The deflation is awful.

Vulsahdaal

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Vulsahdaal wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Vulsahdaal wrote: »

LunaFlora wrote: »

deflation is awesome

Not really. A temporary shift in the market due to an overabundance of supply is ok, but in this case I think is more likely due to a significant loss of players. And if conditions remain like this we will most likely see traders who make that their end game join in the exodus.

I just dont see much awesome about that.

An increase in players is more likely. More items listed in the traders resulting in lower prices.

There arent more items listed in traders. Each trader guild has a limited amount of members and each member can only list a limited amount of items, so there arent more items listed than before.

The lower prices are more likely due to items not selling, so trader will lower the price trying to get something for it. Problem is, even at the lower price its not selling, as Ive mentioned with the furniture plans and Baron Zaudrus mask.

This appears to be a decrease in the amount of players, not an increase. Unless I am misuderstanding what you mean here? Maybe you can explain further?

That argument would only hold water if those finite number of slots were also static in what those slots could hold.

A finite number of slots does not apply to Stackable items. Perfect Roe is showing up in larger wholesale stacks more often than they used to these days. Nor does it take into account what items are occupying those slots. Sellers are gonna fill those slots with items giving them the highest return.

Were not that far from each other in thinking, but what Im not seeing is how youre concluding this is due to an increase in players.

If youre seeing an increase in the amounts of Perfect Roe or as you also mentioned Aetherial Dust in the traders (and yes these were in the event drops mentioned here a few times) to me this does not indicate an increase of players.

Why are they more abundant at the traders now? I suspect its more that sellers who see their sales numbers crashing are going into their reserves and pulling out the most expensive items in hopes of making their sales quotas and/or guild dues.

Not an increase of players, which may actually increase the demand for such as others have said.

freespirit

That was my point, activities that could result in more dust being on the market are still going on, I was agreeing with you!

sarahthes

Vulsahdaal wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Vulsahdaal wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Vulsahdaal wrote: »

LunaFlora wrote: »

deflation is awesome

Not really. A temporary shift in the market due to an overabundance of supply is ok, but in this case I think is more likely due to a significant loss of players. And if conditions remain like this we will most likely see traders who make that their end game join in the exodus.

I just dont see much awesome about that.

An increase in players is more likely. More items listed in the traders resulting in lower prices.

There arent more items listed in traders. Each trader guild has a limited amount of members and each member can only list a limited amount of items, so there arent more items listed than before.

The lower prices are more likely due to items not selling, so trader will lower the price trying to get something for it. Problem is, even at the lower price its not selling, as Ive mentioned with the furniture plans and Baron Zaudrus mask.

This appears to be a decrease in the amount of players, not an increase. Unless I am misuderstanding what you mean here? Maybe you can explain further?

That argument would only hold water if those finite number of slots were also static in what those slots could hold.

A finite number of slots does not apply to Stackable items. Perfect Roe is showing up in larger wholesale stacks more often than they used to these days. Nor does it take into account what items are occupying those slots. Sellers are gonna fill those slots with items giving them the highest return.

Were not that far from each other in thinking, but what Im not seeing is how youre concluding this is due to an increase in players.

If youre seeing an increase in the amounts of Perfect Roe or as you also mentioned Aetherial Dust in the traders (and yes these were in the event drops mentioned here a few times) to me this does not indicate an increase of players.

Why are they more abundant at the traders now? I suspect its more that sellers who see their sales numbers crashing are going into their reserves and pulling out the most expensive items in hopes of making their sales quotas and/or guild dues.

Not an increase of players, which may actually increase the demand for such as others have said.

It's likely IA provisioning bags. There was a "how to get rich in ESO" video on yt just before the anniversary event (posted by hyperioxes) that pointed out the high drop rate of gold mats from IA provisioning bags. Prices started dropping for all the items that drop from them within days... And that's anything that goes into the various ambrosia recipes plus the various war torte recipe ingredients.

manukartofanu

Vulsahdaal wrote: »

Well even after some interesting posts in this thread, I still have no idea whats really going on here.

I know about some increased drop rates. Sixth House banner, Khajiit brazier etc..

I know that many mats flooded the market with the event boxes and the obsessive farming many turned to in their quest for ink. Im also aware of the drop rate of furniture mats and ink being increased by ZOS.

All these can most definitely contribute to what we are seeing now, however as someone who only very rarely deals in mats (even when the price was up) I cant help but feel theres something more concerning going on here. That is, that its not a price thing. Its just that nobody is buying even when prices are lowered.

Someone here mentioned specifically the Baron Zaudrus mask. This caught my eye because Ive been actively looking for it these past couple weeks as well as watching TTC. I finally got it yesterday. Paid 2.9 mil. He mentioned that this is only a fifth of what it went for before. I cant say I know this for sure, but it sounds probable enough. I went to the cheapest available on TTC, expecting it to be gone, but it was still there. With 7 days left to go, and this was at a Mournhold trader with high visibility.

So I have to wonder, why is something that the market is not flooded with (the most pages Ive seen on TTC is 2.5) and is listed at a fifth of the price still not selling? Maybe people dont like Baron Z (and I get that as he is my archnemisis in IA, not Tho'at) but still, something seems off.

As I mentioned, I dont deal in mats. I do deal in furniture plans and furniture. When I first noticed an issue was in less than 30 days after Gold Road release, I was trashing purple and blue Colovian plans because they wouldnt sell at any price. Now I dont bother. I was gonna try to farm up some Dwarven Glass Armonica sketches, but for what reason if they wont sell either?

Basically the tldr version is: Over abundance of supplies (intended by ZOS or not) may be part of the problem, but atm I believe the real issue is a significant loss of players. If no one is playing, then no one is buying. And this I dont believe was intended.

This topic attracted many in June when it caught even the biggest traders, who are well-versed in the ESO economy, off guard. https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/8148075/#Comment_8148075 I hope this moment will be the final piece of the puzzle for you. If not, I recommend reading through the entire thread; many knowledgeable people have contributed to it.

manukartofanu

SirGabenOfSteamia wrote: »

The deflation is affecting wayyyyyy more than just mats. ZoS has been making many incredibly rare or otherwise expensive things flood the market in a way to make it more readily obtainable for the average player, which is fine, but I personally think it punishes those who have already done everything in the game and find their joy from it now through grinding and selling on the markets.

Some examples of how the trading situation has changed over the last year in my experience on PS/NA:


Filer Ool with the introduction of the IA immediately began selling deadlands treasure maps in the first week of release, at least on console. This led to the price of maps dropping from around 50k EA on PS/NA to 5-10k where they sit today. Ancient daedric motifs dropped from anywhere between 200-500k to 30-90k today. Same goes for other maps and motifs the filer has sold that one could obtain their respective drops from.

Jubilee halved the price of rare mats, whether it be gold or alchemy. The extreme abundance of motifs that dropped during it due to jubilee boxes being able to be farmed infinitely crashed many of the rare ones. Some examples being minotaur chests dropping from 250k to 100k, Fang lair chests from 80-100k to 20k, crimson oath chests dropping from 500k to 200-250k. Plenty of other already decently cheap motifs

The Lucent Sentinel motif began dropping and selling between 100-500k depending on the page, two weeks later the West Weald event happened and now it's easy to find every page of the chapter at 5k EA.

Extremely rare masks like Lord Warden, Molag Kena and Baron Zaudrus have all dropped this year. People seized the opportunity and farmed them to hell, now traders are flooded with them at 1/5 of the price they were before with no one buying.

Guilds are struggling financially with crashing prices and lack of sales. Because so many people got their bags flooded with gold and alchemy mats from jubilee they no longer buy as much from guilds. Many guilds that held the same traders for years can no longer afford them and have been forced to move out. You might think this is great for newer guilds, which it is, but it has also opened the door to trolls who are either outbidding or being the only bids on multiple traders across the game. The traders they own sit there without a single listed item for weeks on end. Orsinium has had 2 of these on PS/NA for over a month, as one example.

I personally enjoy grinding scaly cloth scraps from the Silent Halls in Blackwood to list in traders. In the last year their price has crashed from 1.2mil to 400k for the set of 50. This is seemingly because ZoS boosted the drop rate of them, with single enemies dropping sometimes 2. Yet even with lower prices sometimes they will expire in the traders 2-3 times before they sell. Likely indicative of the lack of demand that has come with the dwindling playerbase.

Another example is the random increase of the drop rate of the morrowind banner of the 6th house from vvardenfell, which wasn't touched for 7 years until now for some reason. What was once one of the most sought after furnishings in the game now doesn't even sell for 50k.

There's no reason to grind anything anymore. Gold is abundant, things are cheap. I barely hop on other than to do dailies anymore. I understand it's great for new players, and ZoS is obviously trying to hook in a new audience with recent changes. But I don't think it helps the veteran playerbase of the game who are finding less and less reasons to play the game.

It’s not very clear how this helps new players. Previously, there was a difference between blue, purple, and golden gear. Now there isn’t. Golden items still have some value, but at this rate, they will soon be only slightly more valuable than salvage junk. So the question is: why do new players need golden items? Purple gear isn’t so much worse that it’s impossible to play with, but now new players have one less goal in the game because everything is already handed to them. The question is: why play? Why do new players need a 6th house banner or expensive recipes, why do they need all this at the beginning of the game?

Danikat

Vulsahdaal wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Vulsahdaal wrote: »

LunaFlora wrote: »

deflation is awesome

Not really. A temporary shift in the market due to an overabundance of supply is ok, but in this case I think is more likely due to a significant loss of players. And if conditions remain like this we will most likely see traders who make that their end game join in the exodus.

I just dont see much awesome about that.

An increase in players is more likely. More items listed in the traders resulting in lower prices.

There arent more items listed in traders. Each trader guild has a limited amount of members and each member can only list a limited amount of items, so there arent more items listed than before.

The lower prices are more likely due to items not selling, so trader will lower the price trying to get something for it. Problem is, even at the lower price its not selling, as Ive mentioned with the furniture plans and Baron Zaudrus mask.

This appears to be a decrease in the amount of players, not an increase. Unless I am misuderstanding what you mean here? Maybe you can explain further?

I'm not saying the person you replied to is right, but that's a flawed argument. It only works the way you described if every guild with a trader always has the maximum number of members and all the members keep all their slots full.

I'm in 2 social guilds with a trader. One encourages members to use the trader (mentions it in the message of the day etc.) but doesn't require it, the other it's just there and only really gets mentioned if someone asks about how to buy or sell stuff so a lot of members don't even know we have a guild store or trader. I scan both guild stores most days with TTC and the first one has around 35 pages, the second varies between about 9 and 15 pages - meaning there's a lot less items being sold on that trader.

Also guilds without a trader still have a store. Only other guild members can buy from it, but it's still another way for those members to get items without buying from a trade guild, which would help to lower demand. (My third guild is like that, I've never even seen their store mentioned in chat and they've never had a trader, but I recently found out some people do list stuff on there and I've bought some things myself which I would otherwise have gone looking for on traders.)

Arunei

LaintalAy wrote: »

Arunei wrote: »

Er, you do realize just because you don't use a lot of gold, that doesn't mean no one else does, right?

You do realise that for many months the forum was full of "stuff too dear" comments?

If you do a lot of the hardest endgame PvE or a lot of heavy PvP, you'll tend to spend a decent amount on potions and food (if you don't make them yourself).

Making them yourself doesn't cost gold.

If you do housing, it can cost millions of gold to properly furnish a place, especially if you're relying on Lux Vendor stuff that hasn't been circulated in a while so you're having to pay out the nose @ trade guilds for it. Blueprints and the mats for furnishings can be expensive as all heck, especially for newer and thus rarer ones.

Find plans for free, where other players find them.
Luxury Vendor stuff is for folks with money, just like RL.
"Trade Guilds" don't really sell anything; their members do.

If you want to buy carries for getting the really hard to get titles and stuff, carries cost millions of gold as well.

If you can't get the title without a carry, you don't deserve it.

If you want to buy Crown Crates with gold, the going rate for them is ridiculous. I bought 2.5k Crowns from a friend and it translated to 2.5m gold.

You can't buy Crown Crates with gold. Not approved.

If you pay others to craft gear sets for you or to give you the mats to improve bound gear, that can cost quite a bit.

Craft your own stuff; refine your own tempers.

If you craft, Motif chapters can be stupid expensive. Style pages can also be very expensive. And the harder the content these things come from, or the rarer they are otherwise, the more they cost.

Farm the motifs yourself. Some come from events; most don't.

There are a number of fragments for all sorts of Collectibles that are super expensive. Scrap of Minstrel's Cloth still average like 250-299k each on PC-NA, and you need 10 of them iirc to make the Costume they're for. That right there is a couple OF million.

Try harder.

Each of these things alone can cost you millions, VERY easily. Now imagine if you're someone who crafts, does Housing, and buys a bunch of Crown Crates with gold. You could be looking at dropping several million VERY easily.

It's a temporary phase. As more of these 'evil guild trader' middlemen stop farming, crafting and trading; the things you need will just get rarer and subsequently more expensive. It's a death spiral.

The Merchant Class has been run out of town.

Literally none of what you tried to counter my points with matters one bit lmao. The person asked what people would spend any money on. I gave them examples of things people could easily spend millions of gold on. Your whole post means nothing, so...good for you trying to be antagonistic I guess.

Also yes, you are allowed to buy Crown items with gold. There's no difference between buy or trade in this instance, the end result is the exact same; person A gives person B gold and gets gifted a CS item. At the end of the day it doesn't matter what arbitrary words you want to apply to this transaction, it's allowed.

What ISN'T allowed is buying gold or other in-game items for irl money.

Nharimlur_Finor

Arunei wrote: »

LaintalAy wrote: »

Arunei wrote: »

Er, you do realize just because you don't use a lot of gold, that doesn't mean no one else does, right?

Literally none of what you tried to counter my points with matters one bit lmao. The person asked what people would spend any money on. I gave them examples of things people could easily spend millions of gold on. Your whole post means nothing, so...good for you trying to be antagonistic I guess.

Your opening statement was intended to support the idea of players needing to make high volumes of gold in order to progress. My counter points were there to debunk your list of reasons that anyone needs gold at all. All of those points matter with regard to debunking your claims. Including the carry one.

The ONLY reason players need gold is to save time by buying shortcuts and not doing the hard work for themselves.

The ideal future for ESO is a world populated by low-level players with no in-game money slugging away endlessly and continuing to subscribe in order to access all available features. if only long term players with gold to waste, would quit and go somewhere else.

Major_Mangle

Nah, it's great. No more borderline scam prices on things because a small group of trading whales manipulate market prices in a regular basis.

ElderOfTamriel

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

The thing is despite the massive deflation people are still asking over 1000:1 for crowns, back when items were actually this value before the mass inflation, Crown prices were more along the lines of 300:1

idk what server youre buying crowns for 1:1000 but on PC EU Crown Network Discord its still 1:3000

ElderOfTamriel

LunaFlora wrote: »

deflation is awesome

i kinda disagree, depends from what angle youre looking at it.

i tend to farm/hoard rare plans and keeping them for sometimes over a year in my bank, waiting for them to gain value, before i resell them. many of them have dropped A LOT in value now, so my effort to take care of them for so long was for nothing now... which i obviously cant like at all. But its a risky business and i know this so i shouldnt be surprised.

On the other hand i could start buying plans now and learn them cheap for my collection which is also good

dk_dunkirk

I've complained several times on here about the ridiculous inflation of PC prices over the console markets. The pro-inflation people told me repeatedly that it was no big deal, because you could just go farm something pricey, and then you could afford to buy whatever it is you wanted. (In response, I filled up my 10 slots with characters just to do writs with so that I could generate the upgrade mats and not have to buy them.) Seems to me the same argument would apply in reverse. Now the people who farmed pricey items for money no longer need to do so. Or, if they still want to do that, it takes much less to buy the things they wanted the gold for, like furnishing plans or whatever. Seems to me that everyone should be happy now, but they're not. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

manukartofanu

dk_dunkirk wrote: »

I've complained several times on here about the ridiculous inflation of PC prices over the console markets. The pro-inflation people told me repeatedly that it was no big deal, because you could just go farm something pricey, and then you could afford to buy whatever it is you wanted. (In response, I filled up my 10 slots with characters just to do writs with so that I could generate the upgrade mats and not have to buy them.) Seems to me the same argument would apply in reverse. Now the people who farmed pricey items for money no longer need to do so. Or, if they still want to do that, it takes much less to buy the things they wanted the gold for, like furnishing plans or whatever. Seems to me that everyone should be happy now, but they're not. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

They were right in what they told you, and in reality, your conclusion is incorrect. The part of the market that has suffered the most is precisely the one supported by daily quest farmers. The most affected group in the past year has been homebuilders. Old recipes haven’t dropped in price; in some cases, they've even gone up because they've become more attractive compared to the devalued motifs and armor materials. Style materials haven’t decreased in price either; in some cases, they’ve even risen sharply and significantly in a short time. At the same time, there’s really nothing worth farming, as new motifs immediately lose value, and new recipes also quickly drop to almost nothing. Farming dailies is also no longer profitable—it still brings in income, but what was once an elite farming method, one of the most lucrative, has turned into an almost meaningless way to get materials that are now worth almost nothing. Update U44 might help a little, as it increases the drop rate of some materials used for furniture crafting. An ecosystem that took years to build has been destroyed due to the changes over the last year and a half to two years.

Danikat

manukartofanu wrote: »

dk_dunkirk wrote: »

I've complained several times on here about the ridiculous inflation of PC prices over the console markets. The pro-inflation people told me repeatedly that it was no big deal, because you could just go farm something pricey, and then you could afford to buy whatever it is you wanted. (In response, I filled up my 10 slots with characters just to do writs with so that I could generate the upgrade mats and not have to buy them.) Seems to me the same argument would apply in reverse. Now the people who farmed pricey items for money no longer need to do so. Or, if they still want to do that, it takes much less to buy the things they wanted the gold for, like furnishing plans or whatever. Seems to me that everyone should be happy now, but they're not. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

They were right in what they told you, and in reality, your conclusion is incorrect. The part of the market that has suffered the most is precisely the one supported by daily quest farmers. The most affected group in the past year has been homebuilders. Old recipes haven’t dropped in price; in some cases, they've even gone up because they've become more attractive compared to the devalued motifs and armor materials. Style materials haven’t decreased in price either; in some cases, they’ve even risen sharply and significantly in a short time. At the same time, there’s really nothing worth farming, as new motifs immediately lose value, and new recipes also quickly drop to almost nothing. Farming dailies is also no longer profitable—it still brings in income, but what was once an elite farming method, one of the most lucrative, has turned into an almost meaningless way to get materials that are now worth almost nothing. Update U44 might help a little, as it increases the drop rate of some materials used for furniture crafting. An ecosystem that took years to build has been destroyed due to the changes over the last year and a half to two years.

Why aren't the old recipes, motifs and style materials worth farming? The ones that haven't dropped in value, or have even gone up? Do they no longer drop or something?

(I'm genuinely asking because I don't know, but I always assumed people who farm recipes will focus on whichever are most profitable, not just the newest ones.)

manukartofanu

Danikat wrote: »

manukartofanu wrote: »

dk_dunkirk wrote: »

I've complained several times on here about the ridiculous inflation of PC prices over the console markets. The pro-inflation people told me repeatedly that it was no big deal, because you could just go farm something pricey, and then you could afford to buy whatever it is you wanted. (In response, I filled up my 10 slots with characters just to do writs with so that I could generate the upgrade mats and not have to buy them.) Seems to me the same argument would apply in reverse. Now the people who farmed pricey items for money no longer need to do so. Or, if they still want to do that, it takes much less to buy the things they wanted the gold for, like furnishing plans or whatever. Seems to me that everyone should be happy now, but they're not. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

They were right in what they told you, and in reality, your conclusion is incorrect. The part of the market that has suffered the most is precisely the one supported by daily quest farmers. The most affected group in the past year has been homebuilders. Old recipes haven’t dropped in price; in some cases, they've even gone up because they've become more attractive compared to the devalued motifs and armor materials. Style materials haven’t decreased in price either; in some cases, they’ve even risen sharply and significantly in a short time. At the same time, there’s really nothing worth farming, as new motifs immediately lose value, and new recipes also quickly drop to almost nothing. Farming dailies is also no longer profitable—it still brings in income, but what was once an elite farming method, one of the most lucrative, has turned into an almost meaningless way to get materials that are now worth almost nothing. Update U44 might help a little, as it increases the drop rate of some materials used for furniture crafting. An ecosystem that took years to build has been destroyed due to the changes over the last year and a half to two years.

Why aren't the old recipes, motifs and style materials worth farming? The ones that haven't dropped in value, or have even gone up? Do they no longer drop or something?

(I'm genuinely asking because I don't know, but I always assumed people who farm recipes will focus on whichever are most profitable, not just the newest ones.)

Because farming implies some consistency in profit, but there's no consistency at all there. Chef Arquitius's Lost Thesis is an extreme example of something you might end up farming. It can drop for someone who casually stops by the Battlegrounds, while many people have been going there for years without it dropping even once.