Fashion wars is becoming unblanced.

[Zexanima.7851]

@"Ben K.6238" said:When the parallel is something that's been debated frequently in past, on the most specious of pretenses, it does tend to become distracting in the "lol this again" kind of way. If this is specifically a discussion about how cosmetics should be available, not whether they qualify as power progression, it's a much more sensible one.

So, on to this:

@"Zexanima.7851" said:"Providing buyable skins that become on par with skins locked behind in game rewards invalidates the player effort required to obtain those in-game skins. This also chips away at the idea of prestige in the game as form of a progression ladder and curbs the idea of 'fashion' as a form of accomplishment."

If visual appearance is intended to be a form of prestige, the gem store would indeed invalidate a whole lot of things that require in-game achievement. It looks like ANet are broadly OK with this - visuals don't help you win, so the gem store gives you all sorts of visuals.But they do seem to make a couple of exceptions at the moment for infusions and armour skins. There are a few old armour skins on the gem store, but lately they're just doing outfits there, leaving 6-piece armour sets for in-game rewards.

Whether the best/most customizable/flashiest skins should be restricted to in-game achievements is tricky though. At the moment, that's just legendaries and legendary armour. Personally, I don't use legendary skins much because there are other skins I like more.The problem is, if the skins on the gem store weren't as nice as the best stuff you could acquire by playing, there'll be a whole lot less people who'll pay for them. There's a substantial risk of the reverse happening too, if all the best skins are on the gem store so there's nothing worthwhile to acquire by playing.

What it seems ANet are trying to do is provide different types of skins on each, so you can't get the legendary VFX by just buying gem store skins, and you can't get a fancy-looking mount by just playing a lot of raids (excluding the gold-to-gems conversion of course). I'm not sure how successful they've been at keeping the in-game achievements distinctive, but given that it doesn't affect gameplay they seem to be OK with blurring the lines a bit.

In an MMO or any game really I'm going to assume it's not viewed as big leap for me to say fashion is generally viewed as a sign of "This guy is good, he's put in some time and effort" and you get to flaunt that. You go from looking like a grungy low poly peasant to a big shiny floating ball of details. In GW2 though it just means "Ah, that guy spent some money he got from the holidays on a skin." and starts to eliminates any form of prestige fashion has. Idk what anet's goal is and I know they are big for going against the grain but I'm on the side of not agreeing with that direction.

[Zexanima.7851]

@Raknar.4735 said:

@"Zexanima.7851" said:Screw me for drawing parallels I guess. Here is my refactored argument:

"Providing buyable skins that become on par with skins locked behind in game rewards invalidates the player effort required to obtain those in-game skins. This also chips away at the idea of prestige in the game as form of a progression ladder and curbs the idea of 'fashion' as a form of accomplishment."

You're implying that "fashion" can only be accomplished if you're using expensive or "prestige" skins. That's just not true. Flashy =/= good looking/fashionable

Ugghhhhhh. insert "here we go again" meme I'm not implying that

You're "technically" right that fashion doesn't have to be flashy, but that's not my meaning behind the use of the word in this case. I'm trying to say that looking flashy, having high poly count skins that look (and I'll be murdered for using this word) "cool" with good detail and vibrant colors in a multi-player game is generally viewed as prestigious. When you start giving out this same quality of gear to who ever has a dollar the prestige of those items starts to go out the window. There is no "fashion ladder" if I may be so bold as make up a term. Please don't murder me I know that's not a real thing

[zealex.9410]

I dont have a problem with gemstore skins or their quality but we should absolutely see the same quality and close to same cadense for ingame skins.

I mean just compaire any of the weapon sets we got recently to the mhthic set, i understand devs need money to warrant developing the game further but come on, i want to play a game not a platform for anet to sell me virtual stuff.

[kharmin.7683]

@"Zexanima.7851" said:

In an MMO or any game really I'm going to assume it's not viewed as big leap for me to say fashion is generally viewed as a sign of "This guy is good, he's put in some time and effort" and you get to flaunt that.To me, this also is highly subjective. Personally, I don't have this point of view and really couldn't care less how much time anyone has put into a game. It doesn't affect my enjoyment in the least. {shrug}

[b k.1648]

@"Zexanima.7851" said:In an MMO or any game really I'm going to assume it's not viewed as big leap for me to say fashion is generally viewed as a sign of "This guy is good, he's put in some time and effort" and you get to flaunt that. You go from looking like a grungy low poly peasant to a big shiny floating ball of details. In GW2 though it just means "Ah, that guy spent some money he got from the holidays on a skin." and starts to eliminates any form of prestige fashion has. Idk what anet's goal is and I know they are big for going against the grain but I'm on the side of not agreeing with that direction.

Fair observation. GW2 isn't the kind of game where there's a strict progression of shininess. (GW1 was much more so, oddly enough.)

I tend to find players behave like magpies, collecting the gaudiest and most tasteless arrays of tat they can find for their characters' outfits, so perhaps that has some effect on my ambivalence toward the situation - if players are just going to make themselves look ridiculous anyway, I'm not going to be that bothered by how they did it.

But that could easily be curated by the game artists; if the most difficult skins to acquire look tastefully impressive instead of impressively tasteless, people who are more interested in rarity won't find themselves wearing a clown suit. (Or invisible armour.)

[Danikat.8537]

@"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:What are we winning when everyone has their own idea of what is most unique, most fashionable, most cool?

That's where my thinking on these topics always goes. It reminds me of when the 7th birthday rock 'chair' was released and a bunch of the first people to get it (people who had created their characters on the first day of headstart) were all lined up in LA posing with them. Someone came along, took one look at the line-up and said "hardly any infusions, disappointing". It's a pretty safe bet the people there all had plenty of time to make their characters look however they wanted and it was true, hardly any of them were using infusions, or many shiny skins. They weren't even all using legendary weapons (or gem store/black lion weapons).

Tastes vary and you could never get a consensus on which are the best skins or how to 'win' at fasion wars, so even if they wanted to there's no way Anet could make sure all the best skins are in the gem store.

I was really looking forward to previewing the new Mythic Weapons after hearing all the talk about them, but when I finally got to see them in-game for myself I was disappointed. They're certainly shiny, and could go with some of my characters more over-the-top looks, but I don't think they're better than stuff I've already got and even if I could buy them directly for 500 gems or so I'm not sure I would.

(Although I recognise that a lot of people do really like them. This is actually the third weapon set to be released this way, and the fact that so many people are only just noticing there are unique weapon skins only available in bundles and acting like this is something Anet has never done before goes to show much much more attention this version is getting,)

But for what it's worth I'm one of the people who likes to look at other people's characters, I have a whole folder of screenshots of characters I think look really cool, and it's never because of 1 skin, or even because they have lots of flashy/expensive skins. It's the combinations which interest me. When someone has put together a look with a clear theme, or really good use of colour or something novel I've not seen before that impresses me. I don't even think about what the skins are or where they got them, unless I'm trying to figure out how they did it.

[CETheLucid.3964]

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@Raknar.4735 said:

@Zexanima.7851 said:Screw me for drawing parallels I guess. Here is my refactored argument:

"Providing buyable skins that become on par with skins locked behind in game rewards invalidates the player effort required to obtain those in-game skins. This also chips away at the idea of prestige in the game as form of a progression ladder and curbs the idea of 'fashion' as a form of accomplishment."

You're implying that "fashion" can only be accomplished if you're using expensive or "prestige" skins. That's just not true. Flashy =/= good looking/fashionable

Ugghhhhhh.

insert "here we go again" meme

I'm not implying that

You're "technically" right that fashion doesn't have to be flashy, but that's not my meaning behind the use of the word in this case. I'm trying to say that looking flashy, having high poly count skins that look (and I'll be murdered for using this word) "cool" with good detail and vibrant colors in a multi-player game is generally viewed as prestigious. When you start giving out this same quality of gear to who ever has a dollar the prestige of those items starts to go out the window. There is no "fashion ladder" if I may be so bold as make up a term.

Please don't murder me I know that's not a real thing

No ones going to murder you for being wrong. Ben said it best.

@"Ben K.6238" said:The "fashion wars" thing is a joke. You don't actually win by being more stylish.

If you have to move the goalposts for the argument to make sense, it's not much of an argument.

Have a nice day.

[Zexanima.7851]

@kharmin.7683 said:

@"Zexanima.7851" said:

In an MMO or any game really I'm going to assume it's not viewed as big leap for me to say fashion is generally viewed as a sign of "This guy is good, he's put in some time and effort" and you get to flaunt that.To me, this also is highly subjective. Personally, I don't have this point of view and really couldn't care less how much time anyone has put into a game. It doesn't affect my enjoyment in the least. {shrug}

I'm...going to say it's not subjective. As you progress in games, usually of the RPG/FPS variety, you get the nicer more appealing looking items as you go. They may be silly, they may be """"""cool""""""" but they will of no doubt be of higher quality that what you started with either "physically" through more detail and polycount or prestigiously through the effort it takes you to get them. This is not really present in GW2 anymore and it it kind of was at the start but the cash shop has been phasing this out.

[Raknar.4735]

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@Raknar.4735 said:

@Zexanima.7851 said:Screw me for drawing parallels I guess. Here is my refactored argument:

"Providing buyable skins that become on par with skins locked behind in game rewards invalidates the player effort required to obtain those in-game skins. This also chips away at the idea of prestige in the game as form of a progression ladder and curbs the idea of 'fashion' as a form of accomplishment."

You're implying that "fashion" can only be accomplished if you're using expensive or "prestige" skins. That's just not true. Flashy =/= good looking/fashionable

Ugghhhhhh.

insert "here we go again" meme

I'm not implying that

You're "technically" right that fashion doesn't have to be flashy, but that's not my meaning behind the use of the word in this case. I'm trying to say that looking flashy, having high poly count skins that look (and I'll be murdered for using this word) "cool" with good detail and vibrant colors in a multi-player game is generally viewed as prestigious. When you start giving out this same quality of gear to who ever has a dollar the prestige of those items starts to go out the window. There is no "fashion ladder" if I may be so bold as make up a term.

Please don't murder me I know that's not a real thing

You can deny it, but you're still saying skins with overly flashy designs are at the top of the non-existant "fasion ladder".Poly count has more to do with how old a skin is, rather than if it is on the shop or not. Newer items have a higher poly count, that's true for every new shop item as well as for every new ingame item like the Dragonrender helmet. It's the same for other games, too. Just look at old WoW armor that simply recolors the characters skin, and newer armor that actually is armor.

Colouring in GW2 works differently, since you can dye most gear in a vibrant color.

And if you're giving gear any "prestige" value, then it doesn't really matter if there's flashier gear on the shop, does it? I mean, you can just give "overly-flashy-gemstore-helmet" a "prestige-rating" of 0, while giving any "super-hard-challenging-linen-cloth-of-endgame" a "prestige-rating" of 99 ;) .Since everyone else that sees the ingame item will know of the challenging hardships you had to go through to get it. (Unless you just want to show off in front of newer players, as they have their own subjective "fashion ladder")

[Zexanima.7851]

@Raknar.4735 said:

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@Raknar.4735 said:

@Zexanima.7851 said:Screw me for drawing parallels I guess. Here is my refactored argument:

"Providing buyable skins that become on par with skins locked behind in game rewards invalidates the player effort required to obtain those in-game skins. This also chips away at the idea of prestige in the game as form of a progression ladder and curbs the idea of 'fashion' as a form of accomplishment."

You're implying that "fashion" can only be accomplished if you're using expensive or "prestige" skins. That's just not true. Flashy =/= good looking/fashionable

Ugghhhhhh.

insert "here we go again" meme

I'm not implying that

You're "technically" right that fashion doesn't have to be flashy, but that's not my meaning behind the use of the word in this case. I'm trying to say that looking flashy, having high poly count skins that look (and I'll be murdered for using this word) "cool" with good detail and vibrant colors in a multi-player game is generally viewed as prestigious. When you start giving out this same quality of gear to who ever has a dollar the prestige of those items starts to go out the window. There is no "fashion ladder" if I may be so bold as make up a term.

Please don't murder me I know that's not a real thing

You can deny it, but you're still saying skins with overly flashy designs are at the top of the non-existant "fasion ladder".Poly count has more to do with how old a skin is, rather than if it is on the shop or not. Newer items have a higher poly count, that's true for every new shop item as well as for every new ingame item like the Dragonrender helmet. It's the same for other games, too. Just look at old WoW armor that simply recolors the characters skin, and newer armor that actually is armor.

Colouring in GW2 works differently, since you can dye most gear in a vibrant color.

And if you're giving gear any "prestige" value, then it doesn't really matter if there's flashier gear on the shop, does it? I mean, you can just give "overly-flashy-gemstore-helmet" a "prestige-rating" of 0, while giving any "super-hard-challenging-linen-cloth-of-endgame" a "prestige-rating" of 99 ;) .Since everyone else that sees the ingame item will know of the challenging hardships you had to go through to get it. (Unless you just want to show off in front of newer players, as they have their own subjective "fashion ladder")

Whatever, I give up, this isn't worth the keystrokes anymore. I'm the wrongest wrong of anyone who has ever been wrong and I'm spouting nonsense in front of the gas station like some homeless guy who drank too much mouth wash.

[Zexanima.7851]

@Ben K.6238 said:

@"Zexanima.7851" said:In an MMO or any game really I'm going to assume it's not viewed as big leap for me to say fashion is generally viewed as a sign of "This guy is good, he's put in some time and effort" and you get to flaunt that. You go from looking like a grungy low poly peasant to a big shiny floating ball of details. In GW2 though it just means "Ah, that guy spent some money he got from the holidays on a skin." and starts to eliminates any form of prestige fashion has. Idk what anet's goal is and I know they are big for going against the grain but I'm on the side of not agreeing with that direction.

Fair observation. GW2 isn't the kind of game where there's a strict progression of shininess. (GW1 was much more so, oddly enough.)

I tend to find players behave like magpies, collecting the gaudiest and most tasteless arrays of tat they can find for their characters' outfits, so perhaps that has some effect on my ambivalence toward the situation - if players are just going to make themselves look ridiculous anyway, I'm not going to be that bothered by how they did it.

But that could easily be curated by the game artists; if the most difficult skins to acquire look tastefully impressive instead of impressively tasteless, people who are more interested in rarity won't find themselves wearing a clown suit. (Or invisible armour.)

This is more or less all I've been trying to get across.

[Offair.2563]

@Just a flesh wound.3589 said:I have bought bought mounts, outfits, backpacks, gliders and weapons from the gemstore and hereby unanimously declare myself the winner of this game. Now that I have won there is no more reason for you people to play. All I ask now is for the last player to turn the lights off before they log out.

Show me your wooden sword!

[Hot Boy.7138]

I don't really agree because I'm winning Fashion Wars right now on most of my characters and they're wearing mostly vanilla skins. I don't mind anet putting skins in the gemstore, but i wish they would go back to releasing whole armor skin sets, instead of pieces. I was one of the one that advocated for no more armor skin sets in the gemstore back in 2012, but i regret that so much. I don't think any of us realized we'd just get way less new armor set releases. If anet goes back to releasing FULL armor sets, i'll buy.

[AgentMoore.9453]

My main is a Ranger who wears the very basic leather tunic you leave the tutorial with. He has been my main for over 6 years, and I haven't changed his top because it's the closest thing in-game to how I've designed his look; I think it looks better and more accurate on him than anything else in the game, even fancy gem store offerings or end-game rewards.

If you're going to try and argue that fashion = winning or that fashion isn't subjective, I hate to be the guy to tell you that that is an opinion and that opinions are uh... subjective.

There's nothing you can currently buy that is actually factually "superior" to the offerings in-game. Easier? Convenient? Pretty? Maybe, but nothing objectively better.

I've got my gripes with this game sometimes, but pay-to-win isn't one of them.

[Zexanima.7851]

@Hot Boy.7138 said:I don't really agree because I'm winning Fashion Wars right now on most of my characters and they're wearing mostly vanilla skins. I don't mind anet putting skins in the gemstore, but i wish they would go back to releasing whole armor skin sets, instead of pieces. I was one of the one that advocated for no more armor skin sets in the gemstore back in 2012, but i regret that so much. I don't think any of us realized we'd just get way less new armor set releases. If anet goes back to releasing FULL armor sets, i'll buy.

@"AgentMoore.9453" said:My main is a Ranger who wears the very basic leather tunic you leave the tutorial with. He has been my main for over 6 years, and I haven't changed his top because it's the closest thing in-game to how I've designed his look; I think it looks better and more accurate on him than anything else in the game, even fancy gem store offerings or end-game rewards.

If you're going to try and argue that fashion = winning or that fashion isn't subjective, I hate to be the guy to tell you that that is an opinion and that opinions are uh... subjective.

There's nothing you can currently buy that is actually factually "superior" to the offerings in-game. Easier? Convenient? Pretty? Maybe, but nothing objectively better.

I've got my gripes with this game sometimes, but pay-to-win isn't one of them.

You both missed the memo.

@Zexanima.7851 said:Whatever, I give up, this isn't worth the keystrokes anymore. I'm the wrongest wrong of anyone who has ever been wrong and I'm spouting nonsense in front of the gas station like some homeless guy who drank too much mouth wash.

[Donutdude.9582]

There are far more important things for the developers to worry about that your concerns over Fashion Wars.

Honestly. What is this community coming to now?

[Zexanima.7851]

@Donutdude.9582 said:There are far more important things for the developers to worry about that your concerns over Fashion Wars.

Honestly. What is this community coming to now?

No u

[Hot Boy.7138]

@Donutdude.9582 said:There are far more important things for the developers to worry about that your concerns over Fashion Wars.

Honestly. What is this community coming to now?

Fashion Wars is one of the biggest aspects of this game. A big part of end game is skins. No one is leveling pass level 80...

[AgentMoore.9453]

@Donutdude.9582 said:Honestly. What is this community coming to now?

Literal costume brawls. Catch me outside; I'll have my collar popped. Bring your best shoes.

[Dante.1763]

@Hot Boy.7138 said:

@Donutdude.9582 said:There are far more important things for the developers to worry about that your concerns over Fashion Wars.

Honestly. What is this community coming to now?

Fashion Wars is one of the biggest aspects of this game. A big part of end game is skins. No one is leveling pass level 80...

PFFFFFFF im level 303 i dunno what you are on about. Get on my level!

[Omega.6801]

But isn't fashion, in the sense of how appealing YOUR characters look to YOU, like a personal opinion and a matter of taste? YOU win by having toons that appeal to YOU, YOU lose by having characters that YOU think are ugly.

There have been pointless fights over nothing on this forum before but this thread, oh boy...

[LucianDK.8615]

@Raknar.4735 said:

@"Zexanima.7851" said:Screw me for drawing parallels I guess. Here is my refactored argument:

"Providing buyable skins that become on par with skins locked behind in game rewards invalidates the player effort required to obtain those in-game skins. This also chips away at the idea of prestige in the game as form of a progression ladder and curbs the idea of 'fashion' as a form of accomplishment."

You're implying that "fashion" can only be accomplished if you're using expensive or "prestige" skins. That's just not true. Flashy =/= good looking/fashionable.

Well said, well said. Infact theres so many clones around with the same few legendaries that they are become quite mundane and -not- at all special. The op still is completely misstating what P2W is. You gain no advantage, and infact you are just copying everyone else.

[googel.3278]

anet: buy gems now to satisfy the pixel addiction, then complain later

[IndigoSundown.5419]

@Zexanima.7851 said:

@"IndigoSundown.5419" said:The term "Pay to Win" has a meaning. It means,

pay for a significant numerical advantage in fighting other players

that is either not available via play or is available via play but only through extremely lengthy and difficult means. In pay-to-win, a player is paying to be able to beat other players in combat. At least in the west, this practice is reviled because it is a form of cheating sanctioned by the game developer. That means the term has very negative connotations.

Attempts to stretch the term to fit a different circumstance are attempts to cash in on that negative connotation as a way to build agreement and put pressure on a game developer to change their practices. Stretching such terms to cash in on the negativity is as empty of value -- to me -- as would be cheating in PvP, via pay-to-win or any other cheats.

Complain about the cash shop all you like. Try to build agreement that there ought to be more rewards in game all you like. I'll agree with you. However, try to manipulate me into thinking something is like something else that it is manifestly

not

like, and I will believe you are being dishonest and will not support your position.

Well, curse me for trying to use effect means of persuasion. I guess I've been had. As for being dishonest all I have to so is...no u.

I'm not trying to stretch anything.

A part of the end game is cosmetics

. It's not a plus, extra, nice fancy addition but is stated as

goal

of the game as you play it. Imagine having a barbie game on my phone where I earn cloths by playing some mini game but then I can purchase just as good or better cloths from their cash shop. It's circumventing the mechanics, it's using the same cheap tactics. You're not wrong though, it doesn't cookie cutter fit the textbook definition of what 'pay-to-win' is and that's why I state it as a question and draw parallels and not straight up state it as 'ARG THIS IS P2W'. Implying someone is dishonest when they obviously not trying to be, for what reason I'm not sure, is just rude af.

It's possible that my use of the term stems from seeing people exploit terms like "pay to win" over and over on these boards because the terms they're exploiting sound bad. Imho there's way too many attempts to appropriate negative terms on these boards, and I may have gotten carried away. I will accept your statement that you had no intention to invoke the negativity associated with the term and apologize for any offense taken.

That said, I believe that the question you raised deserves discussion. However, I believe if you look at the thread, the discussion is more about the pay to win term than it is about GW2's reward structure versus the cash shop. I find that unfortunate.

In a perhaps vain attempt to end the tangent, I believe that ANet asked too much of cosmetics, but that that ship has long since sailed. I don't feel any need to compete over having my characters look good, and would have no interest in playing a game where the lion's share of the enjoyment I derived from it was some "look," no matter where the look came from. If I did seek some sort of recognition in a game, I would rather it be for being helpful and welcoming than in having a character decked out in the latest baroque, over-designed eyesore that ANet puts out.

That said, I accept that some people need carrots to chase in MMO's. I think ANet could do a better job of providing incentives for such players. I also believe, though, that any such are going to be purchasable to some extent, because ANet remains firmly committed to providing material sinks for the vast number of rewards whose only purpose is to be salvaged for said materials.

[DonArkanio.6419]

I agree with the statement. Every cosmetic GemStore addition makes me furious.

But I am afraid there is nothing even ANet can do at this point. GW2 could not be as successful if implemented sub-fee, and can be very sustainable with the current business model which aims for GemStore items having the most value of all in the game. This keeps away P2W and allows ANet to continue developing GW2.

• Core game is free-to-play
• Expansions (now combined) are buy-to-play
• No sub-fee
• No P2W mechanics

I believe this is a price game has to pay in order to be sustainable. I hate it, but I think it’s the best way they can do this with GW2 getting older.