Mini Pig Woes...

Kinda ditto.

Pigs were basically perfect gifts: Cheap enough not to feel bad about giving them freely. Cute enough to be aprreciated. Unsual enough to startle casuall players.

Seriously, players were not giving them away because they were worthless ... Otherwise you would see tons of people givign away all matter of crappy drops.

Type of people who proclaimed minipig worthless usually just bin/merch/mule worthless things. Not "waste" time giving stuff away.

Only selfish thing about giving pigs away was that it made givers feel good. People like feeling good, so you cant really blame them.

Well, I gave them away because I am nice. I could have sold the 20 or something for 1k each. That is 20k+ I could have had, but chose not to because some people missed the festival, etc.

So I don't think I am fooling myself. I am irked that ANET did this.

Ditto; I had plenty of room to keep the pigs. I just was much more interested in giving people something to smile about. And that makes me feel good. A lot more good than a celestial pig would make me feel.

Hey - Just randomly jumping in here because I felt strongly about the issue and wanted to give feedback (at the risk of making A-net bashing worse, which I don't condone at all, as they've provided us with an excellent game that has connected me with alot of great friends.)

My girlfriend and I run a guild, and between the two of us after last year's event, we had about 20-25 minipigs between the two of us (possibly a bit of an exaggeration, not positive, but not too much of one). We gave those pigs away to guild members who didn't attend the event, new players that I met who were looking for a helping hand, anyone else who was unable to get a minipet or otherwise would like one. We were thrilled to be in a position where we could do that, as alot of people were excited to be able to get them.

My girlfriend is a huge minipet freak, and wants a celestial pig. Sadly, we do not have enough pigs left to get even one at this point... we're going to try to go out and buy a few, probably at inflated prices (although hopefully not), which is aggravating due to our good intentions. (Had we known, we would have saved 5-6, and then given the excess away.)

Obviously, this isn't the end of the world. We both still love Guild Wars for the great game it is and for the friends that we've made here. I suppose I haven't said much that anyone else hasn't said already, but I feel better getting my opinion out here, as I know the staff reads the forum.

I'm not sure what the reasoning was behind this, but I do hope that future events don't use a similar model. We don't regret giving the pigs away, but we do regret that this is the reason we're going to have difficulty getting the celestial one.

Rain

And because of that, if I had received 12 mini bone dragons, I would have done the same thing. People like you are so determined to call us greedy, the only thing I was being greedy about was space. I needed space for my characters. They really expected me to have saved 5 mini pigs?

I'd say the biggest issue behind this is storage. Until recently storage has completely sucked. Yet these seemingly worthless items, have been taking up space in my storage, storage space that I needed for more important things, we were expected to keep them for a year...it is BS. Even people who collected minis would not have saved more than one pig at the time.

One year ago from now, there was no reason at all to have saved these. You had to save items that were essential. My storage was filled with weapons and armor. Things that were necessary to play the game. Yeah sure, I didn't need to have multiple armor sets or weapon sets, but it does allow you to do things differently in the game. To me those pigs were wasting the storage space I needed to play the game.

I wouldn't have kept 5 bone dragons at the time. I wouldn't have kept 5 ruriks at the time. I wouldn't have kept 5 pigs at the time.

Great analogy. I've always found Gaile's explanations a little far fetched. I suppose she is paid to do damage control. If only she realized a simple, "Yeah, this probably wasn't the best idea... sorry." instead of trying to write them off would work a lot better. Trying to paint people who gave away minis as somehow being the bad guys isn't going to go over well.

yep know how you feel, I gave 10+ away of the pigs for free to people that where not on or just new players that didnt have any pets.

Now if I want a celestial pig going to cost me 100k, like wtf anet.

442 fortunes later = no rat too

lately i feel anet has just been laughing at us players

xmas was a big f you too with that polar bear

Vilaptca, it wasn't an attempt to say that those of us who gave mini pigs away were greedy.
It was an attempt to put things into perspective.
We don't have the right to stand on such a high horse for giving those things away.
We weren't giving away something useful to us. I understand being pissed about it eventually leading to not getting a shiny object, but honestly if we knew they would lead to this there would be no giving them away because they were actually worth something.
It's like giving away an old toy you don't use or want and then finding out on ebay next year it's become a collector's item.

Anet helped some of their buddies free up storage space and become millionaires in the process;
I didn't get a minipig;
and now I've gone through my 250th fortune without any rat.

Now I'm waiting with baited breath to see how ANet will screw me with the finale, what disastrous surprise they're waiting to spring on me there?

Yeah. Just peachy.

RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GO I hate surprises.

I still stand by my original stance of "your all overreacting", plus I got a feeling all of this will merely repeat itself, overhyped mini pets that become total trash after 1 day, a most comical and ironic thing to watch, is it not?

33 pages of people bitching about this, the incredibly - up logic behind the whole thing, and the lack of preparedness that they unleash upon their community, and not a single reply from ANET that I've seen yet.

It's like they are saying, "Thanks for buying our game! Here, have a - up economy, some nerfed skills, a search button from which you can spend all the money you have earned over the last 2 years on over-inflated mini pets, and when your done with all that, don't ever expect us to say anything about anything so get lost."

This goes beyond complaining or whining. This is a downright insult to the community on behalf of ANET. This by far ranks as the most illogical thing I have ever seen a dev community do, and I used to play BF2 so thats saying something. The sad thing is, I don't EVEN want the nasty little shit of a pet, I'm just completely dumbfounded and astonished at the sheer magnitude of this proverbial community "-" you by ANET.



DO NOT EVADE THE SWEAR FILTER

Nothing has been taken away from anyone. Some free eye candy in a video game was offered in a way that not everyone will get some.
Some people here are coming across as emotionally fragile.

Well the way I see it, this is a new holiday item to reward players who own the older holiday item.

However, even if you were at the event last year, that doesn't necessarily mean you have enough pigs to get the new celestial pig.

Its only a reward for players who have A LOT of pigs.

And since theres no way to get pigs outside of buying from other players, player greed becomes a MAJOR factor.

So it basically benefits the greediest players who hoard the most. And they control the market.

Casual players have very little chance at this. With Celestial Rats, i can get lunar fortunes on my own.

I'm willing to play by Anet's random item rules, and have rare items through their methods of chance (birthday presents, rare drops, etc.), but when its other players who are motivated by greed who control how I get something, I get annoyed.

It's still eye candy with a function no different than all the other mini pets.
I think if people put too much stock into a mere symbol in a video game they are setting themselves up for all kinds of repeated disappointment.
This topic feels more reflective of fragile expectations than the game itself.

If I have fun doing something, such as collecting minis, drawing, tap-dancing, eating sushi, or something else and someone comes along and ruins my fun, I think I'd be pretty pissed.

Do you understand the concept?

I understand the reason why people are pissed. I'm saying it's not justifiable.
Nobody came along and took your minis.
A mini was added in a way that will make it rare.
Just add it to the pile of other rare minis.
Anyone who seriously had to have every mini to be happy already knows how expensive that is.

The other rare minis are still available without relying on other people to dictate how things are.

They are directly from Anet's contests, promotions, special editions, etc. (for the most part).

This is different. Do you see that?

Am i missing something here? people are willing to go on strike outside Anet's HQ because of a minipet?

No, you just made that up, silly.

I have said in the past I see why people are upset, but I think it's unjustifiably melodramatic. Do you honestly think the intensity of the feelings in this thread are displaying rational behaviour?
If so, then I honestly can't prove how trivial this all is.

You found this to be trivial because you don't care about it as much as others do. Is it WRONG that some of us actually CARE about something you think it's "trivial"?

Please.

Yes, it's wrong to care about something of this nature too such a degree that it leads to this type of behaviour. I see so much ferocity, chicken little attitudes, conspiracy theories and bypassing of the swear filter I have to believe that a reality check and coping skill adjustment are needed by some individuals here.

I'm actually starting to get worried about some parts of the community and I imagine Anet and any psychiatric association would be too. It's why I can't ignore this topic.

Gold sinks don't exist for the sake of everyone being able to get them right off the bat. They exist to give veterans who have been around for a long time something to do.

Its not a goldsink. Its a way to turn 5 pigs into 1.

Players made it into a goldsink thanks to their greed.

True, but the point is, anyone new to GW has been seriously handed their asses by all the farming nerfs. This gives the veterans an unfair "headstart" on these titles, since many are sitting on multiple stacks of ectos gained before all the nerfs. This means the new people are very unlikely to attain any of the goldsink titles or FoW armour. To be fair, this is an issue with all MMO's and is part of the reason I'm thinking of ditching the genre totally.

Not to mention how unlikely it is that the lucky/unlucky titles can be maxed from scratch before GW2 as of the end of this festival.

And as for giving veterans something to do, do you mean the 6 hours they spend going "WTB sparklers 150g each" or the couple of hours it takes to set them all off?

More titles like GMC, Skill Cap (apart from the cost), and Vanquishing would be appreciated as opposed to the pointless moneysinks like sweettooth AND drunkard AND party animal AND lucky AND unlucky, etc etc ad nauseum

If Anet want a guaranteed goldsink, they should make all customised weapons able to go onto the HoM. That'd bury some gold...

This only makes me care less about how special mini's are supposed to be.

I really don’t see why they need you to trade in five, and not any non personalized mini. I would like to see the static’s on how many non personalized mini pigs people had to see why they came up with that number.

Well at least this shows me I should be a greedy b***** then being a nice person who gave mimi’s freely to new players of those who didn’t have one.

No you can’t have my mimi’s

I have to agree with Redfeather here. I also should point out that it's mainly the strength of the reaction he's talking about (correct me if I'm wrong Redfeather)

I don't think he's saying your feelings are wrong, he seems to be addressing the "the sky is falling" feeling prevelant here. It's a matter of perspective, and from a broader perspective...this just isn't that big a deal. It's a minipet made from minipets everyone constantly whinged were too common anyway.

That wouldn't be an effective gold sink, because too much development time would have to go into implementing that, and GW2 release would have to be pushed back (or release a severely unfinished and lacking product). Think about how much you're asking Anet to do. They need to create the monuments for each specific skin, then they need to store the information of the weapon, then they need to think up rewards for each weapon in GW2 and implement those. I'd much prefer Anet to leave the HoM alone and work on making GW2 a great game.

Anyone, as for the topic on hand. I agree to an extent with most people here. I was disappointed that the only way I was going to get a celestial pig was to spend a huge sum of money. For someone who never farms, unless you count occasionally vanquishing for that title, paying 100k+ for an item that is supposed to be a fun little addition to the game is asking a bit much.

And that's the point. I see the events as a fun, side attraction from the game. I would rather have no minipets in the event than have some people getting lucky and making it rich in seconds. The same thing happened with the polar bear, where the drop rate was so low that there weren't even any reports on fansites until the last day of the event. Now we have this minipet as a reward for hoarding an item that was a popular and handy gift to give to new players or people who missed out on last year's event.

The problem I have is that adding these minipets to a fun event means that people are going to get disappointed, and that really negates the whole point of the event. After all, if you can't participate in an event that only comes round once a year, you're gonna feel a bit disappointed. If you really think about it, the entire event is rather pointless. It's a pointless, fun thing, just like minipets. But people like to experience every bit of an event, and adding in an event item that is only available to a select few people, you're taking that experience away from people new to the game, or people who missed out last year, or people who gave away their pigs.

Anyway, I'm gonna go back and farm more lunar fortunes (I still have three characters that haven't done the quests). Who knows, maybe if I get another rat I can trade it for a celestial pig :P

BTW people, goldsinks remove gold from the economy, i.e. armor/weaponsmiths/keys/etc. This is not a goldsink because the gold stays in the economy, it just gets re-distributed.

I have to agree with redfeather, too - this is a trivial matter. I think some individuals are taking this too emotionally. I totally agree that this was handled poorly, especially the 5:1 thing when 1:1 would have worked fine, but really, it isn't that huge of a deal.

I agree and am very pissed off about this. i had 23 mini pigs, gave 22 away to friends and guildies and now i only have 1 left for my collection and i will not pay 25k+ per mini pig to get the new one.

Anet should change this for those of us who actual gave them away. True Greed. Anet and the greedy players screwed us mini collectors really good.
This teaches me to NEVER give anything away for free ever again.

and for all you people trying to justify this, Shut up. you got your pigs or your just trying to make more money by super price inflation.

a.net = fail at making people happy.

Strength of the reaction, can be explained by the fact that ANet had made a lot of bad decisions when it comes to Minipet distribution in the last 6 months. (When was that lottery in Europe and the destroyer minipets in America?) So people would think they learned from back then, but with this new stupid idea, they just show that they didn´t learn and care.

It is about how they treat their customers. Not so much about the minipets. Or am I wrong?

I don't think they've ever made a good minipet-related decision since "let's give them as birthday presents". Asian minipets, anyone?

So heres one lesson to learn: keep all collectibles. I happened to keep 1000 pig fortunes from last year because I was unable to sell them, and look wat happened, cele mini pig and fireworks title.

yea i think I'm going to sell all my mini's and just stop collecting. collecting on gw is simply not worth the trouble. Its almost not worth it to even play anymore at all. I made time for this event and it sucked. i shoulda done something else. what a waste of a day. i will not be on tomarrow. no point.

Seriously, except mini pigs aren't 'collectibles,' as in: they don't stack. So I guess the lesson is keep everything whether it stacks or not. Be a pack rat and you will be "rewarded!" In fact, that rewards Anet the most since it means everyone would need to keep buying character slots to store all this crap.


hmm... where are the conspiracy theorists? I think I have a new lead!

I collected stuff for the Halloween collectors through the whole year, cause I knew they would be back and i wanted the booze.

Is that an example?

http://guildwars.incgamers.com/forum...&postcount=351

If you stacked up on party items the last 3 years, you are rewarded now by being able to go for the new title now.

If you stacked up on mini pigs (for whatever reason), you are now rewarded by being able to sell them for 25K each or get a celestial pig.

If it's about pets or event items, stacking them up is the best thing to do it seems. Oh, and NEVER give something away. It takes one thing and the value will shoot up and you will be left empty-handed.

They are constantly keeping us in the dark about things until it's too late.

They completely overreact as well.

They gave away too many mini pigs last year ( so freaking what, but whatever) so they fix that by letting you trade them in A YEAR LATER? who the heck is going to hold on to them for a year when they don't even know there's a reason to? Maybe if they had done this LAST YEAR when everyone was complaining OMG I HAVE TOO MANY MINI PIGS WHATEVER SHALL I DO !?
MAYBE that would have been a good idea. But I don't think so. I think it's absolutely ridiculous that you should have to give up even 1 of any kind of mini pet to get another one. They're not crafting materials for crying out loud, mini pets are supposed to be special aren't they?


They fixed a non problem by coming up with a ridiculous solution, a year too late.

How many people actually have 5 mini pigs and are also willing to trade them in for 1 new pet?

I have 6 across 11 characters. Only have gotten around to dedicating one. So that means if I want this new mini pet I have to give up not only 5 of the actual pets but the option to ever dedicate them ever again.

I don't understand how stupid ideas like this get through the cracks and become reality.
I can see one person coming up with a stupid idea but then everyone says Ok yeah 5 pets for 1 pet sounds like a great idea!! ?? WTF?