will real world trading, gold/item, raid carries have a huge negative impact on the Classic experience?
will someone just be incredibly geared because they paid russians for loot?
was this a problem during Vanilla?
how will Blizzard combat these issues? if at all like retail?
RMT has always been a thing. I remember seeing my fair share of people who I’m sure ebayed their toon.
It’ll continue to exist and will have the same impact it always has. You just report suspected buyers/sellers and move on.
Gold buying and carrying has always been a problem. I haven’t played the current iteration of WoW to know if they have solved the gold buying problems, but I’m betting it’s still happening.
We will end up carrying a lot of our members through Raid clears, so I’m not sure why people would pay money for that. Join a good guild, be active, and you can accomplish anything.
I don’t think it has that big of a negative impact. I think detection of counterfeit gold needs to have some sort of an upgrade, but raid carries have always been a thing. Beyond the loot, people find they like a raid atmosphere or distribution of said loot and apply to those guilds.
Take for example a guild doing ZG pugs with item reserves on private servers. They outfit the people who need certain items, but pugs get a shot at other loot, or reputation for enchants and gear. It provides a gold sink for some people and benefits guilds. A guild progressing through AQ40 probably doesn’t have any raiders actively needing a Brutality Blade from MC, aside from alts or trials. Putting it at a starting 200g/bid helps the guild, puts money in the pockets of people who don’t get anything, etc.
The only real money transfers I’m worried about are potential in-game cash shops that Blizzard may or may not put in. I’m very much no changes, but it remains to be seen if they deliver the product we all want.
People always sold toons or whispered guilds in private for items. I personally used to help Warrior friends get into Onyxia clears so they could get their Quel’serrar treated. I’d tell them there would be a price to the guild, maybe 200g, or they’d have to tank some Jed/Rend runs, and we could slot them in. We even had one Warrior buddy of mine offer 1000g for the Wrath Helm because his guild had recently broken up and he wasn’t going to be raiding for awhile.
Yes, it still happens, and it happened in vanilla too. If Classic is popular at all, it will happen again. If it is not popular, I doubt many will bother as there is no money to be made.
Possibly less than it did in 2004-2006. As another mentioned, the eBay toons were a thing back then. (I personally know someone who would level a character, raid with friends to gear them, then sell the account.) That’s a lot more difficult these days with the way the Blizzard launcher works, though I’m sure someone out there has ways to cheat the name requirements or just takes the risk of their account being compromised / stolen back by the original owner.
Whether that would have much impact on the Classic experience probably depends on what we, as individual players, expect that experience to be. Me? I’m not in the rush-to-raid crowd anyway. By the time I have level 60s and want to find people to raid, anyone who wanted to take a shortcut would be long gone.
Susan sold a lot of Gold in the Vanilla days. I’m not sure it will carry the impact that it once did.
Ebaying was a thing. I sold my original account (the collectors edition boxset) on Ebay to a guy in April of 06. I still have the paypal transaction log. It was totally legal too, as they had directions on how to properly ensure the person took ownership. It also involved mailing them your copy of the game (which I regrettably did). I do have the persons contact information though. I wonder if they still have it?!
I don’t think buying raid carries will be a thing. Maybe paying to tag along and sop up loot that no one wants, after zones have been on farm a while, sure. But serious progression guilds are going to be keeping an eye on gearing apps and alts for coverage.
Raid lockouts were a thing in vanilla, you weren’t just locked out of loot, you were locked out of the instance, period. If a guild sells an MC clear to some guy, they don’t get MC that week. And an entire MC run was only ~22 pieces of loot, divided by 9 classes, 4 armor types, and 3 roles.
Gold selling however, and probably power level selling will likely be a problem eventually. I just hope Blizzard either ignores it, or does something to stop it, rather than what they did in retail. i.e. selling tokens and powerlevels themselves to get a piece of the pie.
I know pservers are at best a reference but the gold selling is strong over there!
Players drive the demand.
Players are willing to spend money to cheese content.
There will always be a Susan as long as there are players willing to pay!
Devs decided to become Susan and now every game is filled with MtX because they seen what Susan did.
They seen Susan’s profits.
They seen players demand to pay for level boosts, items, and currencies.
Way I see it in gaming now. You either have Susan or you have built in MtX.
Classic will be no different.
There’s a demand and money to be made.
They will come…