The bulk of my collection still comes from in game either a vendor or drop though. I don’t think that has really changed.
I can’t wrap my head around why people want something that clearly is special, has established value within the community, was and continues to be traded, but don’t want to put any effort into actually achieving it.
They come from a place of extreme where the item cannot be attained by reasonable means, but instead of arguing towards a reasonable and realisitc way, they want it to be as fast and cheap as possible, catering towards another extreme that is just as unhealthy. No effort given. That’s an A-class example of laziness and entitlement.
There is no “effort” involved in clicking “add to cart”.
Just as there is no “effort” involved in opening a browser-tab and go to bed.
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Okay so prime example for me of a complete and utter waste of time is that ZM mount and pet crafting system. I’ve farmed 3 out of 24 mounts and I was already feeling miserable. 0.00005% drop rates of all the required items but hey! you can spend 1 million gold and buy all of them off the auction house. Such a boring and meaningless grind.
But not all grinds in modern wow are bad. I’m assuming you have hydrosphere toy from mechagon. It was such a fun meta achievement to grind. Fishing all around the world to finally get a super unique toy that allows you to fish mounts and toys from it. Whenever I’d idle with other people somewhere, during raid breaks etc, I’d spawn it and everyone would gather around and fish. Can we have more of that?
… why anyone would want that low poly mount in the first place; doesn’t look worth even a click to unwrap it in my collection from a gift present.
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I would be cheeky and call that a free-to-play model.
I don’t mind that either.
But why am I paying for a box product and a subscription then? 
My point being that Blizzard can’t have it both ways (or well, they can, but I’m going to be upset about it). They can’t charge a premium price and a subscription for the game itself, and then also charge increasingly more money for extras.
No no. That’s not how the piano is supposed to play.
What’s expected – at least from me – when I pay a premium price and a premium subscription, is to get an all-inclusive product.
And if that’s not what I’m getting, what exactly am I paying all this money for?!
Alas I get upset that Blizzard has the audacity, the gall, to demand so much money for the game itself, and then afterward come and demand more money for mounts and pets and other collectibles that they deliberately choose not to put into the game.
Greedy pricks.
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I hated that change and I’m glad they didn’t repeat it. It was in response to criticism of mount farming and this was their solution. I just prefer the Korthia model.
There must have been some who enjoyed it but I detested it though I have now finally made all the mounts. But I got the bulk of them in DF rather than SL.
It’s the same with rep grinds. Some love to stand somewhere and just wail on mobs getting 1 rep a kill. I far prefer having some quests I can do, a bit of rep in a dungeon etc.
I agree grinds vary and not all are bad. But they can’t please everyone all of the time.
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I am happy everytime Blizzard add a TGC mount back with things like this. I probably won’t use those outdated mounts so much having better mounts, like any new mount available in the expansion. But I like the message this gives to scalpers and people who buy scalpers. The message is that Blizzard doesn’t recognize the “worth” of the money spend buying cards for TGC cards. For Blizzard’s point of view those TGC card only value the money that people spent on a deck of card to purchase it and be lucky, and this is not worth so much so if the mount is free isn’t a big deal. Not the 1500 Euros that they are paying now in eBay, that is between the player and unauthorized third-party sellers. That’s not Blizzard’s problem. And precisely it is on Blizzard’s interest to destroy that second hand market by making this moves
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And you are free to stop subscribing if you feel that you do not get your moneys worth. That’s the benefit of a free market. People choose with their wallets, as they should.
I feel that I do get my moneys worth, so that’s why I keep subscribing.
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I have no idea why you’re trying to frame TCG item = swiping your card so hard, but go ahead and lose yourself in that delusion.
Most people did NOT pay absurd amounts of money, but spent their time and gold.
Over the years I have met and read from countless of those people, but not one who spent money. More importantly though, successful auctions on ebay etc. do not come close to tracked ingame auctions of TCG items sold. Not even remotely.
Had a quick glance out of interest:-
Insane amount of money.
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Because there are dozens of webpages selling them for hundreds and thousands of dollars. So no delusion.
Plus… the original way of obtaining them was swiping your card, hoping to get the item you wanted.
Damn right I am.
And that’s where it ultimately ends when the dissatisfaction reaches the boiling point.
And I would wager that for some it already has for that very reason.
And I don’t see how it benefits the game that there are less players.
It may benefit Blizzard’s coffers to make more money here and now.
But hell if I am going to applaud their efforts when it’s MY MONEY they want. The greedy bastards they are.
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Its almost like the original way to obtain them was to in fact swipe your card, not to mention that you still have to pay an extreme amount of gold or real money to obtain them. theres also more out there than cards printed due to a mass dupe back in MoP.
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It is a pity, because one of those mouns is the Feldrake, who was already given in a Twich drop, so it seems this movements at most destroy the scalper economy momentarily. I am not sure how much it was before the drop, but 900 $ for a mount that was given free to everyone is absurd.
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I was surprised it regained some of it’s value after the twitch drop but I guess there are always people who miss out.
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It’s because Blizzard don’t give it away by putting it in the game for everyone to obtain at their own time and leisure. Instead they gave it away as a time-limited promotion. FOMO. And if you missed out, then that’s still a mount that you’ll have to pay for on the second-hand market. Just like this ghostly one we’re now being presented with. And it’s why we’ll all make sure to tune in to twitch, because we don’t want to miss out, do we?
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Its weird as well because the Blazing hippogryph was also a twitch drop and was later added to the trading post.
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Unless it returns to the trading post like the blazing hippogryph did.
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I can’t remember where and when, but I seem to recall having read an interview, that the plan is to eventually put all of those promotional items on the trading post - most likely on an undetermined rotation.