Annoying Idiosyncrasy #2: The whole "Guild Store" thing

Aca2017

Don't know where to begin on this one. All just my opinion, of course, but there is so much that is ineffective, in every way and at every level...

1. Structuring the whole "Auction House" mechanism in the form of countless "silos" (i.e. small, functionally disconnected sources/sinks of information/access/supply), which requires externalized, officially unsupported, and (at best) incomplete infrastructure (in the form of third-party addons and websites like Tamriel Trade Center) to make it even remotely useable; The whole thing is "balkanized" (in the worst sense of that term: chop things up, apparently, specifically to maximize inefficiency/minimize utility)
2. Requiring players to "go shopping" among these countless sources/sinks, hoping to find what they want (often only to fail, due to incomplete/inaccurate/out-of-date information... or plain exhaustion) or simply to discover pricing and/or current availability
3. Making the primary organizing principle of the "Guild" mechanism in the game NOT different kinds of content, or progression, or player interests, or playstyles (dungeons vs. raids, levelling vs. end-game, RP, PVP, etc), but the mercantile process of selling digital stuff to others
4. Creating yet another "artificial" and unnecessary hierarchy of haves and have-nots based on where, geographically within the game world, each player's guild merchant NPC is located
5. The entire "Guild Store" implementation itself is incredibly glitchy. Start a search, a page of results can appear instantly or require 20 seconds to appear. Once a page of results appears, it can instantly disappear due to some defect in the implementation, requiring the whole search process to be restarted. A search can indicate no results, apparently due to lag/timeout, even when results are in fact available, and the results can subsequently appear without warning, interfering with subsequent searches. The implementation can often "lock up", perhaps due to some race condition between results lag and subsequent searches or simply an implementation defect, requiring the player to log out and back in again to clear the condition and continue searching
6. A small nit to pick, given all these larger issues, but truly an inexplicable lapse regardless: the lack of keyword/string based search (which database technology is built to do efficiently)

Yeah, sure, "silos" are "realistic" relative to the technology level of the game world... and historically there has never been a single, comprehensive, monolithic marketplace for commodities/goods/services in the real world. And AliBaba and Amazon nonwithstanding (i.e. emerging attempts at providing a comprehensive marketplace), plenty of enterprises exist which are dedicated to providing price/availability information tailored to different classes of consumer.

But the whole thing is inconsistent with the rest of the game design. Pretty much all other in-game infrastructure, like wayshrines, "travel to X" (challenges, grouped players, guildmates, etc), the mail system, and so on, are completely unconstrained in scope and essentially instant (and one's "Guild Store" purchases are even delivered by mail), clearly designed for efficiency/utility. So the "realism" argument doesn't work for me. Why is the "Auction House" mechanism so wildly different? The whole thing sticks out like a massive sore thumb.

This is one of the worst ideas, in terms of useability and general utility to the end-user, I have ever encountered, and IMO probably the single most significant shortcoming in the game.

Salvas_Aren

This is necessary, because it increases total playtime, like ... loading screens.

Mayrael

Elsterchen

I like shopping.

I like prices lower then TTC or MM suggests.

In the current system both are possible . In an action house? - Not so much.

kargen27

An intuitive search when you are in the guild trader menu is really all the current system needs. Would be nice if we received the mail as soon as we purchased but I like that we get them in the mail. Often I buy things that I want a different character to have.

Mayrael

kargen27 wrote: »

An intuitive search when you are in the guild trader menu is really all the current system needs. Would be nice if we received the mail as soon as we purchased but I like that we get them in the mail. Often I buy things that I want a different character to have.

100% agree on that. Better search, instant mails and we are good.

generalmyrick

when the player base drops to a certain point, i am pretty sure, it will force the changes we wish...but until then = shop til you drop! woot!

Beardimus

Mayrael wrote: »

Well played @Mayrael

Do we need another, albeit well written, AH thread? Nope

Knootewoot

That's why i am glad i use:

https://eu.tamrieltradecentre.com/pc/Trade/Search

Enemy-of-Coldharbour

Linaleah

unfortunately, the real reason why guild traders are never going away is that it is single most effective gold sink in this game. it is the main reason why this is the only long lasting MMO that I have ever played that does NOT suffer from hyperinflation, while still allowing for multiple venues to make (create) gold, even if you wish not to participate in trading system and only use the gold to buy things from npc vendors.

so as annoying as the system is... I doubt ZoS will ever manage to come up with a better gold sink (in case you are wondering which part of the system is gold sink - weekly trader bids, listing tax is there, but its relatively negligible)

that said... they really do need to fix all the lag and search issues you have mentioned. especially since 2/3 of the game population have no acess to addons . reminder - consoles exist!

Nestor

ZOS will never go to a single Auction House, reason, a few or even one player can manipulate the market. Making threads to suggest a unified auction house is a waste of time and energy. It will never happen.

What ZOS will do, and we as a community need to encourage urgency for this, is improve the UI to make shopping easier. We talked with the the dev team back in March avout this. They dont like the stock UI either. They need to allocate limited resources to making the improvements. So, lets encourage them to make the changes they will make, which is to the UI.

You want to improve the Guild Trader system, ask ZOS to improve the bare bones UI that folks who dont have access to addons has to deal with. Suggest what you would like to see in that UI, and you will get some improvement.

I will start, give everyone both Advanced Filters and an interface like Awesome Guild Store where searches can be filtered and saved to be used again. And, those filters include Text.

jedtb16_ESO

Nestor wrote: »

ZOS will never go to a single Auction House, reason, a few or even one manipulate the market. Making threads to suggest a unified auctuon house is a waste of time and energy. It will never happen.

What ZOS will do, and we as a community need to encourage urgency for this, is improve the UI to make shopping easier. We talked with the the dev team back in March avout this. They dont like the stock UI either. They need to allocate limited resources to making the improvements. So, lets encourage them to make the changes they will make, which is to the UI.

You want to improve the Guild Trader system, ask ZOS to improve the bare bones UI that folks who dont have access to addons has to deal with. Suggest what you would like to see in that UI, and you will get that.

I will start, give everyone both Advanced Filters and an interface like Awesome Guild Store where searches can be filtered and save to be used again. And, those filters include Text.

^this.

the ui needs a great deal of tlc but the system itself is good.

major gold sink, a good thing.

a resource that people compete for, another good thing.

fix the ui and it is fine.

kwisatz

Ok. Lets go again.

I don't want any auction house.
For the very first time, I actually enjoy buying and selling in a game.
I don't want to see any mafia controling a central sales system.
I actually love going here and there once in a while, searching for good opportunities.
So tired of people crying to have another clone of existing games; can't you enjoy what you have, with its good and not so good sides?
Don't you never think about all the people around there who actually like the way it is?

idk

I’d deal with each point OP made but much really has nothing to do with his main gripe. Mostly just fill.

Zos didn’t want ya he boring stale central kiosk found is many, but not all games. They wanted it to be more of a social trading scene and that’s what we have with a guild based trading system.

I’m not in a top guild and pretty much in a secondary location and have had no issues. A non trade guild I’m in often gets a location at a tertiary spot and I do well there also.

Considering it the guild based trading system has been successful in creating a vibrant economy its here to stay even if a small number don’t like it. Remember that the devs wanted this and like it so it’s not going anywhere.

RedRook

I agree. It's inelegant at best, a pain in the ***, and it particularly sucks for newer players who already have plenty of things they have to figure out and catch up to.

But it's what we have. And I don't know that we want them to meddle with systems that are functional. If they break something, it stays broken for a while. Good enough is good enough.

Sovjet

Mayrael wrote: »

Wauw, I love it hahahha

DuskMarine

how many more of these threads do we need wish a auto lock would kill these on post theres so many of them.

Aca2017

Linaleah wrote: »

unfortunately, the real reason why guild traders are never going away is that it is single most effective gold sink in this game.

I am afraid I am not following you.

If you are referring to the aggregate amount of in-game currency players spend on in-game purchases, this would theoretically remain the same even if the "Guild Store" mechanism were replaced by a "global" auction house.

If you are referring to the "commission" or "tax" levied (against sellers) on sales... for the purpose of creating a gold sink, this could easily be levied equally by a "global" auction house.

If you are referring to the expense of maintaining a "guild trader" NPC (guilds having to bid/pay regularly to gain/retain possession of it, as their "point of sale"), I confess I have no idea what that typically costs. But as far as I can tell, this "point of sale" mechanic is pretty uniformly funded in-game by the "commission" or "tax" levied on sales, a portion of which is surrendered directly to the "game" and a portion of which reverts to the guild that controls the "point of sale" NPC (the "guild cut"... which in turn is ALSO surrendered to the game to retain control of the "point of sale" NPC). For the purposes of creating a gold sink, this could also easily be levied equally by a "global" auction house. In fact, from the perspective of the seller, nothing about this would change. Either way, it is subsumed by the "tax" paid on sales.

Finally, based on my experience in other games (World of Warcraft and Guild Wars 2), I am aware that guild activities require a steady supply of resources, both in-game and in the real world (the real world typically involves voice communications, a website with forums, etc, all of which represents real-world expense). In my experience, these resources have always been donated by the members

But it crossed my mind that the design purpose of the "Guild Store" mechanism is to provide an in-game mechanism for bankrolling guild activities. If so, all I can say is: sheesh! What a distorted/tortured way to go about it!

And none of the ESO guilds to which I belong that maintain a "point of sale" NPC undertake any sort of in-game activity other than selling stuff via the "point of sale" NPC. Guilds organized around more conventional purposes (content, progression, etc) don't maintain a "point of sale" NPC. So, regardless of design intent, that doesn't seem to be how the "Guild Store" mechanism is actually used.

Conclusion: there doesn't seem to be anything uniquely advantageous about the "Guild Store" mechanism, for the purposes of creating a gold sink. A "global" auction house would work equally well for this purpose.

Aca2017

idk wrote: »

Zos didn’t want ya he boring stale central kiosk found is many, but not all games. They wanted it to be more of a social trading scene and that’s what we have with a guild based trading system.

Real-life analogy:

I would find it really rough to have to get in the car and travel around from store to store "hoping" (on speculation) to find what I wanted (aka "availability"), or even just to price what I wanted (aka "price transparency"). It would be even worse if I used some sort of web tool to locate what I wanted, presumably at the best price, only to travel to the store and find it is sold out, and have to start all over again... ON EVERYTHING I WANTED TO BUY.

I am afraid I am the sort of person who likes Amazon's model. Single point of sale. Unparalleled selection (with few exceptions, which generally involve perishable goods and specialized/high-ticket merchandise, if it is made you can pretty much find it on Amazon). Good prices (driven by internal competition). Coherent, well designed, functional (i.e. not defect prone), performant interface. Delivery to my door.

This minimizes the time I have to spend "shopping", and maximizes the time I have available to enjoy what I really enjoy about life: getting interesting work done, keeping up with the news (is is the duty of every citizen to remain informed), getting out and seeing/doing things (or staying inside and reading, watching vintage movies, etc), descending into subterranean areas to test my combat prowess against... oh, wait, that's not real-life! This also helps me avoid the stuff I don't enjoy about life: sitting in city traffic, "comparison shopping", dealing with frustrating supply issues, and in general not doing the things I enjoy about life, etc.

I want the mercantile facet of ESO to be more like Amazon, even if it is "samey". And I don't really socialize with the people in my trading guilds (and if the design purpose was making buy/sell/trade "social", there would be no "store" mechanism of any kind, everyone would have to hawk stuff live in game chat, and/or an external/third-party web-based mechanism would develop that would basically be guaranteed to operate like Amazon).

The Amazon model is successful for a reason. But... to each their own.

Feric51

Aca2017 wrote: »

Linaleah wrote: »

unfortunately, the real reason why guild traders are never going away is that it is single most effective gold sink in this game.

I am afraid I am not following you.

If you are referring to the expense of maintaining a "guild trader" NPC (guilds having to bid/pay regularly to gain/retain possession of it, as their "point of sale"), I confess I have no idea what that typically costs. But as far as I can tell, this "point of sale" mechanic is pretty uniformly funded in-game by the "commission" or "tax" levied on sales, a portion of which is surrendered directly to the "game" and a portion of which reverts to the guild that controls the "point of sale" NPC (the "guild cut"... which in turn is ALSO surrendered to the game to retain control of the "point of sale" NPC). For the purposes of creating a gold sink, this could also easily be levied equally by a "global" auction house. In fact, from the perspective of the seller, nothing about this would change. Either way, it is subsumed by the "tax" paid on sales.

Bolded the correct answer in your quote. I'm on XB-NA and admit I don't have exact figures because I'm not an officer in my main city trading guilds, but I would conservatively estimate the bid rate is in the mid-high millions, per week, per trader in the major hubs. The one guild I can control bids in, was losing spots in secondary cities like Daggerfall when bidding at 2mil. Even the outlaws refuges in Marbruk, Greenshade is several hundred thousand. (Not sure on exact figure as my bid hasn't been high enough for months, but I keep inching higher).

Even if you went with an average of 1 mil per trader across the board (which is probably a reasonable figure), multiply that by the current number of guild traders available (204) = 204 million gold per week sunk into binary nothingness of Oblivion. An auction house would have to implement one heck of a sales tax to reach those figures.

Ragebull

I’m rich so the system seems to work fine for me, but I’d be just as rich with an auction house so it really doesn’t matter either way

KnightVI

My thought is that we SHOULD have an auction house for each alliance, but that in order to BUY and collect the item, you must travel to the specific guild vendor.

That way it gives us the ability to search everything in one place (yes you may get fewer bargains, but also fewer rip offs), but still sends players to distant locations that they may not otherwise frequent, retaining some realism since you must still pay the specific guild vendor (and an element of risk etc as if you're chasing something rare, someone else may beat you to it)

Lirkin

The pricing for Auction houses could be easily resolved with a little thought but the current system can't be fixed the way it is. Just make it expensive to put an item back in the auction house to prevent people from buying lower listed items and listing them higher. That would make the auction house less likely to get inflated.
It is currently the most aggravating system that I have found and I have played a lot of online games. The current system already has the pricing issue but it can't be seen as easily. Look at the website for pricing and addons. Look at the prices around and they are not that different from an auction house system. It's just harder to find things and a good deal. To time consuming!

WhiteCoatSyndrome

kargen27 wrote: »

An intuitive search when you are in the guild trader menu is really all the current system needs. Would be nice if we received the mail as soon as we purchased but I like that we get them in the mail. Often I buy things that I want a different character to have.

Have to agree with this. I use an add-on, but I have no idea how everyone on console shops without going insane.

Amadis001

Aca2017 wrote: »

A small nit to pick, given all these larger issues, but truly an inexplicable lapse regardless: the lack of keyword/string based search (which database technology is built to do efficiently)

Not wanting to get into the whole dead-horse-already-beaten thing, this the one thing I could really get behind. Why can't I filter my searches for recipes/motifs that I don't already know? Or search by the name of the weapon, or runebox fragment, or whatever, that I know but can't find?

If they did it right (server side), this would cut down on the amount of data that has to be transmitted, hopefully even improving the responsiveness of the whole system.

Linaleah

Aca2017 wrote: »

Linaleah wrote: »

unfortunately, the real reason why guild traders are never going away is that it is single most effective gold sink in this game.

I am afraid I am not following you.

If you are referring to the aggregate amount of in-game currency players spend on in-game purchases, this would theoretically remain the same even if the "Guild Store" mechanism were replaced by a "global" auction house.

If you are referring to the "commission" or "tax" levied (against sellers) on sales... for the purpose of creating a gold sink, this could easily be levied equally by a "global" auction house.

If you are referring to the expense of maintaining a "guild trader" NPC (guilds having to bid/pay regularly to gain/retain possession of it, as their "point of sale"), I confess I have no idea what that typically costs. But as far as I can tell, this "point of sale" mechanic is pretty uniformly funded in-game by the "commission" or "tax" levied on sales, a portion of which is surrendered directly to the "game" and a portion of which reverts to the guild that controls the "point of sale" NPC (the "guild cut"... which in turn is ALSO surrendered to the game to retain control of the "point of sale" NPC). For the purposes of creating a gold sink, this could also easily be levied equally by a "global" auction house. In fact, from the perspective of the seller, nothing about this would change. Either way, it is subsumed by the "tax" paid on sales.

Finally, based on my experience in other games (World of Warcraft and Guild Wars 2), I am aware that guild activities require a steady supply of resources, both in-game and in the real world (the real world typically involves voice communications, a website with forums, etc, all of which represents real-world expense). In my experience, these resources have always been donated by the members

But it crossed my mind that the design purpose of the "Guild Store" mechanism is to provide an in-game mechanism for bankrolling guild activities. If so, all I can say is: sheesh! What a distorted/tortured way to go about it!

And none of the ESO guilds to which I belong that maintain a "point of sale" NPC undertake any sort of in-game activity other than selling stuff via the "point of sale" NPC. Guilds organized around more conventional purposes (content, progression, etc) don't maintain a "point of sale" NPC. So, regardless of design intent, that doesn't seem to be how the "Guild Store" mechanism is actually used.

Conclusion: there doesn't seem to be anything uniquely advantageous about the "Guild Store" mechanism, for the purposes of creating a gold sink. A "global" auction house would work equally well for this purpose.

1 I actualy state in my very post exactly which part of the system is a major gold sink. weekly trader fees. no, they are NOT funded by taxes, not even remotely, the sales taxes are not nearly enough to fund it. but even if they were - this is gold that gets consistently removed from the game. players buying from each other is not a gold sink. guilds bidding millions and millions of gold each week just to keep their trader? THAT is a gold sink, becasue each week, these millions get completely removed out of the economy, since they go back to NPC's essentially. so what you mentioned there about members donating resources to the guild? this is what is absolutely necessary at this point to keep traders. even my pve guild that just happens to maintain a trader, one of those out of the way, non hub traders that are supposed to be cheap? pretty much requires donations to afford aforementioned trader.

why you ask? becasue traders are finite and if you want to sell to players outside of your guild without spending ours advertising in zone chat and risk being cheated? you need a trader NPC.

whether its advantageous or not for a regular player is not the issue here. the issue here is that at this point? its the only consistent gold sink this game has. ZoS tried to add more gold sinks. various furnishing npc's, lux vendors, housing in general. but its just not consistent enough and its also designed in a way to allow people to spend RL money.

guild traders are inconvenient, especially if you are a buyer. some of that can and SHOULD be fixed. but at this point, too much of the health of the game depends on their existence.

P.S. I play WoW actualy, actively. and to be honest? lately I've had horrible time with auction house. some of that is at least in part due to the age of the game. but ... either things are way too expensive due to hyperinflation that blizzard allowed during WoD and especially Legion. or they just don't sell. at least in ESO I can still sell pretty much everything. I don't know if its becasue of traders or despite them. all I know is that auction house is a convenience thing, not a economy improvement thing. and as much as I would LOVE to have that convenience (and trust me, not having to be in a guild just to sell things, not having to worry about minimum contributions, not spending hours even with TTC - to find a few items at the lower price that I'd like to buy - that would be quite lovely), the fact tht there is nothing else in this game that will prevent hyperinflation as effectively as traders? means they will stay in. so why is it so important to prevent hyperinflation? becasue you want those people who actualy generate gold INTO the economy - the questers, the thief's, the grinders... to be able to afford to buy shinies just as much traders can. and why is it so important? because the more people you can sell to, the better things move, and the more people can afford to enjoy the games luxuries - the happier they are and the healthier the playerbase is.

until/if zos finds something to replace the consistency of trader fees? (and trust me, the very same people who will gladly donate vast amounts of gold to their guild community? will balk immediately at higher listing fees and taxes that are set by impersonal auction house, so higher fees alone will not do that) auction house is not happening. aka... auction house in this game is probably not happening. so.. at this point, I'd rather campaign for improved UI. and I say that as someone who has done my share of "guild traders are awful, why can't we have auction house" posts. this game is not set up to work with an auction house.

Jykel

For consoles, an improved UI and search feature would be a huge QoL increase. I would still love to see a Trader Guild Moot or Gathering area where every saturday or sunday for 24 hours, all traders (or reps) appear in a unique area. So for 6 days, its business as usual but for 1 day, just prior to GT reset, we can access all traders in a single location.

Sigtric

Mayrael wrote: »

QFE

Armatesz

Knootewoot wrote: »

That's why i am glad i use:

https://eu.tamrieltradecentre.com/pc/Trade/Search

That is an ineffective system to use on consoles. It gets it wrong on so many levels and makes it sound like someone is trying to manually manipulate pricing, perhaps to their own benefit but looks like it to me.

DuskMarine

just join a guild case closed >_>