Breakfast Topic: What are you willing to buy?
by Allison Robert 
Apr 17th 2010 at 8:00AM
The Celestial Steed and Lil' XT went live the other day to the delight of many, the disgust of a few, and one mother of a checkout line. Toward the end of the day as I write this, the line for purchasing the mount in the North American store clocks in at 148,108 and climbing. I think it's safe to say that the shiny horse, at least, has been a runaway success.
I haven't yet bought anything from the Blizzard store, but I come from a long line of suspicious New England cheapskates for whom saving 10¢ on bulk toilet paper was a day for the diary. Most people don't seem to have a problem with RMT (Real Money Transactions/Trading) as long as they're kept to things that don't exercise any real influence on the game. If they're just for fun and they don't give anyone an unfair advantage -- we ask reasonably -- what's the big deal? Then again, it makes me a bit sad to see brilliant new pets and mounts head straight to the store while things like the moonkin and Tree of Life models have languished for years without updates. Oh well. Everyone has mounts and pets, but not everyone plays a druid (more's the pity).
I have to admit that Blizzard selling formerly TCG-only rewards like the Path of Cenarius might make me reconsider, although I'm not sure it'd be great policy for them to undermine the card game's rewards. Have you bought anything from Blizzard's store, and do you think they should sell anything in addition to pets or mounts? Or, to put it another way, what would you love to buy?
Filed under: Breakfast Topics
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 10)
Tordenflesk Apr 17th 2010 8:05AM
I only bought my authenticator. I don't need any of the other stuff.
Faith-lb Apr 17th 2010 9:37AM
the most objective thing about this steed is the fact its not account bound , you have a code you have to redeem instead.
this has already lead to people doing this in trade
"WTS celestial steed 10,000g"
which is nothing short of buying gold for real money , but with blizzard approval , imo.
Seasqwaa Apr 17th 2010 10:04AM
Oh yeah, it cannot be trade you know. Although it's not BoA, it automatically is soulbound from the mailbox.
Ricohardt Apr 17th 2010 10:07AM
I'd actually be all for buying the items currently only available in the card game. I don't play the card game, but I'd love to have a path of illidan for my little lock :D
Hih Apr 17th 2010 10:52AM
@Seasqwaa: They're selling the code that you redeem for the mount for gold. Not the item itself. So there's a bit of trust involved and an opportunity for scammers to profit, but essentially yes, the people selling the mount are buying gold for real money.
Timidger Apr 18th 2010 8:00PM
In case nobody has noticed, when you are on the non-flying mode of the mount, when you go up hills, it doesn't tilt=C Oh well.....
But i bought it for the
Stars=D
Zalvi24 Apr 17th 2010 11:14AM
see this is the thing........... %99.99 of wow players were drooling over this mount and dying to know how to get it, thinking that theres going to be a slim change for them never to own it, and now that we all know that they can get it for $25, they throwing a fit over the fact that, "ZOMG blizzard jump the shark by selling this mount"
the fact is that either way blizzard is not gonna be able to please all of wow fan base, neither they trying to
loop_not_defined Apr 17th 2010 11:56AM
If you're willing to *give a stranger* 10,000g only on their word, knock yourself out.
If I can't use the secure trade window, it ain't worth it.
Vladeon Apr 17th 2010 11:59AM
@Ricohardt
I would easily pay $30 to see my gnome deathknight (yeah, I'm one of _those_ people) riding the http://www.wowhead.com/spell=65917#. (Magical Rooster). I wanted that so bad. It would complete my collection of chicken pets (other than the rocket chicken which I would also pay good money for, though that would be the only pet that I'd pay money for).
Nathanael Apr 17th 2010 1:03PM
I really wish Blizzard would offer the Spectral Tiger, if for no other reason, than to stop the ridiculous prices on eBay. I'm not even sure I'd buy one, but it would be nice to see the outrageous mark-ups go away.
Eyhk Apr 17th 2010 1:10PM
People buy the Spectral Tiger mount on eBay for $800~$1000 in REAL MONEY.
For an in-game mount.
It happens every day all the time.
Nothing new really.
It's just that Blizzard undercut them with a superior product by about $775~$975.
Now you can get a cool mount for a relatively affordable price.
The market was flooded so in-game it seems to have a lesser value.
But the fact is, a cool mount is a cool mount.
It provides all the effects of a regular mount, but it scales with your riding skill.
It is also given to all of your characters in your account.
It also looks pretty cool.
And you don't have to buy it if you don't want to.
BUT the catch is you pay Blizzard, the overseeing company, $25 instead of some random pawn shop on eBay $900 (and good luck trying to get Paypal to do something about your money when they don't deliver cause they won't).
Blizz probably made a cool million bucks just yesterday.
More money to pay more developers to develop new content to better the game to get more subscriptions.
Sorry I'm rambling but there's a point in here somewhere ;-)
Narshe Apr 17th 2010 1:47PM
I got an authenticator and thats about it for me. When Cata comes out, id like to race change my DK from NE to Worgen and maybe change my Druid too, but all these pets and mounts dont appeal that much to me. Especially since i already have the achievements.
Guildenstern Apr 17th 2010 9:37PM
I'm just waiting for people to figure out that the reason they held the dance studio back is because they're prettying it up enough and waiting long enough for people to forget it was supposed to come for free with WotLK content, so they can sell it.
Can't wait for my $15 a pop dances, Blizz. Not.
RMT ruins games.
Vandersveldt Apr 18th 2010 11:12AM
"blizzard is not gonna be able to please all of wow fan base, neither they trying to "
Blizzards original fanbase was nerds. Hardcore, prefer the original D&D rules, nerds. They haven't been catering to us in 2 years. The kind of people that HATE having consequences in a game, or HATE having a stupidly long uphill battle just for a tiny reward, those are the people they are now catering to. Don't ask my why, those people have a million other games to play, but for some reason they have to find the games that "just aren't accessible" enough, and take THEM over. The people saying "wow is getting too easy" are saying it because it used to be one of the few games out there that gave us that super hardcore nerdy challenge. There are so many great games out, why did the "casuals" get pissed off if even the very end game content wasn't simplified enough? Now it's all business business business, if we don't please the majority, we won't make any money. Well guess what. Wow was not made for the majority, it was a place for nerds to come together and meet, and find challenges, and bang our heads against, and enjoy doing so.
Seriously. There are soooo many other games that DIDN'T offer the crazy kind of challenges that WoW did, why are we trying to make WoW another one?
Xanaron Apr 17th 2010 8:05AM
I'd love to be able to start characters at level 55 instead of level 1.
I'd pay $25-30 for that.
Xanaron Apr 17th 2010 8:06AM
per character.
Vaeku Apr 17th 2010 8:28AM
That'll never happen, because that's not a cosmetic change, and definitely changes the game.
Mailia Apr 17th 2010 8:41AM
You can't predict the future. I bet there has been similar talk about the leveling system, pre-RAF.
Kakistocracy Apr 17th 2010 11:08AM
The problem with the "is it just cosmetic? then it's okay to sell it" test, is that the entire game is just cosmetic.
loop_not_defined Apr 17th 2010 12:10PM
@Kakistocracy
No. "In-game advantage" means a very specific thing, when used within the context of WoW. It means giving players an advantage over others, with PvE raids and PvP typically being the measuring stick.
I've seen people argue that "not having to spend money on mounts" is an advantage. While true, it's an *incredibly weak* argument given how cheap mounts are (especially in relation to the training costs: 6304g vs 161g). I can't think of any other possible advantage one could gain from this mount.