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Official Mount Adoption Feedback Thread [merged]


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@nexidecimus.5973 said:Arenanet, I just have one question. What could have possibly possessed the entire company to go along with this and have not a single individual say "Maybe this is a bad idea. it might kitten some people off." ?

You assume that everyone did. Just because it happened doesn't mean the entire company went along with it. It just means that the people in charge were in favor of it.

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@nexidecimus.5973 said:Arenanet, I just have one question. What could have possibly possessed the entire company to go along with this and have not a single individual say "Maybe this is a bad idea. it might kitten some people off." ?

That's ...not how companies work. The people in charge can make decisions without needing input from employees, and often (I'm not suggesting this is the case here) employees won't voice a dissenting opinion for fear of losing their jobs.

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@dolcolax.1268 said:arent kids supposed to be supervised by parents when playing? i just dont get ppl saying this encourages kids to gamble, when they have someone guiding them.

Because nowadays, where parents have to work three times as much to be able to support their families, they still have time to control their children's online behavior 24/7? I seriously doubt it.

You should see all the games that are exploiting people, and especially youngsters, by introducing skin gambling content into their games (opening containers and what not). This doesn't end with MMOs, mind you. Popular shooters like CS:GO are releasing tons of stuff that lures people into gambling, and many of those players are still teenagers. In addition, there are gambling sites for those gaming skins (mostly illegal, but that is a different story) that support this kind of behavior. I know several people online who have grown addicted to gambling for skins.

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Just adding my two cents here for what it's worth (commented on a separate thread that got merged with this one).

I, like many others, am extremely disappointed this is the route you have chosen to go down. I've spent more time and money on this game than any other I've ever played and it sucks to see this happen. Although I think at this stage it's unlikely, I really hope you will change this and remove the RNG aspect to let people buy the specific skins they want.

If this is an NCSoft decision - I sincerely hope they see all of the outrage this has caused and rethink their business strategy for GW2. There is a great community and a talented dev team worth protecting here that many games would love to have - don't jeopardise that because you got greedy.

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I'm not totally against there being a random aspect to the mount skins, but I think it could have been done better. People don't totally hate RNG, they hate it when there are no alternatives (Remember the days before precursor crafting?). The only other mount skin set in game is a holiday based one. Adding more skins that you can individually pick either in game or in the gem store will present an alternative for those who are not interested in RNG.

Another option which could probably be done faster would just be to let people pick what mount they're getting the skin for. So if I had a mount skin box, I double click it, I choose a skimmer, and then I get a random skimmer skin. I think this could pull a lot of the hate away from these boxes. If you want to keep a full rng box though, add more avenues to get skins to supplement it.

Option 3 is to go a route similar to overwatch. Keep the full RNG box, but let people individually buy skins for an increased price.

Hope this helps :)

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@JustTrogdor.7892 said:

@"Gaile Gray.6029" said:Sorry for the delay. Things went a little weird and I thought I had a disappearing thread here. All should be fine now.

As far as whether we need more feedback: As long as players want to offer their thoughts, we want to read them. I have already submitted a detailed report on the feedback, including many areas of concern, individual and aggregate suggestions, and much more. I've also had conversations on the topic, as well. So this is "in the system" so to speak, but anyone else who wants to share their thoughts is more than welcome to do so!

Given how much this has blown up and in the interest of transparency, perhaps you would consider posting your report here for all those concerned to see? It might go a way to let those concerned know what has been submitted to Anet for review. Also I looked at your posts and can't find the one from earlier where you said you sent an Anet wide message including feedback. What happened to that post? Thanks.

This is just my 2c, but I don't think that's a good idea. I'm not sure transparency is even warranted. A speedy and reasonable solution would be preferred, but there are many reasons not to disclose the inner workings of the company, especially for our own benefit. For one, it would open a can of worms as players dissected every word and wasted Gaile's time with questions, time better spent on her pushing our feedback back to anet. I know it's a hard situation but we have to give her some faith here and see what happens. Sometimes it's better not to look behind the curtain.

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First and foremost, I absolutely adore this game and franchise since gw1 came out. The latest adoption rng based trend, left me disheartened. As there were a couple mounts I really wanted alongside the new shiny back piece located in the BLC, I quickly did the math and for the first time, I felt like this game put a wall up for me.

I've always advocated for gw2, and I've never thought twice about buying things from the gem store that I could control as a consumer, but this lootbox system isn't the right way to do this.

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My thoughts, which I'm sure someone's already posted:

I don't "like" RNG, but I get it. That being said, I don't like RNG at the prices that it's being offered, or at the odds of it being offered. For example, I really don't like the Springer mount. I don't really care about getting mount skins for it. I did get a couple skins, and then I stopped, because I realized I didn't want to empty what spending money I have trying to get more.

  • If you want to have your cake and eat it too, have the "normal" skins be purchaseable directly, and put the "special" skins in your black lion chest like you do the gliders.
  • If you're going to keep it at 400 gems a pop, make the adoption certificates mount-specific. Have one for griffons, have one for raptors, have one for skimmers, etc.
  • If you're going to keep it at 30+ mounts and add more down the line (which I assume you are), drop the gem price.
  • If you're going to make it so we can purchase specific skins I'm okay with upping the price, and having the "special" skins be a bit more.

The only reason $100+ for all the mount skins sounds like a lot to people, is due to the fact it's the only available option to guarantee they'll get a skin they like. If they were able to have some choice in the matter, they wouldn't care how much the full pack would cost for the most part. They'd leave that to the people who can afford to dump that kind of money.

So there are the options I foresee being feasible.

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I have made this survey that sums up some of the topics that people brought up, it should be an important tool for people to get a broader vision of the communitys thoughts. (and its what arena net should be doing themselves at this point, right?)

here is the link

You can see all results at the end of the pool, so Arena Net can check it up too.

Please please please share word of this so we can give valuable data in an organized form to them.Thank you!

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@Boingo.5264 said:I don’t post much, but this has got me so annoyed. To the people who are defending this type of RNG delivery method for mount skins I ask you this: In how many other areas of your life would you be willing to put up with this? Would you buy a car not knowing which one they will ultimately give you? Are you OK buying EVERY car on the lot, just in hopes of getting the one that you actually like? And after buying all of those cars, would it then be reasonable to justify your purchase by saying, “Well, I guess the dealership has to make its money somehow.” This is WRONG, and I guarantee you you would not put up with this sort of thing in almost any other consumer environment.

As many have already said, this could have been avoided by just allowing people to buy the skins that they wanted.

THIS POST RIGHT HERE. If you lack the forsight and understanding to see why this type of behavior is unacceptable and disastrous not just for Guild Wars 2 but for the gaming industry as a whole, YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM. If you do not understand why this behavior encourages lazy game design, YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM. If you are ok with getting less and support companies taking advantage of their player base because by some twisted logic you think this is the only way for them to make a living!!! YOU. Yes YOU. Are part if the problem.

P.S - Thank you Boingo for telling it like it is

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@Zoltar MacRoth.7146 said:

@JustTrogdor.7892 said:

@"Gaile Gray.6029" said:Sorry for the delay. Things went a little weird and I thought I had a disappearing thread here. All should be fine now.

As far as whether we need more feedback: As long as players want to offer their thoughts, we want to read them. I have already submitted a detailed report on the feedback, including many areas of concern, individual and aggregate suggestions, and much more. I've also had conversations on the topic, as well. So this is "in the system" so to speak, but anyone else who wants to share their thoughts is more than welcome to do so!

Given how much this has blown up and in the interest of transparency, perhaps you would consider posting your report here for all those concerned to see? It might go a way to let those concerned know what has been submitted to Anet for review. Also I looked at your posts and can't find the one from earlier where you said you sent an Anet wide message including feedback. What happened to that post? Thanks.

This is just my 2c, but I don't think that's a good idea. I'm not sure transparency is even warranted. A speedy and reasonable solution would be preferred, but there are many reasons not to disclose the inner workings of the company, especially for our own benefit. For one, it would open a can of worms as players dissected every word and wasted Gaile's time with questions, time better spent on her pushing our feedback back to anet. I know it's a hard situation but we have to give her some faith here and see what happens. Sometimes it's better not to look behind the curtain.

As big as this has gotten I disagree. In my 4 plus years of playing GW2 this is the biggest issue I have seen regarding the game and how it goes forward (I wasn't around for the ascended thing). I feel now is the time for transparency more than ever given all the bad press this issue as gained after a very successful PoF launch. Customers that feel strongly about this issue should be shown what is being reported back to Anet decision makers. I don't really have a horse in this race as I am not a mount fan to start with. However, customers that do care about this issue may want to see what is being reported back to those that make the decisions.

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I'm, with many others, are very disappointed in this last update. RNG can be fun, but not with the current mount skins and how it's acquired. Guild Wars 2 is currently lacking fun ingame rewards. It would have been a much more fun experience if these mount skins were used as rare like random drops from upcoming raid bosses and upcoming fractals, and maybe random drops from upcoming world bosses. And maybe some for some collections for those who don't like that sort of system. But I think it is highly needed with the current state of the game with only trash blues and greens dropping. If they were also account bound and not sellable in the trading post or tradeable to other players, would make it so you had to do content and not just buy new skins for gold. It would give the content high motivation and replayability, witch PoF now lacks alot. Sure I'm happy to spend some gems in the gem store from time to time but these new 30 mount skins SHOULD have been fun new ingame rewards, not gem store skins, and absolutely not from random lootboxes from the gemstore. Maybe fun special mount skins, like halloween, wintersday and other special skins should be in the gem store, but not the kind that are currently in the lootboxes, that kind should be earnable ingame through fun loot in ingame content like raid drops, fractal rewards or world bosses. As I said, the game lacks fun loot and motivation and all friends I know stopped playing because of it.

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Let's be objective.

Not all systems with randomness, uncertainty, and risks are gambling. In this case, eventually the chances reach 100%, or absolutely certain that you'll get the mount skin you want.

Nevertheless these systems do exploit certain psychological disorders, like those with OCD or collector's syndrome. These people will throw their entire life savings, even knowing they're not getting parity value or ROI compared to how much they spend, even knowing they're being exploited and cheated.

Thus on the flip side, these types of system feel exploitative, predatory, and unfair to their customers, and most sane people should and will protest these unethical business practices. When better alternatives can be just as profitable. In this particular case, the amount spent by the buyer is finite and upper bounded at a low-ceiling. So there is doubt how much extra profit they would get from a pseudo-gambling system.

Even if they want to keep the RNG system, they should provide alternative methods to acquire these mount skins--preferably in the game via some non-monetary effort. Maybe as low-chance loot or another collection quest.

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I highly suggest you to watch this video

This guy is so right, plus there are some really great suggestions in the video.

Anyway I have one suggestion myself. On one hand I absolutely hate this RNG thing but on the other hand I really like that the mounts in that box are kind of rare due to high pricing and low chances to get what one wants. That brings me to my point. Why not to make a few skins that are obtainable in game proving player's dedication to the game.

Just an example1000 legendary bounties tokens = some sick-looking mount skins10,000 trade contracts = some good looking skins (but not that good)One hell of a difficult collection = legendary gryphon mount skin (a dragon-like look would be nice btw. - and it might go well with lore and possibly with LS4)

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I quite like the random aspect of the mounts, If they'd been sold individually then everyone would be on the same astral griffon. Also you can see whats available with glider skins you think quite like this one, maybe hold out for a better one, oh no the next batch are worse and the one I quite liked has gone and then wait 6 months etc.in terms of price 400 gems seems pretty fair given the dye options, if you don't like it that much you can dye it like crazy and its completely different. One part I don't like is that you cant choose the mount. Bought 2 got a griffon and a flatfish thing ( why do they all look the same?), as a wvwer I doubt I'll bother with griffon unless I can unlock it with wvw tokens of which I have loads and loads of siege and nothing to spend them on cough. 3rd go got giant rabbit of my dreams so happy customer. But.I would prefer the boxes by mount and the skins graded rare etc on the 'chance system'.

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I don't thin ArenaNet is really worried. This post is only to have a wall where the people release their madness. If you really want to know the people opinion, this might be a poll/survey with public results!

In my humble opinion, I don't like how ArenaNet care about the economy. How do you explain the fluctuation of 50% of the exchange rate gems <-> gold? Did you really think about that? All the changes you introduced yesterday created A HUGE inflation in Guild Wars economy. Is really frustrating read some post from Arena Net people saying: "We had originally intended that you should be able to change the sigils in the same way as runes for armor (so we had thought of it for everyone out there who thought we forgot :) ). However, when we started our economic impact analysis it became clear that we needed to do a deeper investigation to assess potential risks we had not previously foreseen. The investigation is currently ongoing."

Quoting this topic: https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/68vw84/flashpoint_devs_here_ask_us_anything/dh1po09/

After read that answer, is like you are making jokes to the people who invested many hours or usd in your game, and then one day, you just play with the economy like that.

I don't mind the mount skins, but I really cares about the game economy. I used to say that GuildWars2 was a really serious game in this area. For the moment, and the recent changes, I don't think I will continue thinking like that.

Cheers. Btw, first time posting in the forums. I wanted more people get my point of view of this topic.

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I'll post what I posted on Reddit

this mount gate scandal could be solved in many ways.

  1. Drop the price. Make them tradable. Make it so the duplicates could be sold on the Trade Post. Loot boxes cost 250 gems.

  2. Make it more expensive 700-800 gems but let the player base choose there skins. Or 500 gems and you choose a random skin from a mount you want.

  3. Split them have some in the cash shop and make some for achievement hunting. Give us a pvp/wvw reward tracks to grind out to get them. Add them to the collection panels and explore Tyria to allow players to collect them like legendary weapons.

These 3 options above would please me. And for the love of God remove the 9,600 gems for all 30 £102 for all of them.

I also think many are missing some points. Anet have been testing the player base with the Loot Box system for years. First the BLC and the keys. Then they add some very shiny skins I'm the BLC's this was the start and now this. They knew mount skins would be popular so they took the easy route.

Also stop attacking Devs it's not them. They have made a great game. I for one have some amazing moment's in the game they created. It's the publishers taken the easy way out.

At the end of the day it's a skin a mount skin it's not game breaking but it's still a skin and people care about these things. But to see some reactions it's mad.

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Dear Anet,

I rarely post on forums but you have motivated me to do so. I have bought all of your deluxe expansions and purchased gems freely and happily as I, overall, enjoy your product. However there is a time and a place for every company when your efforts to maximize your profits comes at the cost of a great degree of disgust and revolt from your fanbase. I think this system is obscene. Make beautiful, even expensive, mounts and we will ourselves selectively purchase them.. but I've already seen too many people screwed over by this grotesque money making scheme. Calling this "adoption" is absolutely absurd, whoever came up with that idea should be fired. Adopting an animal is an act of love and respect, your RNG adoption of mount skins is an act of greed and blindness.

Thanks!

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I just realized that, while I have been spending time in this thread and commenting, I have yet to give an actual suggestion other than 'don't keep it randomized'. So here's my contribution:

I get that the Trading Post would be an iffy thing when it comes to exploitation, especially if you keep the account-bound drop nature (imagine someone making sure they get everything except the expensive ones: the only drops they'd have left would be those most desired skins). The only way out of this would be to make them not account-bound, which so far has been a redeeming (if necessary, in its current form) part of the experience. That would also mean crafting drop tables, resulting in a lot more frustration over the rare skins, etc. This might not be the best way.

Putting them all up separately in the Gem Store would be interesting, but I also get how that defeats some of the purpose. For some players, the random nature is not a turnoff at all, and they're having fun with this. Others just want them all (and some of them now have them all). The biggest 'problem' is the people (like me) who want a few skins, and who don't want them randomly dropped because it's frustrating and I, for one, can't afford it.

That said, I seem to remember from my Halloween package that they were dropped into my inventory first, like minis. I then added them to my 'account wardrobe'. I'm not sure how much of what has already been bought can be turned back, but theoretically, you could put the bought skins back in the inventory so people could choose whether to add them again or:What I would like to suggest is the possibility of having someone at the stables who will exchange two unused skins for one chosen skin. It would make the 'price' of choosing a skin be 800 gems, and I can say I would be alright with this (not to mention, if you get really lucky (which I usually don't, but hey, you have people) you might get the skin you want from one of the actual contracts already).Theoretically, you could even make it so the 'price' for one of the fancier skins, like the Starbound Griffon or the fiery mounts, would be three unused skins (so 1200 gems). You might want an opinion on the fairness of this deal from someone else, though, considering those skins don't appeal to me much, so I'm not representative for what their value would be if they could be chosen.

Good luck with the entire situation, and I hope it will get resolved.

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