Sneak Peek: Guardian Cub Tradable Pet

[Venziir]

I realise no one will notice this, since it will drown in mindless whining - but this is not new. You've been able to do this through the TCG for years.

[Deleted]

This might have been said before, but even then it needs to be said again. This pet will NOT add any new gold to the economy. A person will buy this with real money, and sell it for gold. This is NOT the same as Gold selling, it is very different. All it does is move money around the server. In fact, as this is a legal way of in some way procuring gold, this will undercut the gold sellers, which may even reduce their farming which IS jacking up gold inflation.
Really guys, you're all smarter than this, don't jump to conclusions. I love you really.

[Blackout15]

"real-world cash" made me lol.

[mmathes339]

1) its ugly. 2) its an even bigger cash grab than the other pets. Honestly, I see why they would not make them tradable if every toon you ever make gets one. U could just make toons, get pets, farm gold and delete the toon and do it over and over and over again. But 10 bucks for 1 pet on 1 toon? REALLY??? If it was 2 bucks it would be ok, but full price for not even half the product? *gets out his big rubber FAIL! stamp and plants it on the side of the blizz building* EPIC FAIL!!!!

[Stevecjr]

Some people can not afford the pets from the Pet Store, but can get them from the AH. The issues will be those that post them up for 15,000g plus on the AH cause they spend $50.00 to get a bunch of them and take advantage of the first few hours.

Except the fact that there will be a crap load on the ah driving the price down.

[cleaude]

Seems like a small step toward the EVE model, where you can trade gametime ingame. I'm thinking they're doing this to test how it's received, if it's a failure - who cares, it's just a pet, it'll die down eventually. If it's a success, that opens a lot of possibilities, both economically for Blizzard as well as in combating illegal gold trading/hacking etc. What I like about the system is that it sort of allows gold buying, but doesn't really allow gold selling. I mean what are you going to do, buy the pet for gold and offer it to someone for real money? Don't think many people would buy that, skam risk is way too high if a safe alternative exists. By allowing players to trade this sort of thing, you're giving gold sellers the competition of the entire community, and believe me, there are lots of people with a shitload of gold and nothing to spend it on, it might actually put the gold sellers out of business.

[Riavan]

Everything blizzard posted then was a cover for "we're turning F2P whilst still having a subscription".

[Kisuro]

But 10 bucks for 1 pet on 1 toon? REALLY??? If it was 2 bucks it would be ok, but full price for not even half the product? *gets out his big rubber FAIL! stamp and plants it on the side of the blizz building* EPIC FAIL!!!!

What's funny is that this is an actual reason to rage, and yet people focus on the dumb "Blizzard is selling gold" argument, overlooking the actual issue.

[asharia]

first gold buying service from Blizzard

[Pann]

Rip Chinese Gold Farmers

This will do absolutely nothing to the Gold Farmers. Based on the adverts from Gold Sellers I have seen tonight the average rate seems to be about €7 per 10000g, in order to compete with this rate the pet would have to sell for about 13k putting it in the price range of the Hyacinth Macaw which will remain much rarer.

Players who are willing to pay such an amount for a pet are few and far between and the supply of this pet will be plentiful compared to the rare pets command such fees. I would expect that this will settle at a similar price to the Argent Tournaments, roughly 3-5k, this is simply far too low to put a dent in Gold Farmers' sales.

Obviously many will accept a lower rate of gold per € rather than risk their account being banned, but coupled with the fact you have to wait for this sell on the AH (which could be several days compared to instant delivery from a farmer) I doubt the average gold buyer will accept such a poor return for their money.

Undoubtedly Blizzard hopes that people will see this as way to buy gold legally and buy multiple pets to sell but anyone that thinks they will be able to make tens of thousands of gold is fooling themselves.

[jibbyjackjoe]

Don't like it, don't use it! Like someone stated above, you cannot get anywhere close to decked out PVE gear with gold. You can get a good foothold, and probably get into heroic 5 mans. You can also get into heroic 5 mans with PVP gear too. At least they'll be geared correctly. I do, however, see what everyone is saying. I remember a blue stating that they have no intentions on doing this to WoW. A devious, sneaky, "thats not how its supposed to work, but if someone does it we're ok with it" work around to get the end result is still, unfortunately, the end result. WTB a REAL Blizzard Fact Checker.

[Mif]

So much for "no slippery slope"...

[Deleted]

It sounds on people like this pet will sell for hundreds a day on the auction house, but the pet market is too small for that. The only ones who will feel obliged to buy this pet are the pet-farmers who are unwilling to pay irl money for ingame progress, otherwise I really doubt anyone would consider paying a noticeable amount for this pet. Come on, it's not that cute is it? The only game-changer would be if Blizzard did this to everything in the store, but they haven't (yet). I think people are overthinking this, start worrying when they make everything in the store Binds-on-use instead.

[Strikesuit]

And so it begins with RMT in WoW. To all those people who praised the Cataclysm model that drove so many people away, remember to be careful what you wish for. Blizzard's balance sheet must be taking a hit because so many players left, and now we're going to have real money buying gold. I wonder how many cubs I'd have to buy to be able to afford a new BOE...

[Dasn]

how dare blizzard be a for-profit company and try to make profithow dare they

[Deleted]

"It’s potentially worth noting that no new gold is being introduced into the game's economy with those mounts or the new Guardian Cub pet."
- Bashiok (blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/202477/blizzard-youve-crossed-the-line)

This exact same reasoning will be shoved down player's throat when the Real Money AH will be extended to WoW.
It's the next step, mark my words.

[cleaude]

This will do absolutely nothing to the Gold Farmers. Based on the adverts from Gold Sellers I have seen tonight the average rate seems to be about €7 per 10000g, in order to compete with this rate the pet would have to sell for about 13k putting it in the price range of the Hyacinth Macaw which will remain much rarer.

Players who are willing to pay such an amount for a pet are few and far between and the supply of this pet will be plentiful compared to the rare pets command such fees. I would expect that this will settle at a similar price to the Argent Tournaments, roughly 3-5k, this is simply far too low to put a dent in Gold Farmers' sales.

I agree that this pet won't do much to farmers because the market is too small.

However, what would happen if they decide that the pet was a success and go the EVE route, which means trading gametime on the AH. The market for that would be huge and there are so many people with a shitload of gold and nothing to spend it on. Put the gold sellers in competition with the entire community and you may just put them outta business.

---------- Post added 2011-10-10 at 11:10 PM ----------

This exact same reasoning will be shoved down player's throat when the Real Money AH will be extended to WoW.
It's the next step, mark my words.

...so what?

It's not like you can buy anything meaningful with gold and as long as no new gold is introduced, the economy remains stable. An AH like that has a lot more consequences in a game like Diablo where you can just buy everything and I honestly never understood their logic that it makes sense for Diablo, but doesn't for WoW.

I for one would welcome such an AH, would give me an opportunity to get rid of all that useless gold piling up...

[Cows For Life]

It was only a matter of time before this bullshit reached WoW... Remember they announced that it would happen with Diablo III a while ago...

They said no plans for RMAH in WoW. I guess technically that statement is still true. This is along those same lines and they keep moving further down the slope with each new "innovation".

[Jiggles]

how dare blizzard be a for-profit company and try to make profithow dare they

"Try" and make a profit? That makes it sound like Blizzard is barely breaking even. No. More like "constantly come up with new ways to top past very large revenues, whether or not it might harm the game in the long term."

But, you're right. Blizzard isn't doing anything wrong in a legal or business sense. Those aren't the only standards people use to judge companies, however. There are a lot of video game companies out there, virtually all of which want to make a profit. Nonetheless, not all game companies have followed the profits-above-all-else motto. Valve, for example. Or ArenaNet.

[Kaneiac]

"Try" and make a profit? That makes it sound like Blizzard is barely breaking even. No. More like "constantly come up with new ways to top past very large revenues, whether or not it might harm the game in the long term."

But, you're right. Blizzard isn't doing anything wrong in a legal or business sense. Those aren't the only standards people use to judge companies, however. There are a lot of video game companies out there, virtually all of which want to make a profit. Nonetheless, not all game companies have followed the profits-above-all-else motto. Valve, for example. Or ArenaNet.

Yeah, it's not like Valve has their cash cow TF2 where they have millions of microtransactions and hats.

Nope. Blizzard is the devil.

Give me a break.