Skill Rebalances Costs Gold/Gems!

[Sreoom.3690]

Our Sigils, Runes and Infusions (upgrades) are locked to what we attach them to.

 

When you rebalance skills it forces your customers to change their builds and gear upgrades in order to be competitive.

 

It costs your customers gold (or Gems) to change their gear upgrades. The extractor works great...however it costs 250 gems per use!

 

So, when changing their builds people have to decide if they should just overwrite the existing upgrade, or spend gold/gems in order to save them (overwriting existing upgrades with new ones = loss of gold)

 

I understand your desire and commitment to keeping balance, however, If your sub-goal is to create a gold/gem sink (and increase your bottom line)---it’s working!

 

Please consider doing one of these to make it less expensive to keep up with balance updates:

 

Unlock upgrades from the gear by making upgrade slots swappable (i.e. players can swap them out as needed, anytime they want).

 

Or, Make the Upgrade Extractor a Permanent Tool.

 

Or, each time you do a rebalance, give your customer’s as many extractors as they need in order to update their gear.

 

Failing to make switching upgrades free or much cheaper will continue to irritate, alienate, and erode your customer base each time you rebalance.

 

[Magnus Godrik.5841]

Rebalancing is what takes the staleness out of the game. Having the same meta is boring and doesn't really work. Unless your goal is to make players so bored they want to leave. The gold cost is very minimal and chances are your build isnt obliterated into oblivion. You may just have tweak it a little.

[Strider Pj.2193]

Or work to get legendary armor so stat swapping is simple.

 

I would take it that you either don’t play WvW or haven’t for long, as this is the standard for those of us that have played WvW for a long time. Many of us get ascended armor and work on building multiple sets.

 

In my case, I built legendary light armor and am working on medium and heavy now so that when changes happen, and they will, I can just stay swap or swap upgrades. It’s is so much simpler.

 

If you don’t play WvW, welcome to our pain. Get numb to it and adapt.

[Sreoom.3690]

@"Magnus Godrik.5841"

 

I totally agree that rebalancing keeps things fresh. My point was the way ANET locks upgrade components to gear.

 

I disagree with you about the cost. Try switching your runes and upgrade slots on your gear...its expensive.

[Turkeyspit.3965]

What can you do? They are going to make changes to the game, and we want them to continue to do so. That they change how some builds work by changing how traits or abilities work is a reality of playing an MMO.

 

And the answer of course is to always overwrite the runes. An extractor costs about 121g at current prices. Even a full set of Scholar Runes would only set you back 70g if you bought them strait off the TP.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

It's actually 250Gems for _3_ uses, or less if bought in bulk. Also, there are other ways to obtain them, some at no cost.

[kharmin.7683]

Support development; buy gems. I think that's the idea, no?

[Dante.1763]

> @"kharmin.7683" said:

> Support development; buy gems. I think that's the idea, no?

 

I buy enough gems without having to be forced to purchase something for real money that used to be available through in game items, all the change did was actually piss me off to the point that for once im considering /not/.

[Roxory.9854]

I just really wish all this effort to redo builds, sigils, runes, ect.. would go into fixing WvW, Alliances and balancing numbers. Sure balance patches and changes have been the norm and do keep things fresh but every update lately seems to be about Anet making money... Alliance announcement= what happened? server stacking pay to win and horrible unbalanced numbers that is killing Guilds and WvW for the players but it makes money for Anet. Runes and Sigils reworked = everyone spending gold to redo builds, all it did is cost players gold and made Anet money. I love this game but more it seems to be focused on money instead of sticking to promises and fixing what's broken. Couple weeks after sigils and runes, change all the builds and Anet goes Cha Ching! Honestly if WvW was fixed and not this pay to win crap that it has become, I wouldn't even care about spending Gold to rework my armor because it would actually be fun again to use it.

[Charrbeque.8729]

You're a bit behind.

>It costs your customers gold (or Gems) to change their gear upgrades. The extractor works great...however it costs 250 gems per use!

They changed that with the rune/sigil update. It's 250 gems for 3 extractors, or less gems per extractor when buying in bulk.

 

>Or, Make the Upgrade Extractor a Permanent Tool.

We already have that. It's been an ultra rare drop from black lion chests for a long time. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Endless_Upgrade_Extractor_Contract

You can buy it from the trading post, but it will cost you nearly 4k gold.

[Sreoom.3690]

@"Charrbeque.8729"

Yeah....I'm behind...4k gold...reasonable for a PvE scrub maybe...not for a WvW scrub like me.

 

...still a gold sink.

[Shaaba.5672]

I just wish that it was easier to play around with builds including runes/sigils. Right now it feels like a commitment and thus not worth messing around. I just wait for the meta to settle and go from there. I think the changes they made went in the wrong way. They focused on making runes feel valuable, not on the quality of life for the players.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

First world problems? I mean, we're constantly earning gold. If we have to spend it to have a more balanced game, it seems like a fair trade.

[Clyan.1593]

I don't like this either.

I don't mind spending money and gold on gems, but a proper item to safely extract runes and sigils without destroying the gear / weapons should be acquirable outside of the gemstore I think and without RnG. It's common sense I'd say.

 

If you play the mesmer meta build with Leader runes you probably don't want to overwrite them, since they are 1) acc-bound and 2) time consuming to acquire.

 

I really like this game and would support the devs anytime with gem purchases, but something so crucial shouldn't be bound to gems.

 

 

[Axxo.7430]

I would say 250 gems for 6 uses is fair overall.

[Psientist.6437]

The cost of maintaining a gear lifestyle is entangled with the gem shop. This shows how far the studio is willing to push the definition of convenience.

[Astralporing.1957]

> @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:

> First world problems? I mean, we're constantly earning gold. If we have to spend it to have a more balanced game, it seems like a fair trade.

The problem is i don't see that more balanced game. I see only myself needing to change builds every now and them.

 

[MithranArkanere.8957]

The solution is simple to imagine, and hard to implement: a way to unlock upgrades for the account.

 

Now that we have the new materials: lucent materials, symbols and charms, it would be possible to make upgrades into unlocks, while keeping sinks for all upgrades by using lucent materials in the inventory or the bank as a currency to pay for switching upgrades. To ensure upgrades keep being used too, the unlock could have two steps:

 

* **Unlock** for the account by spending a considerable number of all versions of the upgrade and other materials to craft an item that unlocks the upgrade when used.

* **Train** each character individually to use an unlocked upgrade by spending just +1-6 more of the exotic version of the upgrade, and a hero points in a new section for upgrades in the Training tab of the hero panel. This way extra upgrades, symbols or charms are removed from the market for each additional character each account has, and the tons of surplus unused hero points from core and HoT get an use.

* **Switch** upgrades by going to the equipment panel and selecting a weapon or armor piece. Unlocked upgrades compatible with the item would appear in a collapsible section after the stuff in your inventory (including actual upgrades). Then you click Apply changes like when transmuting, and that would pay the cost to apply the unlocked upgrades, usually some lucent motes from your inventory, bank or material storage. The new system would coexist with the current system, so you could use both item upgrades and unlocked upgrades. The difference would be that upgrades applied from unlocks would not be extractable or salvageable.

 

This way you won't have to pay tons of gold every time you want to go back yo an upgrade you obtained before, but upgrades would keep getting consumed since people will need lucent materials to fuel the changes.

[Mithos.9023]

> @"MithranArkanere.8957" said:

> The solution is simple to imagine, and hard to implement: a way to unlock upgrades for the account.

>

> Now that we have the new materials: lucent materials, symbols and charms, it would be possible to make upgrades into unlocks, while keeping sinks for all upgrades by using lucent materials in the inventory or the bank as a currency to pay for switching upgrades. To ensure upgrades keep being used too, the unlock could have two steps:

>

> * **Unlock** for the account by spending a considerable number of all versions of the upgrade and other materials to craft an item that unlocks the upgrade when used.

> * **Train** each character individually to use an unlocked upgrade by spending just +1-6 more of the exotic version of the upgrade, and a hero points in a new section for upgrades in the Training tab of the hero panel. This way extra upgrades, symbols or charms are removed from the market for each additional character each account has, and the tons of surplus unused hero points from core and HoT get an use.

> * **Switch** upgrades by going to the equipment panel and selecting a weapon or armor piece. Unlocked upgrades compatible with the item would appear in a collapsible section after the stuff in your inventory (including actual upgrades). Then you click Apply changes like when transmuting, and that would pay the cost to apply the unlocked upgrades, usually some lucent motes from your inventory, bank or material storage. The new system would coexist with the current system, so you could use both item upgrades and unlocked upgrades. The difference would be that upgrades applied from unlocks would not be extractable or salvageable.

>

> This way you won't have to pay tons of gold every time you want to go back yo an upgrade you obtained before, but upgrades would keep getting consumed since people will need lucent materials to fuel the changes.

 

Build templates that work with unlocked upgrades would solve that problem without doubt. While I am not against a cost for unlocking I am still convinced that a cost to switch between builds/statts/upgrades is not necessary in the slights. At best as I see it, a cost on switching will kill the qol it brings. Why lay an unnecessary burden on the players for matter that could easily be achieved otherwise?

[HnRkLnXqZ.1870]

The longest build I ever played had a constant gear/rune-set for half a year at best. That is the maximum to far. Normally I do a reconfiguration way earlier, sometimes a build lasts two weeks or less. From my understanding, the costs of changing stats/runes/sigils are part of the game and keep me playing. Collecting resources and unlocking new stat-combos. If I could swap everything like in sPvP by doing a few clicks, why would I bother with events like Istan, Tarir, SW, Lab, ... etc.? I do not really get it, what do you guys spend your money on?

 

If it is about the Superior Runes of Leadership and the upgrade extractors, you just need some patience. Wintersday is currently going on and xmas is soon, so there will probably be discounts on gemstore-products soon again. Sometimes we even get free stuff.

[Mithos.9023]

> @"HnRkLnXqZ.1870" said:

> I do not really get it, what do you guys spend your money on?

 

Skins....?

Minis or Legendaries as well.

[Turkeyspit.3965]

Pretty much why I play power builds. Had the same gear and runes/sigils for 8 months now. Sure some sigils have edged up thanks to the rework, but the DPS increase is so minimal that it's not worth dropping 5g to upgrade.

[Donutdude.9582]

I disagree wholeheartedly with the original post. This is an unnecessary QoL option. Simply overwrite your runes/sigils - the gold cost is not _that_ expensive. Gold is incredibly easy to come by nowadays.

[Biff.5312]

It is a gold sink and cash grab - yes. However, they have no incentive to change that (especially when so many players seem grateful to pay more), and certainly not by giving unlimited free swapping. That would cause cash to dry up completely and we'd end up with literally millions of unused rune/sigil mats.

[Anchoku.8142]

It has been this way since 2012.