Originally posted by Fadedbomb

VideoLink

 

The three things in this video that make the cash-shop P2W:

-Keys [edit]

-Apparently keys drop in-game according to posters below, editing this out :P!

 

-XP Boosts, these are exchanged for RL currency in order to decrease the amount of TIME you're spending to level than another person. Standard, cut and paste, advantage over another player in order to level faster, get to other content quicker, yada yada yada. I've seen these very same "hourly boosts" in Asian Grinder MMOs (most of whom have generally failed completely, btw...like 9-Dragons). Time after time it's been proven that uses "hours" instead of "DAYS" for XP boosts has been shown to be pay-to-win. Simple fix if you want to keep it fair is to treat these like a "paid customer" title similar to a $15/month sub. That way you're supporting the game in a meaningful way each month for an exp boost of like 25% rather than getting 50% normal experience for an hour as it currently stands. Again, NOT cool ArenaNet, not cool. 

 

 

-Lastly, we have the end-all, be-all to the PayToWin situation. If you watch said video you can, in fact, buy in-game gold FOR RL CURRENCY! All it takes is a swipe of the CC to buy gems and THEN convert them into gold. I don't care if the conversion rate is $10 for only 10 gold any time you allow in-game currency purchasing to happen it INCREASES outside source popularity because they tend to massively undercut the in-game prices. Look at StarTrek Online!! The DAY they started a similar exchange system Gold Farming purchases increased by almost DOUBLE!! Seriously ANET, wtf here? I understand the need to allow players to convert gold into gems so they can play for free and still benefit from the store, BUT DON'T ALLOW PEOPLE TO TURN GEMS BACK INTO GOLD UNLESS IT WAS GOLD TO BEGIN WITH!!!!

 

/end rant :(

 

 

That being said, I have money to burn and i could easily benefit from this cash shop. However, I wouldn't use it to begin with, but the fact it's there means others will, and that's NOT cool.

I was planning to buy GW2 a week prior to launch if nothing else came out to hold my interest, however the odds keeping stacking up against me as I'm fervently against supporting PayToWin :(!

 

Thanks for reading!

hehehe I read this and have to laugh you sound really ignorant. :) I got one of those mystic keys on a drop this weekend and sold all the junk to a vendor.

I am not a GW2 fanboy. I played the Tere event this weekend too and it also is a really polished fun game. But I have to say I do prefer GW2 over Tera.

1) Mystic keys ---loot drops I got one myself

2) EXP boosts ---I don't give a rats ass if you ge tto lvl cap before me, At least when i get there I'll know how to play my toon.

3) Gems----Does it mater if you spend real cash to get the armor you have when I just payed ingame gold for the same or equivolent set. Hey if you want to spend cold hard cash for the same gear everyone else has access to without spending real cash be my guest.

I honestly do not get why people are even bothered by this.

Cheap?  Broke?  No income?  

The game has no monthly charge, how else are they supposed to make money?  Currently I play two games that are as I call them "freetopay".  I have put money in both games and I see me doing it in this one.   Regarding buying currency, so what?  I mean this is teh new model people.  I get most of you have never played a mmo to endgame outside of WoW but lots of games are changing this way.  Most of the time, they will have a way to get the exact same items in game.  Either by effort or some other equal work to get the item.  From experience, in the two games that I play, its almost always the kids and teens that complain about buyers.  I can't help to wonder if that is to play here as well.  

Originally posted by colddog04

 You are wrong.

There is a direct connection. There is a whole industry called gold farming that has sprung up around this idea. Basically people can purchase gold in video games. So what happens is people who don't have time or don't want to, buy gold. These people commonly have jobs. At these jobs they make money that they use to purchse said gold.

As far as your example.

If you make $5 dollars an hour.  You then spend $20 dollars to save 1 hour. You faill at life because you wasted 4 hours to save 1 hour. It doesn't matter how you feel about it. You still fail at math and life.

See, that's where your argument fails hard.

 

You believe that a 1:1 ratio of value exists to the consumer. When in reality, someone may value putting 4 hours in at work to save one hour in game. 

 

Look at it the other way around. Someone may value putting 10 minutes into work to save 1 hour of game time so they are much less likely to spend money on gems.

 

There is no direct relationship between IRL time played and value of gems. Just saying people fail at life to help support your argument doesn't really work. It actually just amkes you sound desperate.

 

And just to reiterate what you've already expressed to me. You are wrong.

There will be direct relationship between IRL time played and the value of gems. Just because you can't earn gems in game doesn't mean the realtionship doesn't exist. You exchange gold for gems. Which means that the value of gems will be tied to how much gold it is possible to farm in an hour.

We are talking about economics. Economics isn't about feelings. It has laws that govern it. It follows mathematical principles. Which means you are arguing that paying $20 dollars to get $5 back is a good ROI. This is a terrible way to spend your money. 

Originally posted by Lambon23

So if you can find the items outside the cash shop,; it's not pay to win?

Why are you morons so dense?? If someone can get the items with real money; that alone is pay2win. He didn't have to kill monsters or w/e to find the rare chest. All he did was put in his credit/debit card numbers and that's it.

To support this in any way or form is beyond asinine. You people are the reason the gaming industry has becomine so appalling. DLC and cash shops in ALL our games.

The achievments and trophies have replaced our rewards, and our rewards have become "extra content" that we must pay for. Keep oiling up the machine you mindless sheep.

Rage much? lol

You can be proud on your 'No RMT's in my game' but as soon as you insult others who could care less, you become less credible and more of a zealot. No one listens to zealots other than the mindless drones that follow him/her.

Closer to the sheep you mentioned in your post...a little food for thought there. 

As for the thread, real mundane stuff. You no like? You no play. All arguments are moot as:

1) You all have this nifty thing called....wait for it....free will. Hooray! You don't like GW2's inclusion of its CS, vote with your wallet.

2) Trying to bolster a theory with vids is pretty poor research at best, but you can come back and make another thread after launch of 'I told you so...' and create more rage and trolling here (will happen anyway I'm sure).

and lastly

3) Why anyone would actually care what others like or dislike, to me, is baffling because there is no actual debate going on trying to educate anyone. Just comments of 'I'm right you're wrong' or 'No U' that accomplishes very little for a game that has yet to be released and no final facts about the CS are given.

Guess that's what forums have turned into...and more's the pity.

Originally posted by bookworm438
I don't know if it's been mentioned yet but boosts are obtainable in game as well. At least karma and xp boosts are. I got xp boost from doing by personal story, and a karma boost from one of those lockboxes (with a key that dropped in game). 

Well, this post just owned trolls big time.

This video explains very well how GW2 economy works. Take some minutes to watch it if there is any doubt. Its better than just post whatever you think it is instead knowing what it is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kx7o7CRoDXc

Hope it helps.

Originally posted by Atlan99

Originally posted by colddog04

Originally posted by Atlan99

Originally posted by colddog04

 

Yes, I was arguing agaisnt the point you were trying to make because it was false. I guess you can call that arguing just to argue if you want to.

 

"The gold gem conversion will be at a level that makes it economicalyl viable to purchse. This means that it has to be a better use of one's time to work in real life. Then use that money to purchase gold."

 

Those two statements you made put together make no sense because it depends on the idea that there is a direct connection between the amount of IRL time spent making money and in game time saved by purchasing gems. I offered an example. I make $5/hour IRL. I spend $20 in cash shop. It only saves me 1 hour of in game time. I still feel like the purchase was worth it.

 

Perhaps it's not just me arguing just to argue, but the fact that you are also unable to accept that you might be wrong about something. So you then accuse other posters of arguing just to argue.

 

You are wrong.

There is a direct connection. There is a whole industry called gold farming that has sprung up around this idea. Basically people can purchase gold in video games. So what happens is people who don't have time or don't want to, buy gold. These people commonly have jobs. At these jobs they make money that they use to purchse said gold.

As far as your example.

If you make $5 dollars an hour.  You then spend $20 dollars to save 1 hour. You faill at life because you wasted 4 hours to save 1 hour. It doesn't matter how you feel about it. You still fail at math and life.

See, that's where your argument fails hard.

 

You believe that a 1:1 ratio of value exists to the consumer. When in reality, someone may value putting 4 hours in at work to save one hour in game. 

 

Look at it the other way around. Someone may value putting 10 minutes into work to save 1 hour of game time so they are much less likely to spend money on gems.

 

There is no direct relationship between IRL time played and value of gems. Just saying people fail at life to help support your argument doesn't really work. It actually just amkes you sound desperate.

 

And just to reiterate what you've already expressed to me. You are wrong.

There will be direct relationship between IRL time played and the value of gems. Just because you can't earn gems in game doesn't mean the realrionship doesn't exist. You exchange gold for gems. Which means that the value of gems will be tied to how much gold it is possible to farm in an hour.

We are talking about economics. Economics isn't about feelings. It has laws that govern it. It follows mathematical principles. Which means you are arguing that paying $20 dollars to get $5 back is a good ROI. This is a terrible way to spend your money. Anybody who did this would quickly run out of money.

I meant IRL money made per hour. Not IRL time played which doesn't even make sense.

What I'm arguing is that not everyone is thinking about their ROI in a video game. I would argue that the ROI is negative. In those terms there is no such thing as a good ROI in a video game unless you are playing Second Life or Project Entropia where there is an actual possibility of making a ROI at all.

Some people just want 20 gold now no matter how much time they have to work in real life for it. Some people pay very close attention, like yourself, and will make sure they are getting a solid time/value ratio before they spend. Some people will not be willing to spend at all because there is no amount of money that is worth spending extra on the game. And a million other little situations.

You just remove people from the equation and call it math and be done with it. People are playing this game, not a stock trading prgram. There will be many, many purchases where you would consider the consumer to be "failing at life."

There will be supply and demand and the price will rest at some point, but the point at which you buy is very personal and no relationship can be made between how someone would be willing to persoanlly spend based on IRL income.

I fail to see how any of this is Pay 2 Win.

Keys drop in the game world. XP boosts are superfluos because level really doesn't matter in PvP as you are scaled up to level 80 anyway... and Gems for Gold (AND VICE VERSA) is a reactive market system, so the more Gems that are used to purchase gold, the less gold is used to purchase Gems. It's precisely the same system that exists in Eve.

ArenaNet are giving you a choice: play the game, and spend time on the additional content or spend money on the additional content.

Having played the beta I can tell you that NOTHING in the game is hidden behind obstructive microtransactions and never ONCE thought, "OH I SHOULD PROBABLY BUY THIS THING TO GAIN AN ADVANTAGE."

Added to that... you'll be able to buy EVERY SERVICE ARENANET OFFER for GOLD ;D You can go out, farm gold, and spent that gold on GEMS!

Woooooooo for pay 2 win (not).

and to the OP in case you did not know, you can gain exp/craft boosts from world mystic chest drops as well. 

It happened to me this weekend, I found a chest drop, I got a key reward from a storyline quests (i think), I open the chest and found a craft/exp boost. Soooooooo technically doesnt that mean that these boosts can be found in the world as well, so not such a huge advantage to the pay crowd if you ask me.

On the other hand leveling faster is an advantage for those who dont see the relevence. Higher lvl makes more currency from quests/grind, ie they are able to support their guild in WvWvW and other antics. They are also able to modify their PVP character moreso than people who jump into PvP Mists right away at level 1. So isn't that technically an advantage? I could be wrong.

Fadedbomb,

Not only are you slow to the punch, but you hit like a starving Ethiopian child.

Originally posted by KnoxXz

During my time playing the beta, I received a 3 chests and 2 mystic keys... so I don't see a problem there, Also somewhere along the way I picked up a XP booster so they do drop in world.

The cosmetic items are cool and I plan to get atleast the dye pack and the ability to use a skin off another weapon is very neat. I'm sure I will get this as well when I reach max level.

All in all I am not threatened by a cash shop since you can use ingame currency to get the same items. some people don't have the opportunity to play 30+ hours a week so I can see where this might beneficial to them as well.

just my view on it ;)

 

On a ending note. I was blown away by this game. It was the most fun I have had playing a MMO in a Veerrrry long time. +1 Anet

So what did you end up doing with the third chest?  Put it in your inventory, grind for key, or did you drop into the gem store and puchase a key to see what was inside?  I can imagine that ANET loves when it works out that people end up with almost enough keys to open all the chests they have because the temptation to see what is in the rest is oh so high.

Without knowing the drop chance for keys and boxes it's hard to know how much if any the system leans towards encouraging buying keys in the gem store but regradless of what those numbers are today they are pretty easy to change if the bean counters want to in the future.

One thing I have not seen mentioned much that bugs me is the potions that increase the chance of getting a rarer item.

Cash shops have a way of altering the way people look at the game and not always in a positive way.  EQ2 recently released it's first level cap increase since moving all the servers to free to play and the master spell drop rate for the new levels is noticably lower than before.  Was this because SOE wants masters to be rarer for game economy reasons or was it because the cash shops sells items that speed up the rate at which you can research master spell upgrades?  I know more than a few raiding guilds that pretty much everyone purchased these items after the expansion came out (about $30 per toon to master out) on top of a sub to stay premimum (pretty much required if you raid because of the plat limits on free accounts).

Originally posted by udon

Cash shops have a way of altering the way people look at the game and not always in a positive way.  EQ2 recently released it's first level cap increase since moving all the servers to free to play and the master spell drop rate for the new levels is noticably lower than before.  Was this because SOE wants masters to be rarer for game economy reasons or was it because the cash shops sells items that speed up the rate at which you can research master spell upgrades?  I know more than a few raiding guilds that pretty much everyone purchased these items after the expansion came out (about $30 per toon to master out) on top of a sub to stay premimum (pretty much required if you raid because of the plat limits on free accounts).

Totally agree. Even the worst F2P's with a cash shop started "low", with really cheap stuff, cosmetic items etc. Then time has passed, people started feeling that they invested "time and effort" to develop their toon. Now there was the moment when the "mandatory" items popped in the cash shop. Mostly convenience items, not "pure" power. Teleport scrolls to save you travel time. New areas, designed in a way which "forced" you to buy those scrolls (stacked with aggressive hard mobs). Increased level cap, XP which didnt scale but hit the roof, you get 0.001% XP per kill, the obvious XP boosts in the cash shop.

Everyone who experienced this crap has the right to be concerned with every cash shop he sees. Yea so what if the things drop in the game world, those droprates can be altered etc. I'm not saying that it's gonna happen, but why oh why have this kind of items in the shop. I'm ok with character slots (as long as i get a decent number by default), cosmetic items, mounts and pets equal in power with what you easily get in game, i'm totally not ok with gems, xp boosts, chest keys, and i don't give a rat's ass that i can grind for 2 days and get a lucky drop in game. It's power, and it's wrong for what i want, on the other hand bitching over 1000 threads about it has no sense. Other people might preffer this model, to each it's own.

Here's my experience with this whole karma/XP/mystic chest thing.

Karma boosts are not really needed. I never used one and my character had more karma than I knew what to do with. By just randomly playing the game you get enough karma in order to afford all of the items.

XP boosts. I gained levels pretty fast. In fact, I barely noticed when I gained a level. I explored most of the charr and the human 1-15 areas and got to level 17 before the beta ended. In my opinion, the skill point challenges are more important than raw XP as you use skill points to unlock various heal, utility and elite skills. That is why I went to different starting zones, to get as many skill points as possible and try out different utility skills. I can see using the XP boosts to get to level 30 as fast as possible, in order to unlock your elite skill but that's about it. After that it's really useless as there is no more skill slots to unlock.

Either way, the XP boost is only relevent for the PvE side of the game. In PvP you're automatically boosted to max level with all of the skills and traits unlocked.

Mystic chests. I got a few of those, a total of 6, if I remember correctly. I had unlocked one of them and got a run speed potion, a repair kit and a 3 potions that would turn me into a minotaur. The run speed wore off after I died but I think it was something like 10% increase, which was barely noticable. I never got to try the repair kit, I honestly forgot that I had it. The minotaur thing was cool but I wasn't able to fight, jump or do any emotes, so I used it to run around Divinity's Reach messing around with people.

So that's that. Is it P2W? Hardly. Even the gems for gold thing is mostly harmless since in the beginning of the game most people will save up as much gold as possible and once the game matures enough for people to have lots of disposable in-game income, the whole gems thing will become irrelevent. I also want to add that not once, while I was playing the game, did I feel like I was short on gold. Even after purchasing that adept traits book for 10 silver, I had over 40 silver, which level 10 is comfortable amount.

So anyway, that's my experience, take it how you will. Personally, I feel that certain people on these forums exaggerate a lot of things in order to find any fault with the game. Is GW2 perfect? Not even close but it's a darn good game, one of the best actually, and I for one can't wait for it to launch.

Originally posted by simmihi

Originally posted by udon

Cash shops have a way of altering the way people look at the game and not always in a positive way.  EQ2 recently released it's first level cap increase since moving all the servers to free to play and the master spell drop rate for the new levels is noticably lower than before.  Was this because SOE wants masters to be rarer for game economy reasons or was it because the cash shops sells items that speed up the rate at which you can research master spell upgrades?  I know more than a few raiding guilds that pretty much everyone purchased these items after the expansion came out (about $30 per toon to master out) on top of a sub to stay premimum (pretty much required if you raid because of the plat limits on free accounts).

Totally agree. Even the worst F2P's with a cash shop started "low", with really cheap stuff, cosmetic items etc. Then time has passed, people started feeling that they invested "time and effort" to develop their toon. Now there was the moment when the "mandatory" items popped in the cash shop. Mostly convenience items, not "pure" power. Teleport scrolls to save you travel time. New areas, designed in a way which "forced" you to buy those scrolls (stacked with aggressive hard mobs). Increased level cap, XP which didnt scale but hit the roof, you get 0.001% XP per kill, the obvious XP boosts in the cash shop.

Everyone who experienced this crap has the right to be concerned with every cash shop he sees. Yea so what if the things drop in the game world, those droprates can be altered etc. I'm not saying that it's gonna happen, but why oh why have this kind of items in the shop. I'm ok with character slots (as long as i get a decent number by default), cosmetic items, mounts and pets equal in power with what you easily get in game, i'm totally not ok with gems, xp boosts, chest keys, and i don't give a rat's ass that i can grind for 2 days and get a lucky drop in game. It's power, and it's wrong for what i want, on the other hand bitching over 1000 threads about it has no sense. Other people might preffer this model, to each it's own.

I think the only counter there is to this is that you can look at the GW cash shop for an example. It's basically cosmetic + skill packs. There is nothing in the skill packs that you can't get in game. And the skills are pretty easy to get in game.

I suppose people's trust in them comes from their own history with the company and their cash shop in the past.

Ok, so I'm still confused on this RL $ to in game cash. I'm not looking to argue anything here, just trying to see what the real outcome would be on this one.

Let's say I am a rather successful professional in RL, and I pull in enough cash to pay all my bills, and have about $2k a month to play around with as I see fit. And I want to do some heavy crafting in GW2, but as I start out I dont have the funds to dump into mats, I just want to push up my skill as fast as I can in the first couple of weeks after launch so I can corner the market on crafted goods until everyone else catches up the normal way. 

So, if I drop $250 in the first 2 weeks on gems, and using the current conversion rate we seen in BWE #1, how much in game gold can I expect to see out of this for my crafting plan? Anyone able to give me an idea on the numbers here?

Originally posted by Fadedbomb

VideoLink

 

The three things in this video that make the cash-shop P2W:

-Keys [edit]

-Apparently keys drop in-game according to posters below, editing this out :P!

 

-XP Boosts, these are exchanged for RL currency in order to decrease the amount of TIME you're spending to level than another person. Standard, cut and paste, advantage over another player in order to level faster, get to other content quicker, yada yada yada. I've seen these very same "hourly boosts" in Asian Grinder MMOs (most of whom have generally failed completely, btw...like 9-Dragons). Time after time it's been proven that uses "hours" instead of "DAYS" for XP boosts has been shown to be pay-to-win. Simple fix if you want to keep it fair is to treat these like a "paid customer" title similar to a $15/month sub. That way you're supporting the game in a meaningful way each month for an exp boost of like 25% rather than getting 50% normal experience for an hour as it currently stands. Again, NOT cool ArenaNet, not cool. 

 

 

-Lastly, we have the end-all, be-all to the PayToWin situation. If you watch said video you can, in fact, buy in-game gold FOR RL CURRENCY! All it takes is a swipe of the CC to buy gems and THEN convert them into gold. I don't care if the conversion rate is $10 for only 10 gold any time you allow in-game currency purchasing to happen it INCREASES outside source popularity because they tend to massively undercut the in-game prices. Look at StarTrek Online!! The DAY they started a similar exchange system Gold Farming purchases increased by almost DOUBLE!! Seriously ANET, wtf here? I understand the need to allow players to convert gold into gems so they can play for free and still benefit from the store, BUT DON'T ALLOW PEOPLE TO TURN GEMS BACK INTO GOLD UNLESS IT WAS GOLD TO BEGIN WITH!!!!

 

/end rant :(

 

 

That being said, I have money to burn and i could easily benefit from this cash shop. However, I wouldn't use it to begin with, but the fact it's there means others will, and that's NOT cool.

I was planning to buy GW2 a week prior to launch if nothing else came out to hold my interest, however the odds keeping stacking up against me as I'm fervently against supporting PayToWin :(!

 

Thanks for reading!

So everything you just listed literally does absolutely nothing for PvP and WvWvW. Getting extra EXP really doesn't mean anything when you can literally get boosted to 80 in WvWvW and you are automatically 80 when you join a PvP match. Not to mention gear doesn't make a considerable difference, in -game currency with RL money still won't make a difference. 

This is not P2W.

Originally posted by Kaocan

Ok, so I'm still confused on this RL $ to in game cash. I'm not looking to argue anything here, just trying to see what the real outcome would be on this one.

Let's say I am a rather successful professional in RL, and I pull in enough cash to pay all my bills, and have about $2k a month to play around with as I see fit. And I want to do some heavy crafting in GW2, but as I start out I dont have the funds to dump into mats, I just want to push up my skill as fast as I can in the first couple of weeks after launch so I can corner the market on crafted goods until everyone else catches up the normal way. 

So, if I drop $250 in the first 2 weeks on gems, and using the current conversion rate we seen in BWE #1, how much in game gold can I expect to see out of this for my crafting plan? Anyone able to give me an idea on the numbers here?

One thing you should take into account is that the market is accross ALL servers. So cornering the market on what was 48 server at the time could prove quite difficult. Not only that, but crafted goods are, at their heart, cosmetic since you can purchase equivalent gear fairly easily through karma merchants.

But when it comes to the gem/gold ratio, I bought gems at 8 silver/100 gems. This number was skewed incredibly low though so because everyone that wanted to get 2000 free gems could enter their credit card information and purchase them for free. So we really don't have any clue how much in game gold you can get from gems yet and the price will be determined by supply and demand.

One thing to note is taht because people won't have the in game money to spend on them in the beginning, there probably won't be a whole lot of people trying to sell them early on.

All I read was the first post but I want to chime in with my thoughts. I dont mind the cash shop whatsoever, I understand that people who have the extra funds will get to level faster, get to content sooner, blah blah blah. Who cares? If thats what it takes to help the makers of this game to make some extra money so that they do not need to ask monthly fee, then so be it.

The only time I dislike the cash shops is when people can go in there and spend lots of money and get things that cannot be earned through regular means. 

Bottom line: I can deal with people getting XP boosts and the like so that I dont have to pay a monthly fee.