In-game gambling and time-consuming farming forced me to stop playing this game

[Zaklex.6308]

First off, to the OP, the Black Lion Chests are not new, they've been around forever, secondly, I call BS on anyone that blames the game or the boxes for causing addition. Most people have heard of mind over matter, well that applies to almost anything...and there's something else that goes with it, mind over mind, which is knowing your limitations, knowing how to control yourself and don't fall into any traps, but I realize not everyone is that strong-willed. So I suggest to those that have problems like this to do an experiment, and it will take hard work...if you're not familiar with the original Star Trek, go watch some episodes that Spock was the featured character, then notice how they controlled emotions. That's what you need to work on, becoming unemotional...aka controlling your emotions to the point where your mind is in control of your mind...it's possible and it works.

The true definition of gambling includes that you might end up losing...as long as you are always winning then you're truly not gambling.

[Obtena.7952]

Gambling is just another way to say "gaming" ... and guess what we play here ... a game. Seriously, go check out the meanings. You are wagering your time/money to do something with an uncertain outcome every time you play this game. That's what gambling is.

The funny part is that people have to SPECIFY a certain thing in this game to vilify it, simply to justify their own morality. You don't like gambling? I hope you don't play any more games then, otherwise you're just a hypocrite.

[Arzurag.7506]

The only thing I hate is farming/grinding but this is not what your post is about.Sadly, in terms of the rng-lootbox-gambling-debacle, there´s only one to blame and everyone knows that person very well due seeing its face every time one looks into a mirror.

[Krumnoltzwitsky.8971]

@Urud.4925 said:Just a curiosity Krum: is GW2 the only MMO that gave you this addiction? Or more than other MMO you played?The lack of sleep and some general addiction that keeps stealing your time from other things to do (going out for a beer, cleaning better your house, cooking something more elaborate, etc) is something that I always experienced with MMOs, sadly :/However I never bought loot boxes in any MMO. I do buy mounts, skins and other assured items. But I don't buy anything that has a chance to give me what I like.

This is the only MMO that I've ever played so far. I've never gambled with anything in any other game before, as prior to playing GW2 I used to only play strategy games like Command & Conquer, StarCraft, WarCraft (Not WoW), and some FPS like Half-Life etc.

[Krumnoltzwitsky.8971]

To everyone dissing me saying that I'm not taking personal responsibility for my actions, you're wrong. I chose to start down the path of buying the BL chest keys, and for a while I kept choosing to do that again and again even though by then I knew that it was gambling, because I had a problem with it that at the time I didn't have the self-control to stop. It's personally taken me uninstalling the game to stop myself from doing that, and as far as I'm aware, stopping myself doing that is supposed to be a good thing, even if it takes such a drastic action as uninstalling the game. The main reason that I posted this thread is because as I commented above, this is the first MMO I've ever played, so I literally had no idea what to expect in terms of gameplay and content etc. I didn't expect there would be certain things in the game like the loot boxes, and I wanted to know if others had had similar issues with this or if this was just an isolated case.

To those saying that Anet has to get revenue somehow, you're right. Every company that develops games has to make revenue somehow. I agree. Whether or not their choices for how to get said revenue are ethical or not is another question.

[BeardedVagabond.8136]

My Friend made a Youtube Video about the loot boxes in Guild Wars 2 and I did not know he was at the point of it being financially hurting him. He won't admit it, but he is a Gambling addict and his video actually put a different perspective on it for me.
He always said, " he felt it was his duty to pay for the free content that they give us". He finally came to the realization that Anet genuinely does not care, and they will continue to play into peoples demons. He now is fighting with either uninstalling the game, because he knows he will drop too much money. But he also does not want to uninstall because he has been playing Guild Wars for so long. This came about when he bought two Mount Licenses and got the skins that are LITERALLY the same as Vanilla but has more dye channels. The Gems store should not be endgame.The sad thing is, no one will care because it is not you. Unless it is people you care about or yourself, nothing will change. It is a shitty very shitty tactic companies use, and I hope for the day it becomes illegal.

[Mrs Lana.2506]

Yes, it is part self-control (which OP has admitted to and accepted the responsibility). BUT if the items weren't there in the first place there wouldn't have been an issue. It's not "all the blame resides with this party", it's actually "well yeah, both sides are to blame". The game industry has been preying on it's customers for a long time, and while there is personal responsibility to not gamble, there has been next to no backlash from communities for the gambling boxes - until BF2 and the mount skin controversy.

For the record I have bought maybe a handful of keys max from the gemstore with actual cash - I did not get addicted, and I stopped. I have not bought a single mount box and I 1,000% absolutely REFUSE to give Anet any more money. Any company that preys on their own customers deserves to bankrupt. Especially EA.

I've been playing since release and haven't ever been addicted to the BLCs, but I can completely see how it would be addicting. My views were that if something was locked in the BLC then I wouldn't get it, and I've been fine with that. But to those who think that "it's only cosmetic" seriously, get your head out of your ass. If it was "only cosmetic" then why do we have the need for character customisation? Why do NPCs look different? Why does the game even have textures or colours? "It's only cosmetic" is the lamest bullshit excuse I have ever seen. Try running around with ONLY the starter skins. No effects, no auras, no backpack, no weapon transmutes. You may not realise it, but by saying "it's only cosmetic" you are devaluing the artists of the game you vehemently defend, and you are 100% supporting gambling being advertised in a game rated for kids. Endgame in this game IS cosmetics. If you seriously think that it's "only cosmetic" then you should play nothing but pong.

@"Nick Lentz.6982" said:My Friend made a Youtube Video about the loot boxes in Guild Wars 2 and I did not know he was at the point of it being financially hurting him. He won't admit it, but he is a Gambling addict and his video actually put a different perspective on it for me.
He always said, " he felt it was his duty to pay for the free content that they give us". He finally came to the realization that Anet genuinely does not care, and they will continue to play into peoples demons. He now is fighting with either uninstalling the game, because he knows he will drop too much money. But he also does not want to uninstall because he has been playing Guild Wars for so long. This came about when he bought two Mount Licenses and got the skins that are LITERALLY the same as Vanilla but has more dye channels. The Gems store should not be endgame.The sad thing is, no one will care because it is not you. Unless it is people you care about or yourself, nothing will change. It is a kitten very kitten tactic companies use, and I hope for the day it becomes illegal.

There is no reason to keep playing something you know will cause you to lapse into an addiction purely because you've already played it a lot. If he can't control himself I would encourage him - as his friend - to uninstall. There is absolutely no pressure on any customer to keep paying for content for other customers. There is 100% pressure on the devs to make items worth buying to support the game. If the devs don't come out with things that are worth sinking money into then they won't make a profit. That's on them.

Belgium, USA and Australia are all looking into it being gambling. I know Hawaii issued a statement saying they were going to look into creating laws and regulations for it, so there is hope.

[Grampybone.3716]

Maybe Arenanet should introduce another purchasable currency for BL Chests only. A currency that is focused on player key spending behaviour and making them aware of spending their keys.

A type of currency that can be converted to gems once a player is done with those chests.I remember the warnings I received in GW1: You've been playing for one hour. (Take a break? or there's 23h more to go :).

Add a warning for the chests, make people aware they're spending alot of keys at a time/spending alot of money in purchasing them.

That is all ArenaNet can do. The chest system isn't a crime. There's no way you can win a big prize and buy a Ferrari. It's simply goodies, goodies you want SO BADLY at that moment and soon forget about it once you have them, looking for the next kick/fix.

[Prototypemind.4026]

@"Yamazuki.6073" said:If people want to oversimplify "gambling" down to three very basic things; luck, random, risk, then it means you're always gambling. Each day that you live there are risks involved, and how your days go is purely random and based on chance/luck. The word gambling may as well have no meaning in today's world. Kind of like how the labels troll, or white-knight devolved into words to use when someone simply disagrees with you, gambling is now a word you just throw around when ever there's something random you don't like.

Something to consider, loot boxes, dlcs, etc are a consequence due to consumers not wanting to pay more for their entertainment. Games always had an extremely high value per hour of entertainment (even socially) compared to going out to the movies, a bar, etc. Consumers didn't want to pay more for their games, even though they were fine paying more for their other luxuries. Executives ended up finding ways to get more out of consumers while keeping the upfront cost of games the same. As a result we have dlcs, micro-transactions, loot boxes, pay to win, etc. It seems consumers were expecting for games, and cosmetics, to for ever remain 60$ and free for an eternity while still expecting games to evolve and for quality to increase. Just look at how people complain about a skin costing 15-20$. They demand all this be included in the ~30$ expansion.

Many seem to like throwing around the idea corporations are greedy, but how are consumers any different? Corporations want the most cash they can get for the service they offer, while consumers want the highest quality service for as little as possible. The end result is both groups trying to hold onto money.

That's really not the case, though. Companies use RNG boxes because people will on average remain likely to spend more on many smaller transactions than they will on one large one. If you get people paying $1.00 or so a pop for a chance at something while also not revealing what the rate is for the prize that they're after they're going to spend more money than if you just put said item up for direct sale. ANet and every other company that uses these boxes tend to be profitable without them; it's always easy to see that lots of players spend when new cosmetics and items drop in the gem store. These boxes exist solely because they play on people's tendency to spend more on microtransactions and because it's easy to get almost anyone to fall into the gambler's fallacy of thinking they're due for a win for a least a short amount of time.

There is a reason that China not only is moving to force that drop rates for all items in all gambling/RNG boxes be displayed, but also requiring that all items that come from them have a means of being earned directly in game--and that doesn't mean being able to buy them for gold from other players. It's a predatory practice, and pretending that it's not is just disingenuous. Let's not pretend either that ANet couldn't make money hand-over-fist by selling all those items directly at a set price.

I also wonder if the players here who think it's no big deal will care if it remains blind RNG for EU/NA while in China rates are displayed and players can earn all the RNG items over time by playing with no worry of spending cash and not getting what they were after to begin with. I doubt most here or in other titles will shrug it off so easily when those changes go into place, but I guess we'll see.

[mauried.5608]

Would people be happier if GW2 was a sub based game like WOW, but BL chest keys were given away for free by vendors?Then its not gambling, but you end paying more to play the game.

[Laila Lightness.8742]

@"Miss Lana.5276" said:Yes, it is part self-control (which OP has admitted to and accepted the responsibility). BUT if the items weren't there in the first place there wouldn't have been an issue. It's not "all the blame resides with this party", it's actually "well yeah, both sides are to blame". The game industry has been preying on it's customers for a long time, and while there is personal responsibility to not gamble, there has been next to no backlash from communities for the gambling boxes - until BF2 and the mount skin controversy.

For the record I have bought maybe a handful of keys max from the gemstore with actual cash - I did not get addicted, and I stopped. I have not bought a single mount box and I 1,000% absolutely REFUSE to give Anet any more money. Any company that preys on their own customers deserves to bankrupt. Especially EA.

I've been playing since release and haven't ever been addicted to the BLCs, but I can completely see how it would be addicting. My views were that if something was locked in the BLC then I wouldn't get it, and I've been fine with that. But to those who think that "it's only cosmetic" seriously, get your head out of your kitten. If it was "only cosmetic" then why do we have the need for character customisation? Why do NPCs look different? Why does the game even have textures or colours? "It's only cosmetic" is the lamest kitten excuse I have ever seen. Try running around with ONLY the starter skins. No effects, no auras, no backpack, no weapon transmutes. You may not realise it, but by saying "it's only cosmetic" you are devaluing the artists of the game you vehemently defend, and you are 100% supporting gambling being advertised in a game rated for kids. Endgame in this game IS cosmetics. If you seriously think that it's "only cosmetic" then you should play nothing but pong.

@"Nick Lentz.6982" said:My Friend made a Youtube Video about the loot boxes in Guild Wars 2 and I did not know he was at the point of it being financially hurting him. He won't admit it, but he is a Gambling addict and his video actually put a different perspective on it for me.

He always said, " he felt it was his duty to pay for the free content that they give us". He finally came to the realization that Anet genuinely does not care, and they will continue to play into peoples demons. He now is fighting with either uninstalling the game, because he knows he will drop too much money. But he also does not want to uninstall because he has been playing Guild Wars for so long. This came about when he bought two Mount Licenses and got the skins that are LITERALLY the same as Vanilla but has more dye channels. The Gems store should not be endgame.The sad thing is, no one will care because it is not you. Unless it is people you care about or yourself, nothing will change. It is a kitten very kitten tactic companies use, and I hope for the day it becomes illegal.

There is no reason to keep playing something you know will cause you to lapse into an addiction purely because you've already played it a lot. If he can't control himself I would encourage him - as his friend - to uninstall. There is absolutely no pressure on any customer to keep paying for content for other customers. There is 100% pressure on the devs to make items worth buying to support the game. If the devs don't come out with things that are worth sinking money into then they won't make a profit. That's on them.

Belgium, USA and Australia are all looking into it being gambling. I know Hawaii issued a statement saying they were going to look into creating laws and regulations for it, so there is hope.

Its not addicts fault its companies fault for putting content wich can be abused this way

[Laila Lightness.8742]

@Krumnoltzwitsky.8971 said:To everyone dissing me saying that I'm not taking personal responsibility for my actions, you're wrong. I chose to start down the path of buying the BL chest keys, and for a while I kept choosing to do that again and again even though by then I knew that it was gambling, because I had a problem with it that at the time I didn't have the self-control to stop. It's personally taken me uninstalling the game to stop myself from doing that, and as far as I'm aware, stopping myself doing that is supposed to be a good thing, even if it takes such a drastic action as uninstalling the game. The main reason that I posted this thread is because as I commented above, this is the first MMO I've ever played, so I literally had no idea what to expect in terms of gameplay and content etc. I didn't expect there would be certain things in the game like the loot boxes, and I wanted to know if others had had similar issues with this or if this was just an isolated case.

To those saying that Anet has to get revenue somehow, you're right. Every company that develops games has to make revenue somehow. I agree. Whether or not their choices for how to get said revenue are ethical or not is another question.

Its not your fault you are the victim here its all anets fault for using your addiction

[Ceridwen.6703]

Welp, OP, I've known people to quit a game due to addiction issues - and that's addiction to the game itself, not just any gambling therein. A lot of people here in this game could be addicted and not even realise it, and again, not necessarily with links to any loot box forms. Your post could help those people realise they have an issue, and prompt them to do something about it, so I actually think you're awesome to post about your experience in such an open manner. I hope you stay strong and do well. :)

Games could do a lot more to address issues like this, for example putting a limit on how many boxes can be purchased per week, per month, whatever. Don't be up in arms and say "No! How ever will they make money now?!" because the health and welfare of players as fellow humans, not commodities should be more important. Besides, those boxes aren't the only things in the store. Also, games could give a little prompt, "You've been playing for X hours. Take a break!" - just like the original Guild Wars did. Would it even be possible to put non-exploitable group save points in Raids?There's lots more things that could be done, but that's what I have off the top of my head right now.

The rest of the player base could also be rather more thoughtful towards fellow guildies/players when it comes to time demands, gear demands and so on. We should all be more supportive of each other's "real" lives (and I'm not saying people aren't supportive already, because they really are - lots of guilds specify this in their "about us" talk). It makes us a better community to do so.

With all that said, I think I have some real life calling me. Time to get off this forum! <3

[Ayumi Spender.1082]

@"Taygus.4571" said:Every single MMO is like this. Even many mobile and certainly Facebook games.

They're designed to make you feel you "have to have something/do something" , "spend money" or seven stat online a long time.It's an online game problem.

If you don't have the willpower to resist that, then you should play single player offline games only.

I've been hiding away from offline games all of 2017 since getting into GW2, but I've heard so many games have these lootbox crap in them now so... you're also not safe from these.

[Urud.4925]

@Krumnoltzwitsky.8971 said:This is the only MMO that I've ever played so far. I've never gambled with anything in any other game before, as prior to playing GW2 I used to only play strategy games like Command & Conquer, StarCraft, WarCraft (Not WoW), and some FPS like Half-Life etc.

:) I also played C&C, War/StarCraft. Anyway, I'm sorry that you experienced this addiction. Loot boxes are indeed common on several MMOs. I've heard of people that spent 2k dollars in 1 single week, during an event in the last MMO that I played. 2 thousand dollars. Just to have a chance to enchant a helm to the max (and he failed).200$ is also a good amount, but there are people that are unable to stop even after 2k. See it from the bright side. You understood when it was time to stop at least.

Best thing to enjoy an MMO for me, is to avoid to be over-competitive (in most cases, paying players/wallet warriors have a huge advantage in MMOs - Not in GW2 fortunately) and simply refuse to buy any item that has chances to give you good things. If loot boxes would provide good rewards fairly/on average, there wouldn't be a reason to put them in game, instead of selling directly the skin/whatever you like.

[Krumnoltzwitsky.8971]

@"Ceridwen.6703" said:Welp, OP, I've known people to quit a game due to addiction issues - and that's addiction to the game itself, not just any gambling therein. A lot of people here in this game could be addicted and not even realise it, and again, not necessarily with links to any loot box forms. Your post could help those people realise they have an issue, and prompt them to do something about it, so I actually think you're awesome to post about your experience in such an open manner. I hope you stay strong and do well. :)

Games could do a lot more to address issues like this, for example putting a limit on how many boxes can be purchased per week, per month, whatever. Don't be up in arms and say "No! How ever will they make money now?!" because the health and welfare of players as fellow humans, not commodities should be more important. Besides, those boxes aren't the only things in the store. Also, games could give a little prompt, "You've been playing for X hours. Take a break!" - just like the original Guild Wars did. Would it even be possible to put non-exploitable group save points in Raids?There's lots more things that could be done, but that's what I have off the top of my head right now.

The rest of the player base could also be rather more thoughtful towards fellow guildies/players when it comes to time demands, gear demands and so on. We should all be more supportive of each other's "real" lives (and I'm not saying people aren't supportive already, because they really are - lots of guilds specify this in their "about us" talk). It makes us a better community to do so.

With all that said, I think I have some real life calling me. Time to get off this forum! <3

Thank you for your support. :)

Part of the realization that I had that issue with the gambling in-game was also that I'd become addicted to the game itself as well, so it was kind of a double-whammy of sorts.

I think with MMOs possibly even just that little prompt like the one that you said was in the original Guild Wars would be a great thing to have in-game. And regarding the loot boxes, there's strong talk that some countries will make it illegal or require that the game be advertised as MA or R rated (for adults only in other words) due to that content being in the game, which if that happened would definitely slow the sales of games like this and others that are marketed as reasonably kid-friendly.

[Krumnoltzwitsky.8971]

@Laila Lightness.8742 said:

@Krumnoltzwitsky.8971 said:To everyone dissing me saying that I'm not taking personal responsibility for my actions, you're wrong. I chose to start down the path of buying the BL chest keys, and for a while I kept choosing to do that again and again even though by then I knew that it was gambling, because I had a problem with it that at the time I didn't have the self-control to stop. It's personally taken me uninstalling the game to stop myself from doing that, and as far as I'm aware, stopping myself doing that is supposed to be a good thing, even if it takes such a drastic action as uninstalling the game. The main reason that I posted this thread is because as I commented above, this is the first MMO I've ever played, so I literally had no idea what to expect in terms of gameplay and content etc. I didn't expect there would be certain things in the game like the loot boxes, and I wanted to know if others had had similar issues with this or if this was just an isolated case.

To those saying that Anet has to get revenue somehow, you're right. Every company that develops games has to make revenue somehow. I agree. Whether or not their choices for how to get said revenue are ethical or not is another question.

Its not your fault you are the victim here its all anets fault for using your addiction

Do you mean that Anet is engaging in predatory behaviour by introducing loot boxes?

[Krumnoltzwitsky.8971]

@Urud.4925 said:

@Krumnoltzwitsky.8971 said:This is the only MMO that I've ever played so far. I've never gambled with anything in any other game before, as prior to playing GW2 I used to only play strategy games like Command & Conquer, StarCraft, WarCraft (Not WoW), and some FPS like Half-Life etc.

:) I also played C&C, War/StarCraft. Anyway, I'm sorry that you experienced this addiction. Loot boxes are indeed common on several MMOs. I've heard of people that spent 2k dollars in 1 single week, during an event in the last MMO that I played. 2 thousand dollars. Just to have a

chance

to enchant a helm to the max (and he failed).200$ is also a good amount, but there are people that are unable to stop even after 2k. See it from the bright side. You understood when it was time to stop at least.

Best thing to enjoy an MMO for me, is to avoid to be over-competitive (in most cases, paying players/wallet warriors have a huge advantage in MMOs - Not in GW2 fortunately) and simply refuse to buy any item that has

chances

to give you good things. If loot boxes would provide good rewards fairly/on average, there wouldn't be a reason to put them in game, instead of selling directly the skin/whatever you like.

Well I'm personally grateful that I didn't get to that point of spending that much in a single week. And I'm not usually competitive, but I found myself being very competitive in this game.

[Gilcarad.5341]

You don't have to open the BL chests (and thus buying keys). They're not account bound, so why not just sell them on the BL trading post and get some coin for your troubles?

[Laila Lightness.8742]

@Krumnoltzwitsky.8971 said:

@Laila Lightness.8742 said:

@Krumnoltzwitsky.8971 said:To everyone dissing me saying that I'm not taking personal responsibility for my actions, you're wrong. I chose to start down the path of buying the BL chest keys, and for a while I kept choosing to do that again and again even though by then I knew that it was gambling, because I had a problem with it that at the time I didn't have the self-control to stop. It's personally taken me uninstalling the game to stop myself from doing that, and as far as I'm aware, stopping myself doing that is supposed to be a good thing, even if it takes such a drastic action as uninstalling the game. The main reason that I posted this thread is because as I commented above, this is the first MMO I've ever played, so I literally had no idea what to expect in terms of gameplay and content etc. I didn't expect there would be certain things in the game like the loot boxes, and I wanted to know if others had had similar issues with this or if this was just an isolated case.

To those saying that Anet has to get revenue somehow, you're right. Every company that develops games has to make revenue somehow. I agree. Whether or not their choices for how to get said revenue are ethical or not is another question.

Its not your fault you are the victim here its all anets fault for using your addiction

Do you mean that Anet is engaging in predatory behaviour by introducing loot boxes?

Yes for this issue shouldnt been allowed to exist in first place they can talk about choice but its still an use of customers by using it so

[Emprer.7256]

I wouldn't say you were forced though.

[TheOrlyFactor.8341]

There should really be a clarification between what's a loot box and what's known as a grab bag system. In terms of skins and such, the BLC's and the mount adoption system are more akin to grab bags because you can't get the same skin/outfit twice (as far as I know; going by personal experience). You reach in, pull out a skin at random, it's yours and you can't get it again. I have to give MO credit on that. He was right there when he addressed the mount adoption license controversy in his post.

That doesn't mean it's any less scummy, of course. There's still an element of luck and chance involved rather than the choice being in the hands of the consumer. However, there's a difference between a loot box and a grab bag, in my opinion.

Well, unless someone wants to consider a grab bag a subset/offshoot/subcategory of the loot box, which I could see being argued.

[BeardedVagabond.8136]

@Laila Lightness.8742 said:

@"Miss Lana.5276" said:Yes, it is part self-control (which OP has admitted to and accepted the responsibility). BUT if the items weren't there in the first place there wouldn't have been an issue. It's not "all the blame resides with this party", it's actually "well yeah, both sides are to blame". The game industry has been preying on it's customers for a long time, and while there is personal responsibility to not gamble, there has been next to no backlash from communities for the gambling boxes - until BF2 and the mount skin controversy.

For the record I have bought maybe a handful of keys max from the gemstore with actual cash - I did not get addicted, and I stopped. I have not bought a single mount box and I 1,000% absolutely

REFUSE

to give Anet any more money. Any company that preys on their own customers deserves to bankrupt. Especially EA.

I've been playing since release and haven't ever been addicted to the BLCs, but I can completely see how it would be addicting. My views were that if something was locked in the BLC then I wouldn't get it, and I've been fine with that. But to those who think that "it's only cosmetic" seriously, get your head out of your kitten. If it was "only cosmetic" then why do we have the need for character customisation? Why do NPCs look different? Why does the game even have textures or colours? "It's only cosmetic" is the lamest kitten excuse I have ever seen. Try running around with ONLY the starter skins. No effects, no auras, no backpack, no weapon transmutes. You may not realise it, but by saying "it's only cosmetic" you are devaluing the artists of the game you vehemently defend, and you are 100% supporting gambling being advertised in a game rated for kids. Endgame in this game IS cosmetics. If you seriously think that it's "only cosmetic" then you should play nothing but pong.

@"Nick Lentz.6982" said:My Friend made a Youtube Video about the loot boxes in Guild Wars 2 and I did not know he was at the point of it being financially hurting him. He won't admit it, but he is a Gambling addict and his video actually put a different perspective on it for me.

He always said, " he felt it was his duty to pay for the free content that they give us". He finally came to the realization that Anet genuinely does not care, and they will continue to play into peoples demons. He now is fighting with either uninstalling the game, because he knows he will drop too much money. But he also does not want to uninstall because he has been playing Guild Wars for so long. This came about when he bought two Mount Licenses and got the skins that are LITERALLY the same as Vanilla but has more dye channels. The Gems store should not be endgame.The sad thing is, no one will care because it is not you. Unless it is people you care about or yourself, nothing will change. It is a kitten very kitten tactic companies use, and I hope for the day it becomes illegal.

There is no reason to keep playing something you know will cause you to lapse into an addiction purely because you've already played it a lot. If he can't control himself I would encourage him - as his friend - to uninstall. There is absolutely no pressure on any customer to keep paying for content for other customers. There is 100% pressure on the devs to make items worth buying to support the game. If the devs don't come out with things that are worth sinking money into then they won't make a profit. That's on them.

Belgium, USA and Australia are all looking into it being gambling. I know Hawaii issued a statement saying they were going to look into creating laws and regulations for it, so there is hope.

Its not addicts fault its companies fault for putting content wich can be abused this way

Its like telling some one who fights depression to be happy. Walk up to any addict and tell them to stop.People commenting with you made the decision to gamble and you should stop and its an option. Clearly do not know how mental illnesses work.It is both parties fault (initially it is the buyer) but Anet continues to feed it.

[Davin.5784]

First of all, OP, good on you for recognizing your addiction and doing something about it. That takes a great deal of strength and courage. Second, you're not alone! Third, everyone here giving their "professional" opinion and insulting the OP, you should be ashamed of yourself. Gambling can be a serious problem. If it were as easy to NOT do as some of you claim, there wouldn't be helplines, charities or entire psych books written on it.

I've spent close to £250 on keys and over 1k in game since PoF came out on RNG boxes (Mad King, Wintersday, BLC). They don't call it "Fashion Wars" for nothing :(

[Laila Lightness.8742]

@"Davin.5784" said:First of all, OP, good on you for recognizing your addiction and doing something about it. That takes a great deal of strength and courage. Second, you're not alone! Third, everyone here giving their "professional" opinion and insulting the OP, you should be ashamed of yourself. Gambling can be a serious problem. If it were as easy to NOT do as some of you claim, there wouldn't be helplines, charities or entire psych books written on it.

I've spent close to £250 on keys and over 1k in game since PoF came out on RNG boxes (Mad King, Wintersday, BLC). They don't call it "Fashion Wars" for nothing :(

I blame anet the op is the victim here and people talk of him not taking responsibility addiction is a sickness he cant help its anets fault for using his sickness too make money its not his fault