Of course I get that, but you do understand that before I only had to buy 5 tokens instead of the 6 tokens that I now have to buy. Many of us that make gold in game to buy tokens are in this same boat, and now all of us need to buy 20% more tokens to get the same amount of sub time. That is a large increase in demand for tokens being bought off of the AH, and that demand increase will drive token gold prices up.
That bulk time discount was why I was going to the trouble of redeeming tokens for battle.net balance instead of directly redeeming them for 30 days each: you get more bang for the buck by buying game time in larger increments. That’s why Blizzard and most other businesses offer bulk discounts. For example, it’s basically the fundamental business model of Costco.
I get the idea that many people think that this is some sort of “exploit” or a “scummy” or “shady” way to use tokens, but I didn’t set up the system that Blizzard established years ago when they decided tokens could be redeemed for battle.net balance. And Blizzard decided, not me, that battle.net balance can be used for ANY virtual goods purchase, including individual non-recurring game time purchases. Blizzard could have restricted that if they wanted to, but they chose not to, and for good reason.
Blizzard was the one who decided to incentivize larger game time purchases of 90 days and 180 days by discounting the effective monthly rate, and they did that for a good reason: it keeps people subbed for longer.
Also keep in mind that while I am not spending my real dollars to buy game time since I effectively do it by playing the game and accumulating gold, every token I buy had to originally be bought by someone for real money from Blizzard. And they didn’t pay $15 USD for them, but $20 USD each, so Blizzard is actually making more money when people use tokens, even when cows like me redeemed them for battle.net balance to buy large blocks of time.
For example, my 5 tokens that got me 180 days of time started as 5 tokens bought for $20 each, or $100 total. If I had bought my game time with US dollars by the month at $15/each, I would have only spent $90 of my own money. But by buying my game time via tokens, even with the discounted rate for a 180 day chunk of time, Blizzard comes out $10 ahead in the end if I had bought time one month at a time (albeit not from my wallet), for a profit increase of over 10%. And if I had bought my 180 days with my own real money directly, I’d have spent only $77.94, which would be $22.06 less than they got from those 5 tokens.
In the end, the token system and allowing tokens to be redeemed for battle.net balance, including the one time purchase of game time in 90 day and 180 day chunks makes Blizzard more money, which is why they did it that way. This isn’t like some super secret that I only shared with my family in Mulgore and that Blizzard never realized was going on for years and years.
As I noted, I never let my sub lapse before when buying in 180 day increments with my battle.net balance, but going forward, as I just merely redeem tokens directly for 30 days each, it is way, way easier for me to take little breaks, the sort of interruptions in sub time that Blizzard tried to get me NOT to take by discounting those 90 day and 180 day purchases.
/moo 