Selling In-Game Advantages (The Great Debate Over Mercenary Heroes)

I used to go into dungeons as an Assassin with 7 other human assassins. We have an unfair advantage over a human assassin with 7 merc assassins so i don't think that they are an advantage. I have beat everything in PvE with heroes and henchies, barring the things that are impossible(Mallyx, Urgoz The Deep etc.) with only heroes/henchies. At this point in the lfecycle of the game I don't see this as a problem. If John Stumme keeps content coming out regularly, and things like this help to keep content coming out for the game and we get skill updates on a more regular basis etc. then I am totally fine with it.

Is it something that isn't doable by other means in game?
No. You can have 8 of the same profession party in game already and in a superior way.

Does it allow players to complete areas that otherwise they couldn't?
Again, no.

What if instead of being just mercenary heroes it was a pack with other 3 god realms and mercenary heroes?

Would it then be called an expansion and be just fine?

Why does an expansion have to be new maps/areas?

So then...if Anet introduces a free new necro or rit hero people who got the merc heroes are going to go nuts about being ripped off?

I totally agree. GW is so much more friendlier than other games. At least you do not need to pay US$50 bucks for a pair of wings to fly a little faster from one outpost to another.

To be fair, those kind of scam games don't even qualify as MMO's anymore. They should be outlawed.

I'll admit that there is an advantage to mercenary heroes. However, the advantage is significantly overrepresented by the opponents.

-the only advantage that the mercenary heores offer is going from 2-3 heroes of the same profession to going to 7 heroes of the same profession. While this can be an advantage, we must not forget that this is still a question of the advantage of a single-profession team over a mixed profession team. While there may be an advantage, it's just not that big. Especially when we consider that the advantage also comes with weaknesses, too. After all, when too many people use the same skills from the same attributes, remember Power block, Complicate... Also, you lose the builds needing other primaries. After all, the N/Rt healer, Soul twisting protective spirit spammer etc. are also quite powerful.

-the advantages are quite minor and far from game breaking. We've had some other payable advantages, and we survived (storage panels, I'm looking at you!) - there was an advantage, but it was small

-no one seems to object to the advantages offered by campaigns, and those are ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE greater than the shop ones. Try to build a good build with only Prophecies skills, and you'll suddenly see how wonderful skills we got with Factions. Try to finish Factions without heroes, and remember just how much of a difference the basic heroes of Nightfall make. Never mind the powerful Nightfall skills. And never mind the EotN PvE skills that are much much more powerful. And all these things were ALSO paid for, yet you hardly hear people mentioning them.


In the end, I don't really like it, but Anet has shown a lot of restraint with the advantages offered by the shop, which is reassuring for GW2.

Guildwars has gotten very easy with 7 heroes (it was before aswell). I never bring melee, because mobs are already dead before they can reach things. All that 7 heroes really did improve is that there is more space for /P secondaries with Fall Back. And I don't need merc heroes for that. I mean even if these give an advantage it is very very little, because it could't possibly be easier.

There are only a few areas that the Merc heroes might have a bigger inpact, and that are elite areas. But doing DoA in HM with heroes is a big acchievement and would still take about 2+ hours. Thus people would prefer to run organised player groups, because they are just twice as fast (if not faster). We don't need to hassle words over FoW because it was dead easy anyway already. I can't say I have experience with UW nor Urgoz/Deep with the new 7 heroes thing, so I won't start over those.

tl;dr. This game is really easy, and Merc heroes make it a tiny bit easier. Nothing to worry about imo.

I had an hour long discussion/argument over vent the other day regarding this very topic.

The main argument was the "in-game advantage paid by real-world money" part.

I protested with great earnest-y that no advantage was gained because you're only paying to play the game by yourself. Anything that can be done with 1 human + 7 mercs can be done faster by 8 real people and most likely by 7 regular heroes.

The only true advantage gained is when you create a new character you have immediate access to mercenary heroes, eliminating any need for terrible henchies and the need to grind for heroes through the campaigns.

This advantage is minimal when you considering that 95% of the GW population has already at least one character that has successfully completed the majority of the all the campaigns that he/she owns. Thusly they gain no value to the addition of 7 merc heroes.

That said the point of advantage for real money is moot because buying mercenary heroes is no different than choosing to buy an expansion or not (similar to what John Stumme said). GW is a standalone game. Technically its 3 standalone games with 1 expansion and miscellaneous addons. One can purchase just one campaign and play against everyone else in both pve and pvp. However they are at a disadvantage from not having near the same amount of skills; thusly buying an additional campaign is buying access to more professions and skills in addition to pve content. AKA you are buying an in-game advantage!

So to me, buying in-game content for money, regardless of how you define whats an advantage, has already been done before.

But if you think being able to clear FoW by yourself with 7 mesmer heroes in 45 minutes versus 7 regular heroes in a hour is "an advantage', then by all means go spend $45 dollars and buy all the merc hero slots. But lets face it, the SC team can do it under 30 minutes and the rest of us have already hero/henchied our way through all HM missions, vanquishes, and dungeons without 7 heroes years ago.

So yea if ANet wants to release minor content releases, and people buy them, by all means do more if it nets you money to put towards other content releases or GW2. GW is already a dying game, theres nothing wrong with milking the cash flow from the casual players still playing day in and day out.

I don't really see it as much of an advantage if any at all.

Sure you might be able to take 7 of the same profession and do some major spiking or something but it's not like it affects anyone else.

I've bought pretty much everything in the store but I'm not getting this, I don't really see what I would use it for.

The other side of the spectrum?

Whenever I need a change of scenary from GW I Play a game called perfect world. This game is totally free to play and to finish. The enemy's in the game drop coins you can use to buy certain items. But you can also buy gold with real life money. Giving you access to exclusive things. Some of them purely cosmetic, some of them purely for in game advantage and some of them do both.

It is possible to trade the real life money (gold) for the in game money (coins) with other players. There is even a special auction for it. So the game makes it possible to buy ingame money for real life money legally.

I just wanted to show this example to put things in perspective. It has always been possible to buy in game advantages in GW. I am talking bout the eotn preview weapons, the fire imp, the bonus mission weapons, but also simply buying a new campagin.

My second account only has factions and I can tell you it is rather difficult to solo play factions, specially when I compare it with how easy it is with my main account.

Last of all. This game has excisted for 6 years. It has been several years since EOTN came out. Most people are working on GW2. However they still take the time to deliver us new features and stuff for GW1. Those people are not working for nothing and Anet is a commercial company making money.

The advantages of using mercantile hero's are there, but it isn't higher then any advatage. Even without them it is is easy enough to finish the game, get 50/50 in HoM and get GWAMM.

If people want to spent money on something that is 80% cosmetic I say fine. It makes GW still profitable enough to spent some time in by Anet to improve it and develop new content. And that is something that benefits us all.

To me it doesnt make any difference , quite a number of players have multiple accounts which they duel run anyway and having 7 heros either means they can just use the 1 account or they carry on dueling.
2 days after the update i was still using h/h even tho i could cover the 4 slots with extra heros/mercs.
Anet can say - yes its making the game easier with mercs/7heros but also they created a temporary money sink as players went out and bought runes etc for the mercs/heros.
As many will say - its you buying the merc pack from your own choice and isnt anet forcing you to.So in one hand anet is offering the chance to play how you want with a cost but on the other hand its your option to turn it down.
Players have been asking this for ages and anet finally bows down to them but adds
a cost - this mainly affects only the players who either fight with h/h or only have a few friends to play with and doesnt do pugs - others who team up all the time or do pugs wont have any real problems.
Btw i wonder if anets going to spend a bit of the revenue on getting a calender and a clock - just so they can get events dates/start and stop times correct :P

It offers a significant game advantage, why?

1. It allows you to do things faster
2. Allows you to do things others cannot

At this stage of the game does it matter, not really Anet want everyone to get their titles fast so they can milk them more in GW2, simple business.

What I find really annoying is that they do not update PvP as often as they should and any new real content is rare. Yes fanboys you can say all the stuff against this, but it is true. What people are paying is easily enough for a whole new expansion/campaign. Hardly worth it at this stage of the game unless its a new expansion/campaign. Just be ready to be milked repeatedly in GW2.

Silver

See, I keep hearing comments on par with this... or about the "slippery slope," or how this is "just the beginning of the end of f2p."

The last time a new category of product was added to the store was in December of 2009, when they introduced Costumes. It took over a year for them to add a new type of product... the merc slots.

This does not equate to milking the customers. Not even close. And how in the hell anyonecan interpret this as some sort of "trend" towards either a) milking customers through microtransactions or b) changing the company philosophy regarding in-game advantages via real world financial transactions, is honestly beyond me.

It is one microtransaction product among hundreds, if not thousands, they could have dreamed up. One. In over a year. For a game which is six years old from a company that has a new release based on the same lore coming out within a year.

This is not greed, this is not a trend towards milking, this is not a change in the company philosophy.... the sky is not falling. At most it is a way to satisfy investors while providing something fun & harmless to the community without, in fact, going against the developers' philosophy regarding BOTH microtransactions AND in-game advantages.

The men and women working so hard on GW2 and on GW1 deserve to earn a living while they do so. If adding some goofy little features that some players will flock out to buy keeps those developers employed, keeps the company afloat, keeps them working on a game most of us are anxiously awaiting... I'd say it's well worth it, and certainly in no way an indication that we're going to be inundated with microtransactions.

My opinion (owning a full set of hero mercs):

1. Biggest impact I've personally seen is the fun of having customized appearance and names of the merc heroes. I never ran more than 3 of same profession because I never felt it would be necessary. I only put more than 3 for making funny screenshots, not in any mission or explorable.

2. When they were first released I felt it might be an unfair advantage, but the more I played my mercs and read other people's reaction, I see no significant game play advantage right now.

3. I see no problem in Anet adding additional microtransactions. Sure, this caused a debate if it gives an unfair advantage but I doubt that's a trend. Adding the merc heroes was no doubt for profit, which I think is perfectly ok, because so far I've seen no conclusive evidence that merc heroes have given any big advantages.

4. Addition of Mercenary Heroes doesn't change my opinion on Anet, GW1 or Gw2. If any then it's a positive effect because it does bring bit new fun into an old game.

I think the update is fine. It doesn't lead to any imbalance, cause even before heroes were first implemented, there were 7 mesmer/necro teams sweeping tru the elite areas and no one cried about that. Now most classes are more powerful than that - thanks to the power creep - and more so, 7 real players equals 21 big bad PVE elite skills. Mercs dont.

So, what's the problem?

There's absolutely no point in saying that merc heroes are unfair, Anet is evil, etc..

My only complaint it is about its price tag. US$45 its far from what I would call "microtransation".

Looking for the future, I mean GW2, I still have faith ANet will not go "Pay-to-win" business model. But I think their prices need to be seriously reviewed.

Microtransations are a great way to monetize games, but they need to stay MICRO.

In the closed thread, someone raised the point that anyone who has PURCHASED the game expansions has an advantage over someone who has not.
This was immediately countered with a "expansions are not microtransactions" reply.


So, let's consider GW microtransactions:

How many Xunlai storage panes do the naysayers have? If you have PURCHASED additional panes, then you have an advantage over people who haven't - extra space to store weapons / consets / armour / etc.

Was there an uproar when the option to purchase storage was released? Or when skill / pet unlock packs were released? Each of these purchases gives something which can be perceived as an ingame advantage.


I have no problem with people who want to play GW in its' most basic form (ie. with nothing but what comes on the original game disks), but I find it annoying when people complain about others who spend a few pounds to improve their enjoyment of their hobby.

If you could buy a game advantage in this instance "Mercenary heroes" and then take them into pvp and beat up on other players that would be unfair.

That is paying real money to gain an advantage over other players, paying money to gain an advantage over the AI in the pve game is completely different as it doesn't make my game experience any less.

There could be micro transactions that could be considered unfair but not in this case where any advantage is slight at best.

Elementalist heroes can run panic too.

Or you can make a mesmer, or find a mesmer to play with.

Though I still havnt found any need to use more than 2 mesmers yet even though I have the merc pack.

The mercenary pack is not to blame for the games class imbalance in PVE with mesmers being so much more powerful than everything else, and Ellys being the worst caster profession.

It's still as bad as it was the first time this thread was made, and when we tried to discuss why, it was closed.

Stumme's opinion doesn't really count for anything.

1. Advantages are minor
2. Anet needs our charity

I just summed up the pro-Anet side of the argument, right?

To me it is minor advantage and not worth a great debate. The person who doesn't buy all chapters trades off money for in game advantage because there are some choice skills only available in one chapter. The person who decided to buy the Cantha collectors edition paid extra for in game advantage - a minipet that if they were lazy and never dropped it became worth many ecto.

I see either of the above two as a greater trade of real game cash for in game advantage. There was no hue and cry over those so making a deal out of mercenary heroes is just lame. Get over it guys and gals .

One thing as someone said before, micro transactions need to be micro on price as well! I'd compromise with micro transactions if this was the case today. Look at how many items, for example new weapon/armour skins in nightfall. If you added all of those items up and divided the full game price with those items, we'd be talking pennies/cents for each item. So in the case of costumes for example, they should not be passing the 1 quid/dollar threshold in pricing. It is blatent overmilking.

3. Put in a few general heroes of each profession. This would actually result in Mercenaries being a cosmetic feature only, which is what the company always stood for.

That's the most annoying part of the whole thing, unique heroes ok, but at such an expense indeeds goes too far for one side of the community, and makes one (minor) side waste money, under which are parts with more (threepack) and more (7pack) waste - It's just not worth it in my opinion!

Besides, costumes are customisations everyone can see, but custom heroes only are visible in parties, and in parties, they are redundant except when its a noobPUG or a underheroed class (Me, Rt).

So far i know, those guys got 2 uses and 1 coolness factor.
* Prophecies+Factions players can get heroes.
* Unsocial players can use more then 3(2) heroes of one class in their team
+ You can use your own characters in a team (like it has use for me, my favorite classes are melee and ranger, and the current AI would turn them to morons, something i couldn't bare to witness or waste money on).

Has it given people an advantage? Yes

Another question perhaps is, How much more of an advantage is it than running dual accounts?

It was designed for cosmetic reasons to make the playerbase happy and in that respect it succeeded. People can now use their own characters instead of the generic heros everyone has.

TBH i'm not entirely sure it has been long enough for the true implications of it to come forth yet so we can only discuss the merits so far.

If it is found to give people an unfair advantage, which i do believe it eventually will, then the problem will need to be addressed. Not alot that Anet can now do to stop it at this point, other than limiting the number of same professions in the party. Personally i would like to see this implemented anyway as i have suggested before(sorry folks but i think that all the gimmick builds are part of what destroyed the partying aspect(along with heros in the 1st place)). Limit it to 2 of each type of profession per party and it would solve any advantage from the mercenary heros people have, but would upset an awful lot of people who can only play gimmick builds (not to mention the outcry from the speed clearers). Or have it so that people can only have the set amount of professions the same that others do i.e. 3N, 3W, 2Rt etc.

TL,DR - Yeah imo it's created an imbalance(between have's and have not's) but in an imbalanced game thats in it's twilight years, do Anet care.

Is this really worth discussing?

A 7 mesmer team is only so much faster than a 2 mesmer, splinter, MM, ... team.

Mesmers are overpowered, but so is RoJ, Splinter, SS, Every armor ignoring AoE skill. Almost every skill/effect which does an AoE effect.

What I would be worried about instead is the fact that this might be a premise for GW2, micro transitions with an in-game advantage.

The cost of the items is milking the customer base, if it was actual real content then sure most folks would be happy. No one here is saying they do not deserve a living or that the live team want to show they can generate revenue. Anet is certainly not as bad as other developers but they are on the border and one wonders when that border will be crossed, because they will continue to do this. It is part of their business plan and hell, I understand the importance of being a revenue generating business unit, but value, cosmetics and advantage are all part of the product mix. You need to get it right. Anet have not.

In your opinion it is not considered milking the customer. I lol'd hard when I saw the prices, I can afford it sure, is it value for money? Hell no.

Silver

I see it a bit differently:

1) Advantages are minor AND purchasable minor advantages already have a precedent in the in-game store.

2) Anet doesn't need our charity. However, any monies anet is able to bring in through micro transactions help to fund GW2 production as well as additional free content updates to GW1. Thus any player interested in seeing these things happen should be, at least, understanding of their need to make money.

As for the anti-merc people, it seems to be basically

1) I have to pay to have the same advantages and disadvantages as people who paid more than me.

2) The price for this minor advantage is too high.

3) Merc heroes blur the lines between cosmetic upgrades and upgrades which actually make the game easier for the player.

Did I get that right?

I think those 3 are the three different types of anti-mercs (, and im majorily a #2), so yeah, you're right.

Point is that i didn't pay for any cash shop item, why? 2 reasons;
1. i like to physically see my product, which is why i got no problem buying campaigns, but i do have buying the bonus pack.
2. secondly, i do not want to pay for something not adding anything besides cosmetics - examples include the BMP, costumes (yeah...), and now also the Mercheroes (for one its price/use is overexpensive, and besides of the minor to nulled advantage, its purely cosmetic, and hey, 7(8) of the same profession is boring :P)

To have a concise and clear jumping-off point, here are a few questions:
What kind of impact have you personally seen or felt stemming from the introduction of Mercenary Heroes?

- None, except some pretty screenshots of people and their heroes all wearing the same colour!

Do you consider the introduction of Mercenary Heroes to be an unfair game advantage for those with excess real-life money or an aesthetic fan-service that benefits many of the game's players (or both)? Explain.

- No, what creates more of an unfair advantage is intelligence. Seriously, the only area unable to be completed with 7 heroes really is UW (havent yet tried urgoz and the deep but whatever). This is not limited by builds but by the necessity to split at certain moments during quests. Maybe a few people have completed but for all aside from this with the BASIC heroes you can complete anywhere in the game that you want. Look through the thread.... necros, mesmers and rts are OPed! 3 Necros, 2 Mesmers, 2 Rts <- that adds up to 7!!!!! THATS HOW MANY HEROES WE ARE ALLOWED ZOMG! With these you can complete FoW, DoA, Slavers, ALL dungeons etc.... In terms of speed, that will more be determined by what primary class you run, play style and safety vs speed decisions and NOT by if your lucky enough to have a 4th necro or 3rd rt.

Are teams consisting of 7 heroes of the same profession consistent with the game's themes and/or felt values? Why or why not?

- No, teams consisting of 7 heroes are against the theme of a massive MULTIPLAYER orpg. Whether they are same profession or not who cares. HOWEVER, imo people should be given the freedom to really do what they like, I love the 7 hero update, it allows me to do a vq over a few hours while i afk from time to time to do work or whatever. If people want to run with 7 necros, thats fine by me, let them have their fun! <- its a game after all NOT a competition (THIS IS PVE WE ARE TALKING ABOUT after all, if u wanna compete go PvP).

Summary: game = fun, 7 heroes = freedom = fun, merc heroes = fun for people who want to spend the money on them. As we established fun = game therefore it is in keeping with game values!

Do you believe that this is a "trend" that the Live Team and Anet may continue to follow in the future? In your opinion, is that a good or bad thing?

- You seen the 1/2 yearly costumes etc? ANET are a business, they need money, they sell stuff for money, we buy it! Thats called basic economics. Personally, I don't buy it! I have no objection as long as the cost never becomes obligatory!

Profit is obviously always a concern for any for-profit business. However, over the years many game companies have added features to games specifically for the benefit of their fans, whether for monetary gain or not. What do you believe is the primary motivation for the addition of Mercenary Heroes - profit, fan service, or a mixture of both?

- Profit <-

Dear Op,
You seem pretty pissed at this update (u mentioned it somewhere that this merc heroes annoys ya). Im guessing you <3 PvE and take it all very seriously and hence this post! Bet your excited about winds of change and further updates! Remember, if you want further updates, they need to program them, that requires staff, staff require money or they dont work selling stuff makes money! Anything they try to sell to us I see as a GOOD thing, I dont buy it, but I see people who do, that makes ANET money and will allow them to keep making updates which I enjoy for free!

Mav

Summary: Profit is GOOD not BAD!

Does the addition of Mercenary Heroes change your opinion on the direction of the future of the company; namely - Guild Wars 2? If so, in a positive or negative way?

You want us to say a negative way, but tbh, I look at it positively! THEY ARE MAKING CHANGES! the game was stagnant and boring, these updates have actually livened it up again, made people talk about it etc.... As far as them making money, I'm glad, they need to be paid if they gonna make more updates! <- and more updates is what I want!

People will always complain! Its a game remember, go and have fun, stop whining!!!!

What i have felt to this day is nothing. From day one of my travels and adventures of Guild Wars I've always used them. Yeah i wiped a few hundred times but that is the way i play. In game i do not see chatter about it. I do not hang out in town looking for people to talk to because i'm busy playing the game. What I’m saying is i'm playing the game with friends and not worried about these details. 7 of me or 0 of me. I just play the game.

No sir. I only see it as an aesthetic. I'm not sure what to say. I've always just played the game and not worry about finishing some HIGH end area faster then last week or some screen shot i see on guru. To me "getting it done" is "getting it done". Owning some weapon or stack so of ectos mean nothing. It does the same damage and one day ecots will be worthless.

i guess the answer your looking for is NO. right? I mean the game came out when people had to play one of the holy trintry. Tank, DPS , Healer(is that right?) New year and new people mean new way of thinking the game and making it better.

Nope not a bad thing at all. I have money and want to spend it. If they want my money they better keep doing stuff.

A mix of both but I believe more of a profit. Anet is showing NCsoft "look XXX people paid for these latest thing so let's hire X people to help the staff for X more year/month." that is the way i look at it.


Nope people/companies need to make a buck and this is how they are doing it.

KJ these are just my thoughts and remarks as you asked. Please do not take anything i said personal. If it seem that way I am sorry. It's my point of view from the way I play the game. I'm one of them "Show them how you feel with your Money and not your mouth." But thanks for this. I know the TK read these forums and want our feedback as players. I like the options of the people who respond with real answer and not one liners. I also see you post/remarks on the wiki and how vocal you are on the wiki. All in all I'll pay for whatever (YES even a new class) I like and keep chucking along till i see something better.

Plus i'm just filling in my game time till Diablo 3. I"m bored of GW and these Mech heroes are fun. Game is six years old right? I'm still finding thing here and there to do but for how much longer? Gotten pretty far in UW and Fow by my self/team. So if Anet wants my money they better keep my busy and find more stuff away from Diablo 3 or my money is going to Blizzard.


*Edit AKA Last rant* I pay 500 dollar or something to change the flipping title screen. See my sig. Also a grand or more for some sort of Market Place.

Content is difficult to define. Anet periodically releases new "content" which does not consist of new skins, skills, heroes, areas, etc. As for a new "challenge" that's probably open to debate, but I take that what you're trying to say is more along the lines of "new stuff to do in game." Trying to equate the idea of new content and a new retail product is only going to run into problems. For example, who among us would suggest that the BMP was not a form of new content? And yet, you could never physically buy it in a store. The same could be said for the fire imp upgrade to the GotY edition. In fact, if you bought the GotY edition retail, you actually had to pay EXTRA to get the fire imp, unlike someone who bought it in the online store. The modern economy has, as we all know, been vastly changed by the electronic frontier. Even in other sectors, its quite common to buy things in an electronic form that are not available physically for purchase (e-books are a great example, as are unreleased streaming media contents).

The selling point of a campaign is really that it gives you "new stuff to do" and that description is deliberately vague. As I see it, the biggest selling point of the merc heroes is that it allows for more easy party creation in ways that would have been difficult previously... difficult meaning you may have needed another human to help you. However, since 7 heroes became available independently of merc heroes, we can take from this that anet is allowing players to play solo if they choose, something which has always been a major selling point of Guild Wars over other online RPGs, at least in my opinion. Merc heroes don't allow you to do every area of the game solo, the 7-heroes update does that. Merc heroes give the player more customization of solo play. Time will show if that is really a major advantage or not, but so far I think the general consensus is that it's not. I might even go so far as to say that the fire imp gives a greater advantage in pre-searing than merc heroes do in post, as it effectively allows you to double your party size... but that's an issue which probably requires more thought.

Yes it was, you must be new here...

Not a big deal at all. Just a lot of moaning over a non issue.


There's no real difference that I'm seeing from me using two accounts and hero dumping on the first. I've been doing that since heroes were introduced. I bought the 8 merc package, and I'm enjoying the custom team alot.

Stop whinning, and go play the game.

I've not felt any impact personally from the introduction of Mercenary Heroes. Well, to a very small extent, I've seen people clear DoA HM in top-notch speed with Mercenary Heroes, but that's it.

No I do not consider Mercenary Heroes as an unfair game advantage for money. Money can already buy you a game advantage, e.g. a player without EotN is way weaker than a player with it.

I see nothing wrong with having 7 heroes of the same profession.

I don't think this is a trend that the Live Team and ANet might follow, because it's only been one update. I also don't really care, so it's not a good thing or bad thing to me.

I think the primary motivation for the addition of mercenaries is profit.

No the addition of mercenary heroes do not change my opinion of the future of the company.

Sorry read this one wrong and posted something stupid. I will exit the discussion with something stupider

"Nothing says E-Peen like having a set of 8 characters in Obsidian waving Crystallines The perfect audience for it as well"

i never bought merc heros because

a) cant afford more then one and it seems to only be useful if you buy 3 or more.

b) normal heros do the same work

c) if i wanted to run more then 3 messie ie.-me+2 heros i would have to make and grind up to lvl 20 so not worth it

d) and finally i only play some of my chars now so basically i wouldnt use them as merc heroes. ie- my derv lols even thought she has 26 max titles cba to play her again.

but it wouldve been nice if they did what they did with the free/buy panes to the merc heros. let us have one free and pay for more.

7 heroes is more OP then mercenary heroes.

Obviously, if you were still limited to 3 heroes, mercenary would be no better then regular heroes. But the point is, 7 OP bars that synergy well together, no matter what profession, destroys PvE.

I don't care about mercenaries. The only person I've seen who bought mercenary heroes uses such builds as "fast casting Me/N minion master." I do fine enough rolling over PvE with SAB way necros + panic mesmer + prot monk + rupt ranger. Having 7 mesmers would be no better. What am I going to do, overspike the monsters even more? Whoop de do.

It's not very different to the advantages an extra campaign gives.
They are a one-time purchase. You are not paying for some VIP fee, or for items that give more power.

Most people rarely bring more than 3 heroes of the same profession, excepting necromancers, so it's not such a big deal.

Stumme seems well aware of both sides of the issue, so I don't know what else I can say, beyond that mercenary heroes really are the limit of what I had expected to see in the in-game store. Of course, I really can't, right now, formulate a coherent argument for why there is a difference between paying for EotN and getting access to heroes, and simply paying for mercenary heroes, except that the mercenary heroes are horribly overpriced in comparison. If the things were more reasonably priced - along the lines of what we'd be expecting to pay for a single feature that'd we'd see in a full expansion - I think there'd be a lot less complaining. Maybe not. Maybe introducing "GW Cash" so they can profitably sell us things that individually cost less than $10 would do more harm than good. Actually, that'd be a cool poll...

Just...be careful guys. Honestly, selling a full new profession would probably not be the best of ideas. Yes, people pay for professions when they buy expansions, but that's not the only reason they buy expansions. Many people buy them for the new skills, or the new areas to explore, or the story, and the professions come as just a bonus to that. That means that those people aren't going to feel the need to buy the new profession immediately, but then they'll feel the effect of other people being able to do things that they can't. It's like selling new skills for the professions that we have; even if you balanced them so they're pretty much equal in power to stuff we already have, it'd still be grating to know that your options are limited compared to someone else that's shelled out extra money just for those skills. It's a psychological thing; we'll pay for a great big bundle of stuff, and we're fine if someone else doesn't pay for that bunch of stuff even if that means there's a huge disparity between us, but God forbid you charge us for a little thing that causes a little disparity.

And really, maybe that's what's happened here. By breaking the components of an expansion apart and charging for them individually, you make people really think about what exactly they're paying for, as opposed to "oh yeah, $50 for all this new stuff, great!" And, again, it doesn't help that a full set of mercs costs the same as a full expansion.