If blizzard sold transmog sets in the shop

[protpaul]

Considering people have always bought gold, has the game been P2W all along?

In extreme cases you can argue yes. Though even now full mythic clears cost hundreds of dollars in gold. Some people do buy gold to pay for it. As early as tbc bear runs I've seen it or at least a few buyers claimed to.

[Biggles Worth]

What if Blizzard sold transmog sets in the shop? Like unlike the store helmets these are entire armor sets. Maybe even weapons and enchants. I'd instantly throw my money at the screen. Listen, I am neither good enough nor do i have the time for mythic raiding, and mythic raiding is always where the cool armor sets are. I get the "How about unlocking them through achivements/acomplishments?" but I like many others have more money than time, and I'd very much enjoy to look badass without having to run ancient raids for months.

Yes/No?

Edit: I didn't mean selling sets already in the game but brand new ones like the one in the shadowlands preorder

If they do, time to go free to play.

[Stardrift]

bro anybody can do what they want with their money lol if im bored and wanna buy a $20 mount im going to. If I want to buy a coin or two, I will. If I want to order food, I can. Are you going to go stand outside of your house and tell all of your neighbors that they're morons for paying a delivery fee when you see a food order pull up to their house? No, because that's idiotic and anybody would look at you like you're an asshat. Just like I am now lmao

They're paying for a service, dude. They're paying for it to get delivered.

You pay $15 a month for a $50 expansion, and you're telling me there's still shit that you gotta pay for after that?

Of course it doesn't hurt the wallet much, but you're still paying someone to not offer you everything you already paid for, just to have you pay some more for that last little bit.

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Hey thanks, I'm glad I can do what I want with my money.

Wonder how many times you've complained about capitalism on Twitter.

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Well would you prefer that the monthly sub was increased by $10 and you were given everything on the shop for free?
Or maybe you'd prefer that there was no shop and they reduced the size of the dev team by 25% (with a consequent reduction in content)?

Because I think those are the only real two alternatives to the current situation.

As I've said before, it just strikes me that a lot of people who are critical of the shop feel entitled to more for what they pay than is actually realistic.

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Step 1: Open a new tab in your browser
Step 2: Google "Average Blizzard Salary"
Step 3: (for advanced users only) follow some of the links to see what this number means

If you still have issues, take it up with Google. But from where I am sitting, it looks like you simply don't want actual facts because they would clash with your narrative.

Something tells me you have no idea how business, economics and video game development works.

[Halfaheart]

They're paying for a service, dude. They're paying for it to get delivered.

You pay $15 a month for a $50 expansion, and you're telling me there's still shit that you gotta pay for after that?

optional purchases are optional and whoever wants to utilize these services to enhance their own personal gameplay are completely entitled to do so and anybody looking down on another person for it is actually a clown

[Ticj]

No, because we already know this then takes art time from sets that can be acquired ingame. Look what happened with mounts. Blizzard has plenty of time to create store mounts every few months but gives us the same reskinned horse for the twelfth time.


Also of course the best looking sets come from the hardest content. If you want these sets then just wait 2 years and you can one-shot every mob in the instance. There are already so many sets in the game you can easily get that I don't see your issue.

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optional purchases are optional and whoever wants to utilize these services to enhance their own personal gameplay are completely entitled to do so and anybody looking down on another person for it is actually a clown

I look down on it because supporting this practice harms people who don't pay for these optional services.

[Advent]

I look down on it because supporting this practice harms people who don't pay for these optional services.

And yet no one seems to be able to adequately explain how.

[Fayenoor]

Yes, I am fine with Blizzard doing cash-shop xmog as long as:

• Cash Shop sets are unique and not obtainable otherwise in game
• Ingame vanity sets like PvP Arena GLadiator set, or Mythic Raiding Set are not obtainable through cash shop. (same principle as mounts).
• They do not compromise on ingame set quality and design because of cash shop set.

To the naysayers, this system is already partly in place through the BMAH, which is effectively a cash shop.

[Rehija]

It would really depend on if the optic enhancements bliizard would sell appeal to me and if they fit my tastes. Get me some bonewings ? Im all for it.

[Kaibhan]

Sub games should not have cash shops. I'll buy the shit out of xmog sets in say GW2 since it's a 1 time purchase and after that f2p but I will not pay a sub fee and then more on a cosmetic item.

[Fayenoor]

I look down on it because supporting this practice harms people who don't pay for these optional services.

How does it harm anyone if it is not compromising quality of ingame items?

It is a cosmetic item with no impact on game play. Same principle as mounts. There are cash shop mounts and ingame mounts. Many ingame mounts (like Lucid nightmare, Mail muncher etc) are as good as any cash shop mount. They have released pretty decent ingame mounts in BFA already in addition to the cash shop ones. (and unique ones like Hivemind mount). And no, not all of them are reskinned horses.

Optional services to support the bottomline is always beneficial to game development. Then execs dont have to lay off a bunch of artists/devs in order to meet their profits if they have reasonable income through some endeavors. As a publicly traded company, they will always look at improving their profits even at the cost of internal staffing.

So, I would rather people who can afford it help buy such things from the cash shop, if it would mean keeping a developer/artist from losing their job due to profits not meeting expectations.

TLDR,
Some people buy Collector's editions. Some don't. If it is not game breaking, allow the consumer to chip in and decide what they want to spend their money on.

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Sub games should not have cash shops. I'll buy the shit out of xmog sets in say GW2 since it's a 1 time purchase and after that f2p but I will not pay a sub fee and then more on a cosmetic item.

Wow and FFXIV are the only two currently active MMOs which have subs. And they both have cash shops. FFXIV has very comprehensive set of "xmog" items available in their shops. And people buy them a LOT. If consumers want to spend on such things, why shouldnt they be allowed to do so? It is not game breaking.

If it is against your principles to not support such things, then dont buy the items from cash shop. But dont block others who are willing to support artists for their hardwork from buying such items from cash shops.

[Majalahti]

As long as WoW has subscription there's no place for in-game cashshop.

Go f2p if you want cashshop in your game.

[Wheeler]

But...they already did this (Selling Xmog in the shop) - There were helms you could buy.

It didn't bother anyone then, it wouldn't bother anyone now.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

As long as WoW has subscription there's no place for in-game cashshop.

Go f2p if you want cashshop in your game.

This 100%. Dota 2 is an example of a cash shop in the general right direction.

[Garretdejiko]

Thing is, if Blizz do that, they will be seen as greedy fucks. Whereas when FFXIV do it, it's fine..
I don't mind having shop only sets if they are silly and not linked to a certain, class or race. Those should be obtainable in-game, %100.
The immersion and game fantasy for transmog went down the drain when the Yeti onesie was implemented, maybe even before that.

[Fayenoor]

Thing is, if Blizz do that, they will be seen as greedy fucks. Whereas when FFXIV do it, it's fine..
I don't mind having shop only sets if they are silly and not linked to a certain, class or race. Those should be obtainable in-game, %100.
The immersion and game fantasy for transmog went down the drain when the Yeti onesie was implemented, maybe even before that.

Maybe because FFXIV has always had the cash shop (since release or close to it); while in case of WoW it was a new thing. I agree with you completely that it is completely mind boggling how much negative press Wow get from such things.

Yet the same people wont hesitate to buy wow tokens and spending thousands of gold buying carries or buying BoE. Through the BOE system, most of wow is p2win anyways. Guilds buy mythic training FFS. As in they hire high end raiders to teach their guild how to get CE!!! And then whine about game breaking systems???
Same in arenas.

Cosmetic items is not the thing to whine abt at all.

So why deny people/casuals who have money to spend on getting cosmetic items which don't harm anyone at all?

[Ghostile]

This 100%. Dota 2 is an example of a cash shop in the general right direction.

As long as WoW has subscription there's no place for in-game cashshop.

Go f2p if you want cashshop in your game.

Instead of a optional cash shop for cosmetics, you would pay a subscription fee that has been adjusted according to currency courses?

[Starfals]

I have never and will never spend anything on the shop. The shop should close down and all those items should be obtainable in the game.

This. I also never used it and i never will. When they make the game free to play, i might consider it once or twice but that's all.

Free to play with shop
OR
Pay to play without shop

That's how i see it, and if they start to make amazing sets exclusive to the shop and keep giving us ugly skins from raids and mythics.. I'm out.

[protpaul]

Instead of a optional cash shop for cosmetics, you would pay a subscription fee that has been adjusted according to currency courses?

I don't get what you mean by adjusted... I can't recall any other mmo raising their fee...

I don't understand why some consumers now demand less for more and weirdly think of companies as friends.

[Ghostile]

I don't get what you mean by adjusted... I can't recall any other mmo raising their fee...

I don't understand why some consumers now demand less for more and weirdly think of companies as friends.

Eve online has done it multiple times now.
And the rest just have cash shops.

If they adjusted the sub value to be what dollar value used to be back in the day, we'd pay $21 per month.
Makes optional cash shop that sells irrelevant items sound pretty good alternative.

[Fayenoor]

I don't get what you mean by adjusted... I can't recall any other mmo raising their fee...

I don't understand why some consumers now demand less for more and weirdly think of companies as friends.

Adjusted mean just that. Adjustment can happen without raising the fees. It will just be counted in the current fees.

Profit = Revenue - Cost

in the simplest representation. As a Publicly traded company, blizzard is always looking to increase profit. That's how capitalism work.

So there are two ways to improve revenue.
Either cut cost (by removing key ingame features, or removing internal resources i.e. devs/designers/artists etc).
Or increase revenue.

They increase revenue by several ways:
1) More active subs (very very hard these days with so many options to choose from. WoW is not the only decent game around). As their earnings show, their sub numbers taper off significantly after the initial burst at the start of expac.
2) Introduce other means of income - e.g. cash shop and cosmetic items. They already have some of it through wow tokens BMAH and BOE system.
3) Increase monthly sub rate. (not possible as you correctly pointed out. No MMO does this).

TLDR--
When you make a product, you dont just build an awesome product and hope it will make millions because consumers will just fall in love with it. You need to find ways to make a sustainable profit.