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Again with the US only Gem Sale? - [Merged]


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As per News:https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/stock-up-for-spring-with-20-off-digital-gem-cards/

This appears to be only available to US residents. Can you take the time to note this in future promotions like this in the news article? Thanks on behalf of those who can take advantage of this but, c'mon man, give us Canadians a break (and the rest of the world too).

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Is this really only working for US citizens? And not anyone that can just use the .com Amazon page? Usually I try to buy directly from ArenaNet ingame - cause it feels safer than some 3rd party resellers with codes (where gems might be cheaper). But if this is an official store ... I might be tempted. On the other hand: I do not have a credit card (other payment methods are more common in my country) and so it won't be possible to use for me to use the .com webiste from Amazon.

  • I still have gems of the 4k I bought previously for march sale where I only got the black lion requisions team package. Planned to buy 3 shared inventory slots with the remainiong one - but the slots didn't go on sale it seems. (Also not announced for the remaining days.) Guess I'll wait for anniverary sale and/or release of the next expansion - to buy more gems. (Planning to get the expansion edition that comes with gems. "Ultimate" I think those are named.)
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Oh I see. Well I overlooked this it seems. Thanks for pointing it out.

Seems a lot of the special stuff is for the US only - since the company is seated there. Wouldn't have been a bad idea to implement such sales ingame directly where everyone can access it - and where they already work with payment providers to make ingame purchases available to everyone.

Reminds me that the special donations events also are focused on US (US children I think) where you can "buy" a blue title by donating to the US children. (Some world-wide international active organization would have been better here.)

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@"Luthan.5236" said:Oh I see. Well I overlooked this it seems. Thanks for pointing it out.

Seems a lot of the special stuff is for the US only - since the company is seated there. Wouldn't have been a bad idea to implement such sales ingame directly where everyone can access it - and where they already work with payment providers to make ingame purchases available to everyone.

Reminds me that the special donations events also are focused on US (US children I think) where you can "buy" a blue title by donating to the US children. (Some world-wide international active organization would have been better here.)

Anyone could obtain the 'blue' title by purchasing from the in-game Gem Store.

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I already asked about this on the German Forum but didn't receive an awnser yet and, quite frankly, i don't really expact to get one.I'm just wondering why even Post about this on the German, French and Spanish frontpage if it's US only again? I bet there at least a few People right now who are holding of on there Gem purchases because they are expecting a discount in a few days and some might even buy on Amazon.com from the EU or Canada because thats the Link Anet provided and than worst case end up with invalide codes. Thats just asking for trouble with refunds and bad reviews. Please quit the shoddy promotions already and hire some decent PR People the game deserves it.

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@"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:Anyone could obtain the 'blue' title by purchasing from the in-game Gem Store.

Yes of course. I'm sorry for posting something wrong. If I remember corretly buying just anything from the store during that "event" got you the title - and ArenaNet donated for each purchase you made? Just that to me it would have felt a bit like "donating" when otherwise I would not have needed to buy stuff at that time. I usually buy at other times. (On sale.)

I understand though that companies have special responsibilities. Even in my country (Germany) with lots of social security we have companies that do such stuff. And in the US where the focus is less on social security and charity is more important ... this is even a bigger thing for this company. Only natural to focus on the country where the company has it's roots and where most employees are from. But let us not discuss this any further in this thread. I might talk about it when this "event" comes up again. (Or I might just ignore it and accept it as it is.)

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I'm in the UK and tried to buy a gem card through Amazon.com but it kept telling me the item had become unavailable when I tried to go to checkout, so it seems like it's not working. (It is normally possible for me to buy things through Amazon.com, I do it periodically for CDs and LPs which aren't getting a UK release.)

(Also it's quite likely this is a sale Amazon decided to do and Anet just decided to promote it on their site having noticed it was happening. Retailers can and do discount products all the time, without having to arrange it through the product's supplier. It is annoying that the majority of sales they promote and all the promo tie-ins they've arranged have been US-only, buy I guess it's easier for them to hear about US sales. I've seen the game discounted in the UK several times without Anet promoting it. Although I haven't seen gem cards sold at all in years.)

Edit: I was commenting on the price difference being too small to matter once you factored in currency conversion and taxes, but apparently that's because the sale hasn't started yet, so I took that part out.

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I can think of a few good reasons why they could be doing US Amazon sales specifically. The first would be that they want people to acknowledge it as an option, because people don't seem to notice it. The second might be that they want to overshadow the US scalpers selling $25 physical gem cards for $35, by bringing people into the fold of buying digital cards and reviewing the product. The third would be that perhaps US customers aren't buying gems and they want to entice them. The fourth could be that US Amazon wants to do some sort of deal, but I don't think this one is as likely.

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@Quench.7091 said:I can think of a few good reasons why they could be doing US Amazon sales specifically. The first would be that they want people to acknowledge it as an option, because people don't seem to notice it. The second might be that they want to overshadow the US scalpers selling $25 physical gem cards for $35, by bringing people into the fold of buying digital cards and reviewing the product. The third would be that perhaps US customers aren't buying gems and they want to entice them. The fourth could be that US Amazon wants to do some sort of deal, but I don't think this one is as likely.

You dont think Eu got any scalpers?

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@Linken.6345 said:

@Quench.7091 said:I can think of a few good reasons why they could be doing US Amazon sales specifically. The first would be that they want people to acknowledge it as an option, because people don't seem to notice it. The second might be that they want to overshadow the US scalpers selling $25 physical gem cards for $35, by bringing people into the fold of buying digital cards and reviewing the product. The third would be that perhaps US customers aren't buying gems and they want to entice them. The fourth could be that US Amazon wants to do some sort of deal, but I don't think this one is as likely.

You dont think Eu got any scalpers?

I think they do, but I'm not familiar with EU law. Some countries target specific scalpers with laws, such as ticket resellers. A more recent anti-scalper discussion I've heard about was a game console scalping law. I don't believe cards/codes are covered by such a law, but I could be wrong.

Edit 1: Are the EU online stores doing alright with their sales? The US Amazon digital gem card was actually kind of hidden. I remember the physical card being listed above it for some time. The EU could be having the same issue, but I wouldn't know.

Edit 2: I know that on March 6th of this year the listing issue was still a problem, because it actually inspired me to write a review on the gone-rogue physical card page. The review attempts to redirect traffic to the digital gem card and away from the scalpers. I don't know if that did the trick, but I know that ArenaNet's approach probably fixed it, intentional or not.

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@Hemi.5267 said:Same. I buy a lot of gems, for myself and my 7 year old daughter's account..who loves to dress-up her character. Would be nice to see some love for the EU player-base too...

I hope they do something outside the US in the future. Especially since it's Amazon we are talking about. My daughter does the same thing with her characters btw ?

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Gems cards on Amazon Canada are 90 bucks. Only two available. Not sure what the prices is in other places.I think we all should get the discount through the gem store. Anet didn't learn from the last time.Maybe they didn't see the posts about it on there forum or they don't seem to care.Remember this when they want full price for the next expansion. Maybe I will wait for a deal on it after they launch it.

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None of these are discounts on Gems (or discounts on anything). In fact, excluding the Quizno's promo, they are all sweepstakes and they all clearly state which countries are eligible (or not) to enter.

It's close but, functionally quite different.

Selling a product (at retail or a discount) is different then giving away a product. I imagine that there are business reasons that Anet/NCSoft choose not to resell the discounted Gem cards in regions outside the US. I wonder what reason they would have for promoting this Globally without noting that it is US only in the release.

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Ok. This is more to address that ArenaNet never does anything for players outside the US.But, if we are to only consider discounts on Gem Cards, then this is the first time there has been such a promotion, so it's a bit disingenuous to say ArenaNet never includes anyone outside the US. I'd think one would need more than one occurrence to establish a pattern.

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It would be nice to see a sale on gems for everyone. Maybe it could be done through the gem store itself?

(Although I have mixed feelings on it because then I'd be tempted to spend more. At the moment I only buy enough gems for the thing/s I want right now, if they were on sale I'd have to decide how many I can afford to buy in one go.)

@Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:Ok. This is more to address that ArenaNet never does anything for players outside the US.But, if we are to only consider discounts on Gem Cards, then this is the first time there has been such a promotion, so it's a bit disingenuous to say ArenaNet never includes anyone outside the US. I'd think one would need more than one occurrence to establish a pattern.

Well...statistically if they've only ever done 1 gem sale and it's US only then 100% of gem sales have been US only. ;)

@MokahTGS.7850 said:The problem with selling things in a world economy is that you (ANet) are subject to trade laws, agreements, and restrictions that limit what they can and cannot do. It's not like some ANet employee is flipping a switch locking out non-US markets.

That can be a problem with sweepstakes, lotteries and other types of give-aways where the laws can get complicated, but I'm not aware of anywhere you're allowed to sell a product but not allowed to change the price it's sold for, temporarily or otherwise (which is basically all the discount is).

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(DE)https://www.amazon.de/dp/B01NADDQJH/https://www.amazon.de/dp/B00935B4O4/https://www.amazon.de/dp/B009AYOFI0/

All with zero stock. And this has been the case for some time. Please allow people from the EU to take advantage of this sale and restock the gem cards for the EU. All official retailers have been out of stock on these for more than two years and unofficial retailers ask extraordinary prices. At the same time, many players are dependent on gem cards because of various problems with the DigitalRiver in-game gem shop.

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@"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:Ok. This is more to address that ArenaNet never does anything for players outside the US.But, if we are to only consider discounts on Gem Cards, then this is the first time there has been such a promotion, so it's a bit disingenuous to say ArenaNet never includes anyone outside the US. I'd think one would need more than one occurrence to establish a pattern.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/get-gem-cards-at-20-off-during-the-best-buy-gaming-weekend/

From last year, at least this one clearly stated US only, but again it was available for online ordering in the US.

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