Does Anet still have a resident economist and/or a trading post dev/dev team?

[Zebulous.2934]

Looking at the expansion exclusive relics we have now, I don't imagine people will want to unlock every new relic.  So many relics have trivial effects or inconvenient activation conditions.  If the new relics are similar to the recent batch then I would expect to only desire to unlock one relic per expansion, or none if they continue to be poorly implemented.  I don't believe significant fomo will be generated by expansion exclusive relics.

[Astralporing.1957]

11 hours ago, Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:

The way I see it, this is a one time opportunity to get Legendary Relics and future-proof all of your builds for whatever updates and expansions get launched next. 

Untrue. The Relic, unlike all other Legendaries, will not be future-proofed.

[Astralporing.1957]

59 minutes ago, Zebulous.2934 said:

Looking at the expansion exclusive relics we have now, I don't imagine people will want to unlock every new relic.  So many relics have trivial effects or inconvenient activation conditions.  If the new relics are similar to the recent batch then I would expect to only desire to unlock one relic per expansion, or none if they continue to be poorly implemented.  I don't believe significant fomo will be generated by expansion exclusive relics.

If that's so, what's the point? Anet would only bee needlessly irritating legendary holders for no gain at all.

The issue i see is that if the situation you describe would indeed happen (which would be very likely if new relics would just offer new options, without being actual upgrades), Anet would then be heavily incentivized to make the new relics worthwhile to obtain (read: better than the previous ones). And that leads straight into a powercreep scenario.

[Solvar.7953]

The fact that the recipe (and cost) for legendary relics is unknown certainly adds to the desire to craft a legendary rune.

I don't have any legendary runes right now.  But if I craft one, I get that rune + relic.  Is it worth it to do so?  I have no data on that.  But I'm feeling something of a desire to do so, because if I don't, and it turns out the legendary relic will cost 300 gold, missing out on getting it for 'free' is a bit of a hit.  Also, looking at how much it would really cost me to buy materials (based on what I have in storage), legendary rune is <200 gold.

It is probably good that Anet at least announce this - there would have been a lot more upset people if those with legendary runes got the relic, and those who did not were out of luck and had no idea that was going to happen.

But I also feel like if they had some grace period built in (eg, anyone who gets a legendary rune by say June will get a legendary relic - since presumably there will only be 1 spot in the legendary armory for relics, should be pretty easy to see if someone should get one), it would have been much better - it is more time for people to gather materials for the rune, but also adds an overlap with the relics being available so people actually have the knowledge to know how much it would cost to make that relic and if it is worth it for them to make the rune.