Why XTH should remain broken

I agree with this:

This:

And finally this:

I shouldn't have used the phrasing "under the impression that". I should have said something like "on the faith that". I took a gamble. Just the same, my point remains valid (a point which has nothing to do with my personal well being): before introducing a system which encourages the spending of real money on accounts, you'd better be damn sure that you know what you're doing, because if you don't (as in this case) you will either encourage people to buy accounts that you'll render worthless later, or else you will be supporting an unpopular system. If that's what you end up creating, NO MATTER WHAT YOU DO AFTERWARD, somebody's going to be pissed off at you at the end of the day.

I don't think XTH is exempt from change, but considering that all the facts have been "in" for a long time, I'm not sure a fix is forthcoming. On the other hand, they have a long history of cluing into the obvious twelve months later, so I could be wrong! My accounts have already paid for themselves, so I couldn't bitch too loudly if they did, which for the XTH detractors is probably the best argument you could give to get off the XTH system. Suppose that ANet announces that the XTH will be shut down in 6 months, stopping people from buying new accounts, and allowing existing account holders to get the value out of those accounts (and merely cutting off the truly "free" money after the accounts have been paid for). Just a thought, and this is coming from a guy with a gajillion accounts. If my suggestion happens, I'll post a youtube of me eating a hat.

oh, sorry, too busy doing too many things at once... 5000 per month I could actually believe... but I still think it's just a feel good bit of hype based on a limited set of data from a very specific time frame that just happened to look good enough to post "See, we care".

I'm sure the points being made are still understandable to most.

I'm not sure a 'fix' is coming either, and indeed I find it most probable that it won't be neutered. And yeah, you're right about Anet busting out and and fixing things... a year after everyone else noticed a problem, it happens

Oh, I don't think you'll be eating any hats over this...

Perhaps Anet will shift to nontradable keys, people with multiple accounts will still get 'some' value from the XTH, in the form of Zaishen drops, it doesn't completely remove the RMT aspect of it, but it does cripple it significantly while still allowing the multi account holders some perks.

For the record, I have four accounts, and I want the XTH fixed (not fixed as in returned, fixed as in take away the free money aspect of it).

It doesn't matter that I'm in a position to make more money every month than an estimated 70-80% of the GW population, solely by utilizing the XTH. I still think it is contrary to the spirit of the game, the ideals that sold this game to many...

I would like it fixed, not going to cry if it isn't fixed, obviously... but I think it's an area that ArenaNet should have given more thought to when they were first implementing it. Fair and balanced is how the game should be... not advantages to those with more money, not rewarding time over skill in general... fair and balanced.

^^that is what is wrong with OP's whole argument.

The wealth here is created by the player who bought the account and activating them, since they created that wealth by opening new account, it is rightfully theirs. You cannot assume that there's a pool of wealth waiting there, so that it can be equally divided.

Its like complaining about people who play 20 hours a day while another only play 6 hours and that everyone should stop playing at 6 hours so that the wealth distribution may be "equal"

Does not happen like that. stop complaining.

Tips:
Be happy with what you have and stop looking at what others have.

Note:
One cannot do zMission or zBounty or Traveller's if the account isn't being played before!

Pumpkin Pie

i never said wealth distribution should be equal, i simply stated that players should not have this much of a economic edge over other players simply from buying accounts. The poll statistic results were to show how big of a edge these players have over single account users.

And that right there is your biggest problem. Guru is not representative of the entire population. The percentage of people owning only 1 account is likely MUCH higher.

Daesu, you are absolutely right. GW is NOT some "dream" utopia.

However, that doesnt change the fact that
1)A.net is hypocritical, Gold selling, when they ban gold selling.
2)A.net WANTS you to think they are different than the thousands of other WoW clones.

Yes, this was stated on page 2 of the thread.

My issue with XTH doesn't have anything to do with how "rich" people become from owning multiple accounts, but more how it affects the overall gameplay of GW.

When Z title was new Z Key prices ranged between 5.5-6k each. Ectos were a steady 4.9k and platinum was a commodety. With abuse of the XTH Z Keys dropped to as low as 3k, essentially screwing over everyone who invested in their Z Title prior to the influx of Z Keys. That more than the measly 100k per account people recieve was the problem.

The rich people of GW as everyone knows, are the Ebayers and Powertraders. People who buy accounts for Z Keys over buying gold online (both of which I disproove of) are simply dumb. Solid powertrading can bring an easy 80-140e an hour depending on your skill level and luck, making these people far richer than people who use multiple accounts for XTH will ever be.

It would be too late now to make Z Keys account based only; it would put an unfair advantage to the currently disadvantaged - those who bought high Z ranks when Z Keys were higher priced. People with low ranks would find it difficult to achieve high ranks without competing heavily in PvP. Anet needs to make a compromise inbetween, Perhaps reducing the amount of keys awarded for predictions. Part of the reason Z Keys are so low is just that there is the mentality that all the keys recieved are free. People will sell their keys cheap because, "hey its all good I got them for free." If people got fewer it would still be worth it to do predictions, all free money. But the value of them would steadily rise and perhaps the enconomy might get a little better as people would be smarter with their keys, or even use them.

I don't care a ton personally I make so much more off of P Trading than people who utilize XTH as their sole source of income will ever make. I just feel jipped I wasted over 8000 Z Keys worth at 5.5k each for my silly Z Title I'm glad I focus on minipets now and stay far away from that cursed chest!!

EDIT: though this doesn't apply to everyone, not all buy multiple accounts for the sole purpose of abusing the XTH. I myself have over 20 accounts I use for storing all my junk (Oh it builds up over the years...) In addition, I use 3 of my accounts quite heavily in PvE and PvP... The poll put up doesn't reflect the amount of accounts people use for XTH, but just the amount of accounts people have... Call me crazy but I only predict on 4 of my 21accounts... 3 for myself and 1 for my sis.

/fail at uderstanding MMOs.

Early adopters ALWAYS get shafted in the long run. Accomplishments in MMOs always devaluate fast. There is nothing that can hold value unless it is discontinued.

Really, what would you expect, to save money when something is hot and new? Anyone who bought that title early on must have known that they would save millions by waiting a while. That 3k per key extra was your price for getting title ASAP.

/fail at understanding the economy of GW. If that was true prices of things such as the Asian Miniatures (Panda, Island Guardian, Vizu etc.) and prices of things such as r8 Weapons would lose value over time. And well... we all know that paying 160e for your first panda then selling it for 22,000e later is nice profit . Neither are discontinued in fact I have an email link from Regina saying there might even be plans to introduce more contests with "In game rewards" - AKA most likely minis. Sure I admit Z title could only drop in the long run but it's dropped far faster then it would have normally and your idea of how MMO's work is completly off. Most accomplishments have actually risen.. Champ points can nolonger be farmed w/o recieving a banhammer.. the keg farming was nerfed so it actually takes a few days to get Leg Survivor if you want to get into small things....

Z Keys are part of the economy and are no different, there is no denying that XTH has had a profound affect on the title that would have otherwise been actually quite prestigious to have at high ranks.

Z-Keys do not have a set price nor is there a limited quantity of them in the game.
It was OBVIOUS that their price would fall.
Now, one could argue that buying keys back then was silly - but you do have to remember that you had those title ranks sooner than the people that are buying keys now. You paid to be the first.
I guess what you are really pissed about now is that no-one cares about you being first.


And this one was just lovely:
I approve your idea that MASSIVE farming, which you support, has NO influence whatsoever on the prices. It's the XTH, with it's few keys PER MONTH that is raising the prices.




Eversince the XTH stopped working - I stopped caring about PvP.
But you know what, I can play PvE as the sole player in my map.
I'd love to see how that works out for the PvP guys.

Well Anet didn't tell people to go out and buy multiple accounts to exploit a flawed system now did they?

Technically in one sense it is cheating, technically in another it is real money trading.

I'd find it quite amusing if Anet did change it.

What edge?

I don't have anything left in my account after I was hacked, and I am still able to play normally and quite well and having lots of fun while there are a lot of GW billionaire running around in the game.

I agree that wealth in the game at this point simply doesn't matter. What really matters is that people aare free to play how they want and have fun how they want rather than have options narrowed and play styles dictated.

Remove the frigging stupid loot nerf, which killed the game far more than anything else. Either that or Kill XTH and SF to be consistant.

Economic Edge???? What is that? Is there whole portion of the game I have missed? Does this Economic Edge allow the top rated people/guilds in PVP to spank everyone else? Does this economic edge allow ppl to breeze FOW/DOA/End Game Bosses faster and easier than everyone else? Does this Economic Edge help ppl with Hard Mode? Wait I got it Economic Edge allows ppl to dominate everyone in the snowball tourney this weekend right? No? Rollerbeetle Racing maybe? No....Hmmm trying to find out what portion of the actual game this Economic Edge is allowing everyone to dominate in Guild Wars. How about in Pre??? No.

WAIT I GOT!!!!!!

E-PEEN TOURNEY!!! Damn that is it I quit! Everyone with multiple accts is winning the I have more crap than you tourney, the I have the coolest armor tourney, the I have 10000000 ectos tourney, the I have the best weapons tourney, the I have the best minis tourney, etc....

Mireles quit being worried about what everyone else has or doesn't have and play the game. Having 1 or 100 accounts does not affect YOUR actual gameplay in any way. Keep out of everyones fun. When we need someone to head the MMO multiple account police, we will give you a call.

i'm not as smart as a lot of people are on guru *looks at inde* but i think they should bring xth back. just because you hate it and dont want it back doesnt mean everyone else does. i play the game normal and with events and other such things i stayed at a steady 300k. i only use the zkeys to help with my one ziashen title. and yes i know i can play pvp to get zkeys. but not every one is good at pvp. *looks shocked* and i only have one account! so leave xth alone if you dont like it and let the rest of us enjoy it..when it comes back.

I haven't really given my opinion on XTH and whether it should come back or stay away. People play the game for their own reasons and they are many. Who am I to define what is fun for someone else?

Wait a minute... How can you run a fansite and not get it? The whole POINT of fora like these is to rant and flame that the game should be played YOUR way and anyone who thinks otherwise is a big poopyhead!

Get with the program, man!

I am one of those people with only one account. I have not been powertrading and I have not gotten loads of free z keys. Still I have a obsidian armor and a set of chaos gloves and cash + ectos etc worth 2 -3millions. I got my GWAMM title with all the inventments in alcohol, partystuff etc, in other words I feel rich enough. It doesnt take away anything from my gaming pleasure if some people have 30 accounts and can earn 1k keys per month. Let them do it if they want to spend rl money on it.
To me its much better than the money goes to anet than into ebay sellers or chinese moneyfarmers etc. More money to Anet means they have better ability to fund the work on gw2 and maybe even some ressources on the gw1 live team.
So I just wish they get the XTH fixed and even more people will buy loads of accounts for it.

I enjoy GW just fine while ignoring all three of those things.

ANet has made it very clear that GW2 benefits from such accomplishments will be merely cosmetic anyway. I really do sympathize with the frustration people feel who worked hard for a title and then saw someone else essentially fork over a bunch of real-life money to get it easily. But not because I think the latter is wrong. It's because I've made the same kind of mistake myself: creating a definition/expectation in my head and clinging to it as if it should be some universal law.

It's kinda like the epiphany I had when I realized that sports refs aren't really dispensers of justice. The only reason that I would get so upset about bad calls is that I believed that refs *should* make things fair. Nope, all they do is try their best to make the game stick to a set of rules, and they're prone to mistakes and grudges just like we are. If you believe that GW titles prove a certain flavor of worthiness in yourself, you're making a similar mistake, and you're just setting yourself up to be disappointed when you see someone else achieve the same titles without appearing worthy.

IMHO the GW "economy" is just fine as it is: real life money via extra accounts leads primarily to non-gameplay-related cosmetics. I say "primarily" because there are a few exceptions like skill/unlock packs and consumables. If I had enough real-life money to fund constant use of consumables, then sure, I'd have a huge gameplay advantage... but I digress. I don't get the sense that very many players use their wealth for gameplay advantage, and ANet has been careful to confine that stuff to PVE (except skill/unlock packs, which IMHO is the most underestimated form of buying a gameplay advantage for real money, but I digress again...). ANet has to make their money somehow, and making it off of our craving for status and appearance rather than our craving for gameplay advantage is a strategy that appeals to me.

I don't see it that way. Suppose someone managed to crack ANet's keygen algorithm and started producing and selling access keys. I bet nobody would complain if ANet caught the guy and put a stop to it. They wouldn't cry out "Hypocrites! Banning some guy for selling access keys when they sell access keys themselves all the time!" Take a careful look at gold selling and you'll see that it's essentially the same concept. There just aren't (yet) general laws against it to make us think "of course that's wrong." ANet is having to enforce it themselves.

Bravo! you get it!! And I wish others would understand this as well.

I'm fine with the xth being down, as a mainly GvG player zkeys come fast anyway.
Can sell them to PvE players who can't get them this easy anymore. (and should'nt)
It started out as a PvP title, but it's a PvE title now.

You can buy consumables with real life money? Where is that in the store?

Not directly of course:

real life money -> multiple accounts -> multiple XTH -> loads of zkeys -> in-game gold -> consumables

A bad poll being used to make a silly point. The populaton of a gaming forum is not representative of the overall population of that game. Having ownership of accounts being described as "control" of anything other than those particular accounts is just melodrama. Enjoy the game and quit worrying about what everyone else is doing.

The only advantage having lots of in-game money gets you is being able to buy special low-req equipment, things like q8 AL16 shields and the like. This is the ONLY thing that in-game money is good for in terms of giving a competitive edge.

If you have lots of money, you can use consets for everything in PvE. Yay you, you kill a bunch of AI monsters more quickly.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the possibility of making Zkeys non-tradable like Zcoins. This would fail for the people going to max the title (like me) unless you're a regular HvH or GvGer in the mATs actually earning points... oh wait... maybe titles should be earned after all?

Correction, it's a good poll for the information that I intended it to be used for. It's just being used by someone else to make a completely unrelated point. As when you have one-line from a conversation and take it out of context it no longer makes sense. And in case anyone wants to post about the poll not reflected the GW population, he knows this. I went over this on page 2 with what real #'s are probably closer to.

Oh yeah, I forgot about that. Come to think of it, maybe wealth really DOES lead too much to competitive advantages. Getting +8 armor or standard weapon dmg at an attribute level of 8 instead of 9 could make a major difference depending on the build.

What really should have happened with the XTH is similar to how it was when they used it in Winterfest I believe. The reward was a Wintergreen weapon, which is kinda useless but pretty cool. I agree that tourny reward points should have been left to people who actually competed in the tourny, but it is too late now for any change to matter.

Although it is quite nice to be able to unlock fancy armor on my PvP toons even though I don't do mAT's anymore...

OK, maybe I misread the OP, but isn't this thread just a bitchfest that people who have multiple accounts make more money? (whether its XTH or Traveler gifts, the complaint is the same)


Frankly, until someone can think of a way to limit accounts, I think this is all a moot point. ArenaNet doesn't have the resources to figure out what household has one account per person (husband, wife, kids), or multiple accounts for one person.


I think this is all making a mountain out of a molehill. As has been discussed previously, buying outside products for items to be sold in-game is nothing new: mini-pets in PCGamer, contest rewards, collector's editions, etc., etc.

Seems strange that multiple accounts are getting so much attention.

I think that remark from Raven Wing is right on target. What is your objection? I'm an example of someone who decided to buy additional accounts instead of gold from moneyfarmers when I wanted to convert some real-life money into in-game money.

The remark is also on-topic because XTH (when it's working) is the primary catalyst for converting real-life money into in-game money with royalties going to ANet rather than moneyfarmers.

They pay more, In my opinion, they actually deserve to get more ZKeys.

Okay, fair enough. I can't argue with that.

*Looks at previous page* They have...

*Looks at all other threads on this general topic* And they mentioned it there too.

If they announced they're shutting it down permanently I would jump with joy irl!

Yes, even with my 4 accounts making me free 300-400k per month from it.

That's because I don't care about freebies and personal gain, I care about having a good quality game. Real world money giving real financial advantages in a game makes a crappy game economy.

Disagree. There are no "good polls" on the internet. Anonymous internet polls are always fail. "Is this a good idea?" a) yes b) no c) pie. Pie will win.
I doubt the validity of the poll at all, even if its just meant to be representative of guru. Because pollers will always pick something randomly just to *** with people.
Main reason I don't like polls on guru and posted in site feedback to get rid of them.

I am not envious if people are growing rich around me, more power to them. I am sure the average amount of gold per account in this game is alot higher than it was 4 years ago because they are too many easy ways to farm and too many easy ways to earn huge amounts of gold for very little work (e.g. zquests and nick's gift).

Targeting just XTH is wrong. If you really care about your principles, then all these things (nick's gifts, zquests, birthday presents, etc.) also have to go because these can be easily bought through real world money too.

I dont support the OP's suggestions because I know that the game already has been giving in-game benefits for real money, ever since the first unlock pack appears in their online store and ever since Factions Collector's Edition came out. I accepted it as part of GW and ANet, otherwise I would have stopped playing this game a long time ago.

They dont need to say that directly. All ANet needed to do was to state that EACH account would have a chance to win in XTH and some people would go out and buy new accounts. Comon, dont tell me you can't understand that is their way to entice people to buy more of their games? I am sure ANet and most people know what that would amount to. Similarly for Nick's gifts.

Also, birthday presents would encourage people to buy more character slots. Even if you do nothing to the character that you just created, it would still get a birthday present year after year. Isn't that also another form of easy income?

Even non-tradable zcoins can be a source of income. Although zcoins themselves are non-tradable, the goods that you can exchange for them, are tradable. How much does a heavy equipment pack cost right now?

In the case of zcoins the enticement is for you to get more character slots, not account.

Your skepticism is just as "fail" as polls really. Since a poll is not meant to be definitive in the first place. As far as "*** with people" I think it's fairly obvious that this was not the case with the poll. What you have is just an opinion, just as mine is. Which is also "fail" and again no way definitive as to what the true answer is.