Build Templates Were Free in GW1

[Emberstone.2904]

So let me get this straight. In Guild Wars 1, we could make as many build templates as we desired. For free.Using Arc, I can make as many build templates as I want. For free.

And now you're expecting me to be okay with this feature being monetized? Across almost all of my characters I use more than three builds already, and easily switchable using Arc.

I can't keep justifying this game to my friends anymore. I can't keep sticking up for it if you're pulling stunts like this. This is actively making the game worse for me. I am not dropping cash on a feature I already have, and I am not wasting gold on it either.

I don't even know what else to say. I don't even want to play this game anymore after this. I am just at a loss. Such a long-awaited feature to have natively in the game, and it couldn't have been implemented in a worse fashion. Paid. For real?

[vesica tempestas.1563]

But your OK with justifying playing a mmorpg with no sub. They are putting a useful utility in the shop that people want, buy it and support the game or don't.

Put it this way by your argument you only ever want items in the shop that are not desirable and have never been free in any game in the past.

[Taygus.4571]

l you dont have arc anymore, it's being disabled today.

[Pirogen.9561]

If template is stored on your client, then it costs ANet nothing.

If template is stored on server, then it costs ANet something. Server disk space. Disk space is not for free. One(1) template would be like nothing. But on server you have to multiply this by millions of characters/accounts. So it does add up.

OK, 3 templates are already there. The "current" ones. So 3 don't increase disk space. Extra do.

GW1 "templates" where on client, your PC.

Where are GW2 templates stored?

• If client, then "pay for extra" is a dirty money grab.
• If server, its justified. Disk space is not for free.

[SidewayS.3789]

It simple actually. They want to milk every penny from this game. Aside of this "Saga" i doubt they have a vision about this game. So they "hot pancake" now its the Build Templates, who will try to squeeze as muuuuuch as they can get from peoples. I mean,we've seen that their priority is Gemstore and monetization. Guild Wars 2 could have been so much more than an average AT BEST, compared with today's MMOs.

[ListenToMe.5130]

guys. the game is free to play.it's not sub-based.it's a business.i will happily swipe my credit card for templates.not interested in using additional software and copying and pasting stuff.

[Ben K.6238]

Builds were also more interesting in GW1, despite having less individual components to them.

Do you suppose I could pay for customisable weapon skills? No? :/

[Taygus.4571]

@ListenToMe.5130 said:guys. the game is free to play.it's not sub-based.it's a business.i will happily swipe my credit card for templates.not interested in using additional software and copying and pasting stuff.

yeah but how many builds do you have?

The people complaining have 15+ builds..some have 30.

@400 gems for gear and 400gems for traits...not counting needimg to buy character slots too.The person with 30 builds will have to spend4+4+4+4+4= 20 x400gems3+3+3+3+3= 15 x400gems€175 ...thats really not acceptable.

(Btw, I'm someone who's happy to anets build templates, I just understand why people are upset.)

[crepuscular.9047]

just buy a new character slot and roll a new toon with specific build you want, i never saw the need for myself for build template

i feel it's more for targeting those hardcore raiders who constantly switching builds for specific encounters

[Offair.2563]

@crepuscular.9047 said:just buy a new character slot and roll a new toon with specific build you want, i never saw the need for myself for build template

i feel it's more for targeting those hardcore raiders who constantly switching builds for specific encounters

Or switch that one or 2 traits manually.

[derd.6413]

gw1 > gw2gw2 dyinganet evil

everything is said so now we can close this thread

[kharmin.7683]

This wasn't answered already in one of the other build template threads?

[Tukaram.8256]

@Emberstone.2904 said:So let me get this straight. In Guild Wars 1, we could make as many build templates as we desired. For free....

This is not GW, it is GW2. GW had free templates, it had heroes, it had everything outside the city instanced, GW had a very linear story path. Different game. Sorry, but it makes no sense to compare the two games.

[witcher.3197]

@ListenToMe.5130 said:guys. the game is free to play.it's not sub-based.it's a business.i will happily swipe my credit card for templates.not interested in using additional software and copying and pasting stuff.

This game is buy to play, not free, and I'd gladly buy more expansions if they delivered repeatable content with them.

I'm all for paying to support development of the game. Right now I feel like we're just paying to support more things to pay for on the store. Where's my playable content other than LS?

[Teratus.2859]

3 Build templates per character is more than enough for a default, hell i've been making alts so long for builds I doubt i'll even manage to fill all 3 slots on every character anyway.

2 equipment slots per character doesn't bother me either.

The account storage is the only one that's worth upgrading and we get 6 of those for free when the feature comes in so.. it's hardly a big deal unless your the kind of person who only plays a few characters and has about 20 different equipment sets and builds for them.. which i've never understood the reasoning for tbh.I guess that's the price for using meta builds in everything.. eventually you get nerfed and you gotta change to another.

[sajah varel.9261]

The issue is not that it's not free is it's server side. The issue is the price. They are charging each template for more than 100 gems (how much is it ? 400 gem ?). Let's be clear, a template file for a char isn't going to be more than 32 kb (maybe 64 kb if you have more than 50 templates on a char), a template string is maybe 1 kb at most, counting equipment. If you have 10 chars it's what, 500kb maybe.

So for each additional template they are charging you 100 gems ($1.25) for 10 kb of space on the server (if your account has 10 chars). There is no version of this where 10Kb costs 1.25 on a server. Even if you add the design cost of the template feature.

That's just ten times too much. And that's if it's 100 gems. If it's 400 gems it's $5 10kb.

I wouldn't mind the whole template feature was locked under a one time price of 1200 gems. you don't need it, you don't pay, you need it you pay once. But the whole cash grab is low.

Especially when they put the templates on the server on purpose. Because if they did it locally like in GW1, it would have saved a lot of money for them and for us.

And please stop with "the game is free", the game isn't free. It paid itself with the older players (that bought the game when it was not) and the ones that have the expansions. The free part is the base game without trading post...

A free game is path of exile. GW2 is not a free game.

[ZDragon.3046]

walks down street awww snap... here we go again.

[ParadoX.3124]

It better be working day 1. I hope.

[Ayrilana.1396]

It’s funny that players who had been wanting build templates were saying they’d be willing to pay for them. Now that we’re getting them, with expanded slots being purchasable, it’s suddenly not okay. Such is the nature of the GW2 player-base I guess. “Be careful what you ask for” never rings much clearer.

I’m also slightly curious how many of those complaining actually have used build templates through ARCDPS. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re complaining just for the sake of complaining. Gotta grind those complaints out after all.

[starlinvf.1358]

@"Pirogen.9561" said:If template is stored on your client, then it costs ANet nothing.

If template is stored on server, then it costs ANet something. Server disk space. Disk space is not for free. One(1) template would be like nothing. But on server you have to multiply this by millions of characters/accounts. So it does add up.

OK, 3 templates are already there. The "current" ones. So 3 don't increase disk space. Extra do.

GW1 "templates" where on client, your PC.

Where are GW2 templates stored?

• If client, then "pay for extra" is a dirty money grab.
• If server, its justified. Disk space is not for free.

Everyone also seems to keep forgetting that Templates in GW1 didn't have to deal with the type of gear system this game has. In fact, it didn't even deal with its own gear system.

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Template

GEAR STATS CHANGES EVERYTHING. Build Templates only have to deal with Skill slots and Attribute points..... both of which are completely independent from gear. GW1 also had 4 weapon slots you could load up on the fly, and for the vast majority of builds the only necessary gear change was a spare helmet with a different rune on it.

Build slots for GW2 could do the external string thing for Utilities and Traits, because those are universal to the profession in question. Gear on the other hand is wildly different, because you're dealing with Bespoke UIDs for the item, and not just the Item ID (which there are also way too many to be sane...... just look at the TP for any one type of item, and tell me they all are the same thing). Its THIS that all the problems stem from. And NO, its not easily fixed...... and no game with a similar type of loot/gear system would fare any better.

They're going with the most viable solution to this whole situation, which is Containers that house the items in question. Legendary gear adds another layer of issues with how its Meta data has to be manipulated. While lesser of the issues, that meta data manipulation is even more complexity and validation checking thats not worth squat, if system its on top of can do something like accidentally overwrite items, or can't handle conflicts like soul binding state, mixed gear (rarity/bind rules), etc. The 1:1 relationship to the slots wholesale avoids this problem, and the containers make a framework to address a whole set of items as a single bundle. I addressed this in a thread years ago about how to handle Per-Character gear set recycling, using a quirk of the existing gear system to create a "left to right" and/or "Load Order" priority. But it still requires you have all the gear you need on that character, and gets stored in the gear panel rather then the inventory.

Trying to make One gear set active across multiple characters is an entirely different problem, and would need something very specific to do it. And thats a new class of Shared slots that have to paradoxically both allow and deny all valid gear combinations for a Class. Making them sharable on a per-class basis is very doable, but kind of defeats the purpose. Separating the weapons gets rid of the biggest conflict for armor, but the weapon compatibility problem across classes remains. its gets very messy, very fast.... and I don't trust the Devs to simplify it enough to make it satisfactory.

I can think of one solution, but I don't believe the community will fully appreciate the compromise, and would end up just demanding more then its capable of...... Binding Template items to a special bank tab, and using that as a Pool of gear. This addresses the UID problem, since those items are now pinned down. But it also means at any point removing an item from the pool for any reason (like to change its stats or runes) breaks ALL the templates its attached to, and will have to be manually updated with the replacement item one by one. Because I guaranty, if it doesn't go out of its way to make it not-load, players will start running around with missing armor pieces and not realize it. If you deny players are that dumb, you need not look further then this forums to prove their existence..... and that is just a tiny sample of the actual population, whose average awareness is far lower.

Gear stats is the entire justification for the need of Gear templates..... But its also the reason why Gear templates are ultimately no more useful then what we're already doing, sans Legendary gear.

[AlexxxDelta.1806]

Many things in gaming were free in the 00s that aren't anymore. We live in the age of "pay to pay" model for some time now. "Playing" is just an afterthought and just there to keep the "paying" going.

And since most seem really happy to keep "paying to pay" the trend can only continue. " AnEt tAke mY mOneY NAO" posts, asking for features any older gamer used to take for granted, are pretty common after all.

[sajah varel.9261]

@starlinvf.1358 said:

@"Pirogen.9561" said:If template is stored on your client, then it costs ANet nothing.

If template is stored on server, then it costs ANet something. Server disk space. Disk space is not for free. One(1) template would be like nothing. But on server you have to multiply this by millions of characters/accounts. So it does add up.

OK, 3 templates are already there. The "current" ones. So 3 don't increase disk space. Extra do.

GW1 "templates" where on client, your PC.

Where are GW2 templates stored?

• If client, then "pay for extra" is a dirty money grab.
• If server, its justified. Disk space is not for free.

Everyone also seems to keep forgetting that Templates in GW1 didn't have to deal with the type of gear system this game has. In fact, it didn't even deal with its own gear system.

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Template

GEAR STATS CHANGES EVERYTHING. Build Templates only have to deal with Skill slots and Attribute points..... both of which are completely independent from gear. GW1 also had 4 weapon slots you could load up on the fly, and for the vast majority of builds the only necessary gear change was a spare helmet with a different rune on it.

Build slots for GW2 could do the external string thing for Utilities and Traits, because those are universal to the profession in question. Gear on the other hand is wildly different, because you're dealing with Bespoke UIDs for the item, and not just the Item ID (which there are also way too many to be sane...... just look at the TP for any one type of item, and tell me they all are the same thing). Its THIS that all the problems stem from. And NO, its not easily fixed...... and no game with a similar type of loot/gear system would fare any better.

They're going with the most viable solution to this whole situation, which is Containers that house the items in question. Legendary gear adds another layer of issues with how its Meta data has to be manipulated. While lesser of the issues, that meta data manipulation is even more complexity and validation checking thats not worth squat, if system its on top of can do something like accidentally overwrite items, or can't handle conflicts like soul binding state, mixed gear (rarity/bind rules), etc. The 1:1 relationship to the slots wholesale avoids this problem, and the containers make a framework to address a whole set of items as a single bundle. I addressed this in a thread years ago about how to handle Per-Character gear set recycling, using a quirk of the existing gear system to create a "left to right" and/or "Load Order" priority. But it still requires you have all the gear you need on that character, and gets stored in the gear panel rather then the inventory.

Trying to make One gear set active across multiple characters is an entirely different problem, and would need something very specific to do it. And thats a new class of Shared slots that have to paradoxically both allow and deny all valid gear combinations for a Class. Making them sharable on a per-class basis is very doable, but kind of defeats the purpose. Separating the weapons gets rid of the biggest conflict for armor, but the weapon compatibility problem across classes remains. its gets very messy, very fast.... and I don't trust the Devs to simplify it enough to make it satisfactory.

I can think of one solution, but I don't believe the community will fully appreciate the compromise, and would end up just demanding more then its capable of...... Binding Template items to a special bank tab, and using that as a Pool of gear. This addresses the UID problem, since those items are now pinned down. But it also means at any point removing an item from the pool for any reason (like to change its stats or runes) breaks ALL the templates its attached to, and will have to be manually updated with the replacement item one by one. Because I guaranty, if it doesn't go out of its way to make it not-load, players will start running around with missing armor pieces and not realize it. If you deny players are that dumb, you need not look further then this forums to prove their existence..... and that is just a tiny sample of the actual population, whose average awareness is far lower.

Gear stats is the entire justification for the need of Gear templates..... But its also the reason why Gear templates are ultimately no more useful then what we're already doing, sans Legendary gear.

The issue is that "additional storage". Let's be clear. It's uneeded. People needing more storage just buy a bag slot. costs the same as a template tab and holds more.Just a string that references what items need to be swapped with the current equipment is enough. That's how, for example, ESO addons do it. The interface API to make them isn't all powerful, they just have 2 API functions, one that gets the item string (which is of the same nature as the GW2 item string, it's handled by the engine, it's not complicated to use, it does it all the time, that's how your inventory works) and one that swaps gear (which is a core function of the engine, there is nothing to do here, just to call it). The addon then creates a textfile with the strings of each gear and reads it when you load the template.I mean there is nothing hard in that, that's basic coding, I dare even say it's barely coding, you just read/write a file and make a loop with several variables.

The whole unecessary equipment storage stuff is what is causing all this mess. And I stand by it, it created it's own problem just for the say of raising the price of the feature.

That's like wanting to get a car and got a plane instead, because you know, faster, better, more features, just costs more. But I just needed a car...

[ZDragon.3046]

@sajah varel.9261 said:

@starlinvf.1358 said:

@"Pirogen.9561" said:If template is stored on your client, then it costs ANet nothing.

If template is stored on server, then it costs ANet something. Server disk space. Disk space is not for free. One(1) template would be like nothing. But on server you have to multiply this by millions of characters/accounts. So it does add up.

OK, 3 templates are already there. The "current" ones. So 3 don't increase disk space. Extra do.

GW1 "templates" where on client, your PC.

Where are GW2 templates stored?

• If client, then "pay for extra" is a dirty money grab.
• If server, its justified. Disk space is not for free.

Everyone also seems to keep forgetting that Templates in GW1 didn't have to deal with the type of gear system this game has. In fact, it didn't even deal with its own gear system.

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Template

GEAR STATS CHANGES EVERYTHING. Build Templates only have to deal with Skill slots and Attribute points..... both of which are completely independent from gear. GW1 also had 4 weapon slots you could load up on the fly, and for the vast majority of builds the only necessary gear change was a spare helmet with a different rune on it.

Build slots for GW2 could do the external string thing for Utilities and Traits, because those are universal to the profession in question. Gear on the other hand is wildly different, because you're dealing with Bespoke UIDs for the item, and not just the Item ID (which there are also way too many to be sane...... just look at the TP for any one type of item, and tell me they all are the same thing). Its THIS that all the problems stem from. And NO, its not easily fixed...... and no game with a similar type of loot/gear system would fare any better.

They're going with the most viable solution to this whole situation, which is Containers that house the items in question. Legendary gear adds another layer of issues with how its Meta data has to be manipulated. While lesser of the issues, that meta data manipulation is even more complexity and validation checking thats not worth squat, if system its on top of can do something like accidentally overwrite items, or can't handle conflicts like soul binding state, mixed gear (rarity/bind rules), etc. The 1:1 relationship to the slots wholesale avoids this problem, and the containers make a framework to address a whole set of items as a single bundle. I addressed this in a thread years ago about how to handle Per-Character gear set recycling, using a quirk of the existing gear system to create a "left to right" and/or "Load Order" priority. But it still requires you have all the gear you need on that character, and gets stored in the gear panel rather then the inventory.

Trying to make One gear set active across multiple characters is an entirely different problem, and would need something very specific to do it. And thats a new class of Shared slots that have to paradoxically both allow and deny all valid gear combinations for a Class. Making them sharable on a per-class basis is very doable, but kind of defeats the purpose. Separating the weapons gets rid of the biggest conflict for armor, but the weapon compatibility problem across classes remains. its gets very messy, very fast.... and I don't trust the Devs to simplify it enough to make it satisfactory.

I can think of one solution, but I don't believe the community will fully appreciate the compromise, and would end up just demanding more then its capable of...... Binding Template items to a special bank tab, and using that as a Pool of gear. This addresses the UID problem, since those items are now pinned down. But it also means at any point removing an item from the pool for any reason (like to change its stats or runes) breaks ALL the templates its attached to, and will have to be manually updated with the replacement item one by one. Because I guaranty, if it doesn't go out of its way to make it not-load, players will start running around with missing armor pieces and not realize it. If you deny players are that dumb, you need not look further then this forums to prove their existence..... and that is just a tiny sample of the actual population, whose average awareness is far lower.

Gear stats is the entire justification for the need of Gear templates..... But its also the reason why Gear templates are ultimately no more useful then what we're already doing, sans Legendary gear.

The issue is that "additional storage". Let's be clear. It's uneeded. People needing more storage just buy a bag slot. costs the same as a template tab and holds more.^ Lol Subjective much?

[Astralporing.1957]

@"Pirogen.9561" said:If template is stored on your client, then it costs ANet nothing.

If template is stored on server, then it costs ANet something. Server disk space. Disk space is not for free. One(1) template would be like nothing. But on server you have to multiply this by millions of characters/accounts. So it does add up.

OK, 3 templates are already there. The "current" ones. So 3 don't increase disk space. Extra do.

GW1 "templates" where on client, your PC.

Where are GW2 templates stored?

• If client, then "pay for extra" is a dirty money grab.
• If server, its justified. Disk space is not for free.Why they couldn't have stored them locally, then - especially seeing how it would let them avoid those ridiculously low template caps?Yes, exactly. If they did that, it would have been harder to explain heavily monetizing the system.

[IndigoSundown.5419]

This is not the ANet that made Guild Wars.