GW2 - Dye Unlocking no longer Account based
Recently forum posts by Crystin Cox of ArenaNet, have caused quite the stir with the announcement that Dye unlocking would be changed from being Account based as they were announced to be in 2010 to being Character based.
The explanation for this was basically that they didn’t want dyes to be thought of as a collectors item and that they wanted the dye palette of each character to be unique to it.
The issue with this I feel is that while they may not have wanted it to become a collectors item with this new system it is more so, as the availability of dyes to dye your character with will now drop.
Not all players have understandably not taken well to this change, as with duplicate dyes being possible from gem store dye boxes it does monetize the customization of your character more - though how much further is yet to be seen since the gem store has yet to be finalised, so it could very well end up being not much of a big deal also.
For the full quote and further coverage head over to GWI.
I’m having a bit of an issue with this change. I understand their intent but like you said just because Anet doesn’t want dyes to be collectible people are going to try and collect them anyway. Also she mentioned that dye should be a way to show your characters progression. I don’t see how that’s even logical. Your gear does that not the color you’ve applied to it. What if someone likes the starter dye set and never even bothers unlocking dye.
Another thing I realized is what if you’ve found some dye in world and unlocked it for your character but later on you realize this character really isn’t for you and you are out of character slots and you just want to delete it. You’ve lost any dye that you’ve unlocked on that character. So unless the mystical forge makes it pretty easy to make the exact dye color you want and relatively cheap I think this change is a tad bit unfair.


