Build/Equipment Templates need to be account bound c'mon Anet!

[SirRocket.3516]

So, I know it's a tired discussion because they came out ages ago, but I'm putting it into the traffic anyway because I didn't really play when they came out, but have been pulled back in 🙃

 

Not only is the way it's been chopped up a mess, but the fact that the storage for templates IS account wide, is a real cheeky move. Absolutely everything about it is a huge disappointment. Except for the price, the price is absolutely ludicrous! 

 

Please make it all account wide, it's a fair compromise.

 

One of the best things about GW2 is how it leans more into broadening your accounts capability. Encouraging more varied play.

 

I WANT to buy them, I really do and I would, but I won't. This ain't a good deal no matter how you look at it.

-------------------------------------------------

Ramblings:

 

I know it seems like I'm being a bit dramatic, especially when you CAN just get another character slot, but I don't know. For me this has been something I have wanted in GW2 for ages, as I'm sure many other had. 

 

I understand that this is how Arena Net needs to operate. They do need to find creative ways to keep a revenue flowing, but this is a flop.

 

GW2 is such a fantastic game, that really isn't like any other MMO. A game that I still believe hasn't reached it's peak. 

 

If you read this, thank you and I wish you well 🙂

 

-S.R

[Roda.7468]

Yeah, if they made them acccont-wide I'd actually drop the money to unlock every slot, but seeing the absolutely MASSIVE amount I'd have to buy to get equal flexibility on all my alts has tanked my motivation to even try.  Same deal with inventory slots.

[Veprovina.4876]

Yup. So do bag slots.

But hey, it's the usual "they get more money if it isn't" argument (although i'm pretty sure more people would buy them if they could use them for all their characters)...

 

Oh well...

Edited August 2, 2021 by Veprovina.4876

[T G.7496]

You're not being dramatic at all.

Their so-called templates system remains a s***show money grab.

It is so much worse in almost every way that matters than Arc Templates was.

Shameful really.

It was the fastest unpinning of an official feedback thread I have ever seen. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

[DanAlcedo.3281]

I would buy all the templates if they were acc bound. 

[draxynnic.3719]

I can see the logic for bag slots and equipment templates. Each one represents additional storage space on their databases (just like bank tabs do). Whether what they're charging is a fair price when you could be getting additional character slots instead is another question, but you are essentially buying additional space on their database when you buy one of those, and if they made it account-wide that would be a LOT of extra database storage if someone added another bag slot or equipment template to an account with 30 characters.

 

Build templates, on the other hand, really should have been free. You're paying 300 gems for a line of about 60 characters that the program reads to identify your build. I'm just storing them in a spreadsheet myself. I'm not an expert, but it strikes me that if they'd given build templates for free (maybe even just used the GW1 system of them being locally stored) then that would have encouraged people to buy more equipment templates to serve those builds.

[LSD.4673]

For a game with such an absurd number of stat combinations -- many of which are worthless at worst, and not worthwhile at best -- and for a game in which all that variety goes to waste with the same builds dominating, to the extent that patches time and time again nerf builds as their main priority...equipment templates seems like the best way to actually breathe life into gameplay. A ways to encourage making different setups that don't take enourmous amounts of clicking and storage space in order to jump into and out of.

 

And rather than make them available, they made them prohibitively expensive.

[Dante.1763]

Yea id drop money and buy the rest of my equipment/template slots if they actually became account bound. I  havent bought -any- as is.

[Omega.6801]

Won't happen, so the discusion is moot.
Sure, everyone will agree to a cheaper way to obtain these items. Could have been free, could have been 9 or 12 or 24 slots and we would all gladly take it. But ANet won't do it. There will be sales and maybe bundles every now and then, that's it if you want tha unlock for cheap.
Not happy about it, but that's just the way it is.

 

inb4 "B..but they did mounts, everything is possible". Jup, that's true, but I doubt ANet will make a decision to lower their microtransaction income and I doubt NCsoft would let them go through with it, even if ANet wanted to.

[Astralporing.1957]

1 hour ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

I can see the logic for bag slots and equipment templates. Each one represents additional storage space on their databases (just like bank tabs do). Whether what they're charging is a fair price when you could be getting additional character slots instead is another question, but you are essentially buying additional space on their database when you buy one of those, and if they made it account-wide that would be a LOT of extra database storage if someone added another bag slot or equipment template to an account with 30 characters.

Notice, though, that the reason why what we've got was "bag slots", so loadouts (and not actual templates) was exactly so they could justify cash grab. All they'd have to do for the system to work better is to make both loadouts (paid) and actual templates - with the latter being free, and able to use gear from both loadout slots, and inventories. But then they probably thought that less people might feel forced to pay to buy additional loadout slots, so they decided to go for better monetization at the sighificant cost to utility of the feature.

 

And that's how the whole "template" feature was designed - you can see piece after piece all the parts where they decided to sacrifice QoL in order to squeeze just a little bit more money out of players. Up to the point where the whole feature turned into something that doesn't have a lot of use at all, and actually hurts in some places (fast legendary switching anyone?)

[Dawdler.8521]

2 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

And that's how the whole "template" feature was designed - you can see piece after piece all the parts where they decided to sacrifice QoL in order to squeeze just a little bit more money out of players. Up to the point where the whole feature turned into something that doesn't have a lot of use at all, and actually hurts in some places (fast legendary switching anyone?)

Except that probably 95% of players saw even the most basic templates as a gain since before they didnt had them and then they not only got them, but also freed up entire bags with gear.

Edited August 2, 2021 by Dawdler.8521

[SirRocket.3516]

2 hours ago, lokh.2695 said:

Won't happen, so the discusion is moot.
Sure, everyone will agree to a cheaper way to obtain these items. Could have been free, could have been 9 or 12 or 24 slots and we would all gladly take it. But ANet won't do it. There will be sales and maybe bundles every now and then, that's it if you want tha unlock for cheap.
Not happy about it, but that's just the way it is.

 

inb4 "B..but they did mounts, everything is possible". Jup, that's true, but I doubt ANet will make a decision to lower their microtransaction income and I doubt NCsoft would let them go through with it, even if ANet wanted to.

Yeah, but that's the easy answer.

 

Nothing will probably happen, but nothing ventured nothing gained.

[Astralporing.1957]

4 minutes ago, Dawdler.8521 said:

Except that probably 95% of player saw even the most basic templates as a gain since before they didnt had them and then they not only got them, but also freed up entire bags with gear.

Sure, but notice how the most benefit from the feature goes to those that have the least need for it, and often use it for purposes other than the one it's theoretically made for (because, no, build templates feature was not made for the purpose of freeing inventory slots). And those people would probably not really care if the templates were not implemented - it didn't really change anything important for them anyway.

 

On the other hand, for those that did ask for the feature, cared about it and had the most need of it (those with a lot of builds and constant need of switching them), it turned out to be a massive downgrade compared to ArcTemplates. As well as something that does not really fulfill their needs, because it got intentionally crippled for the purposes of monetization.

Edited August 2, 2021 by Astralporing.1957

[Dawdler.8521]

Just now, Astralporing.1957 said:

Sure, but notice how the most benefit from the feature goes to those that have the least need for it, and often use it for purposes other than the one it's theoretically made for (because, no, build templates feature was not made for the purpose of freeing inventory slots)

Well we got the package, both builds and equipment. Freeing up slots was a bonus for the later.

 

Still, the point applies. Only a very, very small part of the community - those using the arcdps templates - "lost" some flexiblity (except that needed bags, still costing gems). Everybody body else gained. Yes, its monetized. But thats the core basis for GW2 monetisation - its per character (well not all) because the game make you want alts and lots of them. But still everybody gained. Whether people then wanted more... You get the idea. This is no sacrifice for QoL. Even for people that never needed it, they still got it.

[Astralporing.1957]

2 hours ago, Dawdler.8521 said:

Still, the point applies. Only a very, very small part of the community - those using the arcdps templates - "lost" some flexiblity

So, those that lost are those that actually used the system.

 

2 hours ago, Dawdler.8521 said:

Everybody body else gained. 

The gain is mostly theoretical. Most of those people that "gained" something do not actually change their builds or switch gear at all.

 

2 hours ago, Dawdler.8521 said:

But still everybody gained.

No. The people that "gained" were those that didn't need it. Those that did need it, lost.

[Omega.6801]

3 hours ago, SirRocket.3516 said:

Yeah, but that's the easy answer.

 

Nothing will probably happen, but nothing ventured nothing gained.

And "nothing will hapen probably, nothing gained nothing lost" is supposed to be the "hard" answer?

[sasya neko.1985]

i still have the free ones unused, waiting for Anet to grow a pair.

[kharmin.7683]

2 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

So, those that lost are those that actually used the system.

 

The gain is mostly theoretical. Most of those people that "gained" something do not actually change their builds or switch gear at all.

 

No. The people that "gained" were those that didn't need it. Those that did need it, lost.

You cannot know that "most" do not actually change builds or switch gear.  You can't know, either, that those who have gained didn't need templates.  Just because some players didn't want to use a third-party add-on doesn't mean that they didn't need a template solution.  I know your severe disappointment with losing ARC and ANet's "templates" -- you've been very vocal on the forums about it, but statements like these border on hyperbole and don't serve your argument well.

 

I will agree with the sentiment that many players who used ARC lost a lot of the functionality that they had.

 

[Gotejjeken.1267]

Might just be me, but GW2 is the one MMO where I've never felt the need for an alt.  I mean for muling, sure, but never felt the need to actively play more than one character at a time.  

 

The entire game seems to revolve around NOT having alts--from the 'my story' journey to the birthday gifts being per char to a lot of things back in the day being soul bound.  

 

Maybe its my age though and willingness now to just pay for whatever I don't have instead of park alts at farming spots 🤷‍♂️

[Dante.1763]

2 hours ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

So, those that lost are those that actually used the system.

 

The gain is mostly theoretical. Most of those people that "gained" something do not actually change their builds or switch gear at all.

 

No. The people that "gained" were those that didn't need it. Those that did need it, lost.

I gained alot, i never used ArcTemplates either. Kept multiple builds worth of gear in my inventory on multiple characters. Now i dont have to do that and i can swap my build super easy.

[Infusion.7149]

If equipment templates were accountwide it would be free storage for people with a lot of alts while bag slots cost 400 gems in the gemstore. That is unrealistic to happen unless it were legendary armory only for that account-wide tab. Otherwise the entire system would need to be gutted.

Build storage should have been free and build templates could have been account-wide however. You're mainly paying for the hotkey function on build templates as if you don't need to load them on the fly you can paste a chatcode.

Edited August 2, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Cuks.8241]

Build templates was a feature I was looking forward the most. And it was also the biggest let down of this game. I was expecting unlimited, local build templates. I don't think this is to much to expect since well you know gw1 had it and many other games also.

 

I haven't bought any and don't intend to because it is a rip off. 

 

We had wvw, pvp and pve builds before so not much was gained in terms of quantity. The only good feature are the hotkeys for fast switching. 

[Astralporing.1957]

12 minutes ago, kharmin.7683 said:

You cannot know that "most" do not actually change builds or switch gear. 

Do you remember the first marionette? Anet let us know then that half of the playerbase never changed their build since they set it during leveling. With a significant portion not even setting it for the first time. The only thing that changed since is that the game shows you that you haven't yet selected a build, but i doubt that general attitude changed that much since then. At best i'd expect players to do some playing around after unlocking new elite spec, but i sincerely doubt many actually ever look back at that tab during normal playing. Only the relatively small group of more invested players do.

 

I mean, seriously, there are people that come to raids with rng gear (rng gear - gear you obtain from drops, with basically random setup of stats and mismatch of sigils and runes).

 

12 minutes ago, kharmin.7683 said:

You can't know, either, that those who have gained didn't need templates. 

True, some probably did. But still, most people that did "gain" didn't need it (because most people don't need it), and most people that did need it either got a halfbaked solution, or just plain lost on functionality because they had to give up Arc. And all that because Anet prioritized money over functionality and gutted the system due to that.

 

 

1 minute ago, Infusion.7149 said:

If equipment templates were accountwide it would be free storage for people with a lot of alts while bag slots cost 400 gems in the gemstore. That is unrealistic to happen unless it were legendary armory only for that account-wide tab. Otherwise the entire system would need to be gutted.

It could have worked like an actual templates and (like with Arc) just used the gear from inventory. There would have been no free storage, but actual usefulness would have been higher. Especially since there would be no need to cap it at 6 slots only.

 

Or they could have split it into gear loadouts (paid) and the actual templates (working from both loadouts and inventory, free, and not capped at ridiculously low amount).

 

 

 

[Infusion.7149]

6 minutes ago, Astralporing.1957 said:

Do you remember the first marionette? Anet let us know then that half of the playerbase never changed their build since they set it during leveling. With a significant portion not even setting it for the first time. The only thing that changed since is that the game shows you that you haven't yet selected a build, but i doubt that general attitude changed that much since then. At best i'd expect players to do some playing around after unlocking new elite spec, but i sincerely doubt many actually ever look back at that tab during normal playing. Only the relatively small group of more invested players do.

 

I mean, seriously, there are people that come to raids with rng gear (rng gear - gear you obtain from drops, with basically random setup of stats and mismatch of sigils and runes).

 

True, some probably did. But still, most people that did "gain" didn't need it (because most people don't need it), and most people that did need it either got a halfbaked solution, or just plain lost on functionality because they had to give up Arc. And all that because Anet prioritized money over functionality and gutted the system due to that.

 

 

It could have worked like an actual templates and (like with Arc) just used the gear from inventory. There would have been no free storage, but actual usefulness would have been higher. Especially since there would be no need to cap it at 6 slots only.

 

Or they could have split it into gear loadouts (paid) and the actual templates (working from both loadouts and inventory, free, and not capped at ridiculously low amount).

 

 

 

Could of, but it is what it is now. Pretty naive to think they would scrap the entire system for equipment templates after they sunk a huge amount of resources into it. Also having to swap infusions would still be a problem if not implemented correctly. In the current system you can use WvW infusions on another template.

I could only see build templates changing to accountwide honestly but even then it's a stretch because this community wants to be compensated for everything.

Edited August 2, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Astralporing.1957]

Just now, Infusion.7149 said:

Could of, but it is what it is now. Pretty naive to think they would scrap the entire system for equipment templates after they sunk a huge amount of resources into it.

I know the chances they will change it are close to nil, but i will still keep calling them out on it. So they will never try anything like that again.