Monk Charging Service - How much? (If your against charging - Dont come here)

^ LOL...not only is Guild Wars not capitalistic....but it's about as close to communism as you'll ever see.

In response to that. All i'll say is that. There are more warriors (tanks) then monks. If i go into a mission town, how many W/Mo's am i going to see, compared to Monks?

how is that a valid point in any way?

Capitalism is going to spring up in any community with an exchange of good and/or services unless you specifically enforce otherwise.

With your argument, based on supply and demand, this means that a warrior should charge less than a monk by a certain percentage. But do you see any warrior charging a fee for mission?

If a W/Mo goes into a mission town and asks "LFG MISSION"
It may take a while to get an invite

If a Monk goes into a mission town and asks "LFG MISSION"
Most likely he/she will get an imediate invite.

I've tried this. Heck even not saying anything.
My W/Mo goes into town, says nothing. Get nothings

My Monk goes into town, says nothing, gets a few invite requests (and i didn't even say anything)

Point is. Monks are wanted more. Hence in higher demand.

You won't see a W/Mo charging (except for a run) Since there are many of them.

capitalism: An economic system based on predominantly private (individual or corporate) investment in and ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange of goods and wealth; contrasted with socialism or especially communism, in which the state has the predominant role in the economy.

I'd say that scrolling "WTS" for 7 hours a night to get rid of your P.O.C. rams hammer does not count as being a capitalist community. The trade governed by the traders...you can't charge 50K for a rune because the rune trader regulates it...you can't charge 100K for a tanned hide square because the Material trader regulates it....government regulating prices is about as close to communism as you'll find.


Darksci: because you are in high demand you feel you have the right to charge people??? I'm gonna start charging monks(thanks to you) to go to the underworld...I means seriously, they're useless down there...so I might as well charge them if they want to go.

Had to say it: We could just say the same thing about you.

If you're charging for your time that's one thing, however I personally wouldn't pay a monk to help me in a quest as its all suppose to be a TEAM effort. (Besides, I play a monk and she NEVER charges people who join her team, but hey I'm a team player...)

why not do both? get paid while doing required missions and then farming when you have all your skills?

I think you're confusing capitalism with supply and demand, bartering, etc. That's not capitalism. Capitalism is a system, and it implies things like ownership, production, corporations, and a free market. You might trade your hammer for a sword, or your rune for a few K, but that's not capitalism any more than pooling your money with your roommates to buy groceries is communism.

How much do you see Warriors chargeing to Run players to Draknors from Beacons?

Nevertheless, the presence of a system of supply-and-demand-influenced prices is sufficient for the point he was trying to make.

Ditto. I wouldn't expect someone charging for their services to be a good team player (read:team oriented) thus I'd never pay someone, even a monk, to be on my team.

Also, my monk will never charge a team to do her job.

The best thing to do is ask for donations in my opinion. There was a guy running to forge for free just to p.o. the ones who were charging like 3K. In the end we all ended up giving him a total of 4K as a thank you.

Monks are not so scarce after ascention - it's just that we don't want to play with stupid pugs.

I'll help guildies or farm solo as a smither, sometimes i might hook up with some people on my friends list. (aka - good pugs)

If I need to travel or do a mission the henches will be a lot better than any group that would pay for a monk.

For money - make a forge runner or farm.
For items - farm solo.

as for the question "how much should I charge?" here's your answer.. 0gp. Ask for donations, or ask for un-wanted loot. Don't come in and demand anything.

Better hope you don't group with me (You as in monks who charge money for "services"). Whether I can trick you into joining my group and beating the mission or not, you're not getting 1 gold from me.

We delete spam, flames, and off-topic posts all the time.
I fail to see how expressing your opinion on the subject at hand is rude, unless you do it in a rude manner or purely to be contrary.

Again, these are boards for public discussion. If you don't want to discuss them publicly, don't put your thoughts up for public scrutiny.

As for you second point:
He can ask politely, and hope that people will listen. If you are uncomfortable with that it says more about your own comfort level than the forums. We actively discourage (and punish) hostility here.
As for starting your own thread: Please don't clutter the boards. If you're discussing a topic that's bound to intersect with another currently being discussed, it will probably be merged anyways. Creating extra threads just creates extra work.

While I think that Monks charging for services anywhere, anytime is ridiculous... I have to say what's even funnier to me is the people getting bent out of shape because someone is flaming them when they said "Oh nos, don't flame me".

Anyway, anyone who pays for a Monk to heal for them is a fool, and fools are quickly seperated from their money. I play a W/N, and I tried to do the Thunderhead Keep mission 3 times last night. The last try, we failed at the last part because I was the only Warrior in a group with 3 Monks. THREE MONKS! Not one of them could keep anyone in the party alive. I even stopped fighting for a few seconds to throw Blood is Power on them before they hit me with a heal. I have yet to meet a Monk who is worth me paying 100 gold to, let alone 1000 gold.

The Monk never saves the day, the Monk is the one worrying about healing Bone Minions or casting Enchantments while fighting 4 Mesmers than to heal the people who are getting beat on. They are always the ones sitting the back, spamming "My Energy is 4 of 72" after every fight because they can't just HEAL. "Oooh, Vigorous Spirit, yeah, that will help when I have 4 creatures beating on me at once and I'm having to drain their health to stay alive because you are too slow to heal!" Show me a Monk who can really save a mission, and I'd might be willing to pay. So far, no Monk will ever be worth me giving them my hard earned fake money.

OK - Not involving anything to do with charging for this reply...

How about you enter a mission without a single monk. If you can beat the mission, i dunno say thunderhead keep (i got stuck on that mission with my ranger, since i couldn't get into a group with 2 monks) without a monk. If you can, then your a legend and your absolutely godly (aka has quite alot of skills).
But the majority of players unfortunetely don't have skills - sorry but thats true. And they require a monk. I remember in the ascalon missions, were it was possible to complete a mission with 4 non-monks. Then it got to yaks bend, and things got slighty harder, and alesia was needed quite a bit.

Healing Monks do save the day for most people, you can have 5 tanks, 5 nukers, 5 trappers, but you do need 1 monk as well. But the reason why most people tend not the play them is that they are boring to most people (although i enjoy playing it)

granted I am still new to game, but I find vigorous spirit an energy saver; at least in the area I've played in so far. usually I can drop that on the warrior, and then concertrate on healing other casters. and only need to occationaly patch the warrior if he/she drops below 75% health.

Well, what I contend is that this was not the subject at hand. The post in question made it the subject at hand, in otherwords, the thread was hijacked.

Well, I guess it's your forum, so if that is how you wish to run it I will respect that and follow your suggestion as to thread starting. I still maintain that such behavior is rude.

Well, Vigorous Spirit only works if the person it is casted on is attacking a creature. When trying to cast spells to keep you alive that take a while to cast(like Healing Signet), it's not that great. It's especially bad when that Monk casts it on you while fighting a Mesmer who will always hit the Shatter Enchantement on you and make it even harder.

Vigorous Spirit can be good, but no Monk should ever throw that on a Warrior and heal others once they reach the Desert and beyond... sadly that's happened to me twice this week.

There was a monk spamming the All channel in a mission that will remain nameless on a server that will not be revealed to protect his sad, sad little identity.

Needless to say, chat discussion was 'vigorous' in that area.

As I happened to be playing my warrior 'toon at the time, I promptly logged out, and back in as a monk, spammed the all channel as a 'free' monk and took two parties through the task at hand (successfully)

End result? He'd spent about 3 hours spamming the all channel and taking abuse. I'd helped 10 people through, without charging, and picked up purple and gold and dye and stuff and then went and sold it.

I wonder who made more money that night?

I will only pay a monk if it's a girl and she agrees to get naked and dance for the group before we pay her and go in.

Then I kick her out and get a monk who won't charge me. Or wake up my wife and force her to come along. Cause she only charges me sex.

How many monks can adventure WITHOUT any other player class. I'm thinking none. None if they are true monks because you will be beaten by nearly every monster out there due to the fact that the bulk of their effects heal others and not themselves and their offensive spells are really not effective to be used constantly. Next in like is weaponry. Not much for a selection of useful items that do enough damage.

This is why there are all these WARRIOR/monks because they want the best of both worlds. Who wants to play a character that REQUIRES a party.

Monks need groups as much as a group needs a monk, if not more.

Personally. I think elementalist/MONKS are better because they can be shaped for higher energy and can take more of a pounding. Add a couple of area affect damage spells for defence and its all good.

I am assuming that the only reason why a Monk would charge a price is to make money. In that case if the monk gets paid less than 10k, the monk would be losing money, because in the hour it takes to find a group and complete the mission, a monk could easily have made 10k farming. If you are a monk and you don't know how to make 10k farming in an hour, you probably haven't played enough and do not understand the monk profession enough to be charging money for your services. Since nobody would ever pay 10k for a monk, then the monk should not be wasting time with this stuff at all.

However, it would be cool of all the Monks form a union and start charging high prices to force people to learn how to play properly. I have a Warrior/Monk as one of my characters and I designed it to be played without a monk in the group. I carry condition and hex removal and have stances and healing to keep me alive. The only way I die is if massive hexes and spells are spammed on me, and in that cause I would have to rely on a mesmer or ranger to take care of the casters. Seriously, monks are not any more important than any other class. They are required by groups right now because people design their character under the assumption that they will be healed by someone else. I love how some warrior/monks use strenght of honor and judge's insight and carry an offhand item to do more attacks. Those characters are not tanks at all (and of course they charge toward enemy healers leaving the rest of the party exposed). Tanks should be able to survive for a very long time. I think over the course of completing the game, I have only seen one other warrior who played a tank. In some missions where there are crappy players around I sometimes find the entire party dead and I take 10 minutes to kill off two big groups while they are all hitting me and then revived the others. If people design their builds under the assumption that there will be no monk, then then party won't need a monk. Also, the current trend is to get a lot of high damage warriors and elementalists and have 2 or more monks heal them while they fight everything off. This is why mesmers, rangers, and necros are underappreciated, because they do not fit into this type of strategy. Rather than breaking/interrupting spells, people prefer to have 3 monks out heal the damage caused. So I hope all monks start charging incredible fees so people would change their opinions and change their strategy.

Your completely missing the point here. Every class needs a group.
Monks need a group (they need tanks. rangers, etc)
Tanks need a group (they needs rangers, monks etc)

BUT BUT BUT BUT BUT

Its easier for a MONK to get into a group than a TANK, BECAUSE they are SO MANY TANKS.

Lets take this situation, A group needs only tanks and monks.

How many tanks and monks do you think you'll find in a typical mission town.
Today in Ring of Fire i counted 5 monks, and 16 Warriors.
Suppose that 50% of each class now charged

That means there are 2 monks (2.5, but wutever) and 8 warriors that are charging.

Usually there are 2 monks and 2 tanks per group of size 8
That leaves--
Group 1: 2 monks, 2 tanks, 4 others
Group 2: 1 monk, 2 tanks, 4 others (NEEDS 1 more person)

Group 2 needs 1 more monk, but hey, the other 2 are charging now.
Whats left? There are the others and another 4 non-charging tanks left.

You can instantly see theres a shortage.
Now YOU could put yourself in group 2, but you'd only beable to help yourself. And i doubt 1 monk could heal the other 6 people and himself.

so basically you feel it's ok to charge for your services because it's easier for you to get into a group...where has your argument gone? you lost it like 4 pages ago

4 pages ago he asked a simple question to get a simple answer but since everybody has their own opinion (the negative ones are the most vocal about it) they had to throw it around like it mattered.

4 pages ago he wanted to know what the average rate was for charging for a monk so as not to overcharge what some people will pay. Believe it or not this game has a LOT of players and there are some who will offer a monetary (omg this is fake money people) incentive to join their group even IF it isn't the perfect group composition. My opinion matters as much as the next guy who posts a load about how much the OP sucks and should die because he wants to earn a buck so ha!

Darksci, the fact is you don't have to justify yourself to the peanut gallery of nay sayers. In my experience as a monk the 2plat to join a group get ignored, the 1 plat seem to find groups. I've been offered 2.5 plat by a group leader to join a group who was really desperate for a monk. Often groups think paying the 125 entrance fee to FoW or UW is enough. You're better off solo farming junk off trolls and selling it but if you MUST charge then that is in my experience the average. Some griefers will join a group and wait till the end encounter and try to extort 25k from everybody but that is bannable. Btw, I did see a monk in abaddon's mouth last night selling black dye+his service as a monk for 7500 gold as a combo deal.

Darksci has never had a valid argument in this thread. How can you lose something if you've never had it?

He started by saying monk's profession is similar to doctors in real life, thus the monks have the right to charge fees. Basically he forgets that this is guild wars, and that everyone else also has his or her own profession.

And now... his argument comes to this (the above quote).

on a battlefield in the heat of heavy gun fires,

soilder: Medic!

doctor: Yes, I am here Mr. Solider Man! What kind of medical insurance plan do you have?

soilder: huh?!

doctor: I see, you don't have insurance. Let's see, stop bleeding will be 50g, repair broken bones will be 200g, physical theorpy recovery will be 500g. How do you want to pay?

soilder: wtf...

I'm against monk wh0res because they use, and sometimes take advantage of, lower-level noobs in order to make a profit. I do not condone nor advise anyone to do this, as it can be immoral- especially when there are monks out there which the poor noob doesn't know about perfectly willing to do the mission for free just so he can get a skill point or bonus xp.

Psh.

Stupid Monks!ut.


By the way, has anyone seen what happens you type those words uncensored? They're not even curses...

Funny, though unfortunately a very real situation in this country (America for me). My friend owes $3,000 in medical because her insurance ran up and she's severely ill. Not a pretty picture, to see the rich crushed beneath the poor like this...

Lol... funny.

That must be one multi-skilled doctor. He should have no problem stopping the enemy after letting his own soldier die.

Well Darksci,

I'm a Ranger/Mez, but my Girlfriend plays with me and is my Monk. When we go looking for a group we sometimes check if she can have any of the spare materials that the rest of the group doesn't need.

I don't see any harm in it and she doesn't ever really play unless she's with me (she doesn't have fun blowing a couple of hours farming) and it's a little hard for me to take care of my Four characters and her two characters Gold needs all the time. So for example if one of the other characters in the group only use Iron and scales, and they have some cloth and glitter then she can get that, sure it's not much and it wasn't a real loss to the character who gave it to her, but if all six of the others (plus myself too) give her their useless material then after a few missions she can have more than enough stuff for her armor needs and sell whats left .

We don't pick groups on the basis that the they do this, we just ask them and if they do then Cool, a little less Farming for my Ranger to do, if they don't then oh well she's one heck of a good monk and deserves better but it's all fun and games (litterally ) and it's not worth arguing over.

So to answer your initial question, sure you can charge a fee for your service (500g to 1plat seems reasonable), but IMO the game would be more fun and you could make just as much money if you just asked for the materials or unused items of the group (not to mention you'd spend more time PLAYING the game and less time standing around in town asking for a flat fee)

WHY does she deserve better??? I'm a damned good ranger...does that mean you should give me all your materials because I deserve it?

why does everyone think Monks are so important? Is it a pretrained thought engraved in you RPGers from other games? Monks are not that important in this game...funny thing...no more important than any other class.

Wow... might as well ring the dinner bell and tape a flame me stickee to your back with a topic thread like that.

Anyhow, I will try to answer in the spirit of which it was posted.
How much? 0g
How much will you pay the rest of the party to back you up?
I always thought a group was supposed to work as a team

First of all she's not asking for ALL of their materials, just the ones they wouldn't otherwise need... and you know what, if you wanted to you could probobly ask your groups if they would give you all their leftover materials and they might just do it.

Also as a Ranger I don't usually need a Monk myself either (they are nice to have though), but there are other classes out there that can't heal themselves as effectivly or even as Rangers we all get in those situations where we are being spammed or just unlucky and a good monk can save our lives and let us tear the crap out of whatever is attacking us instead of us standing there trying to heal ourselves...

Ok, look, I don't think you completely understand the situation, so I'm going to lay it out.

1) There is a lack of monks compared to other classes in the endgame, causing a lot of people to wait around for groups to form.
2) There is a portion of players (not specifically monks) that aim to make money.
3) Monks can farm for money way faster than whatever they have been getting paid in groups.

The concept of paying monks, in all likelihood, did not come from a monk. It started with a group, wanting a monk badly enough to offer money as enticement. Now, a large part of the community wants to offer money to monks so as to solve issue (1) by drawing monks away from point (3).

You seem to think you're on some crusade against greedy monks, which is ridiculous, because if all they care about is money they'd be way better off farming for it. I (and I don't play a monk btw), would much rather offer them 1-2k an hour if it's going to pull in some small portion of the farmers and increase the monk pool by that much more.

And guess what? They're still losing out, because they don't make money as fast as if they just went and farmed on their own. I just hope that with some amount of monetary compensation for their farming time lost, along with the promise of some human company, will be sufficient to pull them away from their farming activities.

Your crusade is not against greedy monks, if you get your way they will actually make more money. Your crusade is only hurting needy non-monks. If I'm looking to pay a monk, I'm happy when a money-accepting monk advertises themselves. If a monk is looking to get hired, he's happy to find me. Both of us are very much not happy with you if you're being a dick about a transaction that doesn't concern you at all.