Curse

Darkobra · Oct 18, 2007, 05:50 PM // 17:50

The way I see it, in the eyes of the company, we're primarily a financial statistic. "We've sold this many copies of the game to this many people!"

Secondarily, we're a community with issues to be addressed. If we find something too hard/too easy in the game as a community and not just as one or two people, then it becomes the attention and concern of Arenanet. And believe me, I've played games where the company outright REFUSES to listen to their own customers/player base. Arenanet at least create some sort of balance of what we want and their vision.

Recently, that balance was swayed. But even more recently, the balance is slowly being restored. The buff of dungeon and hero books, for example.

Halmyr · Oct 18, 2007, 05:54 PM // 17:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Risky Ranger

Paranoia: baseless or excessive suspicion of the motives of others

Just because your paranoid, does't mean nobody out to get you

Theus · Oct 18, 2007, 05:57 PM // 17:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mordakai

Huh, according to another thread, Anet listens too much to their customers...

Yeah..thats apparent in the current state of pvp.

HawkofStorms · Oct 18, 2007, 06:16 PM // 18:16

I agree with Soti in a way. Anybody who has every played a community created mod or game knows how there is a different attitude in a game with around 300-1000 members compared to one with a community of 3 million.

Rocky Raccoon · Oct 18, 2007, 06:46 PM // 18:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by SotiCoto

[Disclaimer : NOT a complaint thread.]How much of its player-base will A-Net quite willingly ostracise or eradicate in the course of progress?
I cling to the game presently, and actually forcibly control myself to a level of discomfort in order to just play the game... but I have no doubt it is just a matter of time until I am flicked aside as if I'd never existed.

Why would ANET banish people for no reason? There has to be something that would bring that about, not just in the course of progress. A company that doesn't keep it's customers happy will not be around for long. I also ask what are you forcing yourself not to do that is so painful to you and might get you banished?

Darksun · Oct 18, 2007, 07:28 PM // 19:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by Halmyr

Just because your paranoid, does't mean nobody out to get you

It also doesn't mean someone is. But for the most part,it's not a reasonable reaction.

The fact is: you can't please everyone all the time. Ok, let's start there.
The next question is: Does the forum accurately reflect the whole of the customer opinion? And does Anet have a better method for determining customer opinion by monitoring/recording player activity IN GAME. (not watching every move, but looking at what towns/missions/quests/armor/weapons/mods are popular, The true rate a which people make money, how many hrs the average person plays, what holidays get the most repeat players, what skill/builds/weapons/armor are the most/least effective etc...)

If you are one of the minority who isn't pleased, what should you expect should happen?
If you ARE pleased, should you expect to become displeased for the minority?
People need to get a realistic perspective before they get to the assumption that Anet does not care.

Antheus · Oct 18, 2007, 08:23 PM // 20:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by HawkofStorms

I agree with Soti in a way. Anybody who has every played a community created mod or game knows how there is a different attitude in a game with around 300-1000 members compared to one with a community of 3 million.

Hopefully you also noticed how some people are very missing from such communities.

Corporate stance is: everyone is welcome except those that aren't.
Private stance is: nobody is welcome, except for those that are

Yes, the difference comes from known size of human social circle, which is 150 people. In such games, everyone knows everyone.

If you look at EQ-esque sharded games - they have 3000-5000 players per server (concurrent). The reason isn't only in technical limitations, but also in the fact that this is perfect size. It allows a handful of communities to form, yet does not create anonymous community. It's a perfect balance for those who want anonymity, and those who want large social spheres.

GW in this respect is different, since it has double anonymous community. First the One Server, which houses hundreds of thousands of players. And secondly, with many characters per player.

GW is more the: you are anonymous, unless you choose not to be.

And as such, the happiness of the anonymous is the important one. Yet, it's never heard in open, but is noticed by Anet. On the contrary, the non-anonymous people are extremely vocal, yet have little weight - they are the few.

Age · Oct 18, 2007, 10:29 PM // 22:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by ThyNecromancer

Anet is your best friend until you buy their product. I was sold when they said that we would get to level 25. Then as I was a few hours into the game, I asked my guildmates on coms where my levels are and they said that anet changed their minds just before the game release. I felt I was scammed at that point.

All publicity is publicity, no matter if it's good or bad. If someone rants about a game, other people will go and check it out. If you make a rant about the game and how from the start up to date how it's gotten worse, skills messed up, ect and 20 people read it, half of those go and check out the game and they all like it. Anet lost you but gained 10 new players, They have your money so it doesn't really matter if you stay or leave.

What do you mean all those levels as GW has always been at level 20 even back in beta?It was never going to be highier than 20 ifyou read everything right.

draxynnic · Oct 19, 2007, 02:52 AM // 02:52

Actually, the level cap has changed in development. There was a period where it was going to be 15...

Personally, I think the level cap is irrelevant anyway - the principle behind the game was that you'd reach it reasonably fast, and you did. Increasing it to 25 would only have meant that the power curve is a little smoother and maybe that it took a few hours more to get there - it wouldn't have made one bit of difference once you got there if the cap was 20, 25, or 125.

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Shelf

This is a quote from the first page, and I haven't read the rest of the thread yet, but I had to comment on this...

People who say things like this need to understand something very important: even though we've already bought the game, we are still worth a lot to Anet. Why? If we like the game enough, we'll tell our friends to buy it, we'll spread the word about how great a game GW is (hypothetically). So our worth to Anet is the amount of new players we bring to the game.

Plus there's the fact that ANet IS looking to sell us more product. No company will be looking to release a finite number of products then spend the rest of it's (likely to be short) existence sitting on their laurels counting the money from those products - they're always going to be looking to make more in order to keep the revenue coming.

=HT=Ingram · Oct 19, 2007, 07:18 AM // 07:18

well this is an interesting topic. Arenanet has stated they never anticipated a player to stay in the game the entire time with the veracity they have out of their loyalty... They expected a campaign to gather people in and play for a few weeks here and there, maybe a month or two, and be able to casually walk away from it and come back to it later Either on a new campaign expansion or for a holiday event without penalty...

Or be able to return to the game after a hiatus and start a whole new adventure experimenting with a new class... IE Campaign characters... Or whatever you have not played yet with regularity. For me that is Eles and Paragons. I just made new characters for each recently on my last return to the game.

Beyond that they were happy with that situation, as they figured they had loyal players that kept buying their campaigns and other content like expansions, so all was fine.

But they also had another market. the cheaters. While they didn't approve of them, it could not be denied that they often return because the buy an new game again and continue where they left off. Figure that is a good 18% of their market share right there. Call it undesirable repeat revenue. Then you get teh reseller loss of revenue, from those that play for a while and dump the account either on Ebay or in game to a friend. Figure that represents 2% of players at the least.

And you have the really bad scammers that not only sell the account on ebay but Retain the master account so they can reclaim it later and loot it. This is the Scammers trifecta. First they prob dint get eh account legally to be gin with, then they sell the account to some poor unsuspecting slob and lets them use it for a month or 2, then they reclaim the account using the master account password to lock the victim out of their account and lot their character, and start the entire cycle all over again. I expect this is a bigger number but lets just say that represents 5%.

Finally you have the cheaters. Gold sellers and buyers... And people that hack the game to get unfair advantage in instances... IE always +10 regen hacks, that kind of thing... these people exploit the game for real life monetary gain. Sweat shops, Bots, Scripts, hacks, farming abuse whatever.
These people are in violation of the EULA just as the others are, but often are harder to catch without significant proof of incrimination. These people often use 3rd party tools to conduct transactions like MSN, or xfire, or webpage voice chat, whatever. Then the transaction happens in weird ways I'm sure to make it even harder to track. IDK I have never seen it done, but I have heard the stories. ;( This easily constitutes 25% of all players in the game. People who feel they are justified to cheat as long as its just for them and they are not hurting anyone by getting a million in game gold in a matter of seconds so they can continue to drive the economy into the stratosphere with unjust inflation. Indeed proof that most things are not selling for the ridiculous 100K +X ecto is encouraging that this part of the community has been significantly snuffed out, for the time being cause gold prices are so high its not very affordable to do it as it once was.

So using those estimates. 32% undesirable, with 18% leaving and returning later... thats about 14% annual acceptable losses in players...

Seeing as they have been having a 130% to 230% growth margin, its not a very significant number that Anet is considering a loss at this time. Even if you say a good 30% has left from PvP changes or whatever and may never return... But they could too. its a hard line there... But lets say that number is a fair estimate from that kind of thing... so 45% total loss of players... thats still 85% growth for the game population Minimum with their sales numbers. that means for every player that does not get a campaign or expansion cause they quit or were banned, 1.5 to 2 players have started playing the game new, and has the potential to buy more campaigns they do not have yet. Thats a pretty good market share.

Basically I am using time in along with number of campaigns and # of units sold over time... 1 million to 2.5million ... then the 3million to 4 million marks within 1 year... its a hard thing to calculate without knowing for sure what the ban numbers are. we only can have a general idea from announcement from anet over time... And some of the other figure I consider estimations from attitude online in fan forums on some issues, and ect... there is no hard way to tell if this holds true in game or not. But one would assume my estimation is on the HIGH side on the unfavorable... So even still Thats a huge market share for Anet... My personal opinion is its much much higher then I estimate in numbers lost to numbers gained... more like for every 1 lost like 20 gained. but I know if I said that It would be snuffed as exaggerated, which I fully can accept. these are all just laymen estimates...

Fril Estelin · Oct 19, 2007, 07:29 AM // 07:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by =HT=Ingram

So using those estimates. 32% undesirable, with 18% leaving and returning later... thats about 14% annual acceptable losses in players...

Just curious: how did you get these estimates? It baffles me that one can estimate this from outside Anet. Do you interpolate local results? If so what's your basic population? (and I thought that these "bad guys" would tend to lay low and keep invisible since they can be banned ... though there's stil still "truth about GW" thing, but it looks to me like BS)

Kashrlyyk · Oct 19, 2007, 08:13 AM // 08:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mordakai

..
Well, that power should be absolute. After all, they make the game, they decide what actions are deserving banning or not. It's not a democracy, it's not up to this forum to decide....

Absolute power? Really? If they want to ban people for complaining on the forums, you would be okay with it??? If banning people would be against the law, they should still be allowed to do that??? Is ANet above the law for you????

=HT=Ingram · Oct 19, 2007, 08:13 AM // 08:13

Call it a estimate, from time in game and drops in populations that is noticing over time, and reaction in fan forums. I been in the game for over 3 years. in that time its done nothing but grow. Spread out some yes, but growing none the less. Even when 1000s of accounts are banned and announcements of such events have happened in the past, as well as others less notable...

If you just go by populations in this forums that consider significant EULA violations their right as a player to do any time they feel like it. Well, You just had to be here for all the issues and see how they played out is all I can say.

Are there significant EULA violators still in game? Absolutely there are. Are they the majority? Not likely. If they were, Anet would significantly change the system to prevent it. As in removing the ability to trade gold to each other and possibility removal of the trade button all together. But that would cause more problems from scammers then it would be worth in my opinion.

I still think the 14% number is conservative, but the actual number that can be CAUGHT for doing this is probably lower then that. Thats why I said these were estimated numbers in my post. I fully agree these are not based on any fact, just estimations based on community reaction, Population growth over time, and knowledge of past operations to take down these violators that are done quietly, but none the less mentioned on occasion to assure the game populous. Even Galie says she would Love to release the actual numbers, but that would be a violation of privacy on their part on some of these issues. But that the number banned over all this time is significant, but not overly so. So in my mind that should be anywhere from 10 to 20 %. I guesstimated it around 14%.

So there you go... Ingy is admitting he is pulling some of these out of the air. I never presented it as fact, I said it was a conservative estimate based on time in game and trends seen both in public view and behind the scenes in more private discussions.

Oh using the sales numbers and trend in game. IE districts for each area and regions. I would say we aver something like 2 million players still in game across the world. Not all at once but over the year I would say that prob an good ave number. Out of the 4million units sold thats around 50% right? So my estimation that 45% may be lost total over time from Undesirables, bans, or just people that just do not play anymore (retiring), is still holding true with that number... But if early next year (jan 08) they suddenly see a 5 million units sold announcement, then the growth figure is STILL chugging away... and I think it will be. As there still seems to be significant #s of new players coming to the game every week.

By the time GW2 comes out I am betting GW1 will be at 6 to 7 million units sold. Just from people either buying more campaigns that are new now, or people coming from other less attractive MMOs cause the free to play opportunity is just to hard to ignore. The over all game population however will likely stay around a static 2 million. That also seems to hold true for WoW BTW. They have said as much over the years themselves, and they boast a 9 million units sold figure over 3 years. But annual subscriber base is around 2 to 3 million subscribers maintaining their accounts. GW is harder to track as they do not publish number like that as there is no subscription to base it off of. But one would assume the numbers are similar.

GW however has had 3 campaigns and 1 expansion. WoW had 1 campaign and 2 expansions. Each has had holiday events and special events, and free updates as well, but GW has never charged for those with a subscription either.

Now GW2 is coming. There is not a WoW 2 Expected, planned or even rumored...

If only 50% come to GW2 by that time, Expect a 3million user base right away for that. Overnight GW2 will be the Grand successor, and Have a very strong and hard to ignore step on the market share. Just saying. Anet has a bright future if they keep things going during this downtime with development. Trust me the another 25% will come with the hype over the projected success after the fact. Its just going to be HUGE. thats all we can say. GW1? I honestly do not know. I don't think it will die, as I honestly think Anet will try to keep both franchises going as one, with annual expansions for both over time. GW1 lore building for expansion in GW2. If they do that it will continue to grow BOTH games in 1 franchise. Potentually doubling their market share over time and surpassing WoWs success.

SotiCoto · Oct 19, 2007, 08:23 AM // 08:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Risky Ranger

Why would ANET banish people for no reason? There has to be something that would bring that about, not just in the course of progress. A company that doesn't keep it's customers happy will not be around for long. I also ask what are you forcing yourself not to do that is so painful to you and might get you banished?

It isn't a matter of "no reason" so much as very little reason.
The bigger and more anonymous the community, the less the misdemeanour required to get banned.
As such... as the community grows... the banning borderline spreads inwards... past my threshold first.... and eventually past the thresholds of normal players... until people don't know why they're being banned at all.

Etta · Oct 19, 2007, 08:27 AM // 08:27

Why bring all these up anyway? Have you been banned in game? Are you just paranoid? Or you're just stoned?

SotiCoto · Oct 19, 2007, 08:31 AM // 08:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by Etta

Why bring all these up anyway? Have you been banned in game? Are you just paranoid? Or you're just stoned?

Option B.

Paranoid.

But then when you've been banned from as many things (with no reason given) as I have, paranoia is a natural reaction.

=HT=Ingram · Oct 19, 2007, 09:01 AM // 09:01

Just for the record the people I know that have been banned either

1: Was in violation of the EULA and was either buying or selling gold openly.

2: Was scamming people and getting away with it for a long time and had NUMEROUS Warnings that if they did not stop they would be banned for it.

3: Were hacking the game to do things its not designed to do in order to make farming easier. IE Bot farming with 3rd party software. And Anet caught them.

or finally 4: Didn't own the account they were using. IE buying it illegally from someone other then Anet or worse stealing it using a key generator. Thus unfairly punishing someone that purchased the game and became victimized by their actions. Indeed this one is a bad one for everyone involved.

Just do not buy used accounts from ebay people. trust me if you want another account go get a cheap one from retail, they are out there.. I recently saw Factions for 29.99 at EBgames in the store. the CE was 39.99. pretty good deal for a extra account for the kids or friends or whatever... I use my extra account for guild storage and beta testing (It still has my beta character from Nightfall on it thats unaccessable atm Reserving a Name cause NF is not on that account. lol.) Yes that too is against the EULA as we are sharing that account, but we are also not scamming people on it either and we all have other Primary accounts we purchased... But generally we do not try to log into it unless we are sure no one is on it first. However If it got banned for being shared it would hurt yes, but the justification would be there for it rightly...

We know this is a gamble, but the convenience is to hard to not use it in that way. If we only had an easy way to share Guild storage as a Service. Hint hint!!

I digress. The spirit of the EULA is preserved in the use of the account in this way, if not to the letter. As all parties also own their own copies as well. IDK its a tough judgment call... I would be working with Anet support if it ever became an issue on a way to allow it eventually, or attain a service to make the need for it moot. Which is what happened when they offered character slots for many people the need for extra accounts vanished overnight. And indeed in some cases were given to friends as gifts. Again technically Against the EULA... as it has the potential for very very bad things to happen with master account abuse. But ultimately, it was an added player to the game instead of just a trashed one. And since then they have added other campaigns to the account on their own. So thats a good thing at least. As far as I know, This has not resulted in any bans when done in such a way. But technically speaking it Could as your in violation of the EULA. So its a big big gamble to take. Then again, its just a game. IDK that one obviously is Anets call. As is everything in the game ultimately. If they let it happen they are generally OK with it. As long as its not a common occurrence. IE people buying 100s of accounts to resell them on Ebay for a profit as the accounts are preloaded with goods, which is another Virgoods Profit making venture that Anet frowns on.

The only other thing that is recent is the dishonor hex, but thats a temporary thing. Its not a ban, it goes away IF you play the game correctly once its lifted. And even with it on does not mean you are not allowed to play other things, its just you need a little social engineering on the do's and dont's of PvP.. thats all...

De Wilde · Oct 19, 2007, 09:05 AM // 09:05

I've been trying to think of a good way to respond to this since I've read it.

I still don't think I've come up with anything that I can post to assuage Soti's fears but I'll give it a shot.

I'm not a regular around this forum, and in fact until very recently, rarely posted. However, I am known in a specific area of net community, namely dealing with online Roleplaying (D&D, Whitewolf etc)... And I've ran a few online chats, as well as helped on several until burn out hit an all time maximum and I stepped back from it.

While the community base for each individual chat is much smaller than Guildwars, the precedence stayed the same.

To begin to ban and punish all willy nilly, will not bring in new clientele, and will drive the loyaltists away, causing a schism within the gaming world as a whole, they become branded as jerkfaces (nicer term than I would use but don't want to get into trouble) and within a manner of months, they would have to totally re-work their business model, and begin charging monthly fees - due in part to loosing a large clientele base, and thus loosing even MORE customers due in part to the fact they're now a monthly fee game.

Here's an example.

I worked as an administrator of a chat (much like Gaile I was doing PR work for the most part.. Dealing with people, issues, and just welcoming folks to the chat) The head admin and owner of the chat began to ban people out of the simple basis of "not liking them" those people told other people so on and so forth, and the chat became a ghost town within a month. And here's the kicker, we WERE a free chat, everything that was done for the chat was paid out of pocket by the staff and the owner of the chat. The chat closed down.

Sooo.... I'm going to quote here

Quote:

It isn't a matter of "no reason" so much as very little reason.
The bigger and more anonymous the community, the less the misdemeanour required to get banned.
As such... as the community grows... the banning borderline spreads inwards... past my threshold first.... and eventually past the thresholds of normal players... until people don't know why they're being banned at all.

This won't happen. A-Net would have to be moronic boobs for several reasons. One of them including the fact we are FREE advertising for them, we tell our friends, we give our buddy keys away, we keep coming back. Another reason? We are a wealth of intelligence, ideas, and creative notions that in turn - turn each one of us a muse for the A-Net teams to get ideas. They tap into the vein to get ideas on how to make things better (And no this isn't the "we as a community rock", this is solid truth - as seen as the changes that have come to several things to date that the community has wanted)

Plus I don't think they're that apathetic (We'll leave that to the gamers :P) nor megolmanical enough for it.

We won't ever become disposable, because while some may believe we're not thought of after we pay our money, it's not true. So I honestly believe with the things you've said you have absolutely no worry... As someone else said.. It depends on what type of apple you are.

Hah verbose waffling at 4 am... Go me

=HT=Ingram · Oct 19, 2007, 09:33 AM // 09:33

Well said. my friend. Anet is receptive to us, and will let us do some things that tend to bend the RoC and EULA at times... But they do have a limit... Thats why they give people warnings and 2nd chances, and so on...

Its not to necessarily protect their bottom line. its more to protect the players...

They value both our input and our presence. And really do try to do the common good for everyone. SOMETIMES they go too far, other times not far enough... its a hard line to walk.

They want you to be able to play, and want to keep your business. it has to be pretty egregious for them to go so far as a perm ban. Indeed sometimes all they want is for you to contact support and talk to them so they can explain WHY the ban happened and how to prevent it happening again. IE a warning.

If you continue to do something that is blatantly against the EULA or RoC and a warning has been issued, they are not going to be as nice the 2nd time for sure. so its in your best interest to just go with it at that point. The average player will never see a ban on their account. It really does take a lot to merit such attention as I understand it. People that have had false positives from false reports and such has often been cleared with a conversation with support and a review of logs of said reports. It really takes a lot to get flagged. It just does not happen as often as people think to a normal player...

Red Sonya · Oct 19, 2007, 10:19 AM // 10:19

I found this from another site I visit I think it sums it up pretty well our positions nowadays as compared to the beginning:

Quote:

Since there is no monthly fee all that the community matters is that initial $40-$50 we pay to get the initial product. After that we don't matter, cash is already in hand. They have made their profit on us period. Then the next time we matter is when there is a new chapter or expansion and only for that period of time of profit. After that we are a liability to anything new they produce that they don't get paid for.

I'm sure you are familar with the carrot in front of the horse issue? Well Anets carrot is little gimmicks to keep people coming back to buy that next $40-$50 chapter or expansion. Prophecies they added Sorrows Furnace to give us HOPE that this would be a regular thing. Well it wasn't it was a ONE time thing, but, we suckered up to that carrot for the next chapter and HOPING for more. Notice how each new chapter added something we basically had to PAY for? More storage which they said they would NEVER charge us for was charged for in Factions. Three Heroes were added in Nightfall that makes playing Prophecies and Factions easy as hell. And now the final gimmick the addon mission pak for $30 or $40 more IF you buy through the game store. If not you don't get it. Pressure sales marketing at its finest.

I don't know of many companies that have great interest in their liabilities except how to "reduce" them. Thus Anets way of reducing costs now for GW1 is to make things not as bright as they once used to be. Their way to reduce it was to implement GRIND and we can see from many threads that GRIND is the single most hated thing that these players who post here talk about nowadays. GRIND will push a number of players (I can't give exact figures) away from the game. Anet/NCsoft are at that point there is no more INCOME to be had from GW1 so everyday is a liability to them having to keep the servers on for it. So, they want people to quit playing it now, they already got your money.

EDIT: Oh I will also add that the loot code and the general nerfs to our favorite skills are also things they KNOW will drive players away. People don't want to put in their little time they have only to get a smidgen of loot. I would think many of these people are used to Diablo 2 like loot and when you play this game of GW and spend days and days and days and barely get a handful of gold, that becomes unfun to people. Then of course the nerfings to the skills and all in the name of balance blah blah. lol Anet/NCsoft know exactly what they are doing and doing it on purpose.

When NCsoft pulled the plug on Auto Assault they showed themselves for what they are. Money grubbing corporation, they had no care in the world for the Auto Assault community, they pulled the plug on them and gave nothing back. Even some of the worst mmo/mmorpg's haven't done that to their community. Shadowbane probably one of the worst of them all gave it's community free servers, they didn't pull the plug.