of the LS, they would need to spend about $60 for all of the content they missed should they want to replay the story. It’s not an insane amount, no, but it can add up for new players that are starting even later than that. GW1 expansions were about $30-40 on launch and only went down in price later. The expansions for GW1 also came out on a yearly basis roughly (which I assume the LS will essentially do as well). Sims expansions have been $20-30 with a new expansion coming in every 9 months or so. World of Warcraft’s expansions are $20 (for Pandaria) which come out… what… every 6-9 months as well? The average cost of a year’s worth of expansion in a game is around $30. In my honest opinion, I strongly feel like GW is taking a few steps backward having a cost on the missed content (or at least a cost this steep for long periods of absence). Cutting the cost in half would be a lot more reasonable. After the megaserver and its thousands of concerns spilling out from that huge disaster, I feel like GW would want to reel in its lost players. Have the S2 free of charge (perhaps S1 as well when they release it). This will get some players back and lead to happier customers which ultimately seem hard to come by these days.

Why are you assuming that they won’t release the seasons as packs for a lower price?
It is very unlikely that they will just give the ability to buy every piece one by one without a package-price.

As for prices, the next WoW expansion (we can’t really count Pandaria, seeing as it has been out for quite sometime and thus have lower price than before/at release) currently costs €44,99 which would translate to about $61, rather than $20-30 as you claim.

Getefix.9150:

by the way – i didnt read most of the 5 pages of comments so this may have already been answered/said

with the whole paying 200 gems for a story step you missed, what happens to those who buy guild wars 2 after we killed an elder dragon (eg mordremoth) i thought that the best model to follow would have been the elder dragon arcs as permanent arcs that are unlocked post- zhaitan firework show
because all this talk of elder dragons, someone buys guild wars 2 late, and they only kill one and have to pay loads just to fight something that is the whole point of the guild wars 2 story….

imagine it if it happened to you “we just killed zhaitan! which one next? mordremo-” “sorry bub you need to pay to fight him”
“but i’m the commander, surely i need to be fighti-”
“nope pay up”
“but i dont have any money”
“then you cant fight him”
“but it will kill us all!!…[/sigh] – right you can kill him without me then”
“wait… we need you to-”
“I DONT HAVE ANY MONEY”

So, how come that is okay and works with other MMOs that goes the expansion route?

In Lord of the Rings Online for example you need to pay in order to do the Moria parts, the Rohan parts, the Mirkwood parts and in the future, the Gondor parts and Mordor parts.

juno.1840:

Now you’d be delivering content that has value (at least 200 gems of value). You’d be funded by content and not cash shop trash. In short, it’s the B2P model (not the F2P with cash shop).

No, it would be a P2P model in that case, since you would basically be forced to pay in order to get access to new content EVERY SECOND WEEK.

Devata.6589:

Where did you get that information? The blog says you can unlock instance content but also open world content to repeat later.

Here:

Open world content additions to Living World updates will permanently expand or change the world of Tyria and will tie to the theme and story of the episode. This means you can play the open world content and the story content (if you’ve unlocked that episode) anytime you want, on every character you ever make on your account!

I read that part as that all the open-world things will be permanent, but that the story part must be unlocked in order to play it permanently.

Naevius.3185:

I still would like to know whether this change means that LS 2 will have no massive group events like the Marionette fight, or Escape from LA. I don’t see how that kind of event would ever be re-playable at will.

Is it possible that there might be different versions of episodes (e.g. ‘live’ vs ‘re-playable’ ?)

There seems to be difference between story (the replayable, buyable things) and open world.

Those big events can still take place in the open world part of the releases.

Morrigan.2809:

They had the option to guest it was free.
We have no option to get out of megaserver, except to stop playing.
Not the same thing at all really

And yet even with the option to Guest (which was limited) we still had more or less daily complaints about empty zones.
People have been demanding something like megaservers since release more or less, and now we got it, so people had to find something else to complain about in this case the megaserver.
If they remove the megaserver people will just go back to complain about empty zones again, and the cycle continues forever.

Fauven.3195:

maybe a little guess of time by the devs would be appreciated. Will it take a few days or rather a week or even 2 weeks? Waiting can be annoying but waiting without knowing how long you have to wait is even more annoying.
Dear Devs, pls comment with at least a little guess of time or at least an update on how bad the bug is? If we have to wait till start of season 2 ok, but I rather know it then :p

Yeah, and then they do that and it turns out to be harder to fix than they though and thus can’t make it within that timeline. Then people will (as they do every single time something changes slightly) shout about being lied to and we would have more or less the same situation as now, but the topic of complaints would be being lied to instead of bug.

Yeah, and then we will have just as many people going back to the good old: “EVERY ZONE IS DEAD!!! PLZ FIX!!!” mantra, and nothing will have changed.

sablephoenix.1593:

Charging after the fact for anyone who was unwilling or, worse, unable to be there (if someone gets hit with Hurricane Sandy I doubt they’ll be playing GW2 for some time) when the content was new feels, frankly, extortionist.

How come it is unacceptable here, but it is fully alright that you have to pay in order to pay for something you missed when it was shown on television while those people that watched it (or recorded it) don’t have to pay for it?

zMajc.4659:

Official update on the issue would be great.

You had one about two days ago in this very thread saying that they have found the issue and is working on it.
No point giving any more updates until it is fixed.

The fact that they place the “(if you’ve unlocked that episode)” directly after story content does suggest that it specifically talks about the story content, at least in my eyes.

somsom.5201:

How does a new player get $60 worth of gold? That’s what I thought. Don’t be facetious.

Where do you even get the numbers from?

You are assuming that:
1: People would buy every single episode.
2: People would buy every single episode on their own.
3: ArenaNet won’t release a package at the end of a season at a reduced price.

ArenaNet never goes to E3. They prefer to go to conventions with actual players rather than conventions for the companies.

somsom.5201:

Are you kidding?

Because for someone who logged in during that 2 week span…they got it for free! Have fun being a new player and having to buy:

• base game
• S1
• S2
• S#

Each season is ~$60…

And when I bought the game I had to pay about 50% more than someone needs to pay to access the game now.

You have no idea if we have to pay for S1.
You have no idea how much each season will cost.
You are basing your whole argument on speculations rather than facts.

Since they made a rather clear distinction between Open-world and Story in the blog post it is very likely that maps, dungeons and such are part of the Open-world rather than Story part of the releases and as such would be free.

zrangon.6415:

I can see there’s a lot of enthusiasm but personally am worried by the statement that its intended to be challenging for skilled players. Whilst I’m an enthusiastic and regular player there’s no way I can be considered skilled. I hope the difficulty level is not set too high

That part is talking about achievements, not the the content as a whole.

Enokitake.1742:

If someone buys the game after the end of living story 2, they’d have to pay to unlock living story 2.

If I buy lets say Lord of the Rings Online today, I have to pay to unlock a kitten-ton of expansions. How is this different?

Stormcrow.7513:

Think that if Anet wanted the respect of the community they would have given ALL the LSS1 chapters for free.
This stinks of nickel and diming and seems to be the concurrent trend with Anet.
Milk all we can while we can, even with old rehashed content.
Why stop here Anet? Why not just charge gems to enter dungeons? Why not just charge gems to login?
Charging money for previously free content is a slippery slope that I hope Anet doesnt fall down.

You are aware that they have said nothing at all about the cost for S1, right?
They have even stated that it won’t be in the journal at release, but might be added later, and as such your whole post is completely invalid.

For all we know WHEN/IF S1 becomes available it WILL be for free.

LordEnki.9283:

I’m sorry Anet, but I can’t afford your game anymore.

Are you somehow forced to pay?

Flash.6912:

^ I go by gold to gems exchange rate

…What?
You quite clearly stated that it would cost $10. That is very much a real life currency, rather than in-game gold and as such, you rather clearly didn’t talk about the gold to gem exchange rate.

The fact remains that for $10 you get FOUR releases, not one. And that is a rather massive difference. Four releases is basically two months releases.

Flash.6912:

^ what he said. This is really a bad move for Anet. $10 for every contents that new players missed. I know the journal start at season 2 but eventually they will add season1. That is like more than $100+ waste to catchup all of the season1 stuff!

$10 for every content?
No.
More like $2,5 for every content.
Not to mention the fact that S1 won’t even be available, at least not at first.

Aye, it is terrible marketing. Which would suggest that it won’t happen.
ArenaNet aren’t a bunch of idiots, they know how stuff like this works.

It is very likely that each season will at its end be bunched together to a pack and be sold for a lower price. Exactly the same way as expansions. And no, an expansion doesn’t HAVE to include new races or professions.
You also have a grand total of zero idea about what will be added in S2.

Snowmoon.1758:

What about someone who feels like taking a break from GW2 due to burnout?
1 year later, do you think he’ll still wanna pay for it?

It is rather likely that they will bunch up each season and sell it as a pack (most likely for a slightly lower price than buying everything one by one) which would basically be like buying an expansion pack, and people don’t seem to have much issue with that.

Snowmoon.1758:

Making people pay for missed content is rather silly imo.
Can you imagine someone who missed 10 episodes of Season 2 due to exams
and when he finally comes back, he has to pay 2000gems JUST to unlock them to play? (considering 1 episode costs 200gems)

Why would he even bother to pay?
Seriously, judging by the quality of season 1’s story, is it even WORTH to pay 200gems?

You’re just encouraging people who are not able to play to actually seriously consider quitting the game.

Very VERY stupid move Anet.
This is probably one of the WORST decisions you’ve made.

It is extremely unlikely that someone would be so busy that they couldn’t spend 5 minutes every TWO WEEKS in order to unlock it for free though, don’t you think?

It is also very unlikely that someone would have exams for about half a year.

Eirian Direstorm.9748:

From the notes:

“Characters under level 80 will be able to see the available episodes, but will not be able to play them until they reach level 80. Think of the Living World story as the constantly expanding continuation of your character’s storyline once they reach level 80.”

Do you mean that characters under level 80 can’t do any of LW season two?

Aye, seems like it.

Which is most likely a good thing, seeing as even with the scaling the things is either too hard for upscaled or too easy for natural level 80s.

LS is basically becoming the new end-game system for Guild Wars 2.

Clear out your mail-box.

Sola.7250:

If you don’t login, you need to pay to doing Living World, Huh? Anet, None of the Living World stuff so far has been worth paying for, dumbest idea yet!

Anet, if you want money from me, you’ll need to do a hell of a lot better than this!

Well, then don’t pay for it.
It is there as an option for people that want to do it, but missed it when it was released, as opposite to right now where if you miss it, it will be gone forever.

More like Living Story version of Caithe, Logan, Rytlock, Zojja and Eir.

If you have to ask, it is rather likely that it won’t be okay.

Khorrax.2108:

They just had to monetize story as well, didn’t they?

Other than that, I like the changes. I might actually check LS season 2 after all.

To be fair it is rather unlikely that most people will be so busy so that they can’t login for 10 seconds once every two weeks.

And the price is so low that it doesn’t really matter much anyway.
You can get the gold for it within a couple of days without much trouble.

Aye, looks like a rather good solution for the whole issue.
It is nice to see that they have also officially decided that the LS takes place after defeat of Zhaitan, and that it will now assume that people have completed that.

It won’t be implemented for S1, at least not at first, since S1 was not built with the Journal in mind.

They are changing the reward structure for S2 as well it seems, and making them permanent.

Or you can you know, login one time during the two weeks that event is available and have it unlocked for free.

It is unlock forever, for the account.

It is rather likely that everyone would get free access to S1 LS when/if the add it to the Journal.

Sadly it does indeed sound like we will have no more world-progressing big battles, since the open world stuff does seem to be completely permanent.

Ah well, got to lose some to gain some I suppose ^^ Like the change to the system overall.

Sicarius.4639:

Any large open-world LS2 bosses could potentially come back as fractals for replay? Might be one way to get around it.

Maybe, but that would make them much less of large open-world bosses, seeing as Fractals have a limit of 5 players.

Aye, it might simply be that all the pure story parts of the Living Story will be replayable.

I wonder if this is what they meant when they said that LS2 would be permanent. If it was, let the rage begin

tigirius.9014:

I’m going to waste no time pointing out the sheer number of F2P games that have great expansion size content 3-4 times a year with 0 subscription and exactly 0 of them use DR against their players, 0 of them have a AH focused system of loot acquisition (even in one that has Ferengi mind you) and exactly 0 of them hate farmers and in fact encourage them. Their economies and profits have been great for years in some cases.

Oh, I would love to hear about a couple of those, because I can’t really find any of them.

Indeed, I am personally a bit worried that this will mean nothing large-scale (such as Marionette) in Season 2, since those things would be rather hard, not to say impossible, to do on your own.

Thobek.1730:

I recently watched a few episodes of thundercats (research for my design work). anyway… It was surprisingly mature. It had slavery, torture, death, war, and some scenes that hinted on slaughter. It was completely different to the 80’s version. People have become desensitized over the generations and require more and more to shock.

To be fair the bold part can also be said about GW2.

Devata.6589:

Yeah I guess so. It’s btw not just the items in the cash-shop it’s the fact that they are there in stead of in the world and the gold-grind in the world. It’s not that there are items in the cash-shop I desperately want and now I am mad because I can’t get them. Thats not the case. I just want them to be in the game so they are fun to get and add something to the content. Hope you understand that difference.

But what can they add in the gemstore then?
Every single thing they add will be something someone would want to be able to get out in the world.

I suppose they could go the GW1 path and release skills and power buying, but I don’t think many peolpe would want that to be honest.

Azhure.1857:

True. Doesn’t mean its a good idea for every game though. Doesn’t mean its a good idea for GW2.

Of course not.
But the poster I quoted basically said: It didn’t work in ESO so I won’t even bother trying it in GW2 because it will fail there as well.
Which is a rather silly way of thinking.