This has been a rough week to be a veteran Guild Wars 2 player. And a strange week to write about one.
The short version, for anyone who missed it: ArenaNet opened pre-purchase for Heart of Thorns with a single SKU - $50 - that bundled the base game with the expansion. There was no expansion-only option. If you already own Guild Wars 2, you’re still paying $50. If you’re a new player, you get the base game plus the expansion for that same $50.
The community responded the way it responds to things that feel fundamentally unfair: loudly and in significant numbers. Within hours, a post titled “Don’t Pre-Purchase Heart of Thorns” became the most upvoted thread in r/GuildWars2 history. Official forums lit up. Twitter ran hot. Content creators started putting out response videos.
And then ArenaNet responded. And that’s what I actually want to talk about.
What the Problem Was
Let me be precise here, because some of the discourse in the last 48 hours has blurred the actual complaint.
Veteran players weren’t angry that new players could get the base game bundled in. That’s fine. Reducing friction for new players to enter ahead of a major expansion is a reasonable strategy. The problem was the absence of any alternative for players who already owned the game. No “expansion only” path at a lower price. No acknowledgment that players who have been here since 2012 - who bought the game at full price, who funded the three years of development that made Heart of Thorns possible - were being asked to pay the same as someone who had never purchased Guild Wars 2 before.
The math isn’t even the point. The math is $50 is $50 regardless of what comes with it. The point is what it communicates. It communicates that ArenaNet’s pricing structure in this moment made no distinction between a player of three years and a player of three days. And if you’ve put genuine time into this game, genuinely invested in the world and the community, that stings in a way that isn’t purely financial.
It’s worth saying: I don’t think this was intentional disrespect. I think ArenaNet made a decision that optimized for new player acquisition - which is a legitimate goal heading into an expansion - and underestimated how that decision would land with the existing base. That’s a communication and planning problem. It has a solution.
What ArenaNet Did About It
ArenaNet’s response came relatively quickly. Here’s what they announced:
Players who registered a Guild Wars 2 account before January 23, 2015 - the date of the PAX South reveal - and who pre-purchase Heart of Thorns will receive a free character slot as compensation. For players who purchased the base game recently and feel they’re being asked to pay twice, there’s a refund pathway to address that specific case.
Going forward, ArenaNet announced that future expansions will follow a model where one purchase includes the expansion plus all previously released content - standardizing the bundle approach and removing the ambiguity that created this moment.
This does not fully resolve the original complaint. A character slot doesn’t equal the cost gap between an expansion SKU and a bundle. Players who bought the base game as a gift for someone else, or who registered after January, fall outside the veteran compensation window. The cutoff date is somewhat arbitrary.
But here is what I want to say clearly: ArenaNet listened. They changed course. That doesn’t happen automatically in this industry. Publishers and developers let bad decisions sit all the time - defended by PR language, outlasted by community attention spans, buried under the next news cycle. ArenaNet took community feedback that was, at points, genuinely furious, and responded to the substance of it rather than the noise.
That matters. It’s not a full win for the community, but it’s a meaningful one.
What This Says About HoT’s Direction
I want to separate the pricing controversy from the expansion itself, because I think the anger of the past week has made them harder to see as distinct things.
Heart of Thorns is shaping up to be the most ambitious thing ArenaNet has attempted since launch. Four new maps in the Maguuma Jungle. The Mastery system for account-wide progression. Elite specializations for all nine professions. The Revenant. Guild Halls - finally. Raids, bringing instanced high-difficulty group content to a game that has never had it. The Stronghold PvP mode.
None of that is affected by how ArenaNet priced the pre-purchase. The content is real. The scope is real. The pricing structure was a separate decision, made by a separate part of the organization, and it’s been addressed - imperfectly, but meaningfully.
I say this not to dismiss the frustration of the last week - the frustration was earned - but because I’ve watched the conversation in some corners of the community start to conflate “ArenaNet made a pricing mistake” with “Heart of Thorns is going to be bad.” Those are different claims and they don’t follow from each other.
What Veterans Are Owed, Actually
The harder question underneath all of this is one the community keeps circling: what does Guild Wars 2’s buy-to-play model actually owe its players?
The implicit understanding at launch was that buying the game once bought you the game - and that future content would be delivered as free Living World updates. That’s held up for three years. ArenaNet has never charged for Living World content. The major system overhauls - the Wardrobe, Global Guilds, Megaserver - all free. The seasonal events, the world bosses, the map redesigns. All free.
An expansion is a different category. It’s a larger investment on ArenaNet’s part than any Living World season has been, and asking players to contribute to funding it isn’t inherently unreasonable. The question was always going to be how - and this week showed that the how matters enormously.
My read: the model ArenaNet announced for future expansions - one price, all previous content included - is actually a good one. It removes the ambiguity. New and returning players both know what they’re getting. The pricing conversation doesn’t repeat. This week’s friction produced a cleaner policy for the future, which is a strange and messy way to arrive at the right answer, but it’s still the right answer.
Who Should Pre-Purchase Now
If you’re a veteran registered before January 23, 2015: Pre-purchasing now gets you the character slot compensation. The $50 still feels steep for expansion-only access, and I understand if you wait. But the expansion content itself - based on everything ArenaNet has shown - is worth the price.
If you’re returning after time away: This is an ideal entry point. $50 covers the base game and the expansion, plus you’re joining ahead of the expansion launch rather than arriving late.
If you’re new to Guild Wars 2 entirely: Best time in three years to start. The base game is a full, complete game. Heart of Thorns adds everything on top of that.
The pre-purchase controversy is over. ArenaNet responded. The expansion is real.
Watch for beta access announcements - that’s the next milestone, and the first chance to put hands on the new systems and see if the ambition translates.
See you in Tyria.