Lucifer.8514

While what you're saying is perfectly true, if ANet are going to play the dictator in a top-down economy by making drastic changes without warning (something they haven't done before to my knowledge) then they risk people losing confidence in their in-game economy. There are often very good reasons why these things aren't done. In real life, a government could dictate the price of a certain item or impose some arbitrary new tax on specific trades tomorrow, but they generally avoid doing it because suddenly every business owner would eye them suspiciously thinking "are they going to dictate my prices next? Am I going to get hit by arbitrary taxes next?" So I can tell you I am not going to make anything anytime soon. I don't even see the point in playing anymore; ANet has just effectively informed me that they've imposed a 75% tax on my ascendeds retroactively, and I don't get to cancel the deal. So what kind of confidence am I supposed to have in them to treat my time and effort with respect going forward? None. And what's to stop them from doing it again, or things similar to it? Nothing.

Thanks for calling me a whiner and implying I'm too dumb to understand that the prices of certain things fluctuate. Unfortunately, not only do I understand your point but you missed mine completely (or chose to ignore it, but I don't want to assume malice even though you're being condescending). The point is that the price of this item doesn't fluctuate at all. It is sold by the merchant for a fixed price with an infinite supply and regardless of demand. A fixed price which only ever changes if ANet alter it with a patch. And I'll repeat my earlier point: the price isn't the gold. The price is the effort. I don't care if 7.5k notes cost 1g or 150g. It's irrelevant to my argument. I want a game, not a job, that's why I don't spend an hour a day crafting or flipping items on the trading post. I could, and I would turn a profit if I followed the internet guides for it, but it wouldn't be fun. As for your comparison to precursor crafting: that was communicated months in advance. I made this thing three days before the patch - three days! Do you think I would've made it if they mentioned it a week in advance? Of course not! This change is to me like putting up a new item on the store for 30$ and then suddenly setting it to 7.5$ and some gems without telling anyone, then when the people who bought it for the original 30$ and who have plenty of gems in the bank they'd have really liked to use instead of real money understandably get upset just shrugging them off and saying "too bad". Even if the gems cost as much as the difference (22.5$) they would still be justifiably upset.

The halloween green utility effect items work. I know that much... For others, I don't know.

You are forgetting to factor buying the items off the trading post, buying the research kits, salvaging 30 stacks and consuming stacks upon stacks of papers. It's menial busywork that isn't fun, isn't challenging, isn't rewarding. It's a chore. It costs time, and that time is worth a lot more than the few gold I supposedly "saved" even if you don't want to factor in "fun". I could get more gold fishing. I could get more gold doing meta events. I could get more gold doing literally anything else in the game. Why is it so difficult to empathize that I don't like my time being disrespected in this way? I'd make the 75g->7,500 research notes trade not once but ten times if I could, and I bet everyone else would, too.

I'll pay the 75g extra, thank you very much. Give me the option to. Those notes are a pain to get and you all know it. The crafting system is a pain and that's precisely why there are guides and websites to tell you how to make gold by crafting. Doesn't mean I wanna do it. Similarly, the research notes are a pain. I want my research notes, I don't want the gold.

I asked the support team to give me back my 7.5k research notes. I think, it's only fair since they didn't communicate the change earlier and 7.5k is a lot of notes! That's dozens of ascendeds! But instead of being understanding, they gave me a soulless, canned corporate response: This is just so heartbreaking. I got it literally three days before the patch. I would've waited instead of breaking dozens of ascendeds for it, and the sheer indifference with which they treated me is just mind-boggling... Edit: -FAQ- So people are saying it's 75g+2500 research notes... Well I don't care about 75g! Take it! I want the convenience of having the notes, not the useless gold that I'll have to put in another 1-2 hours to transform to notes at maybe1-2g discount. It's not time effective, it's not fun, it's just a pain! You can spend an hour crafting every day and make a good profit, because crafting is boring and people are willing to pay for the convenience. Well, I am more than willing to pay for the convenience of those 7500 research notes! Just take the gold and give me the notes, that's a fair trade, yes ? So why are they not letting me make the trade ?