diremane

I'd really like to see a setup for DUNGEONS that allow for Random Party Members whereby nobody cares how many tokens you have or how many times you've experienced these dungeons, etc. etc. Just a random party generator like say Random Arena in Guild Wars 1 where pot luck is the name of the game. Anyone who bails gets a penalty flag and if they bail twice within an hour they have to sit out an hour like in GW1.

Reason being is I can already see the ELITISTS rolling their hands over each other in how they are going to CONTROL the makeup and gameplay of these dungeons. I want no part of that but since I paid full price for the game I do EXPECT to be able to play those dungeons with others of like mind who don't care if they wipe or having to complete it the first time through.

I've also asked that there NOT be a feature whereby one can/has to show their skillbar setup. This will help eliminate SOME of the ELITIST attitudes that one MUST have a build like on web page "X" or they will be booted. lol Such stupid ridiculous methods of playing a silly game. It's about having fun not about being first or completing everything the first time. There's more players who just want to have a good time of it than trying to be some demi-gods or under the firm arm of some dictator elitists player who thinks you must play like the web-page says or you suck and are a noob. lol

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The above is taken from the "Warrior OP" thread that we previously discussed all this.  As far as I can tell, that's the justification.  Is it enough?  That's for each person to decide themselves, and discuss with others.  I personally think it's too complicated for me to come up with an opinion on which side has the advantage, at least without spending an extraordinary amount of time thinking about it.

white_migraine, on 31 May 2012 - 02:08 AM, said:

AND it's already in a few outfits. This one, for example, makes the arms look like bone:



and then you have these both:

It went rather well except for a couple 10 minute-ish server lag moments. I used the opportunity  to explore the crafting in greater detail. In doing so, I found that I actually enjoy going out just to gather materials, while stumbling across events in the process. This will likely be the way I play the majority of the time in PvE. It is much better than just running between hearts and skillpoint challenges. So basically, I found my favorite way to play GW2 PvE.

Oooo! That skin tone would be perfect! Shades of Carapace would be excellent.

This is something I just whipped up... more antlike, but I guess it's a rough start.


I'll definitely look into Praying Mantis designs too! Obviously my initial study was focusing on butterflies, hence the "cuteness" factor. I'll try to see if I can make a more intense looking race.

Amannelle, on 12 May 2012 - 11:59 PM, said:

Man, insects are tough to draw when you want them to be more than just insects, your work based on that butterfly is awesome. The only thing I can think to say is maybe starting with praying mantis's would help, I say this in that they are very thin, and you can ignore the scythe arms(they'll need to hold stuff... I guess somehow they could hold stuff with those claws) and the body, and work on the torso and face? and branch out from there, they seem to have the cutest faces of any other insect.

diremane, on 13 May 2012 - 12:06 AM, said:

dear god... thank you for the nightmares.

Kyln, on 10 May 2012 - 09:47 AM, said:

It's not about extra clicks it's about the diversion through the store.

Without store in game: Open bank vault, click on button to purchase more storage with gold, end.

With store in game: Go to store, convert gold to gems, purchase storage, go back to vault. In other words, I am forced into the store whether I want it or not. Remember, the store is supposed to be 100% optional not inserted into the game as a required pass through, otherwise it is no longer optional.

Kyln, on 10 May 2012 - 09:47 AM, said:

I going to say it straight outright, the dye a day thing absolutely sucks as a design with 400 dye colors and currently being character only. That is in RL 5.47 years of growing dyes for 5 characters. A stupid and needlessly excessive grind.

Yes, I understand you don't have to have all the colors, but if I really want black, for example, I have to keep growing dyes until I get that black and that could be after having grown 347 other colors. If there were 10 or 20 dye colors in the game and it was account wide, then this design wouldn't be an issue, but with 400 the design completely sucks and is done for only one reason: to get more people to buy the dye packs or magic accelerator flowers in the store. If the store didn't exist at all in the game, I'd bet dollars to donuts that dyes would be following the standard MMO acquisition formula (the same one used in GW1).

Kyln, on 10 May 2012 - 09:47 AM, said:

Karma you get and spend directly, Gems you don't. Karma vendors don't give me the option to spend real life cash, gem vendors don't. Karma vendors can be accessed by my son without costing me from my RL account, the gem vendor doesn't.

Again, the game is B2P the cash shop is supposed to be entirely optional, in other words I should not have to access at all unless I want to purchase something optional that if I don't won't be needed. Everyone will have to expand their bank storage and, yes, I can use in game gold for this but only by accessing the store.

Kyln, on 10 May 2012 - 09:47 AM, said:

That is an utter crock of junk. Even ArenaNet stated they can make a profitable game without a store at all, but the store is bonus profit. They did fine with this model in GW1, and put out content and expansions. The whole either sub or store (for a B2P) to support the game is utter garbage. One that is prolific among the MMO player base and one that I have yet to see one single company in the MMO space actually claim is needed. They aren't going to say anything either because it is a great myth that players have going.

I own an internet company and server and bandwidth charges per year/per user is $2.82. Yes, only $0.235 per user a month. That can be supported through annual box sales. Heck, since they don't charge a monthly fee, I'd by mini-content updates 2 to 4 times a year at $10-$20 an update - similar to DLC. That will make a profit for the work put in.

If they put out even one paid expansion a year, they will be able to make a steady profit and support the game throughout the year. Also, without the store, we would probably have 8 slots to begin with (the standard one per class) and storage would be built into the game to be expandable with bag drops, crafting and bank expansion right at the vault - so we would still have these options.

Finally, when it comes to costumes. An actual virtual costume to produce for a game has a cost of around $200-$300 to make the art and digitize it to a pattern. When 50,000 people purchase this @ $8 that is $400,000 against a cost of $300. Pretty good profit. Put out 1 to 4 of these a month and your in good shape. When you then turn around and want those same 50,000 people to purchase it @ $8 for 5 characters (or more if they purchased more slots), your hoping to get $2M for that same $300 expense. That is what I mean by greed and customer gouging, plain and simple.

Phys, on 10 May 2012 - 09:57 AM, said:

Even at a drop rate of 3 dyes a day you are talking 133/days before getting all the colors assuming you have no duplicates - which duplicates will happen quite often the more colors you have. Also, you can simply control this mechanic by lessening the drop rate of dyes, like to that of GW1. With 1 use per character, even with three dyes a day you are still talking 2 YEARS! before getting dye colors for all characters assuming NO duplicates.

The market will be robust enough with 400 dye colors alone - hell, it was robust with 10 dye colors in GW1. The timer exists for no other reason than to play to people's impatience (since the grind is ludicrous, even by MMO standards) and sell dye packs from the store.

The system sucks no matter which angle you look at it.

Phys, on 10 May 2012 - 09:57 AM, said:

Of course they made dyes to sell dye magic grow/packages. There is no reason to have a 24 hour turn around on one dye and have a "dye seed" drop instead of just dyes dropping. At the current rate of dye seeds dropping it would still take quite a long time to get an account a complete set (with dyes being account bound) the more of those 400+ dyes you get the more duplicates you will get, making it harder and harder to get the last few dyes through drops. That stimulates the market in selling/buying dyes.

The whole dye seed thing is an artificially added gateway to slow down dye acquisition and push for store bought dye related items.


Wayshuba
A minor point to your earlier post on costume prices and account based.

• Guild Wars 1: Costumes cost $6.99 and are account based with costume npc whom you can redeem from at any time as many times as you want.
  
• Guild Wars 2: Costumes cost $8.75 are are character based with no costume storage/npc to retrieve a lost/accidentally deleted costume part.

Those two points are even more valid with your current discussion on buying/not buying said costumes. I too fall into the "i've bought all sorts of crap for gw1 to support anet" that you and others do.  Bought every single CE, extra tabs/character slots/half the costumes and I currently won't support any non account based items in the current cash shop implementation. It's far too much of a cash grab / overly greedy / gouging for me and done in poor taste...unless alienating their customers is their main concern.

Heliar, on 10 May 2012 - 09:45 AM, said:

one off fee of 2 bucks? Hardly. Extra tabs were 600 gems which comes out to $7.50 per tab. A far cry from 2 bucks.

Imaginos, on 10 May 2012 - 11:06 AM, said:

So, on my current GW1 account with 10 character slots I would spend $6.99 for costumes on all characters (including ones I delete and create later). On a GW2 account with 10 character slots I would spend $87.50 to get the same thing as GW1.

How anyone can not see this as outright customer gouging is beyond me. I could accept costumes going from $6.99 to $8.99 for an account wide unlock in GW2, but going from $6.99 to $87.50 for the same thing you got in GW1 is outright ludicrous. I can't see how anyone can defend this sort of MASSIVE price increase (1,252% price increase) from GW1 to GW2. This isn't about profit, you can make plenty of profit on a $9 virtual costume with an account unlock, this is about greed and way overestimating people's tolerance to this kind of stuff just because you have a good game. Same sort of foolishness that has hurt LOTRO so bad.

So, the defenses will be 1.) It is optional you don't have to buy it - which, because of pricing I and many others don't buy it supports ArenaNet how?; 2.) It is only beta. Yeah, a beta after pre-purchase and, I have been in quite a few MMO betas and I can't remember the last time something major in beta was changed for launch.

Mark my words, they are going to go live with this and with it, their reputation will suffer in a big way. They claim they are gamers, first and foremost, but this will cement their reputation as no different than any other MMO company.

Will I play under these circumstances? Sure, of course I will, the game is good. But it also means I will always be on my guard for the inevitable relentless drive to get me to use the store with RL cash and, when the game becomes untenable as a result, ArenaNet will lose me for good - and I don't care how great Guild Wars 2 is for me, once I turn from a company I am gone for good. And, if the store is like GW1 I will gladly spend money to support ArenaNet. If it is like it was in the first BWE, I will go out of my way to not spend a penny in the store and only buy content packs period.

Just ask Turbine how well this has been working out for them with LOTRO.

Morgan Bresail, on 30 April 2012 - 12:42 PM, said:

Assuming you get no duplicates..