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New mount skins and gambling


MsAngel.8640

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I am really concerned about this, the game is for children and young adults onward in age, but the way these things are offered it is gambling and that is very inappropriate, especially for children. A thirteen year old has very poor life skills as a rule and gambling in any form is attractive.If these games are made for kids then those who think these things up need to look at the young they want to play. Micro transactions are all well and good, offer the skins separately, not on a RNG basis, those that want the skins will buy them. You guys want more money offer individual armour skin pieces or sets, not outfits, they will sell like hot cakes.

A parent.-= Nothing is fool-proof to a talented fool. =-

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technically not gambling though, you always get something and it's never the same thing (ofcourse they might change this in the future)Doesn't mean it's a good thing, but it's not the same as gambling.

However as a parent you should teach your childeren about such things, and make sure they can't just spend there money willy nilly on a game, you can't make Anet be responsible for how your childeren spend their money.

Anet can make it more obivious when an item is based on RNG, in a way a child would understand they can get something they didn't want to get.

edit: I have been corrected on the first part of my post, it is gambling, I got the definition wrong. it's a grey area when it comes to the laws for internet gambling

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@CharterforGw.3149 said:technically not gambling though, you always get something and it's never the same thing (ofcourse they might change this in the future)

"Gambling" does not require that one of the outcomes is that you get nothing. A game of chance in which you receive a nominal prize every time is still a game of chance. Some jurisdictions try to skate on the technicality that every time you pull the arm of a slot machine you get a small piece of candy, but it's still gambling.

Any time you have to pay to take a chance at a reward,

it

is

gambling.

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@MsAngel.8640 said:I am really concerned about this, the game is for children and young adults onward in age, but the way these things are offered it is gambling and that is very inappropriate, especially for children. A thirteen year old has very poor life skills as a rule and gambling in any form is attractive.If these games are made for kids then those who think these things up need to look at the young they want to play. Micro transactions are all well and good, offer the skins separately, not on a RNG basis, those that want the skins will buy them. You guys want more money offer individual armour skin pieces or sets, not outfits, they will sell like hot cakes.

A parent.-= Nothing is fool-proof to a talented fool. =-

Either make sure that your underage kids are playing and spending money in online games in a responsible fashion or dont let them play online at all.

And most importantly, be a role model to your kids in those regards as well and dont make cosmetic shinies in a video game such a big deal of your life.

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@Wanze.8410 said:

@MsAngel.8640 said:I am really concerned about this, the game is for children and young adults onward in age, but the way these things are offered it is gambling and that is very inappropriate, especially for children. A thirteen year old has very poor life skills as a rule and gambling in any form is attractive.If these games are made for kids then those who think these things up need to look at the young they want to play. Micro transactions are all well and good, offer the skins separately, not on a RNG basis, those that want the skins will buy them. You guys want more money offer individual armour skin pieces or sets, not outfits, they will sell like hot cakes.

A parent.-= Nothing is fool-proof to a talented fool. =-

Either make sure that your underage kids are playing and spending money in online games in a responsible fashion or dont let them play online at all.

And most importantly, be a role model to your kids in those regards as well and dont make cosmetic shinies in a video game such a big deal of your life.

You overestimate parents' power over child behaviour. Let's assume the kid will never get money from himto buy mounts today. But whole industry is already teaching him what gambling is and that cool people get cool things from gambling. He may not buy them today but in 10 years the industry is getting new young adult already programmed to be exploited.

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Isn't a little... overreacting?

Then,

  • What about card games like MTG, Yugioh, Pokemon, etc?
  • And about things like kinder egg?
  • Or else, what about a sticker album ( though i don't know if the still do exists )?
  • Or when you do anything which has a chance to drop, isn't that gambling? ( why do you do tequatl? in order to get the ascended chest. Is it granted? Nope, it's random ).
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@Shirlias.8104 said:Isn't a little... overreacting?

Then,

  • What about card games like MTG, Yugioh, Pokemon, etc?
  • And about things like kinder egg?
  • Or else, what about a sticker album ( though i don't know if the still do exists )?
  • Or when you do anything which has a chance to drop, isn't that gambling? ( why do you do tequatl? in order to get the ascended chest. Is it granted? Nope, it's random ).

Card games can be flat out addiction. I still remember stories of people threatening people with knives or just stealing their trading cards and running away with them.As for the kinder eggs, I don't think people buy them mostly or the toy inside and more of "What's inside?" while getting to eat chocolate.I know of sticker albums but.... I can't say for the life of me I know/remember them.

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@Ohoni.6057 said:

@CharterforGw.3149 said:technically not gambling though, you always get something and it's never the same thing (ofcourse they might change this in the future)

"Gambling" does not require that one of the outcomes is that you get nothing. A game of chance in which you receive a nominal prize every time is still a game of chance. Some jurisdictions try to skate on the technicality that every time you pull the arm of a slot machine you get a small piece of candy, but it's still gambling.

Any time you have to pay to take a chance at a reward,

it

is

gambling.

Yes, I may have miss understood the definition of gambling, my mistake.

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To be honest, I don't think gambling is dangerous per se.I've gambled in LoL (random skin boxes) and here for a bit. After my chests were gone, they were gone. I already had a loss from it, read as: The bank always wins.I didn't even had the "Nex time it'll be the Jackpot" feel, it was more of "FU man, never again!".

Aren't you people from the U.S. used to Arcades and video game machines? In Germany, I rarely bumbed into one, but in Italy there was an Arcade, and the kids came with a fixed amount of money, let's say a 10 Euro bill, changed it into tokens and then played. When it was over, they left or watched other players. Nobody pulled a knife and threatened anyone else for more so they could play longer. All of them were like 8-16 years young.

So maybe you should stop wrapping kids and young adults in cotton and make them learn life lessons. Helicopter parents are awful, just sayin'.

@Kheldorn.5123 said:You overestimate parents' power over child behaviour. Let's assume the kid will never get money from himto buy mounts today. But whole industry is already >teaching him what gambling is and that cool people get cool things from gambling. He may not buy them today but in 10 years the industry is getting new young >adult already programmed to be exploited.

So if he does not get money and the caring parent explains how and why, he will later understand. Not the other way around as you claim. I can just talk about myself, but when I wanted to play on those funny machines you see in restaurants with the blinking lights and playing "The Entertainer" in 8-bit music, my parents said no and that it sucks and you don't win. That was around 1995. I am 26 years now and I am not addicted. So aren't literally millions of other people. It's called parenting.

Where are kids tought to be cool from gambling? I'd be interested in which one, and I am sure there might be laws stopping such advertisements that flat out lead into addiction and health problems (same with e.g. tobacco). So far, I have only seen some guy playing Poker online and talking about making big money. Then there is a voice saying: "Gambling can be addicting. [You might lose money]. Information and help at www...". Not sure about you, but the message of that TV spot is: "Gambling can make you rich - No, it does not, seek help at www...".

And what's about your funny "in 10 years kids are programmed to be exploited" argument? This literally applies to almost any consumable. You could say fat people were exploited by happy, CGI animated TV spots about chocolate and people drinking 3 litres of soft drinks having problems with their bones are in that state because CCCompany has their logo everywhere.

Excelsior.

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By definition it is not a gamble:
"verb1.play games of chance for money; bet."she was fond of gambling on cards and horses"synonyms: bet, place/lay a bet on something, stake money on something, back the horses, game; informalplay the ponies"he started to gamble more often"2.take risky action in the hope of a desired result."the British could only gamble that something would turn up"synonyms: take a chance, take a risk; Morenoun1.an act of gambling; an enterprise undertaken or attempted with a risk of loss and a chance of profit or success."You are guaranteed an item, therefore it is not a chance, it's not risky, nor is there a chance of loss or profit(see item guarantee).

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@Zedek.8932 said:To be honest, I don't think gambling is dangerous per se.I've gambled in LoL (random skin boxes) and here for a bit. After my chests were gone, they were gone. I already had a loss from it, read in: The bank always wins.I didn't even had the "Nex time it'll be the Jackpot" feel, it was more of "FU man, never again!".

So maybe you should stop wrapping kids and young adults in cotton and make them learn life lessons. Helicopter parents are awful, just sayin'.

Excelsior.

this this sums it up perfectly

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@Zedek.8932 said:To be honest, I don't think gambling is dangerous per se.I've gambled in LoL (random skin boxes) and here for a bit. After my chests were gone, they were gone. I already had a loss from it, read in: The bank always wins.I didn't even had the "Nex time it'll be the Jackpot" feel, it was more of "FU man, never again!".Aren't you people from the U.S. used to Arcades and video game machines? In Germany, I rarely bumbed into one, but in Italy there was an Arcade, and the kids came with a fixed amount of money, let's say a 10 Euro bill, changed it into tokens and then played. When it was over, they left or watched other players. Nobody pulled a knife and threatened anyone else for more, so they could play longer. All of them were like 8-16 years young.

So maybe you should stop wrapping kids and young adults in cotton and make them learn life lessons. Helicopter parents are awful, just sayin'.

Excelsior.

this is what i tried to say, but buggered it up :s

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@Zaklex.6308 said:By definition it is not a gamble:

"verb1.play games of chance for money; bet."she was fond of gambling on cards and horses"synonyms: bet, place/lay a bet on something, stake money on something, back the horses, game; informalplay the ponies"he started to gamble more often"2.take risky action in the hope of a desired result."the British could only gamble that something would turn up"synonyms: take a chance, take a risk; Morenoun1.an act of gambling; an enterprise undertaken or attempted with a risk of loss and a chance of profit or success."You are guaranteed an item, therefore it is not a chance, it's not risky, nor is there a chance of loss or profit(see item guarantee).

Industry uses this as an excuse to exploit players for years. I hope for big players like EU or USA to finally regulate and penalize this. Currently the only reason we have lootboxes in games is because it's grey area.

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@Zaklex.6308 said:By definition it is not a gamble:

"verb1.play games of chance for money; bet."she was fond of gambling on cards and horses"synonyms: bet, place/lay a bet on something, stake money on something, back the horses, game; informalplay the ponies"he started to gamble more often"2.take risky action in the hope of a desired result."the British could only gamble that something would turn up"synonyms: take a chance, take a risk; Morenoun1.an act of gambling; an enterprise undertaken or attempted with a risk of loss and a chance of profit or success."You are guaranteed an item, therefore it is not a chance, it's not risky, nor is there a chance of loss or profit(see item guarantee).There's the risk of spending something you value and getting nothing that you actually want in return.

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@Wanze.8410 said:Either make sure that your underage kids are playing and spending money in online games in a responsible fashion or dont let them play online at all.

And most importantly, be a role model to your kids in those regards as well and dont make cosmetic shinies in a video game such a big deal of your life.

It's not about what the children are or are not doing, it's about what the children are learning. Whether a parent allows them to gamble in the game or not, if the kid is playing, and sees all these cool skins, and knows that the only way to get them is to gamble for them, then they learn that gambling is good, whether they're allowed to actively participate in it or not. It's like taking your kid onto the casino floor and letting them watch you play blackjack. The only way to not expose them to that is to not let them play GW2 at all.

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@Zaklex.6308 said:By definition it is not a gamble:

"verb1.play games of chance for money; bet."she was fond of gambling on cards and horses"synonyms: bet, place/lay a bet on something, stake money on something, back the horses, game; informalplay the ponies"he started to gamble more often"2.take risky action in the hope of a desired result."the British could only gamble that something would turn up"synonyms: take a chance, take a risk; Morenoun1.an act of gambling; an enterprise undertaken or attempted with a risk of loss and a chance of profit or success."You are guaranteed an item, therefore it is not a chance, it's not risky, nor is there a chance of loss or profit(see item guarantee).

Might want to take another glance at part 2 there. . .

(option 1 also applies here, of course)

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@Shirlias.8104 said:Isn't a little... overreacting?

Then,

  • What about card games like MTG, Yugioh, Pokemon, etc?
  • And about things like kinder egg?
  • Or else, what about a sticker album ( though i don't know if the still do exists )?
  • Or when you do anything which has a chance to drop, isn't that gambling? ( why do you do tequatl? in order to get the ascended chest. Is it granted? Nope, it's random ).

All well and good but you're missing one crucial thing:

Card games and stickers have the trading aspects to them. You can trade your excess cards with others to get the ones you don't have while giving them the ones they need and don't have. It's a bit more complicated in CCG's because of the rarity thing, but it's the same principle. You can't do that with mount skins.

You also won't get the same skin twice when buying, but you're also not getting exactly what you want. CCG's have entire 3rd party markets for getting what you want directly (and the rarity and editions are sometimes designed with 3rd party markets in mind), and you can buy certain editions of boosters to get cards from that set.

So to compare, you can't buy a bunny licence here and just get a chance of getting the bunny skin you wanted, you get all of them, maybe you'll get a jackal skin.

It's gambling either way, CCG's, stickers and mount licences, it's just that some have a half redeeming aspect to them while, judging from the community outcry, mout licences don't. Now i'm not the kind of person who buys skins so i'm not the target audience for Anet when it comes to skins for characters and mounts, but their target audience has consistently up to now gotten a choice of their skin which they would buy and get exactly this. With mounts they changed that to random and that's the problem. Not the gambling itself, it's that people have gotten what they wanted for so long, and now Anet is dangling a red, green and blue candy in front of them, but they have to pay anet for a chance that they get the candy they want.

Until now it was like: "Hey look at the blue candy, i like that - buy - i have blue candy now".Now the same users who are used to that system have to deal with: "Hey look at the blue candy, i like that - buy a chance to get blue candy - i have a yellow candy now, kinda not what i wanted... - buy the chance again (at least i won't get the yellow again) - i have red candy now fuuuu" etc... And this can be either very frustrating since you're wasting RL money on not getting what you want (there's lots of stuff in real life that function this way, games are escapism and this has no place in them, you should be able to get exactly what you paid for), or it can be really addictive making people spend more money than they intended.

That's what people hate most about the system. They can't get the thing directly, and it's really devious and sneaky of Anet to introduce a system where you can spend more than you wanted to get the thing you want. That system was in place for BL chests, but never for direct skins as far as i know.

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@Ohoni.6057 said:

@Wanze.8410 said:Either make sure that your underage kids are playing and spending money in online games in a responsible fashion or dont let them play online at all.

And most importantly, be a role model to your kids in those regards as well and dont make cosmetic shinies in a video game such a big deal of your life.

It's not about what the children are or are not doing, it's about what the children are
learning.
Whether a parent
allows
them to gamble in the game or not, if the kid is playing, and sees all these cool skins, and knows that the only way to get them is to gamble for them, then they learn that gambling is good, whether they're allowed to actively participate in it or not. It's like taking your kid onto the casino floor and letting them watch you play blackjack.
The only way to not expose them to that is to not let them play GW2 at all.

Exactly, thats what I mean. If the parents feel like GW2 is teaching their kid wrong values, dont let them play it. Its the parents' responsibility to make that choice.

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@Ohoni.6057 said:

@Wanze.8410 said:Either make sure that your underage kids are playing and spending money in online games in a responsible fashion or dont let them play online at all.

And most importantly, be a role model to your kids in those regards as well and dont make cosmetic shinies in a video game such a big deal of your life.

It's not about what the children are or are not doing, it's about what the children are
learning.
Whether a parent
allows
them to gamble in the game or not, if the kid is playing, and sees all these cool skins, and knows that the only way to get them is to gamble for them, then they learn that gambling is good, whether they're allowed to actively participate in it or not. It's like taking your kid onto the casino floor and letting them watch you play blackjack. The only way to not expose them to that is to not let them play GW2 at all.

But, you do have some amount of control over what lessons are being learned here. Like, you can just as easily make it a positive learning experience for them if you really want, I don't believe that you can honestly claim that it's an inherently negative one.

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@MsAngel.8640 said:I am really concerned about this, the game is for children and young adults onward in age, but the way these things are offered it is gambling and that is very inappropriate, especially for children. A thirteen year old has very poor life skills as a rule and gambling in any form is attractive.If these games are made for kids then those who think these things up need to look at the young they want to play. Micro transactions are all well and good, offer the skins separately, not on a RNG basis, those that want the skins will buy them. You guys want more money offer individual armour skin pieces or sets, not outfits, they will sell like hot cakes.

A parent.-= Nothing is fool-proof to a talented fool. =-

Were you this passionate about black lion chests over the past 5 years?

I’d also like to point out that the ESRB rating and description...

“TEEN

Content is generally suitable for ages 13 and up. May contain violence, suggestive themes, crude humor, minimal blood, simulated gambling and/or infrequent use of strong language.”

Are your young children, under 13, playing the game?

Have you, or your children, purchased black lion keys in the past?

If you’re very passionate about the effects of addiction, why are you and your children playing a game that is labeled to possibly have “simulated gambling”? There are a plethora of other games out there right?

Do you take issue with the constant violence and alcohol in game?

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@Rashagar.8349 said:

@Ohoni.6057 said:

@Wanze.8410 said:Either make sure that your underage kids are playing and spending money in online games in a responsible fashion or dont let them play online at all.

And most importantly, be a role model to your kids in those regards as well and dont make cosmetic shinies in a video game such a big deal of your life.

It's not about what the children are or are not doing, it's about what the children are
learning.
Whether a parent
allows
them to gamble in the game or not, if the kid is playing, and sees all these cool skins, and knows that the only way to get them is to gamble for them, then they learn that gambling is good, whether they're allowed to actively participate in it or not. It's like taking your kid onto the casino floor and letting them watch you play blackjack. The only way to not expose them to that is to not let them play GW2 at all.

But, you do have some amount of control over what lessons are being learned here. Like, you can just as easily make it a positive learning experience for them if you really want, I don't believe that you can honestly claim that it's an inherently negative one.

How old are you? 20s? 30s? 40s? You were not programmed to be exploited this way in your childhood years. You have self control. Currently the industry is teaching kids to enjoy gambling. To profit on it in the future.

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