WoW Token? Do you think it will be implemented in Classic?

[Crillam]

Hasn't Bliz stated that vanilla WILL BE vanilla? Swear I saw a blue post on that a couple weeks back.

Nope, Vanilla WILL BE Classic. There's a diference.

[Protean]

They gave up in the sense that one of their founding principles when they actually cared about the game was that it shouldn't be pay to win. They clearly stopped caring later on with character boosts and other things that aren't just aesthetic being introduced. The cash shop was a mistake from the very start and it was obvious that it would've come down to this, just like everything else that has gone downhill in nu-WoW. Captain hindsight yea whatever; people were dismissing everything back then, and some of them still are.

How could that be their founding principle when the concept of p2w did not exist at the time in any sense but the most niche of markets.


The cash shop in itself has been a huge success in my eyes. It most likely singlehandedly prevented a raise in sub costs all these years. Sure it was a raise if you felt a need to buy items/services, but you have more of an option to keep your WoW costs down than if they had raised sub costs $1 every year to compensate for inflation and falling sub numbers.

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No chance. You'll pay for a subscription; the subscription will give you access to WoW: BfA and WoW: Classic, and the only caveat will be that you have to purchase a license from Blizzard to access the Classic realms, i.e. a box sale.

No way. They learned their lesson from D3. A game sustained only by box-sales from now to eternity is not going to be worth the costs of production.

[Binaris]

But that's what they are doing now. I mean, okay, I can understand why you don't like that. I rather see a problem that there are binary people "I WILL ONLY PLAY CLASSICS" and how they are going to do that if they have to play retail version in order to get gold or gametime?

You know there is an actual sub people can pay right? Have you forgotten?

[Lillyth]

This has been bothering me lately.

I'm a huge fan of the Classic announcement and I personally want it to remain exactly the same, or as close as possible.

I don't want any added features, but there are those that argue some things will inevitably change like having the battle.net integration. Which I don't see how Blizzard will release Classic without that integration unfortunately.

So if there will be obvious integration features through Bnet, and KNOWING blizzard wanting to milk WoW for all the money it could possibly make, I wouldn't put it past them to integrate the WoW Token into Classic like it is in Retail.

I think this would be a HUGE mistake personally. One of the KEY features of WoW Vanilla was how time-consuming or whatever you want to call it, it was to get gold yourself (or be incredibly lucky). I think if they integrate the WoW Token into Classic, it would ruin that feeling of accomplishment when you actually bought your first mount or finally getting the 1k needed for the Epic mount. It's one of those milestones and achievements in Vanilla that made one of the greatest memories for past players, and the Token would completely destroy that feeling.

Sure, there will be those that say "It doesn't change anything, just don't sell one and you're square" - but that's like the argument for flying "It doesn't change anything, just don't fly" - which obviously (most players who can, will) if there's the option.

I'm a bit scared about this one. I think most people who are asking for Quality of Life changed or added content will see they won't make it in...

But this... This is right up Blizzard's Alley for what I can see they would do...

Added a Poll to gauge what people are thinking.

No, you'll get Classic with all of the inconveniences. Enjoy paying your monthly time with real money.

[HeiAggra]

No chance. You'll pay for a subscription; the subscription will give you access to WoW: BfA and WoW: Classic, and the only caveat will be that you have to purchase a license from Blizzard to access the Classic realms, i.e. a box sale.

If it doesnt rise the price of the montly fee im ok! If it does let them classic players pay for a sub to have access to classic server only.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

I don't think it SHOULD be. It really creates an environment where gold can also be found instantly which is kinda toxic (but always existed with gold selling anyway). Not to mention it wasn't in vanilla so it shouldn't be here line.

But I think it MIGHT be. Mostly because it did 2 things. One it totally smashed gold selling on live realms and I mean smashed it. I wouldn't doubt if you could get it cheaper illegally (not sure tbh) but the fact that their is a legal pool has made it to where I NEVER get a tell or anything about it when before when I logged in it was spam city. Two it gives players a way to pay for subs for free that also nets Blizzard more money (20 instead of 15 roughly for a month on THEIR end).

The only promising ray that it won't be put into classic is other Blizzard games have yet to put something like this into the system. Although no other Blizzard games also takes a subscription. So really I think the pay model is going to be the big determining factor here. Separate sub model in my eyes means it will end up likely. Shared sub model might mean that since the option exists within the sub (on the newest expo) that it is used as a way to pull people to that and get "free subs" kinda like a bait and switch. No sub at all likely means you are dealing with some other form of shop so it might be more devil than not because Blizzard isn't going to be doing this purely for charity.

[owbu]

Comparing incomparable is a logical fallacy. We're not talking about IRL issues here. We're not discussing drugs legalization. We're discussing how legalized gold selling would affect the economy of a classic server.

I was replying to someone, who compared gold selling to murder and drug selling (The argument being: Making crimes legal is always a negative, therefore making gold selling legal is bad). I agree with you, that its not a very helpfull comparison.

Buying and purchasing gold was a bannable offense in vanilla. Not sure what else is there to discuss.

A bannable offence, that was still commonly used and effected the game alot. Like I said, we dont know if "legalized" gold selling actually increases gold selling and if it does, wether or not legal gold selling has a bigger or smaller effect on the ingame economy/gameplay in general. Those are the things that need to be discussed, if you want to figure out which of the two (because you do have to pick or think of a third option) has the lesser impact on gameplay.
(And just to make that clear again, I am not pro token, I am pro looking at data before you decide which kind of gold selling is the lesser evil - if someone comes up with a way to prevent both kinds, I would take that option)

[ONCHEhap]

The way gold worked in Vanilla is part of the Vanilla experience.

The economy was way different back then,and wow tokens would corrupt it

I'm myself not opposed to wow tokens at all,my issue is that it would damage the experience,if it wasn't the case I'd have voted yes

[Forgon]

No, you'll get Classic with all of the inconveniences. Enjoy paying your monthly time with real money.

Thank the lords, if only you worked for blizzard and could make it so.

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The way gold worked in Vanilla is part of the Vanilla experience.

The economy was way different back then,and wow tokens would corrupt it

I'm myself not opposed to wow tokens at all,my issue is that it would damage the experience,if it wasn't the case I'd have voted yes

Dang, you see I was afraid people were not reading the question and thinking the question was "Do you want WoW tokens" not what it actually is "Do you think Blizzard will implement WoW Tokens" - as in, is Blizzard going to do it "for reasons."

And as much as I don't want them to, I think they will because there's a huge market for it.

[Noxina]

Haven't bothered reading through all this, but I assume you're talking about the "buy token for real life money and sell for gold"-part?

However, if I can't pay my subscription for Classic with my wow tokens, I won't even touch it. I won't touch it if there is a second subscription for Classic servers.

But I don't want to be able to just buy gold either though (though I did that back in Vanilla from chineese gold farmers, because I hated farming gold and only wanted to PvP).

[Sibylline]

How could that be their founding principle when the concept of p2w did not exist at the time in any sense but the most niche of markets.

Oh really? There were no games in the ~2005 era where you could pay real money for in game benefits? So free to play games (which have in-game benefits as the main source of income) didn't exist back then.

The cash shop in itself has been a huge success in my eyes. It most likely singlehandedly prevented a raise in sub costs all these years. Sure it was a raise if you felt a need to buy items/services, but you have more of an option to keep your WoW costs down than if they had raised sub costs $1 every year to compensate for inflation and falling sub numbers.

Great economist insight there, if they lose sub numbers they'd have to bump the price up? That would make them lose even more subscribers. Also stop talking like they're some starving almost homeless indie company, they're clearly drowning in money and avaricious as all hell. Few games back then had the audacity to ask for full priced game copy fee + expansions + monthly sub worth half a good game's price.

I was replying to someone, who compared gold selling to murder and drug selling (The argument being: Making crimes legal is always a negative, therefore making gold selling legal is bad). I agree with you, that its not a very helpfull comparison.

My point wasn't that making something legal is bad, my point was that just because some people break a law that it shouldn't be legalized.
If you actually want me to explain why buying in-game gold for real money is bad for the game and its economy as a whole then I'm sorry for you.

[hulkgor]

Hope they won't implement it in Classic.

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The cash shop in itself has been a huge success in my eyes. It most likely singlehandedly prevented a raise in sub costs all these years.

I fail to see how you can make that correlation.

[Forgon]

Haven't bothered reading through all this, but I assume you're talking about the "buy token for real life money and sell for gold"-part?

However, if I can't pay my subscription for Classic with my wow tokens, I won't even touch it. I won't touch it if there is a second subscription for Classic servers.

But I don't want to be able to just buy gold either though (though I did that back in Vanilla from chineese gold farmers, because I hated farming gold and only wanted to PvP).

Ya, I don't think anyone cares how people access Classic, I just don't want the token to be apart of Classic because it would be a legal way of buying gold that I think would break one of the core aspects (and soul) of the Vanilla experience. Though you did admit to illegally buying gold which kinda stinks.

[Forgon]

I would be shocked if WoW token was not implemented in classic WoW, not only does it make sense from a monetary perspective but it also cuts down on gold selling, which cuts down on botting, which cuts down on negative play experiences.

But unfortunately removes one of the greatest core aspects of the Vanilla experience with cheating gold and thus anything to throwing money at it and not time, like Vanilla took.

[Sibylline]

People bought gold in Vanilla though. People have been buying gold for the entire history of WoW.

Does critical thinking escape you? Do you not realize that doing something illegal with risks of getting scammed or banned is completely different to paying the official company money to convert into gold? Much more people would do the latter rather than the former. How many is up to anyone's guess.

I would be shocked if WoW token was not implemented in classic WoW, not only does it make sense from a monetary perspective but it also cuts down on gold selling, which cuts down on botting, which cuts down on negative play experiences.

What about people who want to bot in order to get enough money to buy the wow token for a free sub? Do you think those people don't exist?

[Forgon]

People bought gold in Vanilla though. People have been buying gold for the entire history of WoW.

Ya, but the difference is whether it was legal.

I never bought gold because before it was always ban-able and I didn't want to risk my account. I know people that got banned, it was a risk. Yes, some people did it, but it wasn't sanctioned and in so wasn't done by everyone.

If it was legal and easy with the WoW token, then we gotta look to retail to how things play out: People chose the path of least resistance. Lots of casual players will then just sell WoW tokens to get their gold for mounts, maybe even their Epic mounts, which was a crazy feat back in Vanilla. It was not easy to get your epic mount. It would completely destroy one of the biggest aspects of the game: the economy.

[Dartz1979]

Why would you even need the token system in classic server for starters no-one is even gonna have that much gold.

[Sturmbringe]

Speaking as a person with a LOT experience on the WoW Private Server Scence, I can tell you that the Chinese are sharpening their knives and oiling their bots as we speak.

When Classic launches, the EU and NA servers are going to get flooded by Chinese bots and Chinese Gold Sellers. The client will be different than the original client, so I expect it will take the Chinese about a week to figure it out and create new bots for the New Classic Client and then it's gonna be Nostalrius 2.0 with regard to bots and Gold Seller Spam all over again.

You cannot imagine just how much Gold Selling related spam we got at Nostalrius, K. and E. In fact, it was so freaking bad that a member of the community wrote an addon called SPAM THROTTLE which enables the player to right click on the name of the Spam Bot and permanently "ban" them in Chat, that is to say that you will never under any circumstances get contacted by the Bot again and you will also never get to see any of their spam again on public channels.

From my experience, North American players especially are very prone to buying gold for real money, and the Chinese list prices in US Dollars anyway only.

So, Blizzard have two choices here, either they get the money players are gonna pay to get gold themselves or they let the Chinese Professional Gold Selling companies based in Hong-Kong have it. I hate Chinese gold-sellers with a passion, and I'm telling ya instead of just letting the freaking Chinese get all this money, I prefer Blizzard to just implement the Token system and be done with it.

It is inevitable really.

[Noxina]

Ya, I don't think anyone cares how people access Classic, I just don't want the token to be apart of Classic because it would be a legal way of buying gold that I think would break one of the core aspects (and soul) of the Vanilla experience. Though you did admit to illegally buying gold which kinda stinks.

I even bought level boosts, because I just couldn't be arsed to grind the last few levels as I ran out of quests. So what?

[Forgon]

Why would you even need the token system in classic server for starters no-one is even gonna have that much gold.

Is almost comical how many people have said something similar. Did I word it wrong or something to make people think I'm asking about buying a token that would be on Retail games from a Classic server? Because obviously that makes no sense.. I am speaking of individuals buying a WoW token and selling it - separately - on Classic, within their own economy.