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Gem prices are at an all time high.


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@crepuscular.9047 said:

@Linken.6345 said:Still the aniversery saile going on bud so

even without the sale the gemprice is stupid high, which is made worse by the fact a lot of materials are worth nothing compared to the old days.

just seasonal fluctuation, and a display of amount of liquid gold floating around the economy

my view is gold -> gem needs to be high for anet to make money, and to surviveif players can get too much gemstore items without micro transaction, anet will go broke

It also means it's relatively cheap to buy gold with real money legally through the game itself, which means players are less likely to go to an illegal gold selling site to get it. (I haven't seen gold seller spam in-game for months, but I assume they're still around because I've never heard of any game completing eliminating them.)

@Ricky Da Man.5064 said:When is the best time to convert gems to gold?

Around now. When it's more expensive to buy gems with gold it's cheaper to buy gold with gems.

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I think there is a hidden exchange fee. Cause gems->gold doesn't give the same values ad gold->gems. This is to remove gold from the ingame economy. (Amongst other things that to this. Like things that require to pay gold at vendors.)

I mean as a returning player still playing without expansions and not playing dungeons/raids n stuff ... back then there was not much stuff to really "create" gold. Now we have dailies for 2 gold. Also more things to sell (those 30 or 50 silver junk items). And I gues there is much more I don't do with my playstyle. We need to remember that all the money the people that farm by earning at TP had to be "created" somehow. And is getting "destroyed" somewhere else. (If not traded to other players. By fees or buying stuff at a vendor.)

Isn't that weird that with more ways to create money (already the daily 2 gold is more than compared to before this daily 2g existed - if a lot of players do it each day) means more people going for exchange of gold into gems. Now with certainly different types of players: Hardcore farmers that sell at TP vs. noobs that might use their daily 2g to buy stuff at TP ... it might accumulate for certain rich players that have tons of gold just by playing (TP and selling + the daily gold + selling junk and other sources maybe).

They can drive the prices upwards. We don't even know the exact system behind it. I just started playing GW1 where no TP exists - but exchange merchants. They buy for 10 and sell you the stuff for 100 (so 90 exchange fee I guess.) :D Then again money isn't worth much in that game.

Personally I try to avoid exchanging. For gems->gold it would be a wast of real money. I'd rather save gold and earn it by myself. Don't need too much though. More in a need of gems but buying for real money every now and then is okay - better than doing the grind/farming since I have lots of other stuff to to left in the game. (Catching up after long break.) If I were finished with everythign and bored with PvP/WvW I'd to PvE grind as well I guess. Trying to exchange a bit every now and then. (Keeping still always a healthy amount of gold in case it is needed since there are things that need gold even if you don't want to buy at TP and to stuff yourwelf. )

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I'm surprised so few of you read the old Q&A posts from around release, and naturally this leads to alot of speculation regarding the sudden increase in gold to gem conversion. Well here's why:

Converting gold to gems or vice versa does nothing to affect the value of either, because the total wealth in the game remains the same. There's just as much gems as they are worth in gold, and gold as worth in gems.

The inflation we see today, driving up conversion costs, stems from players buying gems for real life money. This isn't something new and happens periodically during sales and naturally fluctuates from day to day. These "newly created" gems can now be converted into gold which increases the available total wealth in the game, meaning we have to pay more in order to maintain the inherent value of gems.

An easy way to look at the rate of conversion:

  • If price is dropping, this means less people are buying gems for irl money today than yesterday
  • If price remains stable, people are spending about the same amount of irl money on gems today as they did yesterday
  • If price is increasing, people are buying more gems for irl money today than they did yesterday

So as we can see we are still riding the wave of increasing gem purchases since the start of the august sale, seemingly having reached a peak. You can bet they will release new goodies on the 17th in order to maintain this all time high, however it cannot last forever. There will be droughts of new content and the conversion rate will inevitably drop as not as many keep buying gems.

So do not worry, converting your hard earned gold to gems will not drive up the conversion rate, if anything you are doing a favour to others who do the same keeping the price as is. And for those who do buy gems: Thank you for supporting this great company, and remember we've all been there - so don't feel bad but rather really enjoy your new shiny :)

Source:https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/2xtjc7/comment/cp3gd2a

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@rng.1024 said:I'm surprised so few of you read the old Q&A posts from around release, and naturally this leads to alot of speculation regarding the sudden increase in gold to gem conversion. Well here's why:

Converting gold to gems or vice versa does nothing to affect the value of either, because the total wealth in the game remains the same. There's just as much gems as they are worth in gold, and gold as worth in gems.

The inflation we see today, driving up conversion costs, stems from players buying gems for real life money. This isn't something new and happens periodically during sales and naturally fluctuates from day to day. These "newly created" gems can now be converted into gold which increases the available total wealth in the game, meaning we have to pay more in order to maintain the inherent value of gems.

What? That is complete bogus. Read up again.

  • First off, gems converted to gold do not "create" gold. The gold exchanged was initially delivered into the exchange by players who created the gold while playing.
  • Second, when people buy gems with real money, those gems are not yet in the games economy, they are tied to a players account and only when they enter the gem exchange do they affect the games economy (in form of changed exchange rates).
  • When gems are used on gem store items, those gems are removed from the game (in this case a players wallet) while not having been part of the exchange any more to begin with.
  • Players buying gems for real money has absolutely no effect on the exchange rates.

@rng.1024 said:

An easy way to look at the rate of conversion:

  • If price is dropping, this means less people are buying gems for irl money today than yesterday

Which prices? The amount of gems purchased with real life money has absolutely NO EFFECT on the exchange rates. Only gems used in conversion into gold affect the exchange.

@rng.1024 said:

  • If price remains stable, people are spending about the same amount of irl money on gems today as they did yesterday

No, if gem-gold exchange remains stable it means the same amount of people are converting gems to gold as are people converting gold to gems. If either of the 2 pools sees a change in activity, the exchange value shifts.

@rng.1024 said:

  • If price is increasing, people are buying more gems for irl money today than they did yesterday

No, if exchange rates are increasing for less gems per gold the difference between the internal supply of gold and gems has shifted as to result in less gems versus gold. This can be caused by either more gold geting exchanged for gems (without actually less players buying gems, there might even be more players buying gems and exchanging them only that the amount of people exchanging gold is still higher) or by less players exchanging gems for gold (which is unlikely since better exchange rates would actually encourage players to exchange gems, only at a smaller ratio than players converting gold).

@rng.1024 said:So as we can see we are still riding the wave of increasing gem purchases since the start of the august sale, seemingly having reached a peak. You can bet they will release new goodies on the 17th in order to maintain this all time high, however it cannot last forever. There will be droughts of new content and the conversion rate will inevitably drop as not as many keep buying gems.

The exchange has NOTHING to do with gem purchases. The only important factor is gems to gold and gold to gem conversion.

@rng.1024 said:So do not worry, converting your hard earned gold to gems will not drive up the conversion rate, if anything you are doing a favour to others who do the same keeping the price as is. And for those who do buy gems: Thank you for supporting this great company, and remember we've all been there - so don't feel bad but rather really enjoy your new shiny :)

Source:https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/2xtjc7/comment/cp3gd2a

Converting gold to gems reduces the amount of gems in the supply and increases the amount of gold. As singular action, this does increase the exchange rate for gold to gems meaning the next person gets less gems per same amount of gold.

TL;DR: you are confusing the exchange rates supply of gold and gems with the total amount of gems and gold in the game and players wallets. Those two are NOT the same.For clarification, read up here: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Currency_exchange and check the explanation to exchange rates.

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@Luthan.5236 said:I think there is a hidden exchange fee. Cause gems->gold doesn't give the same values ad gold->gems. This is to remove gold from the ingame economy. (Amongst other things that to this. Like things that require to pay gold at vendors.)

@"Danikat.8537" said:You're right about the transaction fee, there's a 15% fee on each exchange. I guess it is 'hidden' in that it's not clearly explained in-game but Anet have told us how it works and that's explained on the Wiki: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Currency_exchange#Mechanics

gem -> gold must be lower, otherwise it will be prone to currency manipulation, and we arent talking about virtual item <-> virtual currency, but real money being manipulated as gems are pegged to USD/EURO at a fixed price through gem purchase

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When I looked few days ago, 400 gems were 191 gold. This means players no longer buy gems with money from banks, so they convert gems to gold. Maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with anniversary sale + no great content in announcement on 30th of August + lack of endgame content for PvP and WvW now and in future (according to announcement).

Theoretically prices of gems (in gold) should drop. However, let's not forget a prologue will be released on 17th September and that will bring new offers; and Halloween event is coming soon with other offers.

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@Alin.2468 said:When I looked few days ago, 400 gems were 191 gold. This means players no longer buy gems with money from banks, so they convert gems to gold. Maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with anniversary sale + no great content in announcement on 30th of August + lack of endgame content for PvP and WvW now and in future (according to announcement).

Theoretically prices of gems (in gold) should drop. However, let's not forget a prologue will be released on 17th September and that will bring new offers; and Halloween event is coming soon with other offers.

You are making assumptions which you can not prove, or which do not make even sense, given only the exchange value.

Read up on how the exchange works, I did a small explanation of it right above your post. All you can deduce from a shifted exchange rate is that the gold supply ratio to gem supply in the exchange has shifted. Why and how it has shifted one can speculate. The most reasonable assumption based on past behavior is:

  • more people are converting gold to gems to acquire items during the anniversary sale
  • the amount of people buying gems and converting gems to gold is less than the amount of people converting gold to gems (that is pretty much all we can assume).
  • the amount of people converting gems to gold might be higher than usual but still below the amount of gold converted to gems (currently people are getting a lot more value in gold per gem than before, also at higher gold cost per gem people are more incentivised to directly purchase gems)

The amount of gems bought with real money can be absolutely unrelated to the gem - gold ratio since people who buy gems with $$$ will simply directly acquire the gem store item completely bypassing the exchange.

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Might be related to the issue of more expensive gems via rl money, too.Instant Gaming is nearly constantly sold out (at least whenever I look), there was a thread here in the forum where ppl. from Australia complained about gemcards not being available in their stores either.So for me the difference is around 10k-12k gems for 100 € (purchased as code via Instant Gaming before, depending on exact price) to now only 8k for the same price in europe (purchased directly from the website)... might be the difference of 2 to 4k some might have sold for ingame gold that they now use their 8k (or whatever less gems purchased) only for their own stuff.I'm moving at the moment so don't have time to play anyways, hope this issue get's fixed in the meantime though.

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Manipulating the exchange rate would be very risky. It would provide every employee with weaponized information that could possibly withstand an NDA, but it would not guarantee an increase in revenue. The studio approaches analytics with faith. I am confident someone would talk. Everything about the current rate can be explained by player activity and Tyria's high standard of living. Other posters have covered this.

I only continue because currency theory is addictive. The gem exchange is an honorable way to monetize players and I have no interest in tearing it down.

IF

The gold supply includes the quantity held in active user accounts and the quantity held within the BLTP.We approach every trade occurring within the BLTP as describing the Lifestyle.Build statistically significant baskets of goods that do not include every trade, a lifestyle.There is an acceptably largest significant basket of goods or a meta-basketry that can be called Inflation or Deflation.

THEN

The gem exchange can cause inflation or Inflation. Players produce all new units of gold and provide all velocity for existing units of gold. Anything that increases the demand for gold will increase the new gold creation rate and existing gold velocity. Currency velocity describes how frequently a unit of gold is traded. (A Unity of currency provides quantum bits of virtual work that experience a change in position as a change in state?!) To predict Inflation we would need to make assumptions about overall player demand for goods and average and modal player income and income sources. The topography of the overall player demand curve is very complex. An increase in supply can cause an increase in demand. The topography of player income and income sources is much less complex. Average and modal income is likely lower than easily assumed. I remember a post from years ago putting the average at 2-5 gold per hour. I don't remember precisely. At such a low average, income from dailies becomes much more significant.

Imo, the likeliness that the gem exchange is causing Inflation depends significantly on how thoroughly the demand curve for gold to gem exchanges overlaps with savings (gold that does not have a determined trajectory) and the share of new gold being aimed at savings or the BLTP.

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There is no need for Anet to influence the exchange directly with shady stuff like locking rates, when they can easily do so indirectly.

They have the keys of the kingdom simply by being the...devs of this game. They create the gold sinks and farms, they create gem store stuff and set the gem prices, they decide the when and how of everything related to the game economy.

So if, for example, Anet wanted the rates to keep going up in the long term, they would just keep creating a favourable market environment for that to happen. Expected player behavior and supply and demand take care of the rest.

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@"Cyninja.2954" said:You are making assumptions which you can not prove, or which do not make even sense, given only the exchange value.

Exactly, I have made assumptions that I can not prove. Because I can't prove them, it's exactly why they are called assumptions; hence why I used the word "maybe" as in "I do not know what will happen", therefore I made a supposition without foundation on facts or statistics, simply because I can't possibly have access on those. I know it may seem strange to you, but I will try to be blunt with you: I am not Anet staff, sorry to disappoint you; I am just another player making assumptions, for fun or for the sake of discussion.

Winston Churchill said: "When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber" - I am just another parrot enjoying the game created by eagles watching our wallets (and this does not imply that you are an eagle either).

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@Cyninja.2954 said:

@rng.1024 said:I'm surprised so few of you read the old Q&A posts from around release, and naturally this leads to alot of speculation regarding the sudden increase in gold to gem conversion. Well here's why:

Converting gold to gems or vice versa does nothing to affect the value of either, because
the total wealth in the game remains the same
. There's just as much gems as they are worth in gold, and gold as worth in gems.

The inflation we see today, driving up conversion costs, stems from players buying gems for real life money. This isn't something new and happens periodically during sales and naturally fluctuates from day to day. These "newly created" gems can now be converted into gold which increases the available total wealth in the game, meaning we have to pay more in order to maintain the inherent value of gems.

What? That is complete bogus. Read up again.
  • First off, gems converted to gold do not "create" gold. The gold exchanged was initially delivered into the exchange by players who created the gold while playing.
  • Second, when people buy gems with real money, those gems are not yet in the games economy, they are tied to a players account and only when they enter the gem exchange do they affect the games economy (in form of changed exchange rates).
  • When gems are used on gem store items, those gems are removed from the game (in this case a players wallet) while not having been part of the exchange any more to begin with.
  • Players buying gems for real money has absolutely no effect on the exchange rates.

@rng.1024 said:

An easy way to look at the rate of conversion:
  • If price is dropping, this means less people are buying gems for irl money today than yesterday

Which prices? The amount of gems purchased with real life money has absolutely NO EFFECT on the exchange rates. Only gems used in conversion into gold affect the exchange.

@rng.1024 said:
  • If price remains stable, people are spending about the same amount of irl money on gems today as they did yesterday

No, if gem-gold exchange remains stable it means the same amount of people are converting gems to gold as are people converting gold to gems. If either of the 2 pools sees a change in activity, the exchange value shifts.

@rng.1024 said:
  • If price is increasing, people are buying more gems for irl money today than they did yesterday

No, if exchange rates are increasing for less gems per gold the difference between the internal supply of gold and gems has shifted as to result in less gems versus gold. This can be caused by either more gold geting exchanged for gems (without actually less players buying gems, there might even be more players buying gems and exchanging them only that the amount of people exchanging gold is still higher) or by less players exchanging gems for gold (which is unlikely since better exchange rates would actually encourage players to exchange gems, only at a smaller ratio than players converting gold).

@rng.1024 said:So as we can see we are still riding the wave of increasing gem purchases since the start of the august sale, seemingly having reached a peak. You can bet they will release new goodies on the 17th in order to maintain this all time high, however it cannot last forever. There will be droughts of new content and the conversion rate will inevitably drop as not as many keep buying gems.

The exchange has NOTHING to do with gem purchases. The only important factor is gems to gold and gold to gem conversion.

@rng.1024 said:So do not worry, converting your hard earned gold to gems will not drive up the conversion rate, if anything you are doing a favour to others who do the same keeping the price as is. And for those who do buy gems: Thank you for supporting this great company, and remember we've all been there - so don't feel bad but rather really enjoy your new shiny :)

Source:

Converting gold to gems reduces the amount of gems in the supply and increases the amount of gold. As singular action, this does increase the exchange rate for gold to gems meaning the next person gets less gems per same amount of gold.

TL;DR: you are confusing the exchange rates supply of gold and gems with the total amount of gems and gold in the game and players wallets. Those two are NOT the same.For clarification, read up here:
and check the explanation to exchange rates.

You are assuming 100% of players convert gold to gems whenever they want something off the trading post, which simply isn't the case. If this was true, the gem to gold conversion would be abysmal compared to the other way around, and we would have an exchange rate hundreds of times higher than what we see today.

Let me clarify - I never said account bound gold was factored into anything, so not even sure why you bring that up. However, what is actually keeping the exchange rate increase at bay, is exactly what I mentioned - people buying gems for real money which then gets consumed instantly by the trading post. It's not factoring into the supply pools of either gold or gems for conversion (because their relative sizes remain the same no matter how much is exchanged of either) as you need to pay with one to get the other.

So yes it is the predominant factor here, I never argued people aren't converting more now than when the prices were lower, quite the opposite, however the in game gold supply isn't infinite leaving real life purchase of gems the limiting factor in order to not skyrocket gem prices. And as I said, buying gems for irl money allows you the option to convert them to gold, thereby affecting exchange rates.

I'm not sure what you're reading into, but I'm not disagreeing with what you say however I think you narrow too much down on the gem/gold pools in order to disprove something I said, when I've already accounted for that from the getgo. Also keep in mind not everyone converts, spends or stores their gems meaning they do not initially affect exchange rates, but they have the potential to do so - hence the pools aren't static resulting in them not being the single factor in determining exchange-rate.

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@rng.1024 said:

Let me clarify - I never said account bound gold was factored into anything, so not even sure why you bring that up. However, what is actually keeping the exchange rate increase at bay, is exactly what I mentioned - people buying gems for real money which then gets consumed instantly by the trading post. It's not factoring into the supply pools of either gold or gems for conversion (because their relative sizes remain the same no matter how much is exchanged of either) as you need to pay with one to get the other.

How much people are buying gems with real money and immediately spending on the gem store has absolutely NO EFFECT on the gems exchange. I'm not sure why you keep mentioning this. I've explained how the exchange works. Personal player wallets and gem purchases off the gem store have no effect on the gem pool of the exchange. The gems spent on items on the gem store do NOT go into the exhanges pool of gems. They are consumed and gone, poof, because their spending power was used to acquire something. The exchanges pools of gold and gems are only affected by EXCHANGING either currency.

The total amount of gems in the game is no factor in the ratio between gems and gold in the exchange and was never mentioned in relationship to the exchange when ever explained by a developer.

@rng.1024 said:So yes it is the predominant factor here, I never argued people aren't converting more now than when the prices were lower, quite the opposite, however the in game gold supply isn't infinite leaving real life purchase of gems the limiting factor in order to not skyrocket gem prices. And as I said, buying gems for irl money allows you the option to convert them to gold, thereby affecting exchange rates.

Yes, actually converting gems into gold WILL affect the exchange because now you are affecting both the gold supply of the exchange as well as the gem supply of the exchange. That is completely unrealted to how many gems are purchased with real money. For example, gems gained via the 5k achievement milestone have the same effect on the exchange (or no effect if used on the gem store immediately) as gems purchased with money.

@rng.1024 said:I'm not sure what you're reading into, but I'm not disagreeing with what you say however I think you narrow too much down on the gem/gold pools in order to disprove something I said, when I've already accounted for that from the getgo. Also keep in mind not everyone converts, spends or stores their gems meaning they do not initially affect exchange rates, but they have the potential to do so - hence the pools aren't static resulting in them not being the single factor in determining exchange-rate.

That's what I'm saying, you are at the very least unclear in your wording or worst unclear on how exactly the exchange works. The wiki has a short version of the explanation which John Smith (former GW2 developer in charge of analytics and game economy) gave in the past.

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@Alin.2468 said:

@"Cyninja.2954" said:You are making assumptions which you can not prove, or which do not make even sense, given only the exchange value.

Exactly, I have made assumptions that I can not prove. Because I can't prove them, it's exactly why they are called assumptions; hence why I used the word "maybe" as in "I do not know what will happen", therefore I made a supposition without foundation on facts or statistics, simply because I can't possibly have access on those. I know it may seem strange to you, but I will try to be blunt with you: I am not Anet staff, sorry to disappoint you; I am just another player making assumptions, for fun or for the sake of discussion.

Winston Churchill said: "When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber" - I am just another parrot enjoying the game created by eagles watching our wallets (and this does not imply that you are an eagle either).

Okay, let me rephrase:You are making assumptions which do not make sense if one looks at past behavior and how the gem exchange works. I was being polite in my original response.

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Today I just bought $35 dollars worth of gems to purchase an item that generates a gold revenue (that item i shall not mention since it is making lots of gold for me) I I have made about 600 gold in 3 days.

With all that gold I made, I converted it to gems to purchase more items in the gems store. So, in conclusion. people invest real money in the gem store to generate more gold which then is converted to gems. Thus the reason why gold to gems is so expensive.

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@Cyninja.2954 said:

@rng.1024 said:

Let me clarify - I never said account bound gold was factored into anything, so not even sure why you bring that up. However, what is actually keeping the exchange rate increase at bay, is exactly what I mentioned - people buying gems for real money which then gets consumed instantly by the trading post. It's not factoring into the supply pools of either gold or gems for conversion (because their relative sizes remain the same no matter how much is exchanged of either) as you need to pay with one to get the other.

How much people are buying gems with real money and immediately spending on the gem store has absolutely NO EFFECT on the gems exchange. I'm not sure why you keep mentioning this. I've explained how the exchange works. Personal player wallets and gem purchases off the gem store have no effect on the gem pool of the exchange. The gems spent on items on the gem store do NOT go into the exhanges pool of gems. They are consumed and gone, poof, because their spending power was used to acquire something. The exchanges pools of gold and gems are only affected by EXCHANGING either currency.

The total amount of gems in the game is no factor in the ratio between gems and gold in the exchange and was never mentioned in relationship to the exchange when ever explained by a developer.

@rng.1024 said:So yes it is the predominant factor here, I never argued people aren't converting more now than when the prices were lower, quite the opposite, however the in game gold supply isn't infinite leaving real life purchase of gems the limiting factor in order to not skyrocket gem prices. And as I said, buying gems for irl money
allows
you the option to convert them to gold, thereby affecting exchange rates.

Yes, actually converting gems into gold WILL affect the exchange because now you are affecting both the gold supply of the exchange as well as the gem supply of the exchange. That is completely unrealted to how many gems are purchased with real money. For example, gems gained via the 5k achievement milestone have the same effect on the exchange (or no effect if used on the gem store immediately) as gems purchased with money.

@rng.1024 said:I'm not sure what you're reading into, but I'm not disagreeing with what you say however I think you narrow too much down on the gem/gold pools in order to disprove something I said, when I've already accounted for that from the getgo. Also keep in mind not everyone converts, spends or stores their gems meaning they do not initially affect exchange rates, but they have the potential to do so - hence the pools aren't static resulting in them not being the single factor in determining exchange-rate.

That's what I'm saying, you are at the very least unclear in your wording or worst unclear on how exactly the exchange works. The wiki has a short version of the explanation which John Smith (former GW2 developer in charge of analytics and game economy) gave in the past.

Look - nobody is saying we are messing directly with the pools of the exchange, or that factors outside can mess with them so please reread if that is still unclear.

The only thing I pointed out, is that if you already have gems (regardless of source) you are less likely having to convert from gold to gems - can we agree this stifles the gold to gem traffic? Because if so it does indeed affect the exchange rate, which is what I'm getting at however it does so indirectly since the pools themselves within the exchange aren't touched.

Once you ignore people having gems from other sources, again while not directly influencing exhange rates, then you completely remove the need for gem to gold conversion meaning whenever something new came on the tradingpost the ratio betweem the pools would become (let's be cautios even) 25/75 - it would cost 3x times more to convert gold to gems than gems to gold. Why aren't we seeing that? Simply because total amount of gems in game decide our buying power, of which not all stem from gold conversion.

Other than that you are just repeating what I said in your own words, which I don't mind but please actually read it through instead of tunnelvisioning on the confined pools of conversion and trying to disprove something nobody argued with you on in the first place.

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@rng.1024 said:

@rng.1024 said:

Let me clarify - I never said account bound gold was factored into anything, so not even sure why you bring that up. However, what is actually keeping the exchange rate increase at bay, is exactly what I mentioned - people buying gems for real money which then gets consumed instantly by the trading post. It's not factoring into the supply pools of either gold or gems for conversion (because their relative sizes remain the same no matter how much is exchanged of either) as you need to pay with one to get the other.

How much people are buying gems with real money and immediately spending on the gem store has absolutely NO EFFECT on the gems exchange. I'm not sure why you keep mentioning this. I've explained how the exchange works. Personal player wallets and gem purchases off the gem store have no effect on the gem pool of the exchange. The gems spent on items on the gem store do NOT go into the exhanges pool of gems. They are consumed and gone, poof, because their spending power was used to acquire something. The exchanges pools of gold and gems are only affected by EXCHANGING either currency.

The total amount of gems in the game is no factor in the ratio between gems and gold in the exchange and was never mentioned in relationship to the exchange when ever explained by a developer.

@rng.1024 said:So yes it is the predominant factor here, I never argued people aren't converting more now than when the prices were lower, quite the opposite, however the in game gold supply isn't infinite leaving real life purchase of gems the limiting factor in order to not skyrocket gem prices. And as I said, buying gems for irl money
allows
you the option to convert them to gold, thereby affecting exchange rates.

Yes, actually converting gems into gold WILL affect the exchange because now you are affecting both the gold supply of the exchange as well as the gem supply of the exchange. That is completely unrealted to how many gems are purchased with real money. For example, gems gained via the 5k achievement milestone have the same effect on the exchange (or no effect if used on the gem store immediately) as gems purchased with money.

@rng.1024 said:I'm not sure what you're reading into, but I'm not disagreeing with what you say however I think you narrow too much down on the gem/gold pools in order to disprove something I said, when I've already accounted for that from the getgo. Also keep in mind not everyone converts, spends or stores their gems meaning they do not initially affect exchange rates, but they have the potential to do so - hence the pools aren't static resulting in them not being the single factor in determining exchange-rate.

That's what I'm saying, you are at the very least unclear in your wording or worst unclear on how exactly the exchange works. The wiki has a short version of the explanation which John Smith (former GW2 developer in charge of analytics and game economy) gave in the past.

Look - nobody is saying we are messing directly with the pools of the exchange, or that factors outside can mess with them so please reread if that is still unclear.

The only thing I pointed out, is that if you already have gems (regardless of source) you are less likely having to convert from gold to gems - can we agree this stifles the gold to gem traffic? Because if so it does indeed affect the exchange rate, which is what I'm getting at however it does so indirectly since the pools themselves within the exchange aren't touched.

Once you ignore people having gems from other sources, again while not directly influencing exhange rates, then you completely remove the need for gem to gold conversion meaning whenever something new came on the tradingpost the ratio betweem the pools would become (let's be cautios even) 25/75 - it would cost 3x times more to convert gold to gems than gems to gold. Why aren't we seeing that? Simply because total amount of gems in game decide our buying power, of which not all stem from gold conversion.

Other than that you are just repeating what I said in your own words, which I don't mind but please actually read it through instead of tunnelvisioning on the confined pools of conversion and trying to disprove something nobody argued with you on in the first place.

You are leaving out 1 exchange though in your approach, and that is also one of the reasons why I prefer to not mention theoretical outside purchases:

People buying gems and converting them to gold, which also increases while the gem-gold exchange changes to benefit gem into gold exchanges.

Yes, obviously people spending money on gems and not exchanging will not affect the exchange. It does not require special mentioning since IT DOES NOT AFFECT the exchange. If you go as far as mentioning outside factors, you would have to mention that people are far more likely to buy gems and exchange them for gold during these spikes. Ideally, just leave this out of the equation since it is both: confusing and not directly necessary to explain what is happening.

The exchange rates are affected by gold and gems which go into either pools. What plkayers do on the side might be interesting, but is ultimately not not relevant. Especially if we delve into issues like players "could have or should have" exchanged gems for gold. They didn't that's all that matters.

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