Should Central Tyrian Masteries be Locked Behind an Expansion?

[Lusts.3890]

This is a question I ask the community. From my own personal opinion, I believe they should not be locked behind an expansion. (I own not only the Guild Wars 2 Physical Collectors Edition, but both Heart of Thorns & Path of Fire Deluxe Editions. I'm simply thinking about how it could effect both Free to Play players, and the community as a whole.)

 

My reasons for this is that a major quality of life feature is found within the Central Tyrian mastery track. Pact Commander. I believe Auto-Loot should be available to everyone. However, the most important reason for me thinking that Free to Play players should be granted access to Central Tyrian masteries is Fractals. A lot of high end fractals practically require the use of the Fractal Mastery line. However, Free to Play players don't have access to those masteries and likely have a harder time finding groups for higher level fractals because of such.

 

Now, I can understand the debate around the Mentor Tag being too common and ruining what it is meant for, but honestly, I don't see that as a problem. People already use it as a lesser Commander Tag. Not only that, if you purchase any of the two expansions to unlock the mastery system, you get an Instant Level 80 boost which gets you immediate access to the mastery line; as well as being able to purchase a Level 80 boost from the gem store. For me, if a Free to Play player earned their way to level 80 and gained the necessary experience to unlock the Mentor tag, I feel as they do deserve it as they have progressed enough or played the game enough to understand most of the basic information on Guild Wars 2.

 

Personally, I don't see any reason to lock Central Tryian masteries behind the purchase of the expansion other than encouraging players to put money into the game. Do you agree that Central Tyrian masteries should be available to Free to Play players? If so, state why you think they should. If you don't agree, also state why. I believe this is a valid argument.

 

EDIT:

A lot of people seem to be quoting me with the "Encouraging players to put money into the game" and replying with "Do you expect devs to work for free?". The game has a cash shop that makes more than enough money to pay devs. It makes more money and at a faster rate than expansion sales from Free to Play players. I go into detail in a reply a few posts down if you'd like to read up on it. But I am not oblivious to the financial woes of a game company. I use to work as a Game Reviewer myself. I've interviewed devs, I know how things work. I am not trying to sound all high and might, just simply that I am not oblivious to these facts.

[Cyninja.2954]

> @Lusts.3890 said:

 

> Personally, I don't see any reason to lock Central Tryian masteries behind the purchase of the expansion other than **encouraging players to put money into the game**. Do you agree that Central Tyrian masteries should be available to Free to Play players? If so, state why you think they should. If you don't agree, also state why. I believe this is a valid argument.

 

That alone is enough reason to keep it that way. Sorry but this game is not expensive. Even if you factor in the occasional expansion (which seem to be at a 2 year interval now) it's far and wide the cheapest, high quality MMO available. Setting up some incentives for people to buy at least 1 expansion is not a big deal.

 

Free to play players get a huge amount of game for free already. There is no reason to add more to that. The idea behind the free to play model is to get people invested and buy the game. For that, the f2p portion of the game is big enough.

 

This is a product people work on. I'm constantly amazed how many people keep forgetting that in this day and age of free to play games.

[Just a flesh wound.3589]

I’m going to say no on both. For one, f2p is an extended trial version. It’s to allow them to check out the game before buying. In no game that I know of does the trial version get the extra features of the core game, since doing so hurts the transition of f2p to buying an account. It’s the same thing with core only owners. ANet spent time and money making these features and giving them away will hurt their income as fewer numbers will feel the need to buy either expansion.

[zealex.9410]

Yes it should since they are *masteries* which is a system pretty much build around and delivered with hot and future expancs

[Limodriver.4106]

"encouraging players to put money into the game" isnt that the whole point of getting DEV paid? ask urself would u go work for free everyday for some kids who just want to play ur game for free?

[Danikat.8537]

I've been wondering about that myself. With HoT it made sense because the whole mastery system was introduced as part of the expansion. Now with two separate expansions, each with their own masteries and a separate set for core Tyria it does seem strange that the core masteries are locked behind an expansion.

 

On the other hand all your examples of when players might want the core masteries require them to have committed a lot of time to the game and to be planning to spend a lot more time playing it. At that point I'm thinking they should just admit they like the game and want to play it and buy the thing. Especially because for me all the other restrictions on F2P accounts would be far more frustrating that not having access to masteries.

 

I'd want to talk in map chat, buy and sell things on the TP, make more than 2 characters and have more than 3 bags (or is it 2?) long before I'd want to play high level Fractals or use a mentor tag or even auto-loot (which I've only just gotten on my paid account, so I'm still getting used to it). And I'd actually pay to **remove** that annoying speed boost in towns.

 

If they haven't already I think they should remove the requirement to play the first part of the HoT or PoF story to unlock core masteries, but they could keep them as something only paid accounts have access to. Encouraging people to buy the game isn't a bad thing, especially when they're given all the time they need to see if they like it and want to play enough to need things like masteries first.

[RoseofGilead.8907]

The entire Mastery system was introduced with HoT. For me, anyway, it makes sense that it requires a paid account (and especially at least one of the expansions) to access the perks of the full game, especially the Mastery system and other thing tied to each expac.

[Lusts.3890]

> @Cyninja.2954 said:

> > @Lusts.3890 said:

>

> > Personally, I don't see any reason to lock Central Tryian masteries behind the purchase of the expansion other than **encouraging players to put money into the game**. Do you agree that Central Tyrian masteries should be available to Free to Play players? If so, state why you think they should. If you don't agree, also state why. I believe this is a valid argument.

>

> That alone is enough reason to keep it that way. Sorry but this game is not expensive. Even if you factor in the occasional expansion (which seem to be at a 2 year interval now) it's far and wide the cheapest, high quality MMO available. Setting up some incentives for people to buy at least 1 expansion is not a big deal.

>

> Free to play players get a huge amount of game for free already. There is no reason to add more to that. The idea behind the free to play model is to get people invested and buy the game. For that, the f2p portion of the game is big enough.

>

> This is a product people work on. I'm constantly amazed how many people keep forgetting that in this day and age of free to play games.

 

However, Guild Wars 2 has a cash shop that is updated almost on a biweekly basis with new items. That is how most Free to Play titles make their money and statistics have shown that it makes a lot more money. That is why you are seeing a ton of subscription based MMOs out there with cash shops now. World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIV, and more. Even triple A titles are now adding microtransactions in their games cause it just simple makes more money than the initial sales of a game. I get a company is out to make money, however the only thing Central Tyrian masteries unlock for anyone is auto-loot and the ability to go higher than Fractal level 50. That doesn't add any new content. All it does is add quality of life features that should be basic for pretty much anyone who plays Guild Wars 2.

 

Mounts and Gliders are also a pretty big quality of life feature as well but those are locked behind expansions and understandably so. But auto-loot being locked behind a pay wall and being able to explore Fractals is it's full capacity? C'mon. If anything, locking Auto-loot behind a paywall is actually hurting sales of bag slot expansions and bank tab expansions. Auto-loot tends to fill your inventory a lot faster than someone who's Free to Play and doesn't hit F on everything and ultimately, my bags constantly filling up is what lead to me finally buying bag slows and bank tabs 2 or 3 years into playing the game.

 

Again, I do not see any reason to keep Central Tyrian masteries locked behind a pay wall.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

It's not a Free2Play game, but offers a Play4Free extended trial. Thus, Masteries, along with all the other advantages to purchasing the game should stay locked behind purchase. We all want the studio to have enough money to keep offering us content.

[Danikat.8537]

I guess the big difference here is I don't see this as a free to play game. It's a buy to play game with a free trial version. Which means you get a free account to try out the game, but if you like it and want to keep playing it then it's time to buy it.

 

The only different between a free GW2 account and a demo is that there's no time limit on it. It makes me wish the term shareware hadn't died out, because that's exactly what this is.

 

 

[Tasida.4085]

Keep it as it is. If F2P people want masteries, they can buy the xpacs. More money = paychecks for devs= more content. It's idiocy to ask otherwise.

[Cyninja.2954]

> @Lusts.3890 said:

> > @Cyninja.2954 said:

> > > @Lusts.3890 said:

> >

> > > Personally, I don't see any reason to lock Central Tryian masteries behind the purchase of the expansion other than **encouraging players to put money into the game**. Do you agree that Central Tyrian masteries should be available to Free to Play players? If so, state why you think they should. If you don't agree, also state why. I believe this is a valid argument.

> >

> > That alone is enough reason to keep it that way. Sorry but this game is not expensive. Even if you factor in the occasional expansion (which seem to be at a 2 year interval now) it's far and wide the cheapest, high quality MMO available. Setting up some incentives for people to buy at least 1 expansion is not a big deal.

> >

> > Free to play players get a huge amount of game for free already. There is no reason to add more to that. The idea behind the free to play model is to get people invested and buy the game. For that, the f2p portion of the game is big enough.

> >

> > This is a product people work on. I'm constantly amazed how many people keep forgetting that in this day and age of free to play games.

>

> However, Guild Wars 2 has a cash shop that is updated almost on a biweekly basis with new items. That is how most Free to Play titles make their money and statistics have shown that it makes a lot more money. That is why you are seeing a ton of subscription based MMOs out there with cash shops now. World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIV, and more. Even triple A titles are now adding microtransactions in their games cause it just simple makes more money than the initial sales of a game. I get a company is out to make money, however the only thing Central Tyrian masteries unlock for anyone is auto-loot and the ability to go higher than Fractal level 50. That doesn't add any new content. All it does is add quality of life features that should be basic for pretty much anyone who plays Guild Wars 2.

>

> Mounts and Gliders are also a pretty big quality of life feature as well but those are locked behind expansions and understandably so. But auto-loot being locked behind a pay wall and being able to explore Fractals is it's full capacity? C'mon. If anything, locking Auto-loot behind a paywall is actually hurting sales of bag slot expansions and bank tab expansions. Auto-loot tends to fill your inventory a lot faster than someone who's Free to Play and doesn't hit F on everything and ultimately, my bags constantly filling up is what lead to me finally buying bag slows and bank tabs 2 or 3 years into playing the game.

>

> Again, I do not see any reason to keep Central Tyrian masteries locked behind a pay wall.

 

Careful, you are mixing a lot of different game monetisation models and how they work:

 

- free to play games have cash shops. Most of those cash shops have pay to win items available making them required to play the game or remove very harsh restrictions. It's unfair to lump GW2 cash shop in with this mix since it is designed way differently

- most subscription based MMOs that are/were tripple A and move to a free to play model are WAY WAY WAY more restrictive than GW2 and require cash shop purchases to unlock even basic things like skill bars

- most subscription based MMOs that are/were tripple A and move to a free to play model do not allow the exchange of ingame currency for premium currency (aka they don't have a gem-gold exchange)

- WoW and FF14 are making additional income because players are willing to pay for that. They remains subscription based games which make a ton of money.

- GW2 cash shop is cosmetic only (well mostly now with some gathering items being direct upgrades) and you can enjoy the game completely free of ever having to use real life cash. You can even gain cash shop items with only ingame currency thanks to the gem-gold exchange

 

I'm not seeing the need to make the free to play model more attractive. It's one of the biggest (I think maybe even biggest), least punishing and actual free to play mode of any high quality not a cash grab MMO.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

> @Danikat.8537 said:

> I guess the big difference here is I don't see this as a free to play game. It's a buy to play game with a free trial version. Which means you get a free account to try out the game, but if you like it and want to keep playing it then it's time to buy it.

>

> The only different between a free GW2 account and a demo is that there's no time limit on it. It makes me wish the term shareware hadn't died out, because that's exactly what this is.

>

 

Well said.

 

[Lusts.3890]

> @Cyninja.2954 said:

> > @Lusts.3890 said:

> > > @Cyninja.2954 said:

> > > > @Lusts.3890 said:

> > >

> > > > Personally, I don't see any reason to lock Central Tryian masteries behind the purchase of the expansion other than **encouraging players to put money into the game**. Do you agree that Central Tyrian masteries should be available to Free to Play players? If so, state why you think they should. If you don't agree, also state why. I believe this is a valid argument.

> > >

> > > That alone is enough reason to keep it that way. Sorry but this game is not expensive. Even if you factor in the occasional expansion (which seem to be at a 2 year interval now) it's far and wide the cheapest, high quality MMO available. Setting up some incentives for people to buy at least 1 expansion is not a big deal.

> > >

> > > Free to play players get a huge amount of game for free already. There is no reason to add more to that. The idea behind the free to play model is to get people invested and buy the game. For that, the f2p portion of the game is big enough.

> > >

> > > This is a product people work on. I'm constantly amazed how many people keep forgetting that in this day and age of free to play games.

> >

> > However, Guild Wars 2 has a cash shop that is updated almost on a biweekly basis with new items. That is how most Free to Play titles make their money and statistics have shown that it makes a lot more money. That is why you are seeing a ton of subscription based MMOs out there with cash shops now. World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIV, and more. Even triple A titles are now adding microtransactions in their games cause it just simple makes more money than the initial sales of a game. I get a company is out to make money, however the only thing Central Tyrian masteries unlock for anyone is auto-loot and the ability to go higher than Fractal level 50. That doesn't add any new content. All it does is add quality of life features that should be basic for pretty much anyone who plays Guild Wars 2.

> >

> > Mounts and Gliders are also a pretty big quality of life feature as well but those are locked behind expansions and understandably so. But auto-loot being locked behind a pay wall and being able to explore Fractals is it's full capacity? C'mon. If anything, locking Auto-loot behind a paywall is actually hurting sales of bag slot expansions and bank tab expansions. Auto-loot tends to fill your inventory a lot faster than someone who's Free to Play and doesn't hit F on everything and ultimately, my bags constantly filling up is what lead to me finally buying bag slows and bank tabs 2 or 3 years into playing the game.

> >

> > Again, I do not see any reason to keep Central Tyrian masteries locked behind a pay wall.

>

> Careful, you are mixing a lot of different game monetisation models and how they work:

>

> - free to play games have cash shops. Most of those cash shops have pay to win items available making them required to play the game or remove very harsh restrictions. It's unfair to lump GW2 cash shop in with this mix since it is designed way differently

> - most subscription based MMOs that are/were tripple A and move to a free to play model are WAY WAY WAY more restrictive than GW2 and require cash shop purchases to unlock even basic things like skill bars

> - most subscription based MMOs that are/were tripple A and move to a free to play model do not allow the exchange of ingame currency for premium currency (aka they don't have a gem-gold exchange)

> - WoW and FF14 are making additional income because players are willing to pay for that. They remains subscription based games which make a ton of money.

> - GW2 cash shop is cosmetic only (well mostly now with some gathering items being direct upgrades) and you can enjoy the game completely free of ever having to use real life cash. You can even gain cash shop items with only ingame currency thanks to the gem-gold exchange

>

> I'm not seeing the need to make the free to play model more attractive. It's one of the biggest (I think maybe even biggest), least punishing and actual free to play mode of any high quality not a cash grab MMO.

 

However, I know plenty of Free to Play MMORPGs that have the same cash shop structure as Guild Wars 2 (Which is not cosmetic only. It does have utility based purchased as well such as Inventory Expansion, Bank Expansion, the recently released Waypoint unlocker which trivializes World Exploration, etc.) So I would not say it is cosmetic only. Also, FFXIV in a recent interview (about a few days old) has stated that Free to Play for them isn't out of the question. Specially after boasting that they saw a peak of 10 million players when Stormblood (Their recent expansion) released. That being said, Free to Play players cannot turn gold to gems. It's one of the many restrictions already in place on Free to Play accounts. So I don't see how that would be a concern. They would still need to purchase an expansion to remove that restriction.

[killermanjaro.5670]

I think the free to play content is already more than generous enough with its content, features and restrictions. In fact a lot more generous than any other free to play content/modes in other games.

 

Where you talk about the autoloot mastery and quality of life things, realistically quality of life features are not something free to play players ever get, or should be expecting in any free to play game/trial. Also with the aoe loot option enabled a free to play player could still loot everything in a 900 range with one button press, so it's not exactly a lot of work for them without the autoloot mastery. Also with only 3 bag slots they aren't going to be holding much loot anyway.

 

Being that a free to play player can't use map chat, I would say it makes zero sense for them to have the option of a mentor tag. They won't be able to call out events they are marking with their tag, say why they are tagged up, or see/answer questions new players might be asking for advice on in map chat. (I know tags won't always answer/call stuff etc anyway, but they are at least able to). A tag without access to map chat is relatively pointless.

 

Personally if a free to play player is playing enough of the game that they are doing high level fractals so "need" the masteries, then I'd say it's quite reasonable to say they should be buying an upgrade, £25 for PoF to lift free to play restrictions, and give a whole expansion and mounts is not a lot for Anet to be asking.

 

I think Danikat above sums it up pretty well. The free to play is just a permanent trial of the buy to play game.

[Lusts.3890]

> @killermanjaro.5670 said:

> I think the free to play content is already more than generous enough with its content, features and restrictions. In fact a lot more generous than any other free to play content/modes in other games.

>

> Where you talk about the autoloot mastery and quality of life things, realistically quality of life features are not something free to play players ever get, or should be expecting in any free to play game/trial. Also with the aoe loot option enabled a free to play player could still loot everything in a 900 range with one button press, so it's not exactly a lot of work for them without the autoloot mastery. Also with only 3 bag slots they aren't going to be holding much loot anyway.

>

> Being that a free to play player can't use map chat, I would say it makes zero sense for them to have the option of a mentor tag. They won't be able to call out events they are marking with their tag, say why they are tagged up, or see/answer questions new players might be asking for advice on in map chat. (I know tags won't always answer/call stuff etc anyway, but they are at least able to). A tag without access to map chat is relatively pointless.

>

> Personally if a free to play player is playing enough of the game that they are doing high level fractals so "need" the masteries, then I'd say it's quite reasonable to say they should be buying an upgrade, £25 for PoF to lift free to play restrictions, and give a whole expansion and mounts is not a lot for Anet to be asking.

>

> I think Danikat above sums it up pretty well. The free to play is just a permanent trial of the buy to play game.

 

I can understand the point you make in your second statement, however; your statement about Quality of Life being a luxury that Free to Play players don't get. One game. Warframe. There are plenty of other games that also add quality of life features as well for all of it's players. I understand bag expansions being a quality of life and locked behind paywalls, but I've never seen Auto-Loot being a paid feature in any game. If only the auto-loot master wasn't tied to the Mentor Tag, it'd be easier to argue for, but I still stand by my statement about Fractals.

 

Personally, I love Fractals, and I'd love to see Free to Play players get access to Fractal Masteries. It just means more groups on the LFG board (if they can use it) and more people to do Fractals with at a higher level.

[Cyninja.2954]

> @Lusts.3890 said:

> However, I know plenty of Free to Play MMORPGs that have the same cash shop structure as Guild Wars 2 (Which is not cosmetic only. It does have utility based purchased as well such as Inventory Expansion, Bank Expansion, the recently released Waypoint unlocker which trivializes World Exploration, etc.) So I would not say it is cosmetic only.

 

My bad, I was not specific enough. The GW2 cash shop has no pay to win products. The just now released (literally today) waypoint unlock is near meaningless ever since mounts were added. You can get all the core Tyria waypoints in 30 minutes on a raptor if so desired.

 

> @Lusts.3890 said:

> Also, FFXIV in a recent interview (about a few days old) has stated that Free to Play for them isn't out of the question. Specially after boasting that they saw a peak of 10 million players when Stormblood (Their recent expansion) released. That being said, Free to Play players cannot turn gold to gems. It's one of the many restrictions already in place on Free to Play accounts. So I don't see how that would be a concern. They would still need to purchase an expansion to remove that restriction.

 

I don't know what FF14 will or will not do. If they have close to 10 million subscribers you can rest assured, they are not taking the free to play route any time soon. That's just like Blizzard announcing 3 years ago that they might make WoW free to play, once subscriptions drop low.

 

Here's what it boilds down to: arenanet needs to make money. Period.

 

The current common ways of making money in MMOs are:

 

- a subscription model (GW2 has no subscription)

- a cash shop model with mandatory items (either pay to win, or removal of restrictions or both)

- regular mandatory expansions (GW2 expansions are not mandatory)

- requires regular purchases of a premium currency without being able to get it any other way

 

GW2 is unique in this landscape in that it's expansions are not mandatory (there is no level increase or gear deappreciation), the cash shop is not required to enjoy the game, the premium currency can be aquired ingame and the game has no subscription. The setup is fine as is.

[Lusts.3890]

> @Cyninja.2954 said:

> > @Lusts.3890 said:

> > However, I know plenty of Free to Play MMORPGs that have the same cash shop structure as Guild Wars 2 (Which is not cosmetic only. It does have utility based purchased as well such as Inventory Expansion, Bank Expansion, the recently released Waypoint unlocker which trivializes World Exploration, etc.) So I would not say it is cosmetic only.

>

> My bad, I was not specific enough. The GW2 cash shop has no pay to win products. The just now released (literally today) waypoint unlock is near meaningless ever since mounts were added. You can get all the core Tyria waypoints in 30 minutes on a raptor if so desired.

>

> > @Lusts.3890 said:

> > Also, FFXIV in a recent interview (about a few days old) has stated that Free to Play for them isn't out of the question. Specially after boasting that they saw a peak of 10 million players when Stormblood (Their recent expansion) released. That being said, Free to Play players cannot turn gold to gems. It's one of the many restrictions already in place on Free to Play accounts. So I don't see how that would be a concern. They would still need to purchase an expansion to remove that restriction.

>

> I don't know what FF14 will or will not do. If they have close to 10 million subscribers you can rest assured, they are not taking the free to play route any time soon. That's just like Blizzard announcing 3 years ago that they might make WoW free to play, once subscriptions drop low.

>

> Here's what it boilds down to: arenanet needs to make money. Period.

>

> The current common ways of making money in MMOs are:

>

> - a subscription model (GW2 has no subscription)

> - a cash shop model with mandatory items (either pay to win, or removal of restrictions or both)

> - regular mandatory expansions (GW2 expansions are not mandatory)

> - requires regular purchases of a premium currency without being able to get it any other way

>

> GW2 is unique in this landscape in that it's expansions are not mandatory (there is no level increase or gear deappreciation), the cash shop is not required to enjoy the game, the premium currency can be aquired ingame and the game has no subscription. The setup is fine as is.

 

I cannot agree with you. Guild Wars 2 makes more than enough with it's Cash Shop purchases. And again, I've seen many Free to Play games have a cash shop without mandatory items. Warframe is a good example of this. Nothing in their cash shop is mandatory and can all be earned through gameplay (besides cosmetics). They made more than they had expected with their current model of being Free to Play that they have gone past their original vision. Steve Sinclair, one of the main developers for Warframe even stated this at one of their conventions. They never expected Warframe to be as big as it did and it gave them the resources to build the game in a way they never thought they could. They are releasing their first Open World zone in the next week or two. They added cinematic story to the game. So more content they added due to the support the community has given the game.

 

When you build a game properly, and enable things for your players; you do not need to worry about adding mandatory items to a cash shop. And most players care a lot about fashion in almost any game, free or not; to buy cosmetics. Its a major selling point for any cash shop is cosmetics. Everyone strives to be unique and cosmetics play on that desire.

 

I am all for paid expansions. I am just do not support putting auto-loot behind a paywall. The only other game that has done this was Black Desert Online with their pet system and the majority of their community does not like their cash shop model.

[Glacial.9516]

Core Tyria masteries should be available for Core Tyrian accounts. Whether they want to extend this to F2P accounts is up to them (but I'd suspect not). I don't see any reason to lock them behind the expansions though, they have nothing to do with the expansion.

[Hevoskuuri.3891]

I agree, Core Tyrian masteries should be available to Core accounts. If you have already paid for the game, and enjoy playing core content without expansions, you should be able to enjoy things like auto-loot and city speed buffs without additional costs. Core Tyrian masteries are NOT expansion content, so they shouldn't be locked behind them.

 

As for F2P accounts, they haven't paid anything to play the game, so masteries should be kept as an encouragement to try out an expansion.

[Alchofas.8243]

Mastery system is a feature included in HOT, so it should be locked from core game.

[Ohoni.6057]

No. You should have to buy at least one expansion to unlock the track. At minimum, they could offer a "Pact Masteries Unlock" option for half the price of HoT or something, but you should need to make that purchase to unlock those options. Period.

[Dashingsteel.3410]

Fractal rewards and guild boons were reworked and repackaged behind a paywall with HoT. Those customers who had shelled out 50 bucks for the core gw2 game had those features stripped from them(Thanks for your business!!!). If you bought the core game and not one of the expansions, central tyrian masteries are being withheld from you as a punishment for not being a return customer.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

> @Lusts.3890 said:

> I am all for paid expansions. I am just do not support putting auto-loot behind a paywall.

 

While I asked for (and expected) autolooting to be part of Core even prior to the launch in 2012, I think it's perfectly reasonable to make it part of the paid game rather than part of free-to-play. It's not just about giving people a reason to spend; it's also about making people who do spend feel good about their purchase.

 

 

 

 

[Cyninja.2954]

> @Lusts.3890 said:

> > @Cyninja.2954 said:

> > > @Lusts.3890 said:

> > > However, I know plenty of Free to Play MMORPGs that have the same cash shop structure as Guild Wars 2 (Which is not cosmetic only. It does have utility based purchased as well such as Inventory Expansion, Bank Expansion, the recently released Waypoint unlocker which trivializes World Exploration, etc.) So I would not say it is cosmetic only.

> >

> > My bad, I was not specific enough. The GW2 cash shop has no pay to win products. The just now released (literally today) waypoint unlock is near meaningless ever since mounts were added. You can get all the core Tyria waypoints in 30 minutes on a raptor if so desired.

> >

> > > @Lusts.3890 said:

> > > Also, FFXIV in a recent interview (about a few days old) has stated that Free to Play for them isn't out of the question. Specially after boasting that they saw a peak of 10 million players when Stormblood (Their recent expansion) released. That being said, Free to Play players cannot turn gold to gems. It's one of the many restrictions already in place on Free to Play accounts. So I don't see how that would be a concern. They would still need to purchase an expansion to remove that restriction.

> >

> > I don't know what FF14 will or will not do. If they have close to 10 million subscribers you can rest assured, they are not taking the free to play route any time soon. That's just like Blizzard announcing 3 years ago that they might make WoW free to play, once subscriptions drop low.

> >

> > Here's what it boilds down to: arenanet needs to make money. Period.

> >

> > The current common ways of making money in MMOs are:

> >

> > - a subscription model (GW2 has no subscription)

> > - a cash shop model with mandatory items (either pay to win, or removal of restrictions or both)

> > - regular mandatory expansions (GW2 expansions are not mandatory)

> > - requires regular purchases of a premium currency without being able to get it any other way

> >

> > GW2 is unique in this landscape in that it's expansions are not mandatory (there is no level increase or gear deappreciation), the cash shop is not required to enjoy the game, the premium currency can be aquired ingame and the game has no subscription. The setup is fine as is.

>

> I cannot agree with you. Guild Wars 2 makes more than enough with it's Cash Shop purchases. And again, I've seen many Free to Play games have a cash shop without mandatory items. Warframe is a good example of this. Nothing in their cash shop is mandatory and can all be earned through gameplay (besides cosmetics). They made more than they had expected with their current model of being Free to Play that they have gone past their original vision. Steve Sinclair, one of the main developers for Warframe even stated this at one of their conventions. They never expected Warframe to be as big as it did and it gave them the resources to build the game in a way they never thought they could. They are releasing their first Open World zone in the next week or two. They added cinematic story to the game. So more content they added due to the support the community has given the game.

 

You can't know how much GW2 makes since I doubt you have inside information. Now if you are refering to NCSofts quarterly reports which in the last years were always part of the doom and gloom cycle for some people to call out the game death, I look forward to seeing you there the next time people need good arguments as to why the game is fine.

 

Warframe also introduces new frames and weapons constantly and new game mechanics which require purchase or massive grind to keep up or viable in endgame. Not a really good example if I might say.

 

> @Lusts.3890 said:

>

> When you build a game properly, and enable things for your players; you do not need to worry about adding mandatory items to a cash shop. And most players care a lot about fashion in almost any game, free or not; to buy cosmetics. Its a major selling point for any cash shop is cosmetics. Everyone strives to be unique and cosmetics play on that desire.

 

Your belief goes stricktly against most revenue research for free to play games. I'm sorry but the majority of cash made in free to play games comes from a minority of players (called whales, similar to poker). Read up on how little the average person actually spends on a free to play game.

 

> @Lusts.3890 said:

>

> I am all for paid expansions. I am just do not support putting auto-loot behind a paywall. The only other game that has done this was Black Desert Online with their pet system and the majority of their community does not like their cash shop model.

 

I'm all for giving small incentives to make players buy expansions and other upgrades before relying that they buy useless stuff. That way the cash shop does not have to become to restrictive once not enough cash comes together.

 

Bringing BDO up is hilarious, I'm not even going to comment that. You should go feel ashamed in a corner to even mention their cash shop model in a GW2 monetisation thread.