What’re we losing with no sub?

[Bakeneko.5826]

55 minutes ago, Bast.7253 said:

I'm not sure about a sub but to me, it feels as though this game has gotten less and less content each year. Less development, less creativity, less passion, less support.

Boy, you should have seen pre-HoT draught.

[Vayne.8563]

1 hour ago, mythical.6315 said:

Whether forced as a set through an outfit or as a set through armor skins, it matters not. 

In which case, there are STILL far less outfits than armor sets. And it absolutely matters, whether you believe so or not. Outfits are inferior to armor sets. It was the original deal Anet made with the community. Outfits in the store, armor sets in the game.

[Vayne.8563]

On 8/4/2022 at 7:33 AM, DexterousGecko.6328 said:

I don't know, I see GW2 pushing end-game instanced content more, and it starts looking awfully like all the other mmos.

Pushing is a bit rich. They have a few strike missions. No new raids or fractals.  Made it easier to get into raids for people who want to. During which time they've been coming out with Season 1 of the living world and after that they'll be come out with a new season of the living world. They've also spent time updating the new player experience, including the start zone world bosses, which aren't hard core.

 

Anet's balance of casual to hard core has always been in the favor of casual.  I don't know about you, but I'm happy working away at the legendary variations, which even casual players can work on.  Tons of achievements for casuals as well.

I'd have been happier if the new zones didn't have hearts at all, but it has repeating hearts for pretty much everyone. Fishing isn't really that hard core either.  There is new end game instanced content, but unlike previous instanced end game content, the new stuff allows casual players to experience the fights in stories, without grouping for strike missions. This is a vast improvement for casuals over raids, which didn't do this.

[Ashen.2907]

2 hours ago, Vayne.8563 said:

In which case, there are STILL far less outfits than armor sets. And it absolutely matters, whether you believe so or not. Outfits are inferior to armor sets. It was the original deal Anet made with the community. Outfits in the store, armor sets in the game.

I wonder if the recent Water Dragon armor set in the gemstore is a sign that ANet has decided to revisit that original deal. 

[Vayne.8563]

13 minutes ago, Ashen.2907 said:

I wonder if the recent Water Dragon armor set in the gemstore is a sign that ANet has decided to revisit that original deal. 

It wouldn't surprise me, considering how long ago they said they would. And a lot of people seem to want to buy armor in the gem store, which annoys me, but there are plenty of positive comments about it. Still, count the armor sets in the gem store and the ones released in game.  It's a landslide, and not for the gem store.

[Ashen.2907]

1 minute ago, Vayne.8563 said:

It wouldn't surprise me, considering how long ago they said they would. And a lot of people seem to want to buy armor in the gem store, which annoys me, but there are plenty of positive comments about it. Still, count the armor sets in the gem store and the ones released in game.  It's a landslide, and not for the gem store.

Agreed about armor in game vs gemstore. Also agreed that it seems likely considering how many years its been since that policy went into effect.

[Ashantara.8731]

No to subscription.

A monthly sub doesn't guarantee higher quality, as other games have proven.

[Linken.6345]

2 hours ago, Vayne.8563 said:

It wouldn't surprise me, considering how long ago they said they would. And a lot of people seem to want to buy armor in the gem store, which annoys me, but there are plenty of positive comments about it. Still, count the armor sets in the gem store and the ones released in game.  It's a landslide, and not for the gem store.

They already broke it before this with the icereaver set

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ice_Reaver_armor

[Vayne.8563]

7 minutes ago, Linken.6345 said:

They already broke it before this with the icereaver set

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ice_Reaver_armor

And that looks more than a year old, so they're adding about 1 armor set to the gem store a year by that logic (except for the many years when they didn't).  Which more or less proves my point. More armor sets exist in the game than in the gem store, and more are added to the game more regularly than the gem store. It's all I'm really saying.

[Parasite.5389]

if you want a sub fee, just buy 800 gems a month and pretend, don't force your finacial preference on other people

[SoulGuardian.6203]

You... offcourse, was always going to get a lot of negative comments, and emojies over this kind of post.

 

Why people feel the need to come up with this question/suggestions every so often; I just don't know; especially when Arenanet themselves have said "Loud and Clear" they will never ever put a monthly fee on Guild Wars.

It is a free to play game and will remain so, until the end of days.

 

Needless to say that that sort of OP is just trying to really annoy the heck out of people.

 

ANet should really place a pinned post clearly saying: DO NOT start posts on monthly fees for this game.

 

This thread should, and most likely will be locked soon.

 

[Shadowmoon.7986]

25 minutes ago, Vayne.8563 said:

And that looks more than a year old, so they're adding about 1 armor set to the gem store a year by that logic (except for the many years when they didn't).  Which more or less proves my point. More armor sets exist in the game than in the gem store, and more are added to the game more regularly than the gem store. It's all I'm really saying.

I mean when you are cherry picking the one reward the former rewards director, Crystin Cox, stated would be primarily ingame it makes the game look alot better. Weapons, dyable back packs, gliders, chairs, mounts, outfits, mail carrier, boat skins, jade bot skins, toys, fishing pole skins, and pvp finisher pretty much have to be gotten from the gemstore or lootboxes.

[Vayne.8563]

29 minutes ago, Shadowmoon.7986 said:

I mean when you are cherry picking the one reward the former rewards director, Crystin Cox, stated would be primarily ingame it makes the game look alot better. Weapons, dyable back packs, gliders, chairs, mounts, outfits, mail carrier, boat skins, jade bot skins, toys, fishing pole skins, and pvp finisher pretty much have to be gotten from the gemstore or lootboxes.

Most of the weapons that are in black lion chests though are available on the tp and the rotation keeps most of them within a reasonable range. I get those as in game rewards, because though their origins are on in a black lion chest, they're reasonable enough for most people to get, as long as we're cherry picking.

[Kozumi.5816]

No amount of money would make this game any better. It's leadership issues, not money.

[Shadowmoon.7986]

8 hours ago, Vayne.8563 said:

Most of the weapons that are in black lion chests though are available on the tp and the rotation keeps most of them within a reasonable range. I get those as in game rewards, because though their origins are on in a black lion chest, they're reasonable enough for most people to get, as long as we're cherry picking.

Someone had to buy the black lion key that created those, just because you can buy them off a whale for gold on the tp does not change they were created by gems in a lootbox.  Those are not in game rewards, they are just poor gem for gold conversion method.  This similar how diablo immortal hides lootboxes behind legendary rifts?

[deadsyeren.9583]

I enjoy guildwars 2 but I admit I went back to a sub game more. I feel like I get so much more out of sub system than f2p. I can actually achieve some really cool items without having FOMO and throwing my wallet at the shop. If you are very good at farming gold then its not too bad because you just convert that to gems and buy stuff, but that's just not as fun to me. 

[zealex.9410]

On 8/3/2022 at 11:56 PM, Randulf.7614 said:

Pretty certain the game wouldn’t exist with a sub. So we are gaining the game.

Also, you don’t list sub advantages, just generic mmo tropes. That is not tied to sub, but the original design vision.

Generic mmo tropes that tbf gw2 fails to deliver on for "free" as those games do in the base game.

[Vayne.8563]

1 hour ago, Shadowmoon.7986 said:

Someone had to buy the black lion key that created those, just because you can buy them off a whale for gold on the tp does not change they were created by gems in a lootbox.  Those are not in game rewards, they are just poor gem for gold conversion method.  This similar how diablo immortal hides lootboxes behind legendary rifts?

But it doesn't matter. Someone did buy that black lion key but I still get many of those weapons for 20 gold or less and quite a few more for 30 gold or less. Why do I care if someone got them from a black lion chest.  Also, someone had to get them from a black lion chest, but they could have bought keys with gold. They could have gotten keys from a zone complete or key farm. The assumption someone had to buy that key is incorrect, though for most it's probably true. I have alt accounts that have never bought a key but have black lion weapon skins. Season of the Dragons gave out a few as well.  Some of my mount skins on those alt accounts, come from the 400 gems I got when I hit 5000 achievement points btw.  

As for other things you listed, mail carriers don't change the game, even though they're all in the cash shop. Chairs. They don't change the game. I don't think about that because they don't actually do anything.  We get every mount for free, yet there's only one mount skin in the game. But those mounts look pretty good in general anyway. You want to change the way your mount looks, it's not hard to save some gold. It's not hard to use some gems from an AP chest. It's not even hard to farm a key once a week, or farm gems for keys. Some people do.

At the end of the day, my weapon and armor skins, factually, mostly come from in game. I buy them with gold on the TP,  or I get them as rewards for festivals, or I get them as rewards for achievements, or even achievement points. I get them mostly by playing. I very rarely buy skins in game. I even get some of them from birthday gifts that come from wardrobe unlocks.

Yes the shop is there. But it doesn't affect function, just appearance, which is what most people actually ask for. And for every person who says there are these skins in the gem store, there are likely people playing who want more skins in the gem store so they can get stuff while playing less, because they don't want to do hard content, or they don't want to grind, they just want to have. This community has never spoken with one voice.

I'm against putting whole armor sets in the gem store, but we've had two in the last couple of years. There are more in the game and I don't love the gem store ones anyway, but I'm against it all the time. However, I did see a thread with some community support thanking Anet for putting that armor in the gem store.

[zealex.9410]

Non sub mmos lose on content quantity, rewards quantity variety and argueably quality, in case of gw2 also consistency, they also get more agressively monetized cashshops with argueably some very powerful qol for sale.

 

Non sub based mmos are more accesible on the other hand.

[ASP.8093]

7 minutes ago, zealex.9410 said:

Non sub mmos lose on content quantity, rewards quantity variety and argueably quality, in case of gw2 also consistency, they also get more agressively monetized cashshops with argueably some very powerful qol for sale.

 

Non sub based mmos are more accesible on the other hand.

Which MMOs, though?

Final Fantasy has a massive amount of resources devoted to its development; nearly every other subscription-based MMOG isn't doing notably better than GW2.

[Danikat.8537]

9 hours ago, zealex.9410 said:

Generic mmo tropes that tbf gw2 fails to deliver on for "free" as those games do in the base game.

They didn't fail to deliver it because they never intended to do it in the first place. That's like saying when I made toast for my breakfast I failed to make scrambled eggs.

The whole reason ArenaNet and Guild Wars exists is because the founders of the company wanted to do something different. If they wanted to make a generic MMO with all the standard tropes they could have just stayed at Blizzard.

I think a lot of people in this thread are confusing those two. Anet didn't just set out to make an MMO without a subscription, they wanted to make one that was different to other MMOs around at the time in a lot of ways and they'd still have been doing that even if they'd included a subscription.

[Southerncarl.2740]

12 hours ago, deadsyeren.9583 said:

I enjoy guildwars 2 but I admit I went back to a sub game more. I feel like I get so much more out of sub system than f2p. I can actually achieve some really cool items without having FOMO and throwing my wallet at the shop. If you are very good at farming gold then its not too bad because you just convert that to gems and buy stuff, but that's just not as fun to me. 

 

As lame as it sounds even with the sub they'd still find a way to sneak a cash shop in slowly but surely just look at wow. In wow you pay for the base game....the expansion....and a sub it blows my mind that people accept a cash shop. These companies have realised they can sacrifice the integrity of the game to make mega bucks selling mounts and armour sets and while some will quit the money they make from the players who buy cash shop items will more than cover the money lost on the people who quit. Welcome to the rot of microtransactions in MMO's.

[notebene.3190]

Naval superiority.

[Doggie.3184]

Sub isn't an issue. If they want more money they should take a look at their fashion designers and whatever weird armor system they have goin' on that's limiting them. Not many people like the outfit system over armor skins; which are rare for chest/legs, and everything they make come with such bizarre and poor design choices to top them off all the time that I can't imagine many people buying them or being fully satisfied. Oversized parts, buttcapes that are pointless/clip/stretched out, large floating shoulders, weird thigh/waist attachments, etc.

People drop a ton of money on clothing in other MMOs. I often want to give Anet money but they don't actually target my wallet, specifically. They also scrapped their 'town clothing' idea centuries ago when they coulda just started making more town-like armor skins. Metal Legion T shirt for example which is the first time they left their comfort zone.

[Sunchaser.9854]

Yeah honestly i get people want everything perfect in a game for free and people advocating for better f2p practices is always great, but i remember as a kid i always wanted games to be super f2p but the ones that went super f2p no monetization would sometimes just flat out die or bankrupt a few laters. Or sell themselves out to a worse investor who'd cannibalize the game etc. 

 

I still am not really the fan of the Living world model's monetization pretty being akin to taking scissors to cut chapters out of a book and making certain stat affixs like Viper's for condi drastically locked to being unobtainable from laurels/fractals, kinda forcing certain living world combinations to be obtained for some players.

But funding the game off cosmetics i think is what a lot of other mmorpg players see and ask for which i think a lot of gw2 players would realize if they played more than one game or mmorpg. 

 

That said, even if you want to spend money there's a pretty iffy system in place. There might be like only 3 outfits in 200 you maybe would be tempted to buy, but 99% of the time, the outfits spend their times not even available for sale. It's like a grocery store that's always out of stock on 95% of items.

 

Imagine if you went to a grocery store and wanted to buy milk, bread, and a flaming outfit and a cool flying tiger mount maybe, but mostly wanted to buy the living seasons on sale first. And you were told you had to wait 50 months of unspecified waiting without alerts to buy bread, eggs were last available for sale 10 weeks ago, and the only way to get a tiger was to spend 20$ on lottery tickets that also unavailable to buy.

Sure, gw2 is very adamant about doing things however it feels like. But i mean. a store that doesn't even offer a cosmetic product you might want more than 1% of the time is just a store that puts too much friction to spend.

 

I like that most products are qol and don't break the game missing. But it seems like in other games, whales don't typically want to have limits spent on waiting. A store that doesn't even offer the products you're willing to buy 99% of the time is

a store you're gonna skip going to 99% of the time to me. But maybe some people are different and camp it, idk if there's market research or if they just did it randomly like their advertising team's awol nonexistance. Or inventing stat selectable gear in a game with like 98% useless gear affix, and then refusing to have a personal affix loot system or more sources of untradable personal loots/ affix preference like wow etc. At least letting viper stats be able to be selectably dropped more often from HOT or vice aversa could be nice.

It's kinda silly all the other affix are 40s to craft but viper has to be 18g of 7g insignia and 10g oil for some weird reason.