Skill Unlocks in the Guild Wars Store!

Err NO.
If you have nightfall, Skill pack does not give you skill from other campaign. You still have to buy the other campaign as well as skills.
All the skill pack does is save you time from unlocking them. Same way as ebay gold save you time from farming.

Funny move by Anet, but totally irellevant for someone who feels an addictive elektricity in his brain every time he unlocks an elite skill.

I don't like pvp so much anyway, because i'm allergic to cookie cutter gameplay, and there is a point at wich you can't stand being called a nub any longer.

Who are these mysterious pvp people that said this? I can't imagine a pvp player caring whether or not you played pvp. What a pvp player might point out, however, is that GW isn't that great of a pve game, and suggest WoW as a better alternative for those not interested in pvp.

If Anet designed the game to force pvp players to play pve then they wouldn't have included pvp-only characters as an option. There would only be storyline characters, and if you wanted to pvp you would have to create a pve character first and play through the storyline. Like in WoW.

For some strange reason, you seem to think that pvp players play pvp to "achieve a certain goal", "reward," or "benefit" - where that goal, reward, or benefit is: Unlocking skills.

That's exactly backwards. PvP players play because they like the competition and the rewards that competition brings. While part of that reward is faction, faction is but a means to an end - with the end being fame, fun, and, for a select few, a tiny, tiny fortune. When pvp players unlock everything possible to unlock with faction - and many of us do - we don't all of a sudden stop playing pvp. The players who reach this point are generally the same pvpers who don't care about collecting pointless junk in the first place.

Many pvp players come from the fps world, where the entire point of the game is the thrill of the competition, not who can unlock the best guns in story mode. For those who want to collect stuff through mindless grind farming, thats what pve is for.

difference between making and scamming

Hey ANET, thanks, so...when are you going to offer 100% map, all missions/cities unlocked for $$?

I thought ANET was against trading in game things for out of game money. Mind you I feel that they can do what they want, but they shouldnt contradict themselves. I bet you they'd jump on anyone trying to sell X number of Flames of balthazar for cash, if it was brought to their attention.

For a second I thought ANET wasnt all about money...should I be fearing a monthly fee because people want RP servers?

You can't buy the skill to use the skills. PvP is still based on your personal skill, not money.

Even if team A has bought the full skillpack, they will not beat team B that has experience in PvP, even if team B doesn't have full skillpack.

Buying the skillpack is useless if you don't know how to use the skills. You still need experience in the game to use that skillpack you bought efficiently.

Only "advantage" buying the pack is that the player doesn't have to spend tons of time grinding faction to unlock the skills one by one... And the game wasn't about grinding in the first place anyways...

Anet would never dare to introduce monthly fees because that would kill the company and enshure Blizzards total domination since they have the better game.By far.

Really: if you buy these unlock packs you are a retard who deserves to be exploited. Can't imagine more then a few dozen people actually shelling out cash for this.

So if a player didn't buy Prophies and only bought Factions can they still buy the unlocks?

If that's the case:

Awesome ANet, freaking Awesome.

At last, A-net fulfill the desires of a bad-known kind of players: the Casual PvPer.
When you have a job, a social life and a family, it's kinda hard to PvP with all these expansions. To stay competitive, you need the new skills of each chapter, but it's very time consuming.

Thank you, A-net.

At Games Convention in Leipzig, Gaile and Izzy talked about chapter specific features.

The part that really worried me was that frequently requested features like trading improvements (auction house), guild storage etc... may be chapter specific or even offered in the online store.

Where will ArenaNet draw the line and what requested features will they offer for everyone across all chapters and what features will they offer just for certain chapters or via the online store?

Because if you look at it, an auction house is just "a nice feature" that doesn't bring any unbalance to the game. It just makes things easier.

I can see this becoming a rather expensive journey.

I'm ok with this. I'd never shell out the cash for it myself, but I have nothing against those who would.

I've probably posted this 3 or more times today, but I'll do it again.

I'm going to make this very, very simple.

Having every skill unlocked (UAS) does NOT make you a better player.

Having access to all the (good) skills is a baseline requirement for competitive PvP in Guild Wars i.e. you really need the good stuff to do well. This helps level the playing field. Lets put it this way, they can bring a gun to a gun fight now, instead of a knife. This doesn't teach them to use the gun.

I am really disappointed too! The "magic" of this game is disappearing with this "Store", I have 8 months unlocking skills, and I KNOW how to use that skills; Now daddy kids buy everything and know nothing about using the skills. WTF? I vote for NO MORE "smart" ideas with the ONLY purpose of make money, or simply start to sell hairstyles and mustaches and make all campaigns free.

EDIT:
Really? You mean you can unlock skills even WITHOUT buy the Prophecies game? If this is true, so the new feature is not as bad as I was thinking. Anyway, I maintain the idea of not adding things for make money ONLY, because when you see the money you get the bad habit and end adding a lot of sh*t to the store.

Leaving the Skill buying issue aside. What bothers me is if the MAJORITY of us ask for it to be sold to us in the On line store... will it be sold there... and ANET say "You asked for this" where is this line drawn. Because FOW armor being sold in the store, is an option and it doesnt affect anyone elses play or give any unfair advantage.....

I See No problem with this, it levels the playing field for people who come into to game in nightfall, who are now faced with unlocking 900 Skills (and thats on top of all the weapon mods to unlock)

900 Skills is about 100 Hours Worth of faction at least

those who earned them by playing, you have the advantage of experiance, they dont, money cant buy experiance


so far ive worked out i spend about 3.6p Per hour on guild wars (2 Chapters, 2 Character Slots) that means im spending more on electricity than i am on guild wars, so im happy to shill out to buy more from anet

well couldent this be a good thing for Pve?
i mean they most likeley will get more funds which they ''could'' use to improve stuff in Pve just a thought..

I wonder if you'll be able to buy PVP classes in the future without having to drop the bundle on the expansion.

As in

15$ for a PvP Paragon without having to buy the entire Nightfall expansion.

That would truly and totally rock.

As JR has pointed out repeatedly in this thread, the quantity of skills unlocked isn't a factor in pvp for all but the very basic beginners. Anyone with enough experience to seriously compete (i.e. design a gvg build other than grab-8-and-go, use voice com, not use henchmen) already has the necessary skills unlocked. This is even more true now that the pre-mades accurately reflect widely-used pvp builds.

Purchasable skill unlocks allow new players to skip the grind of faction farming to unlock runes, weapon mods, and skills not included in the pre-mades. At the moment, however, skipping this step is basically pointless, since there just isn't that much a new player needs to unlock to become competitive. Later, as more and more expansions are released, this may change. As the size of the skill pool increases, this gradually increases the barrier to entry for new players who want to compete in pvp. Purchasable skill unlocks address this problem.

Rhetorical Question: Why does it seem that all of the objections made on the grounds that purchasable skill unlocks will somehow unbalance pvp are made by people who pretty clearly have no experience playing serious pvp in the first place?

Personally I think the pricing is a bit steep, especially for people that already own prophecies and just want to get those skills. I think, and have always thought that UAX should be given to anyone who has bought a chapter, although I also don't think its that big of a deal. I can't remember the last time I couldn't play a character because I didn't have a skill.

Other than that, I think buying the skills is a great way for new players who don't own prophecies to get the skills.

Good job Anet.

Rhetorical Question: Why does it seem that all of the objections made on the grounds that purchasable skill unlocks will somehow unbalance pvp are made by people who pretty clearly have no experience playing serious pvp in the first place?[/QUOTE]


It doesnt unbalance anything, but it does set precedent to make it okay to start selling pieces of the game in the online store. But thats okay too cause I ve never had FOW armor and may have chance at getting it now. If enough ask for it that is....

Personally I think this is a stupid idea. PvP need 8 skills to create a build of their liking. 8k faction is not hard to come by. Changing builds - rinse and repeat, while building up a skill bank! But if pvp people want to pay for this sure go ahead, doesn't affect me.

BUT from the point of view that it will allow PvP people that have purchased chapter 3 a chance to compete I think it is good, just poorly implemented. Imagine by chapter 5+ we are likely going to have many skill packs, they might even need joint weapon upgrades /rune packs, the price new players need to pay to stay competitive will just keep rising...

The precedent was already set with purchasable character slots. This doesn't move us any closer to a world with purchasable vanity armor sets.

Since GW has to keep items balanced for pvp, but also has to appeal to the pve treasure hunters, the easiest way to differentiate common items from rare items is through vanity skins. Selling vanity skins through the online store would have no effect on pvp, but would completely destroy any incentive for pve treasure hunters to continue playing the game. Selling skill unlocks through an online store, on the other hand, has about the same effect on the game balance as selling purchasable character slots, i.e. none.

/FULLY AGREE

this is only good for the PvP community in GuildWars

imagine som1 wants to join full PvP aspect of the game but his first game was nightfall or even a later chapter... how the heck will he ever compete when he needs to unlock all those skills, atleast now if he wants to put some money in it he can unlock everything.

Price is good imo.

I know I will never buy any packs like these, just because I love getting all skills unlocked the hard way, but if some ppl don't like that, well then they can buy it, fine by me

this board is so full of whiners...A.net selling these skills does not in anyway ruin your chances as small/large as they might be to be great at PvP...

if you are simply jealous at the inequality between those with/without cash, lol

Sure A.net could have just made a PvP Prophecy UAX for all players when Nightfall is installed but they are in no way obligated. What right do you have to expect A.net to make it free? Want it, fine; but to get all salty when it is not, grow up kiddies...

just because they created a game plan without the need for monthly fees doesn't mean they have to give up every means for profit...now when we start seeing items that are more then simply graphic differences being sold...i.e. uber stats for cash...then I'll agree. But anet has every right to sell special content. If it ever gets to a point where A.net spends more time on milking the cow then making actual content...well they won't have a game for much longer and the issue will be moot


grats to A.net on giving those pvp purists what they wanted...

Ok, but where are those treasure hunters selling that max gold req8 plat wand 20% recharge, 20% halves casting time? There are no such items on the market. On the wtb forum, you can see several people wanting to buy such a wand, but without success.

So I rather buy it from the store and play the game with my pimp items than loosing hours and weeks on the trade forums and channels to maybe find one, just maybe.

Haven't read any post of this thread.

Just say that this is bad news.We don't know if they are prolly going to sell gold for real cash, or special items for cash or who knows

Pandoras box is open

Bad news indeed, very bad

You should read the previous posts, to prevent people from repeating things. Especially reading what Gaile Gray said about this, or the fact that special items or cash will not be sold in the Store.

Who are these mysterious players? You haven't been on these forums long have you? It's one of the default one-liners posted in response to people complaining about the lacking state of Factions PvE

In denial much are you? The game didn't even have Balthazar Faction on release. There isn't a question WHATSOEVER that ANet intended people to play PvE for their unlocks.

You're confused. I didn't refer to the wishes of PvP players anywhere in any of my posts. I've been referring to the way the game was originally designed and intended to be played.

Right, and they've got their wish, at a steep price. I don't think the 'fps world' has you pay $9.95 per gun does it? The truth of the matter is, the game is STILL designed to make people invest SOMETHING to get their unlocks. Only now, money has become an option. If ANet was truly invested in keeping a fair, competitive playing environment, why did they involve money in the process?

Indeed they're not sold in the online GW store, but on ebay. Think about it.

And what would you want ANet to do about this, except clearly state that they do not agree to this, and take whatever measures they can to prevent it? This happens with every major MMO out there, it's not just GW...


On a different note, here's my view on things: first of all, this change only affects PvP. PvE players have nothing to worry about. Besides, people have always complained about the amount of pve/skill unlocking grind you have to go through in order to unlock the necessary skills and be competitive in PvP. UAS has been an ongoing request from the GW community ever since GW was launched.

Second, one of GW's mottos is "Skill over time spent". This was all true, until now. Chapters are coming out every 6 months, and with 450+ skills in Prophecies, 300 skills in Factions and Nightfall coming out in less than 2 months, we'll probably have around 1000 skills to unlock for UAX. This will definitely put the players that already have Prophecies and Factions (and unlocked most of the skills from both) in a clear advantage over the others. Without this option, it becomes very difficult for newer players to jump into PvP, especially with new chapters coming out every 6 months.

Another thing people are saying is that that the ones who have gone through the pain and grind to unlock everything will be in a slight disadvantage now that others will be able to take out their CC and do the same in just 3 clicks instead of several months. From my point of view (I'm at UAX now) I don't feel threatened or "robbed" in any way by the people who will reach UAS by buying unlock packs: it's one thing to unlock the skills, and a whole different thing to know how to use them properly. And besides, I don't have to pay for the skills like they did.

I believe all that we'll see is just a new bunch of UAS W/E-s with Meteor Shower or Mo/N-s with Life Transfer, and nothing else. People will unlock the skills, but will they know how to use them? In the end, it's still personal skill and gameplay experience that tells people apart in PvP...

I kind of have mixxed feelings about it. It just seems to be more of a split between PVP and PVE to me on one hand. I mean It only unlocks them for PVP, so I dont have much use for them, It wasnt that hard to unlock them anyway, If you pvp'ed just had to use some faction. But any new PVE character I make still has to learn/buy skills independently. This seems tantamount to ebaying gold. Why do people ebay gold? Either because they are lazy, or dont have the time to farm for gold. Why do people pay for skills? Either because they are lazy, or dont have the time to farm for skills. Seems strange to me. Also are these skills available to people who dont have Prophesies? I thought you had to buy Prophesies to have access to prophesies skills. If Prophecies only players do not have access to factions storage, then factions only players should NOT have access to prophesies skills.(sorry if I am mistaken in my assumption that factions only players have access to prophesies skills). However I think this is a step in the direction of skill vs grind. Now (at least for pvp) you dont have to grind or farm to get skills. Anyway those are my opinions. Not all of them mind you, but the ones I want to share.

I wish people would stop comparing purchasable UAS to buying items like Fissure Armor, leet PvE equipment or rank. They are in no way on the same level at all. Equipment and titles are things you EARN in the game as a visible and very real reward for doing something (however meaningless that something is). Skill unlocks are just something you have to, and will do eventually.

Here Here JR.

I dont mind this idea, because if you want to purchase a set of skills for 7.00, or 40.00 over all, go right ahead, because your buying your self another game right then and there isntead of manualy taking the time, and being a real good player at the end of it all.

As long as ANET doesnt get carried away with these sort of things, it's all good.

These threads, and many more like them, express a point cannot be stated strongly enough. With the PvP Unlock Packs, a player may acquire the skills to play one or more characters. But acquiring the skill to play is his/her own responsibility, and something that cannot be purchased. You can buy a hammer, but does that make you an expert cabinetmaker? The skill packs simply enable a player to obtain the tools to play, but learning to use those tools in a successful way requires effort and investment of a non-monetary type.

This is one of the major reasons the PvP Unlocks are available. Thanks for making that clear.


~Gaile

this is exactly what the current crop of bitchers wanted Anet to do in the first place

HOW MANY OF YOU....................

remember all of the earlier posts on this and other forums stating that the more chapters that come out with more skills the less chance a PVP person will pick it up due to the truly staggering amount of time getting the skills they need so they can play what they want to

how many of you remember all the posts asking for a PVP ONLY version?

a PVP VERSION with only the skills already unlocked and ready to use but maybe a bit cheaper.........say 10 dollars cheaper than the regular version?

well they gave it to you including the 10 dollar discount

now stop bitching because they gave you what you asked for in pvp

saying skill unlocks for money is like saying collector's edition with the extra weapons
either does not give the extra payer any advantage over those who don't

wow asking money for in game skills listen gaile most ppl arnt taht obssesd they can just pvp and get factions NO ONE BUY THOOSE WASTE OF MONEY CAN GET EM FREE IN GAME BUY PVPING AND TURNING IN FACTIONS FOR THE SKILLS!

Firstly, you guys asked for this to happen, or do you want me to dig up the other thread where Gaile ASKED you for your suggestions?

Secondly, I have unlocked every single skill in the game through hardline gvg sessions every night with my guild, and I still play PvP, so clearly the motivation for PvP, at least for me, is not to unlock more skills.

Thirdly, what?

Someone knows a bit too much about Ebay

I still wished Anet could just release a Title: UAX, that would've been more promising than Rank, and could prove one's PvP skill easily, instead they had to craw around Ebay and trying to take EULA violaters out of business.

Bit of a two way consideration, must've took alot of thinking for Anet to decide this....

Also, in GW, of course buying a Hammer does not make you a good cabnet maker, but this is GW, you have to be a good cabnet maker to get the parts for a hammer.

Ummm, if I'm reading you properly, no one is required to purchase the packs. Please feel free to continue to earn your skills the traditional way, as I will. The PvP Unlock Packs are another option that some players have requested. It's that simple: An additional choice for players.