Guild stores are flooded and no one is buying

newtinmpls · May 2015

There is more than one reason to change what you ask for an item you are selling.

Well I'm a member of multiple guilds that emphasize selling. I do use both the "recommended price" (that shows up in the ESO software when listing an item) and the data from Master Merchant. I also use my own experience - i.e. while I do like to craft set items for fairly low peeps (I generally do the "material change" cutoffs - which I think are what ... now that I'm out of game I think it's 14, 24, 34 - or do they end in 6 - oh well early alzhieimers).

Anyway, this was partly made easier prior to 1.6 when I unrepentantly scoured the bank containers every time I was there (I also had every character have at least a level one hireling in every craft where it was available). I was swimming in style stones and in green level improvement stuff (honing stones and hemming).

When 1.6 came along, I was starting to concentrate on just a few characters, so I didn't put the hireling points back in (in fact I still have a few characters that aren't fully re-speced yet). So I went from "lots of everything" to an amazing dearth. It's odd how fast style and trait stones go when the only place you are getting them is from deconstruction or delve containers.

When I was down to 20-30 green improvement mats, It occured to me that I was pricing too low and selling too fast, because I was actually starting to put my own characters (and close friends/guildies) armor and weapon needs too far behind my selling desires. So I raised prices a bit to slow things down.

All that being said, sometimes an item expires. I just plop it up onto another trade guild and usually eventually it sells. Some days I sell 3-6 things, sometimes it's a day and a half before I sell anything. I think I probably average one sale of something every 12 hours or so.

Because of 1.6 when I stop by a trader (whereever I am) I just hit the initial R to check the first page or two of prices. If style materials are selling for less than 10 pennies apeice, I buy them. Yeah, I know that I would have to pay 15, not 10, but perhaps like the red code in MM, 10 is a psychological break point for me.

I don't even scroll past the lower prices, so if you are selling a stack of 100 for 100 pennies, which would be an awesome deal, I probably won't even see it.

Attorneyatlawl · May 2015

Alphashado wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Alphashado wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Jaxsun wrote: »

Alphashado wrote: »

Ourorboros wrote: »

Do you think it would make a difference if Master Merchant eliminated the red color from prices? Without that flag, items that get passed over might get sold. Specifically items with a single listing in a kiosk that may have been fairly priced a few days earlier but since have dropped below the current selling point. That red price is a psychological stop button. Without the color the information is the same without a visual cue that stops a sale of what may be a fairly price item. Removing the red color may not stop prices from drifting down, nor should it if that is where the market is headed. But removing the red might stop prices from plummeting in a matter of days, giving currently listed goods a chance to sell.

I think so. All that data is still there with a tiny amount of leg work, but the red or green colors certainly make it easy. Almost too easy. At this rate, average items will be selling for pennies more than vendor value. This excludes rare items of course, which will only continue to rise in value until ZOS adds some gold sinks and makes AP gear BoP.

It doesn't need to be BoP. It needs to be sold on the vendors outright eliminating the bags that drop items.

Some of it is on the vendors and purchaseable outright for AP already, rare sets are intentionally rare. Bind on Pickup for all pvp gear with AP would be ridiculous, however, since it's on par with PVE at this time for making money by selling what you don't need (either bags, opening bags yourself, or buying items directly off the vendors and selling those) just like we sell greatswords of the dreugh king slayer or legendary healer rings now .

People aren't "selling what they don't need." They are farming AP specifically to get gear pieces that sell for ridiculously inflated values because there are no gold sinks. I have played almost every AAA MMO ever created and you will have to remind me of another one that allowed you to sell top end PvE gear that was earned through PvP. Because I can't think of any.

This still isn't the core of the problem though, because people would still be sitting on millions of gold. A solid fix would be to make this gear available to everyone via gold or AP on the vendors. It would stop the inflation and create a gold sink at the same time.

I'm not suggesting making it cheap. 100k-200k per piece would be fine.

Nope. Some of the best gear for pvp comes from raids and vet dsa too. I hope you also will ask that we be able to buy master weaps, vicious ophidian, skirmisher, healer's habit, and dreugh slayer items for gold from npc vendors then!

The solution to not liking the pricing other players ask for their items that they earned (not you) is simple: earn the gold and buy it, or earn the gear by playing the game to do so.

The solution to mudflation is legitimate and repeatedly needed services and items from NPC's that can't be bypassed for cash like respecs, repair kits, etc,. and automatic costs like a built in gold fee per crafting make for using the tools in towns. Changing existing and balanced parts of the economy out of spite because you are not earning your stuff, let alone even if you were advocating it be changed for the entire game rather than only non PVE gameplay rewards as you are for some reason.... not so much.

As usual, you make a lot of assumptions. I can afford this gear. My NB is wearing 4 pieces of Shadow Walker that I paid handsomely for. I could easily afford to fully deck out any one of my VR characters from head to toe in AP gear or any other BoE gear. So your assumption that I am griping because I can't afford this stuff is a typical defense and quite insulting. I am not struggling for money.

I am however genuinely concerned about the state of the economy in ESO. Not because I have a secret agenda, or because I want cheaper prices for myself, or because of any other secretly disguised or thinly veiled motive.

There is something wrong with the system when one piece of gear can sell for an amount far greater than the amount of gold generated by sales tax for a guild with 500 people. No amount of insults, finger pointing, or false assumptions will change that.

Amidst your false assumptions, you failed to notice my suggested prices for this gear if it were to be available for gold on the vendors. If my issue was price, I wouldn't have suggested such a high vendor price.

The game needs gold sinks, not top end BoE gear that just continues to inflate and circulate large amounts of gold. It's hurting the economy.

PVE also has a great deal of expensive bind on equip items, so your point ends up being moot. Legendary healer rings, greatswords of the dreugh king slayer, sun shoes, etc. all are very valuable. Changing it so that players can't get them as drops to sell anymore will just make them unobtainable to many, and annoying to others by limiting the economy and what is worth even bothering with to trade.

Gold sinks are needed, as I've said here in this thread and since launch. Nerfing existing game systems isn't the way to do it. Respecs and repairs used to be major sinks along with bank space, but those have been lowered to near-trivial levels and bank space is not as important now since you can pay $25-30 for an alt account with no subscription required one-time and get another full bank + 8 toons to mule items on.

Gold sinks that make sense would be increasing respec costs back to their original (or higher) levels, as well as repair kits, while simultaneously removing the cash shop versions of both of those (you can now buy inexpensive scrolls to respect, and very cheap repair kits that each repair a full set of equipped gear in one go, gold-free). Then add extras as I already outlined before including a cost for each craft make at the stations (lore-hounds can call it a tool rental fee

) and adding a gold fee back to unlocking a mount on each character (buy a horse? you used to have to on any toon you wanted it on and it cost 41,200 gold. Now you buy one for 800 crowns and it's a done thing for all of your toons!). Use your imagination for others.

maryriv · May 2015

All I am saying is that my sales have been steadily declining for the past month. I don't have time all day to re-list and undercut everyone every 30 minutes.

Slurg · May 2015

maryriv wrote: »

All I am saying is that my sales have been steadily declining for the past month. I don't have time all day to re-list and undercut everyone every 30 minutes.

I really doubt that ZOS is going to drop everything to fix this for you so your options are pretty much these:
1. Price the junk you have that isn't selling so low you don't have to worry about undercutters. Of course this leads to little or no profit over vendor sale price after the store fees, so...
2. Just vendor that stuff and don't worry about it, and...
3. Figure out what people actually want to buy (like Kuta) and sell that, or...
4. Don't worry about your stuff not selling because what do you need all that gold for when they put all the new items in the crown store for cash anyway.

maryriv · May 2015

Slurg wrote: »

maryriv wrote: »

All I am saying is that my sales have been steadily declining for the past month. I don't have time all day to re-list and undercut everyone every 30 minutes.

I really doubt that ZOS is going to drop everything to fix this for you so your options are pretty much these:
1. Price the junk you have that isn't selling so low you don't have to worry about undercutters. Of course this leads to little or no profit over vendor sale price after the store fees, so...
2. Just vendor that stuff and don't worry about it, and...
3. Figure out what people actually want to buy (like Kuta) and sell that, or...
4. Don't worry about your stuff not selling because what do you need all that gold for when they put all the new items in the crown store for cash anyway.

I doubt there is a fix and it's not just me. Everyone has noticed a decline in reasonably priced sales.

Vahrokh · May 2015

Jaxsun wrote: »

It's far from global. M.M. Only tracks the sales of the 5 guilds you are in.

There are perhaps 10 main traiding guilds.

If this was not enough, all it takes is for two random players to share 1 of those guilds and the MM information "spreads" over their combined 8 trading guilds (assuming 1 guild slot per player is taken for their "real play" guild).
Add a third player who shares 1 trading guild with one of the above and the price information covers all the major guilds.

I know it's like this because a lot of guys who post a "WTB" or "WTS" request usually do it in at least 2 of my trading guilds, there are links between people and their guilds and an averaging process is going to affect them.

eventide03b14a_ESO · May 2015

Ourorboros wrote: »

As much as I love it, I blame Master Merchant. I have listed multiple recipes below the current price, only to have them be flagged in red as above average in a matter of days. Whether people are just skipping past red items or actively filtering them out, my sales have taken a big hit since MM arrived on the scene. As a buyer, I'm thrilled by this, but as a seller, it is making that aspect of the game frustrating.

Several of my guilds that usually have a vendor have also been outbid by deeper pockets that have no goods to sell. That is also frustrating.

However, certain items will sell very quickly for a good price. So part of this is knowing the market and putting the right items up for sale.

Master merchant fills the gap that was left from having no world auction house. If people list common things then they will not sell for much. I have no problem selling things that are more uncommon for a good price. People complaining about things not selling should just stop selling things that don't sell.

Deheart · May 2015

?? I use master merchant and usually only sell set items and blues. If the blues don't sell (the set items almost always sell) I deconstruct them and keep the mats.

I also sell stuff that the MM shows to be selling fast in history. If it weren't for the fact that I have respeced my main 6 times in the last week and a lot of my other chars several times in the last week and purchased ancient elf, daedric, and alot of the dwarven motifs I would stilll have a couple hundred thousand in gold from using MM properly.

maryriv · May 2015

Vahrokh wrote: »

Jaxsun wrote: »

It's far from global. M.M. Only tracks the sales of the 5 guilds you are in.

There are perhaps 10 main traiding guilds.

If this was not enough, all it takes is for two random players to share 1 of those guilds and the MM information "spreads" over their combined 8 trading guilds (assuming 1 guild slot per player is taken for their "real play" guild).
Add a third player who shares 1 trading guild with one of the above and the price information covers all the major guilds.

I know it's like this because a lot of guys who post a "WTB" or "WTS" request usually do it in at least 2 of my trading guilds, there are links between people and their guilds and an averaging process is going to affect them.

This is true but MM is hardly ever accurate except on high volume items, those with less than 10 purchases it varies wildly.

Ourorboros · May 2015

As I posted earlier, the problem with MM is that items are flagged as red below the current average price. Not what people are selling or how they are using MM. Ask yourself if you have ever let that red flag stop you from even considering an item for purchase, regardless if it is only a few gold on the high side. I know I was using it that way, at least until I saw what was happening to my own items for sale. Prices for goods, even rare high value items, are drifting down at a much faster pace than they were prior to MM. When Shopkeeper was the predominate add-on, people used it to gauge the market price of an item. But that add-on did not lead to sharply declining prices. It's only my intuition, but I think removing the red flag from MM would at least slow the price drops by removing a psychological speed bump from purchases. How did you answer my question above? If you let that red color influence your purchase, multiply that against the player base, and you can see the very impact that is evident in our economy, with some items dropping by half their value in a matter of days.

I just got a gold reward from a guild as a high seller last week, when we didn't eve have our normal kiosk. So it's not like I'm posting here because I can't sell. I've been an active seller for some time, but only as MM has gained in popularity have I seen prices change as rapidly as they have in the last month. I think the solution is in RED.

QuadroTony · May 2015

Ourorboros wrote: »

As I posted earlier, the problem with MM is that items are flagged as red below the current average price.

author working on option to manually set average price

alphawolph · May 2015

Ourorboros, TANSTAAFL--->There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. Is awesome and I instantly like you because of it.

Just checking up on the game. Stopped playing ages ago because I hated not having a way to sell things without joining a guild (or spamming trade). I see nothing has changed. Carry on.

qsnoopyjr · May 2015

Buy low sell high.

Buy all the carrot soup recipes...

Sell all the carrot soup recipes 10k each!!

P3ZZL3 · May 2015

x-all-the-things-meme-generator-buy-all-the-things-4d00b3.jpg

Seriously though, I posted about 15 items worth 150k last night about 9.30pm GMT.
65k had sold by 9.15pm GMT
Another 15k by the time I logged off at 10.30pm

Ourorboros · May 2015

alphawolph wrote: »

Ourorboros, TANSTAAFL--->There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. Is awesome and I instantly like you because of it.

LOL, thanks. Just want to make sure credit goes where it's due. TANSTAAFL......that's from science fiction writer Robert Heinlein.

qsnoopyjr · May 2015

P3ZZL3 wrote: »

Seriously though, I posted about 15 items worth 150k last night about 9.30pm GMT.
65k had sold by 9.15pm GMT
Another 15k by the time I logged off at 10.30pm

Wow,

Thats a lot of skills.
Post items at 9:30 PM... But you sell half your stuff at 9:15 PM...

Those people must have preordered the stuff you sold!
Man, you must be the coolest trader out there for people to line up and preorder your stuff!!

Jaxsun · May 2015

Vahrokh wrote: »

Jaxsun wrote: »

It's far from global. M.M. Only tracks the sales of the 5 guilds you are in.

There are perhaps 10 main traiding guilds.

If this was not enough, all it takes is for two random players to share 1 of those guilds and the MM information "spreads" over their combined 8 trading guilds (assuming 1 guild slot per player is taken for their "real play" guild).
Add a third player who shares 1 trading guild with one of the above and the price information covers all the major guilds.

I know it's like this because a lot of guys who post a "WTB" or "WTS" request usually do it in at least 2 of my trading guilds, there are links between people and their guilds and an averaging process is going to affect them.

When someone links an item in chat the MM price you see on the tool tip is an average of the 5 guilds you are in, it doesn't add the sales from that person's guilds.

P3ZZL3 · May 2015

qsnoopyjr wrote: »

Wow,

Thats a lot of skills.
Post items at 9:30 PM... But you sell half your stuff at 9:15 PM...

Those people must have preordered the stuff you sold!
Man, you must be the coolest trader out there for people to line up and preorder your stuff!!

You know, it's very hard. It takes a lot of time to locate the item in your bag, go to the bank and put the item up into one of the guilds I belong to.

Cool? You know it!

KerinKor · May 2015

maryriv wrote: »

Everyone is selling stuff @ cost (to be nice?) and still markets flooded with things like recipes etc.

Meanwhile "precious" gems remain @ zero cost.

Everything is way to easy to get in this game, the economy is tanking.

Any plans to fix this?

So, it's easy for me to farm or buy what I need and I'm not being price-gouged .. I don't see a problem to 'fix' here.

Psychobunni · May 2015

Also there are simply less players. Sure, some people showed up when Limited released but finding not much has changed few stayed, even more have left over lack of content/real endgame/ vet grind. That is also going to effect sales.

Elsonso · May 2015

Ourorboros wrote: »

I just got a gold reward from a guild as a high seller last week, when we didn't eve have our normal kiosk. So it's not like I'm posting here because I can't sell. I've been an active seller for some time, but only as MM has gained in popularity have I seen prices change as rapidly as they have in the last month. I think the solution is in RED.

The red is misleading.

MM is not that accurate. It only reflects 5 of the guilds across the whole game and by no means is it an accurate representation of the global market. As a matter of fact, if you are in 5 diverse guilds that sell in very different places, it may not even be an accurate representation of your own market.

It is useful in the context of the 5 guild stores, and much less useful in other guild stores. Consequently, it can tell you how much you should sell something for, or how much you should pay in your guild store for an item. It can be used to identify crazy low prices or crazy high prices in other guild stores, but it is much less useful for marginal price variations.

The price in some other guild store might be red or not, and if it is red maybe you should look in your guild store. However, if your guild store does not carry that item, then the tool really has nothing important to say. When you are standing in Target looking at what you want to purchase, the average price you paid for it at the K-Mart across town has little meaning when the K-Mart across town is out of stock. Most people should know this.

idk · May 2015

Have not tried to sell much this week and still over 150k sold. Is that not good enough?

Lenikus · May 2015

Do as I do, check the price - I mean "Cost", for example, Band of shadow walker (that right?) is 120k, so you check if any friend of guildie needs it, then if not you just go to Zone and Say "Wts [Band of Shadow Walker] 80k".

There. easy, fast gold.
Better yet, you don't even need those pesky trade guilds that do 'raffles' or demand monthly donations* for renting a npc

Islyn · May 2015

All I am saying is that I have been asking in zone for 20x tempering alloy and 8x wax and nothing. buying 1 at a time for 8k is not going to happen so I guess I'll be farming a ton of voidsteeeel and welwas/voidcloth.

Zhoyzu · May 2015

Robotmafia wrote: »

maryriv wrote: »

Rook_Master wrote: »

At this point I vend all equipment that isn't purple, or a v12 or higher piece from a decent set.

I just can't bother with trying to sell some crap piece for 20g higher than I can vend it for.

The game gives out way to much loot. We need more legitimate gold sinks.

they could raise repair costs

they lowered them since the start of the game. i dont make enough money to afford the costs of repairs now

idk · May 2015

Zhoyzu wrote: »

Robotmafia wrote: »

maryriv wrote: »

Rook_Master wrote: »

At this point I vend all equipment that isn't purple, or a v12 or higher piece from a decent set.

I just can't bother with trying to sell some crap piece for 20g higher than I can vend it for.

The game gives out way to much loot. We need more legitimate gold sinks.

they could raise repair costs

they lowered them since the start of the game. i dont make enough money to afford the costs of repairs now

Have to say there is something wrong in your game plan. I make tons more each weak more than my repair costs. I don't even care about my repair costs, not noticeable.

wrlifeboil · May 2015

If you all are complaining about too low prices now, just imagine how much worse it would be if there was a global auction house!

My gut feeling is that the 'invisible hand' that was tending the ESO markets (not just gold sinks) is no longer doing so and the imbalances between supply and demand are becoming more noticeable. If this is true, the outlook isn't promising because the console launch will siphon players from the PC player pool next month and the imbalances will get even worse for the less rare, more commodity-like items.

IrishGirlGamer · May 2015

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

Zhoyzu wrote: »

Robotmafia wrote: »

maryriv wrote: »

Rook_Master wrote: »

At this point I vend all equipment that isn't purple, or a v12 or higher piece from a decent set.

I just can't bother with trying to sell some crap piece for 20g higher than I can vend it for.

The game gives out way to much loot. We need more legitimate gold sinks.

they could raise repair costs

they lowered them since the start of the game. i dont make enough money to afford the costs of repairs now

Have to say there is something wrong in your game plan. I make tons more each weak more than my repair costs. I don't even care about my repair costs, not noticeable.

Agreed. I can make between 2-5k a night in anywhere from 2-4 hours of gameplay. And that's playing, not marketing. For awhile, I used Master Merchant and made even more money - but so what? I didn't have anything to spend it on. I bought all the horses and everything else I want. Right now I'm buying V-level armor to level up my 2nd crafting character.

@lordrichter is right: when I was using MM, I noticed that I could sell some items, even high priced items, much faster in one of my guilds. I could sell into the red consistently. But in another guild, I could price the item 200 gold less (thinking of motifs here) and it wouldn't sell at all.

I like MM and appreciate the work that was put into it, but it's not a perfect sample of the market.

timidobserver · May 2015

IrishGirlGamer wrote: »

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

Zhoyzu wrote: »

Robotmafia wrote: »

maryriv wrote: »

Rook_Master wrote: »

At this point I vend all equipment that isn't purple, or a v12 or higher piece from a decent set.

I just can't bother with trying to sell some crap piece for 20g higher than I can vend it for.

The game gives out way to much loot. We need more legitimate gold sinks.

they could raise repair costs

they lowered them since the start of the game. i dont make enough money to afford the costs of repairs now

Have to say there is something wrong in your game plan. I make tons more each weak more than my repair costs. I don't even care about my repair costs, not noticeable.

Agreed. I can make between 2-5k a night in anywhere from 2-4 hours of gameplay. And that's playing, not marketing. For awhile, I used Master Merchant and made even more money - but so what? I didn't have anything to spend it on. I bought all the horses and everything else I want. Right now I'm buying V-level armor to level up my 2nd crafting character.

@lordrichter is right: when I was using MM, I noticed that I could sell some items, even high priced items, much faster in one of my guilds. I could sell into the red consistently. But in another guild, I could price the item 200 gold less (thinking of motifs here) and it wouldn't sell at all.

I like MM and appreciate the work that was put into it, but it's not a perfect sample of the market.

It was never meant to be a perfect sample of the market. Some people just are not smart enough to figure that out. I wish MM had an option to split the averages up by guild. That would help with obtaining more useful numbers.

asdf0716 · May 2015

This cracks me up. This is exactly what happens in any game with no lock-out timers. If you put in lock out timers, everyone pisses and moans because they are locked out of content, you remove lock out timers and everyone farms the game into the ground and then stand around scratching their heads when the economy tanks.

And yet, you STILL have people screaming for an AH/GTN. Yes- lets combine everything into ONE giant marketplace and tank everything even further.

People are silly.

It's a crappy system. The gear drop rates should not be as high as they are, gear should lose durability every time your repair it and the highest level gear in the game should be crafted, but, require a "special" material that only drops in end game content.