A Message About the Mount Adoption License

[primatos.5413]

So he tells players that it was a mistake but they won´t change it.. usual anet bs business ..and at least now PvE Players get how they are handling WvW since release.. is that good now ? If it were not really sad i might laugh

[tekfan.3179]

@Mike O Brien.4613 said:...

• The Adoption License is a large set at 30 skins. We stand by the work our artists put into each skin, but it’s understandable to see this as pushing down the odds of acquiring any one skin, and to worry that we might add more skins to lower the chances further.

...~ MO

Thanks for the response, but I'd like to add something in regard to this part:Could you encourage your artists, especially those responsible for the Jackalope-themed springer skin and the skin with droopy ears for the same mount, to look at the animations before you approve them? In the first case the ears clip through the antlers, in the second case the ears swing into the head of the mount...in simple idle animations. It really impacts the otherwise superb quality of the mounts your team delivered, not to mention that people may pay cash for these skins.

I wholeheartedly support your decision to cut down on the RNG in the gemstore. If you want to expand sales, might I suggest expanding customization-options? For example: Add customization-slots for saddles and the calls of the mounts. A parrot-like set of calls for the griffon could be hillarious.

On a personal note: The Cloud Corvus skin for the griffon could use a variant with a tail.

[NYG.2568]

They knew exactly what they were doing. Knew it would cause backlash as I'm sure they are aware of other game titles backlash.MO's response is nothing more than a cop-out at best, with a sprinkle of sugar coating "we won't do it again', but for now your EXPLETIVE! It's a damn shame many are excepting this response...

[Romo.3709]

Where is the Thumbs Down option for this?

[Wanze.8410]

@"Mike O Brien.4613" said:Hi,

We made a commitment to you in March 2012 that we’d fund GW2 live development through non-pay-to-win microtransactions. We try different ideas, but we always hold true to that commitment. We’ve been collecting and discussing your feedback on the Mount Adoption License, and today I’d like to acknowledge and respond to the concerns you’ve raised, and to share our perspective with you.

I think alot of the negative feedback you received in the last couple of days is based on many of your customers not understanding this kind of business model and mixed financing. Greed and Money Grab were terms used commonly to describe your practice because they only see how much they think it costs to implement a new mount skin and how much profit you make of it.

Its a vaild concern because obviously, your profit margins on these kinds of micro transactions are pretty high and it looks like an easy way to "print money".

What most players dont consider, is that this profit margin basically pays for the running costs of developing new content, like LW, new raids, QoL features, which all have to be developed by different dev teams that dont generate alot of revenue because they are mostly delivered at no extra cost and cant be covered by box sales alone.

Personally, I dont really care about mount skins, so I am greatful for any extra revenue you make through these microtransactions that funds my opportunity to play this game for free apart from the mandatory box sales.

But I also like the community a whole lot because I have been a part of it for over 5 years and it the current shitstorm, it wasnt a nice community to be a part of, to be honest. So I also appreciate that you take the time to address these issues and are working on a better solution.

I had some thoughts about mount skin monetisation that might be fair to the player base and might also generate enough revenue for you, including crowd-funding and a "Design a Mount" Contest to make sure that only mount skins that are popular will make it into the game.

I posted it on reddit. Feel free to take a look and I would appreciate some feedback, here or on reddit, either from you or someone of your gem store team to point out some things I might have missed regarding Anet´s point of view or things I didnt consider.

[Majestic.1823]

Personally i think it is fine because Anet team needs to make a living in order to continue serving us this game. Besides, you will eventually get all the mounts at 9.6k gems. I find it no big deal because it's completely optional.

[Krypto.2069]

I think one way of approaching this 30 RNG Mount skin situation is to:

1) Play the game and make gold. (This is not very hard to do especially in pve.)2) Convert gold to 400 gems when you have enough. (Conversion right now is 116 gold = 400 gems. And you got more gems for less gold pre-today's BL Sales. So just keep an eye on when converting is in your favor.)3) Buy a license and see what you get! :)4) Rinse and Repeat as needed until you get what Mount skins you want. Your odds get better every time you do it. :+1:

Silverwastes, HoT map metas = easy-peasy ways to make 100-ish gold. There is no need to spend real cash on these skins (or anything else) if you don't want to.

Cheers!

[TexZero.7910]

Dear Mike,

I'd like the content to be in the game, not the gem store.While i understand you have families to feed surely it's not out of the realm of possibility to earn skins as playable content anymore ?

[Entrea Sumatae.7830]

While I appreciate the communication, the response is still very disappointing. At this point, I'm highly doubtful I'll ever see a mount skin released I'll be happy to purchase. I'd love some of the simpler skins from the adoption licenses, but if they remain locked behind RNG I will never touch them, and I'm skeptical we'll ever get simpler, cheaper mounts sold individually when $25 gaudy monster skins and seasonal gimmick packs are on the table. I'd be happy to be proved wrong here, but as it stands the gem store just continues to be more and more disappointing.

[Canis.7451]

While I am glad to finally have an official response on this matter, it is extremely disheartening to know that you still have not addressed multiple issues I've seen brought up in the period of this outrage.

• Will future mount skins included in bundles also be available to be bought individually?Gliders and Outfits in bundles have options to buy them individually when included in a bundle, why not mounts?
• Will future mount skins be priced reasonably, and not rival the price of an expansion?
• Will you make it so that if we have not unlocked a mount we wont get skins for it out of the RNG box?Especially in the case of the griffon which is a mount some people have no interest in acquiring due to the 250 gold pricelock.
• Will you finally distance yourself from RNG gamble boxes following this lashback?

I understand your stance on the issue, but even if you are set on not removing this gamblebox (understandable, honestly, although still depressing) then why not include some of the more desired skins in it to be bought individually, but at a markup? Somewhere between 500 and 800 gems each. Because then those that got the skins through the gamblebox would have received them at a discount for playing with RNG but you would be allowing your playerbase an alternative

[Aya.6321]

Didn't they say the same thing last time the community flipped about RNG and bundles?

[Jaskar.3071]

@Kahrgan.7401 said:In summary: "Please continue to shovel money our way, I'm sorry you feel that we were in the wrong"

Story time: My roommate's boyfriend, whos never played guild wars 1 or 2, was asking me about the "mount loot box" as he saw the huge upset it created, and after talking with him he said that he was thinking about picking up the game but will not now due to this.

You push more people away with bad decisions like this. The bad press from mount loot boxes cost you more than you gained short term.

Short sighted as always.

if that roommate's boyfriend doesn't start this game because of some OPTIONAL skin-set (that admitedly is rng and bad) he is missing out all the rest of the game that is very awesome indeed and well done and so far without even a glimps of "pay to win"

i personally am satisfied that there will no further skins be on the rng-table and i m looking forward to the skins that can be purchased directly

[Wintermute.5408]

@Majestic.1823 said:Personally i think it is fine because Anet team needs to make a living in order to continue serving us this game. Besides, you will eventually get all the mounts at 9.6k gems. I find it no big deal because it's completely optional.

Fashion is heart and soul of this game. 9.6k gems is asinine amount of money for the offer. And poor Anet apaprently didn't make money all this time. Like really, they went bancrupt at least 3 times while running this game. Poor souls...

[SaffronCity.3402]

The refund of gems is not taboo. I don't understand why it's not being utilized. It happened with the re-skin of the flamekissed's original armor look and it happened when certain outfits like the Fancy Winter Outfit used to be individual pieces used for town clothing. To handle the magnitude of refunds, don't have them make support tickets, just create a npc to trade undesirable mount skins for 400 gems or a tab in the actual store, whatever is most convenient. This way everyone WINS. MO just said more skins are on the way so the refunded gems undoubtedly will be used. If you pay for rng there's no way you wouldn't pay for a guaranteed skin. The "apology" seems half-hearted because the original complaints haven't been rectified. We got an excuse not a fix. The problem persists and will persist because it sounds as though these 30 will be forever locked behind the whole concept that created this havoc in the first place. While, I appreciate the acknowledgement of the issue, the dissatisfaction and letdown very much linger.

[UncleHank.8160]

I'll keep on using my shadow abyss Halloween skins until we see what the next mount release brings.

[Fade.5904]

I personally dont mind the system but i think it would have been better to be able to buy specific mounts. Less chance of getting something you dont want or can't use.My 16 year old niece plays GW2 and obviously hasn't got very much disposable income but she bought a single mount and got the astral griffon.. nice but she has 100g in her account and probably wont ever get a griffon.Couldn't you sell random chances at each species? then collecting them all wouldnt seem such a pain.Thankyou

[PirateSpice.8735]

Thank you for acknowledging the problem and committing to a different approach in the future. However, you are still continuing this predatory practice regardless. So I stand by what I've said before. You will not get another dime from me until this stops. You could easily refund the people who have already been suckered in by this scheme, and fix the whole problem, but you're choosing not to. So I choose not to fund you any further.

I strongly encourage other players to do the same. Vote with your wallets. Send a strong message that we do not want this kind of thing in GW2 at all.

[SStelter.4712]

So... nothing changes?

I guess that's pretty much Anet's philosophy on feedback. Pretend to listen but do nothing to change.

[Aya.6321]

@Hecate.2891 said:We got an excuse not a fix.

Pretty much what we only get when we don't agree with something shady that ANET does...

[Umbramare.9156]

I'm baffled how he tries to justify this scam with "variety", while the "variety" is brought by shoving unwanted skins down players throats and either forcing them to spend 120 bucks or suck it up and live with the fact that they wasted their money on some shit skins. Just look at those skins that basically have 3 strokes of dye channel changes. that's literally the "You lost, try again!"

Giving people back their gems, reseting the RNG skins and bundling the skins in packs of 5 for 2k gems (which would be 12k gems if someone wants all of them), would be completly impossible? Yeah sure. The only thing you are concerned about is that you would make a loss with consumer friendly practice.

[Sartharina.3542]

I'm disappointed in the resolution of this issue, because the fiasco highlighted the issue of lack of in-game rewards and ability to customize our characters appearances in-game.

These mounts and grab-bag mechanic would have been perfect to allow players into getting unique meaningful rewards from PoF, allowing the gem store to be stuffed with the other two delivery options

[Adurna.3562]

"we listened to what you said and decided to do absolutely nothing about it

but we did listen"

GEE THANKS GUYS

[Fire X.5184]

yeeeah no. I will say good that you will change your ways (we shall see about that) but at the same time you can't change the system with existing license? Are you kidding me? here I will fix it for you. Make it that we can choose the mounts we want and give the gems back. Don't give a money refund just give the gems back and take away the skins. Then they can choose the skins they want and at the same time they have gems left over. You keep the money and we get the skins we want everyone is happy.

[JustTrogdor.7892]

@Fire X.5184 said:yeeeah no. I will say good that you will change your ways (we shall see about that) but at the same time you can't change the system with existing license? Are you kidding me? here I will fix it for you. Make it that we can choose the mounts we want and give the gems back. Don't give a money refund just give the gems back and take away the skins. Then they can choose the skins they want and at the same time they have gems left over. You keep the money and we get the skins we want everyone is happy.

Sound good on the surface but I am fairly sure Anet has stated that it is not easy to remove account unlocks and is on a case by case basis and may even involve rolling an account back. So that won't work.

[Phyxrgon.7305]

I want the shiny-looking griffon skin... but that's odds of 1 in 30 and my odds always drown me dead. Also we have the Black Lion RNG chests, please don't add any more shenanigans.

Really feel the Adoption Licenses are a big lost opportunity in which if it was pick-and-choose, to study what gets adopted the most... like catering to what might be the better idea/design after combing through results. Also not end up like the reforged hound skin for the jackal-- 2k gems for a single mount skin is over the top. Would have been a better idea to make reforged variants of the rest of the mounts and have them at a slightly even or lower price, like the spooky skin pack.

but meh.