Heya. Returning player here. I've been talking about this topic in the last few days here and there, and I havent really been able to get that much information beyond "just google it", to which I did, and found that most of these discussions go back 2-3 years, and mostly revolve around the argument that Steam does not offer discounts for expansions, or at least is behind Arenanet's store with regards to making those expansions available for sale. That isnt the case anymore according to SteamDB, which shows that the first 3 expansions for this game has gone on sale before, and for me that's pretty much easily a few years worth of content before I need to consider getting more. Coupled with the fact that I have a small child to care for, my gaming hours daily (about 2-4 hours on average including weekends) is extremely limited.
Aside from that, what other reasons are there to forgo a Steam account as opposed to Arenanet?
For me, the most compelling reason to go the Steam account route is because of account management, where Steam negates the need for me to record and keep my serial number in case I need to establish ownership of my account. "Support the devs" is not something I will engage in without first prioritizing my personal interests and consumer rights first and foremost. Steam specifically addresses this particular problem I have with Arenanet's account recovery option, so unless Arenanet support is willing and capable of helping players recover forgotten or otherwise lost serial numbers, I cant justify supporting Arenanet's profits at the cost of me possibly losing my account in the future in case I lose my serial numbers for whatever reason. For reference, Steam's account recovery process is extremely easy to do. I've gone through it several times in the past, for situations such as forgotten passwords and stolen account (actually I changed the password when I was drunk then forgot the password), and Steam's CS has been extremely helpful with regards to returning my account to me. I know Steam takes 30% cut from any money I spend, but this is something I've been thinking about and I don't see a good justification to forgo this service provided by Steam and risk losing my account in the future.