Is it ok to lock the Gryphon mount behind a gold sink collection.

[Nightshade.5924]

@Mitzarin.2963 said:

@Pifil.5193 said:Is fine, a 250g sink is fine for this, most vets probably have far more than this (I've sank a lot more gold into cultural armour and got much less out of it) and those that don't have that much gold can make it over a few weeks or months and treat it as a longer term goal.

That's a fair point; but the achievement and title for cultural armor doesn't have an effect on game-play, the Griffon does. It replaces the glider as a more effective version of it that also travels fast - additionally, it locks mastery experience behind gold (or real life $$) which has not been done before and in my mind sets a dangerous precedent. ONE time is OK, but when people are all like whatever, it's fine, that's when in the third expansion, we're potentially paying 500 gold just to progress.

My thing is... I just paid for an expansion. SO WHY AM I EFFECTIVELY PAYING TWENTY MORE DOLLARS FOR A MOUNT THAT IS PART OF THAT EXPANSION? 100 Gold, at most, would have been reasonable. That would make the entire mount line about 130 gold. That is a much more sane and reasonable gold sink. 250 gold is almost what you would pay for a commander upgrade... more/better functionality, granted, but it bears saying again... this is an EXTRA COST HIDDEN in the expansion. Bad form, Anet, Bad form.

[Vladish.3940]

@Nightshade.5924 said:

@Mitzarin.2963 said:

@Pifil.5193 said:Is fine, a 250g sink is fine for this, most vets probably have far more than this (I've sank a lot more gold into cultural armour and got much less out of it) and those that don't have that much gold can make it over a few weeks or months and treat it as a longer term goal.

That's a fair point; but the achievement and title for cultural armor doesn't have an effect on game-play, the Griffon does. It replaces the glider as a more effective version of it that also travels fast - additionally, it locks mastery experience behind gold (or real life $$) which has not been done before and in my mind sets a dangerous precedent. ONE time is OK, but when people are all like whatever, it's fine, that's when in the third expansion, we're potentially paying 500 gold just to progress.

My thing is... I just paid for an expansion. SO WHY AM I EFFECTIVELY PAYING TWENTY MORE DOLLARS FOR A MOUNT THAT IS PART OF THAT EXPANSION? 100 Gold, at most, would have been reasonable. That would make the entire mount line about 130 gold. That is a much more sane and reasonable gold sink. 250 gold is almost what you would pay for a commander upgrade... more/better functionality, granted, but it bears saying again... this is an EXTRA COST HIDDEN in the expansion. Bad form, Anet, Bad form.

You are not paying twenty more dollars. If you choose to "waste" actual money on it, it is your choice. The only reason you even try to use it as a valid argument (which is not) is because of gem exchange, that no one is forcing anyone to use. On top of that it's a vanity mount, not something that is needed. the gold is an in-game currency and as such can be FULLY obtained by in-game activities.

100 gold, 130 gold more reasonable? Why? You are not setting the prices, and just because you are too damn poor to buy it doesn't make a price unreasonable. I have 10g to my name atm, and it will take me months to save for it, but I have no problem with waiting for it, and gives me a goal to strive form long term. It's a vanity item, they can price it at 1000 gold if they wanted to, and it wouldn't be unreasonable. Just because you want a VANITY item and don't want to wait/pay for it, doesn't mean they should make it cheaper just for you.

THIS IS NOT an extra cost hidden nowhere. Nothing in expansions requires you to have it, and funds for it are obtainable in-game. Think before you post, even if you are just trying to troll.

PS. same goes for Commander Tags, they aren't necessary, they are just addition of convenience. I have better things to spend gold on than Commander Tag, so I never bought it myself, but that doesn't mean I am going to claim it's a bad design just because it's outside of my own personal price range at this point in time.

[Ashen.2907]

For as long as there have been requests for mounts in gw2 there have been player suggestions that they might serve well as gold sinks and revenue generators.

This is as it should be IMO.

[Zephic.3075]

I get far more mileage out of my raptor and springer than my griffon. As the griffon can't actually fly, it acts far more like a glider that can't use updrafts and can occasionally boost itself slightly back up into the air. 250 gold isn't that bad. Sell the accumulated materials that you have massed over time that you aren't currently using, do your dailies, and run silverwastes with a good group and you'll have enough gold soon enough.

The collection quests weren't too interesting, but the instanced event where you fight the Mordent Crescent with the griffon was pretty cool. I would rather have more stuff like that than collect a bunch of griffon eggs and do a bunch of random bounties on timers.

[Hammerguard.9834]

the mount looks like it breaks every mechanic introduced in the game since launch into HoT and PoF. If it's not difficult to get then it shouldn't be in the game at all.

[sorudo.9054]

IMO any mount should never be "hidden", we can get the other 4 (and one completely for free) so i think it should be the same for the griffon.250g is also a huge amount of gold, i think 50g is plenty considered it takes a long time to get it in the first place.

[Vladish.3940]

@sorudo.9054 said:IMO any mount should never be "hidden", we can get the other 4 (and one completely for free) so i think it should be the same for the griffon.250g is also a huge amount of gold, i think 50g is plenty considered it takes a long time to get it in the first place.

Every game has a hidden content and gold sinks. That's what long term goals in mmos are. Without these goals there would be no point to play the game after you have seen every boss once and played the story once. Those goals is what motivates people to keep playing, to keep replaying events, farm content, and stick around for the world not to collapse on itself. This is nothing new in any game, and it simply took a form of a mount in this game. Hell, go tell Blizzard to remove 80% of their mount content because it's unobtainable by most people due to being hidden/behind gold-pay wall (or an actual pay wall in a cash shop). This is simply method of keeping business and the in-game world itself, alive.

Sorry you can't get it yourself, neither can I yet. But you can always make it your long term goal. It is "just" a mount. Nothing really special about if you already own glider either. Yeah, it has some different features, but that's all it is, a glorified glider skin in a way. 250g is reasonable, but so would 1000g be. It is just a gold sink after all.

[RoseofGilead.8907]

It's very fair, and I say that as someone who doesn't have enough gold to pay for the mount. It's not required content, and the other mounts work just fine. So, it's fine.

[Wizler.8192]

Yes. Rich/leet players need something to do. I may never have this mount and that's ok. I have 4 other mounts that are fun and I can basically do everything I need to.

[Nightshade.5924]

@Vladish.3940 said:

@Nightshade.5924 said:

@Mitzarin.2963 said:

@Pifil.5193 said:Is fine, a 250g sink is fine for this, most vets probably have far more than this (I've sank a lot more gold into cultural armour and got much less out of it) and those that don't have that much gold can make it over a few weeks or months and treat it as a longer term goal.

That's a fair point; but the achievement and title for cultural armor doesn't have an effect on game-play, the Griffon does. It replaces the glider as a more effective version of it that also travels fast - additionally, it locks mastery experience behind gold (or real life $$) which has not been done before and in my mind sets a dangerous precedent. ONE time is OK, but when people are all like whatever, it's fine, that's when in the third expansion, we're potentially paying 500 gold just to progress.

My thing is... I just paid for an expansion. SO WHY AM I EFFECTIVELY PAYING TWENTY MORE DOLLARS FOR A MOUNT THAT IS PART OF THAT EXPANSION? 100 Gold, at most, would have been reasonable. That would make the entire mount line about 130 gold. That is a much more sane and reasonable gold sink. 250 gold is almost what you would pay for a commander upgrade... more/better functionality, granted, but it bears saying again... this is an EXTRA COST HIDDEN in the expansion. Bad form, Anet, Bad form.

You are not paying twenty more dollars. If you choose to "waste" actual money on it, it is your choice. The only reason you even try to use it as a valid argument (which is not) is because of gem exchange, that no one is forcing anyone to use. On top of that it's a vanity mount, not something that is needed. the gold is an in-game currency and as such can be FULLY obtained by in-game activities.

100 gold, 130 gold more reasonable? Why? You are not setting the prices, and just because you are too kitten poor to buy it doesn't make a price unreasonable. I have 10g to my name atm, and it will take me months to save for it, but I have no problem with waiting for it, and gives me a goal to strive form long term. It's a vanity item, they can price it at 1000 gold if they wanted to, and it wouldn't be unreasonable. Just because you want a VANITY item and don't want to wait/pay for it, doesn't mean they should make it cheaper just for you.

THIS IS NOT an extra cost hidden nowhere. Nothing in expansions requires you to have it, and funds for it are obtainable in-game. Think before you post, even if you are just trying to troll.

PS. same goes for Commander Tags, they aren't necessary, they are just addition of convenience. I have better things to spend gold on than Commander Tag, so I never bought it myself, but that doesn't mean I am going to claim it's a bad design just because it's outside of my own personal price range at this point in time.

See, you're totally wrong. It is not a vanity item. It is a mount "available" to all. Vanity item implies some rare, hard to get item like the Winter's Presence shoulder pieces. You know, the shoulders that you have to complete an entire collection of DIFFERENT tasks, most of which are resource/gold sinks, but NOT all. And before, hmm, say about a year ago, LEGENDARIES were a vanity item. With the new build a precursor system they are more of a gold sink now. And commander is DEFINITELY a vanity item. It has no "real" extra functionality, except that you can gather a "squad" now, or break that squad up into sub-squads.

But Griffons are a mount that anyone CAN BUY. They HAVE a special functionality, just like all the other mounts. And just like all the other mounts, it's a relatively straightforward task (requiring gold!) to obtain them. Griffons are OBVIOUSLY AND CLEARLY a common item. Which BY EXTENSION makes ANY real cost for them, however much, AN EXTRA COST. ESPECIALLY since we're talking such large amounts of gold. So wake up.. Shame on Anet for this blindingly obvious cash grab.

[Xbon.9086]

Absolutely fine. 250 gold, or buy an entire expansion just to experience gliding, 250 gold is significantly cheaper, plus you earn gold from doing so many things... 250 is just a drop in the bucket, a few hours in the silverwastes, I think it could've reasonably been 600~ gold and still been fine with how fast you can earn gold in the game through trading.

[Cisii.8317]

It should stay as is. I feel unique having it :D

[Disig.7169]

@Daniel.5428 said:I will definitely spend my gold to unlock this mount because I am a GW2 lover and I cannot be healed. Most people told me that with a full mastered Griffon is like you fly with a super-jet plane. As most of you already know, this mount is unlocked by completing a collection where you have to buy 10 items, 25 gold each so you have to spend 250 gold. Do you guys think it is ok to lock a new mount, with new abilities, with new masteries to level(so a bigger mastery level) behind a gold sink. 250 gold is definitley no a small price. Even raids who were not for everybody offered you the chance to unlock the mastery track just by doing one simple boss like escort or prison camp.

People are torn on this. There appears to be a wealth gap in GW2. There are a lot of people who think this is too big a gold sink, and those who think it's not a big deal at all. Personally, I think it's a fair price for people who want to put in the time and effort to get it. It's far less a cost then legendaries, that's for sure. And it's not actually NEEDED. You don't NEED it but it is convenient and cool.

The collection, in my opinion, was fun. I'm a lore person, so the whole quest had a lot of meaning for me. I loved it. But I also know a lot of people did not or just did not care. Anet has to balance these things out, and while I am super glad they gave us a lore heavy collection, I also did not think it was too hard for those who just wanted to barrel through it to get what they wanted.

I guess PvP people are kind of the ones screwed on this if they don't like PvE but again, I don't think the collection was too hard. So yeah, I think it's perfectly fair. It's an end game goal with end game stakes.

[Ahlen.7591]

The griffon was a mistake. And it's one of those mistakes that you can't take back.

[Hadi.3167]

Yes its fair.

[Donari.5237]

I'm fine with it. If it was 3 or 4K gold or even just 1K, I wouldn't be. Maybe that's just because I can actually handle 250 gold -- would be most of my wallet except knowing about the griffon gave me the excuse to sell my recently acquired jetpack skin which I'd been holding on to due to being torn between "I finally have this thing I wanted so much back when it first showed up in RNG and it might turn into a glider some day" and "this thing is ugly and doesn't match any of my characters and I almost never display backs anyway because I want to see my armor/outfit." Sorry to whoever had a buy order up they forgot to remove to get their griffon money ... :) Maybe they are rich anyway and intend to flip it, I just wasn't sure it would sell at a higher price.

Anyway I admit my lack of concern over the price may well stem from it being steep but achievable for me. And it helps that one needn't save up 250 gold to get it, just get 25 gold at a time here and there, which makes the sense of progress possible. I don't have the griffon yet so I can't say how mega fantastic it is/isn't but based on what I've seen about it, I think it's a fair price given the incremental payments.

[tigirius.9014]

I think it's outrageous really, there are plenty of gold sinks in the game, if anything they should have made most of the parts for this mount cost karma and then they'd have something worth it.

[Sorin Noroku.5342]

250g isn't a terrible investment. it'll take a long time to get from only doing daily stuff, but if you worked to make 25g a day (or even 10g), and bought the items when you could (so you don't spend it) it'll take you only 10 days to get it (25 if doing 10g a day). Even players who don't have much time to play it can get it quickly if they try. Personally I made my money through chef, looked at raid metas, and made those foods by just gathering the ingredients and posting the food when I logged off for the day. Made about 400g in just 4 days, sadly the food I was making dropped HARD...but thats the life of black lion traders... a small goal of 25g a day isn't terrible.

[Zoria.1392]

I don't like it.

With everything account bound you can't make money with crafting. I despise farming so I'm always gold starved. Gear up only to get a balance patch that costs another couple hundred gold to change everything, then a new expansion. I turn around and there is a new gold sink. Silverwastes is a real drag after the 10th time. The only place I make some gold is fractals, and it is maybe 6-10 gold.

Do I want to LFG T4 fractals for 25 days to end up with zero gold from it? No.

[felincyriac.5981]

Could've just had a normal scavenger hunt to find the items, maybe some karma involved.

[Ashantara.8731]

@Stalkingwolf.6035 said:yes it's a bit dull. You buy an expansion and than the best part ist looked behind a gold wall.

The "best" part? I think we might have been playing different expansions. The maps and story are the best part of PoF. Also, the griffon is a bit underwhelming and overrated.

[Bish.8627]

I never have gold, I had to empty my material bank to break over 250g. I do think the time and effort invested is worth the mount alone. But, I will go with it. Other games have done worse.

[Ayakaru.6583]

The game is out for about a week yet, and people complain about the existence of long term goals?

[Abakk.9176]

It isn't much of a gold sink really.

I bet that a large part of, at least, the very early people that got one just spent real money to buy gold to get it asap.

[EdgarMTanaka.7291]

Why wouldn't it be fine? Every other MMO that has mounts locks their special mounts behind some teedious and costly grind, why would GW2 be any different?Well this goes against what I usually say becouse I like that GW2 isn't like any other MMOs but what I mean is that people are getting so angry over stuff in this game that is so mandatory in other games, Griffons for example and Elite specializations and masteries. If it was a WoW expansion you would have to do quests and level up to get the new skills and get new gear to be able to continue the story. Sorry for dearailing.... Umm...

Anyway, it is not only a gold sink it is a way to keep players in-game a while longer. I for example loathe grinding and farming so I don't have alot of gold, so I assume that a Griffon may take a few weeks or even years for me to get. But I am in no hurry, as far as I know niether me or this game will die anytime soon.