Guild Wars 2

John Smith.4610:

Vlad Morbius.1759:

John Smith.4610:

MRA.4758:

(Same “textbook” source as your quote.)

~MRA

I laughed at “textbook”, one for you, but I encourage you to search that textbook for whether or not that’s true; especially considering the state of the economy and a video game economy.

I for one don’t mind your input but I am not a fan of your condescending attitude and ridicule towards anyone who is not a student of economics, although you are right this is a video game you manage the economy for…so just how credible does that make you in the field of economics?

Maybe you missed the joke here? He is pointing out that I googled the copy paste inflation definition and I’m acknowledging he caught me. Then I’m telling him to look for evidence that changes in money supply don’t necessitate inflation. There is nothing condescending in this post at all.

Mentioning the video game economy is mentioning that it’s a specific type of economy, not mentioning it holds less value.

I got the joke

Pumping currency into a market doesn’t equate to inflation. If a currency retains it’s purchasing power, which it does in the case of video game economics, it doesn’t matter how much gold is in it. Even in the case of player traded items, there is a rather large missing factor to real world economics, the cost to produce (with the extremely minor exception of crating). Since many items are very much based around vendor value initially (plus obviously scarcity and demand for some of the more luxury type goods), it’s very odd to see it called inflation. There is a good argument always brought up in these circle, which is cost to play, meaning the necessity items that are either broken or consumed and in that particular instance, it cost not a single copper more than it did at release. The “cost of living” hasn’t changed in other words, which is often a key indicator when talking about inflation.

In terms of a currency exchange (such as gold to gems) inflation again is an odd word. The value placed on what it cost for gems is entirely based on whether or not there is even a demand for them. If no one wants what the gem store has to offer, gem prices stay low. The base price hasn’t changed, it doesn’t cost more resources to manufacture gems, they aren’t consumed (although they can be left dormant in a abandoned players account) and of course they are entirely confined to a single economy. Thus eliminating some of the key contributors to inflation.

There’s also no real cost of goods and services. Unless you’re paying all the npcs in the game a working wage to make all these goods and sell all these services

Not sure how you can take a game economy and relate it to a real world one in scope.

I still think the average earning potential of players is a bit on the low side. I would think in a video game, people probaly shouldn’t be struggling with getting some of those nifty luxury goods.

Geotherma.2395:

munkiman.3068:

Basic kits (and this has been tested) yields the same items from salvageables as master kits. It’s a waste to use master kits on just about anything but rares and some high level greens. In most cases, it’s just as profitable to sell blues and greens than it is to salvage them. Mithril, Elder wood, thick leather and silk sell for more and faster to the vendor.

I’d love to see the testing on this, as the wiki states otherwise. But again, I stated my preference, in fact i stated that I was stating that I would state my preference….

I’m talking about rags and torn garments and such. Not weapons or armor. I was actually posting against what the person before me stated, in that you were wrong. Right now it’s almost not worth even bothering to salvage anything less than rare, unless you’re leveling a crafting profession. But, you already stated that in so many words.

Frys (west coast USA) had gem card for $25 (instead of 30)… There are sales fairly often around, I’ve heard of walmart having sales on cards too, but i refuse to shop there.

Basic kits (and this has been tested) yields the same items from salvageables as master kits. It’s a waste to use master kits on just about anything but rares and some high level greens. In most cases, it’s just as profitable to sell blues and greens than it is to salvage them. Mithril, Elder wood, thick leather and silk sell for more and faster to the vendor.

FYI, Heavy Loot bags drop lodestones (rarely, i’ve opened over 1000 and got 3 charged and 3 charged cores, plus 3 other cores and 2 other lodestones). Regardless though, the drop rate is in the toilet for really 0 reason.

Astral Projections.7320:

munkiman.3068:

As i mentioned earlier I opened about 270 chests before getting a ticket, yesterday i opened one when i got a key as a reward and got another one… Just my luck i guess.

Just out of curiosity, how much gold did that cost you?

I bought all my gems with cash. So about 150 USD. I’m actually fine with it, but i am pretty sure i won’t do it again. I’m not a big gambler (might play the lotto once a year), but i do use a lot of the stuff out of the chests (boosters, kits and the like). I did get both backpacks too, along with makeover stuff. Not that i have any desire to make over any of my toons, but i might at some point.

My biggest gripe isn’t even rng, it’s that you have no other option to acquire these skins, as i mentioned before.

Yeah, i guess my point is i see more and more people getting turned off by the amount of work versus reward in video games. If i have to spend days and in some cases weeks to gear my toon to look a certain way, it’s rather unfortunate that it feels like work. I can understand of a point of view of maybe the unemployed, but working all day and coming home to feel like i’m working at a video games get’s pretty tiresome. I’m seeing this among my peers, with basically the same fundamental statements.

I actually don’t want to be poor in a game, I’d like my challenges to be rewarded. One example is how much harder arah is for the same (if not worse in some cases) rewards. People simply don’t want to put in 1.15 hours into the rewards you can get in 15 minutes doing other dungeon paths. But, that’s really only one example.

I took a new toon and just played him, keeping a decent track of what it cost to play versus what i wanted for him as i progressed and i have to say, it’s actually much worse than when i leveled my first toon. If i wasn’t supplementing his income with my level 80 earnings, he’d be geared poorly and struggling through content.

I can understand that a player doesn’t “need” to do x, and that’s always nice. But when the goals are x to get y, if it feels like a chore, then many people will simply not embark on the journey after so many play hours. That’s what i’m seeing with gw2.

Nachtz.4930:

Nachtz.4930:

munkiman.3068:

Nachtz.4930:

munkiman.3068:

Nachtz.4930:

Rashka.7304:

Orangensaft.7139:

Rashka.7304:

Rashka.7304:

Currently i am at 508 rares (19 exo back) and 1408 exotics, no precursor yet.

Up to 624 rares (28 exo back) and 1472 exotics, still no precursor.

both of you spent over 1400 exotics ?

thats like 3000 gold which is like 5-7 precursors depending on which one…

That is naive fallacy because you are not taking everything into account. So far my loss in gold is smaller than the cost of the precursor on TP…

Up to 700 rares (29 exo) and 1476 exotics btw. That was a bad streak of 76 rares and only 1 exo back.

As far as I have been told, the 4 weapons you have to throw in the Mystic Toilet have to have the same stats between eachothers. At least, that’s the only way it worked for me (already got 3 precursors for less than 80 gold, working on my 4th now). It has not been confirmed by any official statement, but that’s what my experience (and my guildies’) say, I may be wrong though. So in your case, what did you throw in the forge ?

This is actually statistically impossible, no matter how lucky, no one is getting 3 pre for 80g… Check your numbers again.

I actually get better exotics back for mixed stats than i do for same stats, on average. But then again i can go awhile and not see an exotic either.

31 tries for Dawn, 3 for The Chosen, and 24 for the Leaf of Kudzu. Only with the cheapest rare items.

Less than 80 gold, I had not more in my purse anyway… Keep your stats for you, luck and statistics are not made to be mixed up.

I guess you’re right, you are one lucky person.

Just had The Legend yesterday for 21 gold (I didn’t count how much tries, but it should be quite easy to count). I gave it to a member of my guild. 4 precursors for less than 100 gold now, let’s keep on the good work

Update : got Dusk in 17 tries and the Lover in 4 tries.

I think I found something, but I won’t say it eh.

If you found something… You should probably share it. Either way it’s not really going to hurt you if people know some mystic forge secret lurking about. I still have my doubts about your luck though, unless you’ve really stumbled on some trick.

I know the named rares (shortbow, longbow, staff, sword, etc.) are said to yield better results, but i’ve yet to see it.

Pandemoniac.4739:

John Smith.4610:

Preferably you use a bundle of goods all tied together, that haven’t been modified by design and found equilibrium pricing quickly.

That makes sense – it seems obvious to use a bundle now that I know. Thanks for explaining.

I’d be curious to know if that real value of gold is something that seems on par with the real time it takes to acquire?

I ask, since it seems to me a good number of folks are what i would consider at poverty level. I’m basing this on what i’ve heard as complaints about the game overall, obviously no data to back it up. There just seems to be a funneling of folks more interested in luxury goods complaining on rate of acquisition, in as much as people mentioning it took them weeks of play time to gather/earn enough for exotics @ 80.

As i mentioned earlier I opened about 270 chests before getting a ticket, yesterday i opened one when i got a key as a reward and got another one… Just my luck i guess.

I still amazes me people talk about RoI in a video game. Maybe if your a gold farmer selling of gold to people willing to buy it from you (illegally of course). Playing games isn’t a job and shouldn’t be discussed as if people need a return on investment for goods purchased in a game. People buy the picks because they are convenient and cool. Are they farming more ori on average? probably not. At least not anymore than what daily for gathering added to the market.

The problem with tracking on the TP is we only know the supply and demand. Buy orders get filled much more often than we can gauge. There was a post where John mentioned a bit about movement, i don’t remember specific numbers, but i remember being surprised. I know i’ve pushed buy orders up on items i’ll be listing down the road. It only makes sense to do that.

Rewiinded.9401:

lordkrall.7241:

Rewiinded.9401:

What’s personally ticking me off is the HUGE difference between the sell price and the buy price for gems.

Average price to buy 100 gems: 2g 89s
Average price you get for 100 gems: 2g 14s

Where does that 75s go? Is it transaction costs? That means an almost 26% procent difference. That’s 12, yes, 12!!!!! TIMES AS MUCH AS ON THE ACTUAL FREAKING REAL LIFE STOCK MARKET.

It’s ridiculous. I know they want to make a profit by taking gold out of the economy. Personally I think it’s discouraging people from buying gems with real money and selling it for gold as well. Especially since they know they’re only going to get 75% of the actual value.

The bold part is quite important here.
Of course they want to discourage people from selling the gems for gold, since they want as many as possible to buy the gems with real money.

That’s why I think that giving a fair price in gold for the gems would in fact promote the buying of gems. Why? Because people won’t feel completely ripped off if they want some extra gold and want to take the shortcut of buying gems and selling them for gold.

The price is fair actually, the base price set at release for gold to gems was somewhere in the 25s per 100 range. The price for real world money to gems hasn’t changed at all.

In your fair price scenario, would the gem→gold→gem be equal? If so, what would prevent players from buying 1000’s of gems when the rate was say 1g, sitting on it for about 20 minutes and selling it back @ 1.2g? The disparity prevents this short term flipping and helps actually stabilize the market, keeping players from flooding the economy with gold.

I reflect again what John Smith said and say the gem market is performing really well.

John Smith.4610:

I see no current issues with the exchange, it’s functioning very well. Remember for every opinion on which way should be “favored” there is at least one opinion for the opposite.

PS please stop calling everything inflation, it’s driving me mad.

I mentioned this the other day in another thread, it bugs me too. The cost to play the game hasn’t changed one copper since release. The only thing that has increased is the desire to acquire those big screen tvs you guys are selling on the TP Too bad the parts to make them are scarce.

Syeria.4812:

marnick.4305:

SnowHawk.3615:

It would be great if Gold to Gem would somehow stay low- while Gem to Gold would stay high- I think that would work possibly work in benefit to all instead of using 79g to transfer to a different server or 10g for a measly 350 gems.

How do you imagine such a system to work?

And if gold > gems is permanently low, as you suggest, why would anyone ever buy gems with cash?

Let’s not pretend here. If the gem/gold conversion doesn’t work and a.net seems to lose too much profit over it, it’s the first thing to go.

If you look closely, he said “Gold to Gem would somehow stay low- while Gem to Gold would stay high.” The problem here then wouldn’t be that conversion, but the fact that players could trade gold to gems then back to gold for infinite money. Hello hyperinflation.

Yes, ^This^ your proposal is very flawed if you give it a second to sink in.

You can make G on the gem store, buy low sell high. Right now a 25.7% increase or thereabouts will cause you to break even. There’s literally nothing wrong with the gem market.

As to gem prices, there is a cap, in that there is a limited amount and a base price for 100 gems. We don’t know however how many gems are available, which is a big part of calculating the cap, we also don’t know exactly what the minimum disparity between buy and sell prices might look like at any cap. It might very well be that at some point the limit would be 25g per 100. There might even be some mathematical genius that could take all the data and get a rough calculation.

As far as item costs, Anet could do a lot of different things to change the market (and have already). So it would be pure speculation as to what it might look like down the road.

Fiontar.4695:

It replaces something you buy by the stack with something with endless uses. What other way would you calculate the value than to calculate how many uses you need to break even? Plus, you don’t buy all stacks at once, you buy them as needed. As others have pointed out, there is no guarantee that there won’t be a higher tier ore in the future that these won’t work on. This just increases the odds that you won’t actually recover the cost of your investment.

Currently, trading gems for gold is really the only way to reliably support the game with out high odds that you are being ripped off in one way or another. If you couldn’t spend cash for gems that can then be converted into gold, these things would be much more subjective. However, we can calculate an actual break even point on these and I just don’t see it ever making sense for the vast majority.

There was a couple other things mentioned beyond the ROI factor, which apparently some people enjoy overlooking and that’s totally fine. But i’m not one to nickle and dime myself out of a convenience item.

That said, there is the fact that “which you can buy, by the stack” will make it a worthwhile investment, there’s been more than once that i’ve need one more slot, but i’ve had a copper set of picks taking up my valuable bag space.

Second is the cool factor. Sure i can buy a 3 times the size cubic zirconia of the price of a diamond, but i’ may just opt for the diamond, since it has value beyond the scope of what my roi is and of course, it makes my wife happy, which is win win for me.

I agree account bound would have made sense… and i’m certain they’d see at least a slight increase in sales doing it that way. But, there are people buying them for many of their toons, so i might actually balance out. The bad thing is if they decided to change it after the fact, people that bought multiples would be outraged.

i’ve already talked about tiers, but it occurs to me, knowing a thing or 2 about programming, that the ascended tick mark in the crafting window could just be pulling from a list of item types. This doesn’t necessarily reflect that they plan on added recipes to crafting for ascended gear.

kokocabana.8153:

Gems prices are regulated by ANet. It’s called the RL money->gem market and that price has always been fixed. That’s the primary market because it’s the only one that ANet is directly involved in. The gem->gold market is a secondary market and it is players dealing with each other. Blame yourself for not buying gems when they were cheaper. The rate will keep moving to adjust for inflation as this is a good gold sink.

You have to look at this like a stock market. Say Apple sells new shares at $100/share before the iPhone came out. That price was fixed. Just like RL money to gems. Once people buy those shares from Apple, they can trade it on stock exchanges for whatever they can get. That is the secondary market. It has nothing to do with Apple. If Apple shares are now selling at $400 on the stock exchange, you can’t go to Apple and say that their stock is too expensive. You should have bought the stock when it was cheaper and not when its already expensive.

The rate is already settling down from the high of 3g50s that I saw on the first night. This is because a bunch of players now see their gems worth trading in for gold. The system is working as intended.

This seems completely accurate to me. The regulation of gems comes from the initial base price of them when they hit the market, when the gem store was @ 100% and looking over the data it’s trending, without fail exactly as it should.

You HAVE to remember that buying gems for gold isn’t some standard of practice when it comes to micro-transactions. It’s a convenience and one i’m very happy to see.

We actually kinda do have sales data, just look at the gems store explosion. Sure we don’t know exact numbers but it’s no coincidence that right after announce the gem prices blew up.

People seem to forget about frostgorge… I don’t farm cof (or any place really) but getting a couple of people to run around orr and doing the temple zergs are always fairly profitable.

I like bifrost.. If i had a ranger that i played often or a thief i would also look into getting the dreamer (not a caster weapon i know). Still if i every bother going for one, i’ll be getting bifrost.

John Smith.4610:

The reason is due to the type of item that dye is, and how people interact with it. Not the different quantities of dye.

This. It’s one of the only (if not only) what i would call tradable perma consumables in the game

Gisei.5749:

munkiman.3068:

Yes, if i have 3g and run across an item that has a buy order of 100g, i can’t sell that item because i have to put up 5g just to sell it. So the solution for me, which doesn’t affect anything about the way the system works now, is take the money off the sale, since the buy order money is a guaranteed sale.

I see two problems. Undercutting, and using TP as storage.

Please understand what i’m proposing. Selling outright to the highest buyer has nothing to do with being undercut or provides any more ability to use the TP as storage. I got an item that i don’t have enough money to list, i click sell to highest buyer, the item goes to the buyer, the money goes to me, the 15% comes off the sale and goes to the TP. Why people even propose to using the TP as storage is beyond me, why pay the listing fee to store an item? A 100g item you have to post for a significantly higher sell price in order to ensure you don’t sell it off, but that’s not even an issue in this scenario.

SET.3275:

Since english is not my native language, i’m not sure what exactly means “tanking” as a verb of tank … I guess it is something like stock up or increasing supply of .
Anyway … as about ectos … it will always be the most common used material, not just in crafting, but for anything. Seem the speculation, after the announce of world events change, have passed and most of the speculators got bite the dust (or i hope so). The price dropped more than 20%. The temporary increasing of supply is probably due to releasing to the TP of speculation stocked up ectos. Soon the listings will become the same as before the patch, so will the price too.
As long as there is no bots (or almost none), the price will remain pretty stable at ~24s (with ~10% tolerance). No chance for 10-15s ectos. There was a topic in which John Smith posted that the volume of ecto market for 24h is like 130k. So … i dont think there is market manipulator wealth enough to make manipulation of such a scale.

Tanking means dropping in price (usually quickly).

Yeah i agree totally with the gem shop as it stand now based on conversions. I’d personally rather play the game, supplement my earnings with RL money than resort to running a certain path my entire playtime to maximize my returns (which aren’t even @ 5% of what i make an hour in the RW). This tells me something about the earning potential of the game, even to minimum wage earners. If you value your time at all and want shiny stuff in game, the only way to do it in a basically logical efficient way is to throw a couple hours salary at it. This doesn’t really favor players and is a fundamental flaw (imho) in the economic earning potential in the game. I don’t think it should be the same though (even at minimum wage), but it’s a pretty large difference as it stands now.

Yes, if i have 3g and run across an item that has a buy order of 100g, i can’t sell that item because i have to put up 5g just to sell it. So the solution for me, which doesn’t affect anything about the way the system works now, is take the money off the sale, since the buy order money is a guaranteed sale.

Actually doing the math (i’m no mathematical genius, btw) if the base price per 100gems is 2500c @ 100% gems in supply, at 0% it would be 250,000c (25g per 100), which means it would never reach your 1:1 scenario as the supply would be completely diminished. That’s making a lot of assumptions on my part since i don’t have time to really sit down and do the math. I’m also assuming disparity at 100% supply is roughly 30%. So this is all basically theoretical since we don’t know total supply, base value or minimum disparity.

Chasind.3128:

Zaxares.5419:

Calae.1738:

I’m going to laugh so hard when the gold to gem ratio gets to 1:1.

The day that happens is the day I’m going to get my Emperor’s New Wardrobe achievement.

Actually, it’ll probably happen if it hits a 100 gems for 10 gold exchange rate. That’s my personal breakpoint, although I doubt it’ll happen (if it ever does) for a long time yet.

If that happens, then it’s ‘bye bye gw2’ for me haha

It would never reach that rate and here’s why i think that (or am actually certain of it). There is a fixed amount of gems which could never exceed the peak ratio and if i were a betting man, i’d bet we might be seeing the peak point or very close to it. People will buy gems, but they will also continue to sell them back, also keeping this plateau somewhat stable. If i had to guess, i would say the peak price points would be 4g per 100 to buy and 3g per 100 to sell (meaning the price disparity at that point is equal to 1g). I wouldn’t doubt that there are a good number of players right now holding on to gems for some peak price point to sell them off at or are waiting for a new harvesting tool, i know i am.

There is one specific thing i’d like to see changed with the TP, that is selling to a buy order. I’d like to see all the fees come directly out of the sale instead of putting up the %5 first. It seems like a minor thing, but i think it would help a small amount for players that simply can’t list a bigger ticket item to a buy order since they just don’t have the G.

Another thing i would like to see is a vendor buy price adjustment. Not a lot mind you, but maybe up the top priced vendor item by 1s to vendor your “trash”. Basically increasing the lowest sell value 1c (say at junk level). It would muddy up the market a bit for a little while on items that are really close to vendor value on the TP, but i think keeping the cost to play the same, but slightly moving up the earning potential would help those that struggle near the bottom.

There is an interesting assumption about being able to obtain a legendary quicker and that is that people will quite playing once they achieve this lofty goal. I personally think that would only be the case for a handful of players that feel as though acquiring a legendary is basically beating the game. Most players i know that earn that reward, actually want to play just to show it off. This not to mention Anet’s goal to continue to add new content and challenges for players, I would think there will continue to be a reason for people to keep playing. I personally play the game since i enjoy it, but that’s just me.

IamDuddits.1692:

Depends on if you factor the time it takes to sell the item and what “playing the market” is defined as. I found it helpful to make an Excel spread sheet where I can input the cost of buying crafting mats and the sell price after TP fees to determine the most profitable items to make. Sometimes the items I put up sell in 10 mins, some times it takes a few hours, but the time I spent crafting and looking at prices is much less than 1 hour.

I’d say I get maybe 7-10 g a day for minimal effort.

gw2spidy has all that for you under the crafting section. it’ll tell you what your margins are, if it’s profitable to craft. The only things it doesn’t work with are things like trays of food (feast items), since it doesn’t take into account the mystic forge costs.

As far as i know there is no time limit. There may be a limit to the amount of sell offers you could put up though. Plus putting items up you don’t want to sell at really high prices is going to cost you a lot in fees.

Ephedrine.4521:

I buy gems and noticed this since I played this game so don’t tell me it doesn’t. The value for gold gets locked and hovers without much fluctuating when the exchange rate changes to fast. I am only giving you my experience as a gem buyer how i see it. I think Gems should be more gold then they actually are.

gw2spidy.com has a graph proving otherwise. A much better graph actually.

ajm.2931:

I doubt this would happen. (would be nice though) It would make it possible to grep total active player counts, server populations, etc. and I can see A.net not wanting that info available.

You can figure all that info out just looking at the leaderboards now. You can also just yank the data right off the page too i suppose, it would work ok, just no the best way to do it. I’m only looking for our guilds roster data anyway, last earned achievement point says way more about player activity than the roster does.

I know i can’t seem to stop using my pick, it’s pretty kitten cool. I can totally see the ori price drop (even most ores for that matter) since people use the pick willy nilly now.

Off topic, but maybe John can poke someone over in the leaderboards group and ask them if we can grab that data somewhere to use on our various guild websites. It actually contains more useful info than the in-game roster does currently!

I’d like to know the same thing too.

Any chance on an API, or info on how we can pull that data from the leaderboards? Be nice thing to add to our guild website, considering you can see who’s online and active.

There is already a discussion on this, it’s pretty much all speculation about any new materials being introduced. The tool says used to mine all metals, period. What that means for future possible metals is an even higher unknown.

Venin.8460:

Wiser with Age.3714:

… If that’s your point of view, then I would suggest going into Artificer for their potion buff consumables and Cook for their food buff consumables. Though both of these buffs occupy the same buffing slot (so you can only use one at a time), you’ll have a lot of self-buffing options and you can change things around whenever you want.

Just to be clear, are you saying potions and foods don’t stack? Not to argue or anything as I haven’t actually tried it myself, but the official wiki says they do stack.

If you’re saying a potion doesn’t stack with another potion or a food doesn’t stack with another food, then you’d be correct.

They do indeed stack you can use food with oils (utility), and potions. Just not crystals or sharpening stones.

Kaiza.4618:

And being player regulated has led to where we are now with the current prices climbing still. Its not going to stop.

This is actually incorrect, there is a peak, we just don’t know what it is (yet). They have stated more than once that there is a limited supply of gems to pull from, which will in fact make the market reach it’s peak point when exhausted. It’s very probable to go to the store at it’s peak point and not be able to buy gems at all.

Vol.5241:

munkiman.3068:

The fluctuation in gold to gems actually works in favor for the player as well. It’s clearly a great investment opportunity. Buy gems low and when big moves like this happen, it becomes very profitable for you to sell them off. Not to mention you’ll have some to spend on the new items too.

Well you have to consider the tax. I can’t remember what it was – 20s? 80s?

You’d have to wait a long time for it to rise that high – and if it does, you lose on opportunity cost

I did early on buy as many gems as i could, with every available ounce of currency i could muster from just playing. I’ve already sold them back when they were in the 1g range, foolishly thinking they couldn’t go much higher. The actual tax is in the disparity between the buy and sell price or around 88s. Given what we’ve seen the rate to escalate to, it’s a pretty safe bet to buy gems at around 2g per 100 (which i did last month) and sit on them till it explodes again. If i would have sold them at peak i’d be making 48s per 100, but this weekend i’m expecting them to hit 3g, quite possibly friday. I might be wrong but either way i have gems to spend at the reduced rate.

dronzer.8392:

Geotherma.2395:

And as for the “no one buys these for boosters etc”, thats your opinion. I buy them for boosters and salvage kits and whatever else it wants to give me. If it gives me another ticket (#5 for me), that is fine too.

If that’s what motivates you to buy the boxes then that’s great! and good for you! but I suspect you’re in a very small minority for this, If one wanted boosters, salvage kits, wouldn’t it be wiser to just buy them direct rather than opening a box? o.O ).

…But for the majority this is not what is attracting the sales, it’s that chance to obtain that luxurious desirable item anything else is considered a loss, just like a casino, you consider the money the reward and everything else a loss, even if it’s a t-shirt given to you on the way out.

Actually, that’s the only thing that motivated me to buy the keys for the chance at the ticket (260 something opened before i got one). I’m for sure going to use every single item i got from them. I’m not happy that i was forced to do it that way, however, I’m also going to use what i got, i paid for it.

The fluctuation in gold to gems actually works in favor for the player as well. It’s clearly a great investment opportunity. Buy gems low and when big moves like this happen, it becomes very profitable for you to sell them off. Not to mention you’ll have some to spend on the new items too.

Not to mention it’s not the same thing at all. Gold to gems prices change, the cash to gem conversion always stays the same. When i refer to what’s available at the store, i ALWAYS use it compared to real world currency, not gold costs. Buying stuff from the store with gold is a convenience and one that players are actually finally paying a steep premium on.

Lonewolf Kai.3682:

Karizee.8076:

SazRB.2894:

is there a preview of the dyes?
a link or whatsoever?

Flame Dye Kit:
Charred: [&AgEdowAA]
Cinders: [&AgEcowAA]
Flame: [&AgEYowAA]
Flare: [&AgEbowAA]
Molten: [&AgEZowAA]
Pyre: [&AgEaowAA]

Frost Dye Kit:
Deep Glacial Sky: [&AgEVowAA]
Deep Glacial Teal: [&AgESowAA]
Glacial Sky: [&AgEWowAA]
Glacial Teal: [&AgETowAA]
Shiver Sea: [&AgEUowAA]
Shiver Sky: [&AgEXowAA]

Are those supposed to be hyperlinks in the brackets?

You paste those links in chat and you can preview the item.

I don’t think anyone is suggesting ALL ascended piece should be able to be sold, but stuff you get as drops would be nice to have on the TP. I know some peoples goal may be to gear BiS and be done with the game, so they may buy gems play for a little while and say, that’s enough. I don’t think people aren’t playing the game in general, which also earns them something. As it is now, you still have to play the game to get most items. There can’t be that many people buying gems to exchange for cash, skipping all the content (crafting to 80, let’s say) and buying BiS gear.

Pandemoniac.4739:

JakHammer.7094:

Ok, so I saw one in action. I caved. Bought 1 only for my main. Pure vanity, as the economics of the item are rotten, but so cool. Sigh. “I feel so —- weak.”

Don’t feel bad – you are now part of the molten miners clique I had no intention of buying anything for a while, but I couldn’t resist either.

I’ll echo that statement. Just too cool and convenient to pass up.

you could invest in gems, i bet this weekend those prices are going to skyrocket. I bought 80g worth a few weeks ago (wish i had bought more now), I’ll be pretty wealth when i go to sell them at the peak.

I’m going to say he listed it for 2175, of which as of today he got undercut bout 176k. Looking over the data on spidy, top offers don’t move much volume, maybe 1 or 2 a month. Might be awhile. Buy offers however could be much more.