24-slot and 28-slot bags being soulbound is an intended functionality.

I made a bug report about these bags being soulbound on use and then being impossible to upgrade further if the character that they were bound to didn't have the appropriate craft at 500 and after a bit less than two weeks I got an answer. Doubt they will change them in the foreseeable future since I haven't seen too many people asking about it, besides maybe one post or two.

Hope it works as a warning so you don't do what I did!

EDIT: adding something else regarding these bags from support. If you did what I did those bags are gone!

@Lunateric.3708 said:Doubt they will change them in the foreseeable future since I haven't seen too many people asking about it

You must not have visited the forums very often. In fact, people (including myself) find this an outrage. Use the search function, there are several threads asking to have them account bound, too.

Something I wonder

Are you able to place the bag into the bank and use it as a crafting material if it is soulbound to a character other than the one doing the crafting?

Huh; I can't even find that particular thread the CS Team sent you to. A Sticky thread should probably be created like there was before.

Edit: Oh! No wonder! It's a link to the old forums. Sigh.

@Ashantara.8731 said:

@Lunateric.3708 said:Doubt they will change them in the foreseeable future since I haven't seen too many people asking about it

Yes, I saw some posts, and these posts are why I say "I haven't seen too many people asking about it".

@Sarrs.4831 said:Something I wonder

Are you able to place the bag into the bank and use it as a crafting material if it is soulbound to a character other than the one doing the crafting?

the item itself becomes a blank space if you try to use it as crafting material on another character, sadly.

@Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:Huh; I can't even find that particular thread the CS Team sent you to. A Sticky thread should probably be created like there was before.

Edit: Oh! No wonder! It's a link to the old forums. Sigh.

Yeah I saw it was a redirect to the old forums so decided to post here instead, mostly as a warning/clarification.

@Lunateric.3708 said:

@Ashantara.8731 said:

@Lunateric.3708 said:Doubt they will change them in the foreseeable future since I haven't seen too many people asking about it

@Sarrs.4831 said:Something I wonder

Are you able to place the bag into the bank and use it as a crafting material if it is soulbound to a character other than the one doing the crafting?

@Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:Huh; I can't even find that

particular

thread the CS Team sent you to. A Sticky thread should probably be created like there was before.

Edit: Oh! No wonder! It's a link to the old forums. Sigh.

Well, hopefully someone from the CS Team notices your post and updates their 'handbook', or whatever.

@Ashantara.8731 said:

@Lunateric.3708 said:Doubt they will change them in the foreseeable future since I haven't seen too many people asking about it

Why the condescending attitude?

Yes, people are outraged by it, but the OP was informing people, very politely, that this was intended and not a bug or an oversight (which is what people initially believed it was).

I believe that there are numerous vendors tha you can exchange your soulbounds with for account bound bags

@DarcShriek.5829 said:I believe that there are numerous vendors tha you can exchange your soulbounds with for account bound bags

That's only for 32-slot, not the 24 or 28.

@Tanner Blackfeather.6509 said:

@DarcShriek.5829 said:I believe that there are numerous vendors tha you can exchange your soulbounds with for account bound bags

Which also shows that the situation with 24 and 28 bags is an oversight, and not truly an intended design.

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Tanner Blackfeather.6509 said:

@DarcShriek.5829 said:I believe that there are numerous vendors tha you can exchange your soulbounds with for account bound bags

I could just as well argue that it signals the exact opposite - they specifically added only the biggest bags, but not the smaller.

Now, if it's actually a design decision, it's one of the most incomprehensible ones I've seen. Given how much it impedes actually crafting the larger bags, I cannot see a single pro to this choice, while a number of cons are obvious.

@Sarrs.4831 said:Something I wonder

Are you able to place the bag into the bank and use it as a crafting material if it is soulbound to a character other than the one doing the crafting?

No. Unless you have maxed the required crafting discipline on that character, you cannot upgrade those bags.

Hyperbole aside,

• It's confusing: people expect bags to be freely transferable across characters, especially since people re-roll.
• It's inconsistent: no other crafted materials are intended to be soulbound.
• It's incomprehensible: account binding removes items from the economy; soul-binding gear is intended to increase demand for basic mats, but the key components of 24- and 28-slot bags are the already-low-supply recipes and runes.

Regardless of the reasons, ANet should make an official statement as to why this is good for the game and, if they feel strongly about it, they should make it clear in the item descriptions that the bags are going to be bound unless upgraded to 32-slot. (At a total cost of roughly 900 gold or more, making it out of reach of so many of us.)

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Tanner Blackfeather.6509 said:

@DarcShriek.5829 said:I believe that there are numerous vendors tha you can exchange your soulbounds with for account bound bags

No, it's no oversight.

I got a follow-up answer after asking if it was possible to recover those bags here.

The short answer is no. If you do what I did they are gone.

@Lunateric.3708 If you have time, I'd see if you can escalate your ticket to someone more senior who can ask the dev team some deeper questions. They might not be able to give you the detailed answer (sometimes, ANet likes to hide some potential economic issues to prevent their words from undermining market stability). However, it seems improbable to me that someone familiar with the game's economy or crafting would see this as a necessary thing, let alone a good way to handle whatever the issue is.

I'd sure like to read what @LinseyMurdock.4165 might tell us or even if @Gaile Gray.6029 could find out more for us.

@"Illconceived Was Na.9781" I sadly closed the ticket already, didn't think there was much else to do besides remaking the bags and giving up on that "investment", sorry.

You can always update a ticket to re-open it.

Good luck.

Soul-bound needs to be removed from the game entirely. Account bound is understandable, but items that are soul-bound have no place in a game like this.

the "intended functionality" will only be reasonable acceptable if the 28 and 32 slot versions need to be crafted in the forge."

If the intention is to make the 24 and 28 slot bags soul bound then it's quite apparent they want you to upgrade them to 32 slot bags before using them if you want account bound ones, which if you think about it sort of makes sense. If you're not following me here's the reasoning: let's give them bigger bags with more slots, say 3 more sizes, but we'll make the first 2 soul bound and the last account bound, now to make each successively larger bag size you need to use the prior bag. A 24 slot bag gets turned into a 28 slot bag and the 28 slot bag is used to make the 32 slot bag. There are two ways around the soul binding issue, one is the buy another crafting license for the character that has the soul bound bags and then select the craft that made the original bag(s), option two is to not give them to another character until you've made the account bound 32 slot bag(s).

@Zaklex.6308 said:If the intention is to make the 24 and 28 slot bags soul bound then it's quite apparent they want you to upgrade them to 32 slot bags before using them if you want account bound ones, which if you think about it sort of makes sense. If you're not following me here's the reasoning: let's give them bigger bags with more slots, say 3 more sizes, but we'll make the first 2 soul bound and the last account bound, now to make each successively larger bag size you need to use the prior bag. A 24 slot bag gets turned into a 28 slot bag and the 28 slot bag is used to make the 32 slot bag. There are two ways around the soul binding issue, one is the buy another crafting license for the character that has the soul bound bags and then select the craft that made the original bag(s), option two is to not give them to another character until you've made the account bound 32 slot bag(s).

The problem with the theory is that, well, it doesn't make sense from ANet's point of view.

• Why would they care if people have 32 or 24 slots?
• The economy doesn't need additional sinks for the supreme runes or recipes.
• It generates work for their support teams, because it's inconsistent with how every other crafting item works in the game (they've even gone out of their way to retrofit previously soulbound items to account bound).

I'm not against soulbinding, as some are. I just think this particular case isn't a good candidate for it.

It is absolutely inconsistent with every other bag I've had (pact boxes were soulbound and they addressed that I think), I don't understand why they'd do what they did but according to what support told me it is what it is.