PTS Update 21 - Feedback Thread for Guild Trader UI Improvements

ZOS_GinaBruno

This is the official feedback thread for the improvements to the Guild Trader UI. Specific feedback that the team is looking for includes the following:

• Were there any items that didn’t show up in your search that you believe should have?
• Are there any additional filters that would help you find things faster?
• Are there any additional UI-specific issues that this change won’t address?
• Which UI were you using – keyboard/mouse or gamepad mode?
• Do you have any other general feedback?

silvereyes

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Guilds & Guild Features

• Fixed an issue where changing guilds would not immediately update the keybinds in the Guild screen.
• Greatly reduced the hitch that could occur when opening the guild bank UI.

ninibini

I really like the new guild store search, it feels really smooth.

I was looking at the PC UI

The filters I'm missing are:
- search for weapon and armor with traits I don't know (for research)
- search for motifs/recipes that I don't know
- filtering potions for crafted and dropped potions

There's a bug with the Recent searches. It's showing "You are enlightened..." for me instead of the search params.
I would love to persist some of these searches (add to favorites) and delete searches from the list.

ninibini

Something else I'm missing is actually a pretty small thing - in Awesome guild store there is a small "user" icon behind the level filter and clicking it will insert your level into the level filter. A workaround could be to automatically add the users current level by default.

The level filter should also be set to CP by default. In most cases I'd anticipate people to search for CP160 stuff. This would save everybody setting the filter one click.

Provisioning recipes (food/drink) could benefit from a level filter as well, as it has been added for added for the actual food/drink. I'm often search for specific level recipes when I'm leveling provisioning.

Grumblestiltskin

I only had a quick look at the new guild trader UI, using keyboard & mouse, and it feels great.

Not much else I can say about it at the moment.

Bootstomp

ninibini wrote: »

- search for motifs/recipes that I don't know

PLEASE add this.

reoskit

I took just a few minutes last night, but here's what I have thus far. Will look more later. (Keyboard and mouse, fwiw.)

Good stuff:

• The text searching is, as far as I can tell, really nice. It was surprisingly fast and complete.
• Purchasing lots of items rapid fire went relatively well - not sure if the current lag is from addons/server pop/etc.

Needs work/broken:
The furniture categories are, quite frankly, horrible - these need work, big time. (I checked multiple stores to make sure I wasn't only seeing filters for available furniture.)

Missing/Requests:

• Like AGS, please put *all* filters in one place instead of scattered in different corners of the UI.
• Please put the Seller in line with the search results; hovering to see this info is not efficient.
• Please add an unknown/known filter for motifs and recipes.
• Please add a deconstructable/not deconstructable filter for jewelry.
• Please add a trait known/unknown filter.

If I missed any of these filters, that only demonstrates that there are too many random spots on the UI to find a filter.

I tried to not look at this as a base-game replacement for AGS, but many of us have been using AGS for years and lessons could be learned from that UI, given how much user feedback went into developing and updating it. Obviously, MM built-ins cannot be part of the base-game UI; completely understandable. I'm grateful for the work you guys have done! Consoles will be so happy!!


Edit: to remove a creepy emoticon I didn't use.

Synnastix

ninibini wrote: »

- search for motifs/recipes that I don't know
- filtering potions for crafted and dropped potions

This +1

As a console player, these are very welcome QoL changes.

MythrialDrow

Just tested this using the controller, everything seems to be working great. There is over lapping of the windows though. All in all this was a fantastic much need change to the guild traders. 10 stars for you

RaddlemanNumber7

PC, Keyboard and mouse.

It looks perfect for the things I search for. Very easy to use. Good filters for finding particular motifs and motif pages. Ans so fast.

Beyond my wildest expectations, in fact. Great job

jlb1705

reoskit wrote: »

Missing/Requests:

[*] Like AGS, please put *all* filters in one place instead of scattered in different corners of the UI.
[*] Please put the Seller in line with the search results; hovering to see this info is not efficient.
[*] Please add an unknown/known filter for motifs and recipes.
[*] Please add a deconstructable/not deconstructable filter for jewelry.
[*] Please add a trait known/unknown filter.

I'm a console player so I can't test, but I second all of these requests. I am so tired of creating/maintaining/consulting spreadsheets while I play.

CaffeinatedMayhem

THe changes are good, and thanks for incluing gamepad UI now. I do have a few notes:

"Name search" - on gamepad UI, this appears to be the search button, but it's for name matching. The "search" button is way far down, and it took a while to get used to the change.

I don't feel categories work as smoothly in Gamepad as on Keyboard. At first glance there appear to be no changes, other than the addition of Master Writs category. Drilling down it's ok, but small things like auto-filling MY CP level into search, offering a typeable price field and making the defualt maximum something like 1000 not 2.1 million would be better.

Allowing search of motifs/recipes/traits "I don't know" - really necessary! I know *most* furnishing plans, and when buying to fill my recipe list, I don't search by specific names. Sometimes I may not know the name of what I don't know!(new content) AGS has this functionality, and since the new UI takes cues from AGS...

Many traders are going to keep using AGS for more than it's (still) superior search filters and for MM integration. I know the economy team isn't happy about an addon that aggregates existing price data in the guild history into a human-readable form, but Master Merchant is very important to trading!. Why isn't this in base game functionality? OR... big ask here - why can't addons interface with gamepad UI as well as keyboard?

Twohothardware

While you guys are working on the Guild Trader UI is there any chance we could get some sort of function to request to join a clan or some sort of way to search for a list of clans that are currently looking for new members?

For the average player it's difficult to join a clan on ESO because you have to know someone that's already in that clan first and because there's no clan tags or anything in this game you have no idea who is in what clan just by looking at their character.

reoskit

Twohothardware wrote: »

While you guys are working on the Guild Trader UI is there any chance we could get some sort of function to request to join a clan or some sort of way to search for a list of clans that are currently looking for new members?

For the average player it's difficult to join a clan on ESO because you have to know someone that's already in that clan first and because there's no clan tags or anything in this game you have no idea who is in what clan just by looking at their character.

You're in luck. This is already announced and was previewed in the last ESO Live.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/364505191?t=01h45m06s

Edit to add: Also, there are guild "tags" when people decide to wear a tabard to represent one of their guilds. Check out the Nameplates options in the settings. Trader kiosks will also display the tabards & name of the guild that hired it for the week.

yooqi

Another vote for unknown/known filter for motifs and recipes. When it comes to motifs, I'm not always looking for a specific one but I might go "window shopping". If I have to sort through 5-10 pages of motifs I already know, forget it, I will get tired and won't buy anything. The unknown filter would entice me to buy more, which in the end is good for traders and sellers.

Jayne_Doe

yooqi wrote: »

Another vote for unknown/known filter for motifs and recipes. When it comes to motifs, I'm not always looking for a specific one but I might go "window shopping". If I have to sort through 5-10 pages of motifs I already know, forget it, I will get tired and won't buy anything. The unknown filter would entice me to buy more, which in the end is good for traders and sellers.

Agreed! When I'm looking for a specific plan or recipe, the new text search function is great. But, if I'm looking to fill in my collections, it would be nice to just set a filter to unknown and just browse through those.

silvereyes

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

big ask here - why can't addons interface with gamepad UI as well as keyboard?

They can, on PC. Most authors just don't bother, for various reasons.

• all the UI is completely different and would need to be recreated from scratch, more than doubling the work to be done.
• I say more than double because, due to the need for giant fonts/controls, it's much more difficult to fit the same functionality onto the screen. It often requires extra tabs, keybinds, etc.
• most PC *users* don't game on gamepad. I think the last time we asked, it was < 10% of the user base, and even that was not gamepad-exclusive users.
• Finally, the kicker, most addon *authors* don't game on gamepad. We don't usually just decide to make addons (and a lot of work for ourselves) for the benefit of the community.

First and foremost, we are trying to meet a need we have in our own gaming, and then share with the community. If we have no personal need for the functionality, it's a big ask to more than double our work for such a small user base. It would be different if they could run on console, but alas...

silvereyes

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

• Were there any items that didn’t show up in your search that you believe should have?

Not that I saw.

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

• Are there any additional filters that would help you find things faster?

• Known/unknown filters for traits, recipes and motifs.
• Craftable/not-craftable filters for master writs
• Per-voucher cost filters for master writs

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

• Are there any additional UI-specific issues that this change won’t address?

• I know the answer would probably be no, but it would be amazing to be able to display min, max and average list and sale prices from other kiosks for comparison-shopping purposes, both when listing and when buying. Providing aggregate stats for an item would eliminate a lot of need for using a third party shopkeeper extension like TTC, MM, Arkadius, and would help the console players enormously. Aggregate stats also wouldn't undermine the core kiosk philosophy of geographic distribution that helps battle market manipulation.
• It would also be nice for the filters on the left to be scrollable/expandable, not just the categories. This would allow addons to tack on new custom filters in an infinitely scrollable list, without needing to rework the entire UI.
• The ability to pin / star / save favorite searches and give them a pretty name
• The ability to clear or delete items from the search history

[Edit: added the last two bullet points]

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

• Which UI were you using – keyboard/mouse or gamepad mode?

Keyboard/mouse

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

• Do you have any other general feedback?

Overall, I'm extremely impressed with the new UI. It's way more robust than I expected, and the text search works amazingly well.

IntelligentAmsomniac

This will be a long post so I apologize in advance for those who are impatient. I feel rather strongly about the guild trader UI and the absolute nightmare it has been to find items. I'm hoping that this update will change things for the better. To that end, I want to give as detailed feedback as I possibly can and also explain why I'm asking for the things instead of just stating that this should be implemented.

First things first, the new UI is a huge improvement over what the vanilla game offers! I absolutely love the keyword search and I can already see a thousand different use cases where it'll be a time saver. What makes it even better is the suggestive search it utilizes so I don't have to know the exact name of the thing I'm looking for. It'll make my life so much easier and the game more enjoyable as a result. I no longer fear having to find a new gear piece or runebox fragment. While I like the new UI, there's still some room for improvement.

Search History
The ability of the game to remember my last searches is a really welcome and unexpected addition. However, what I would really want to have is the ability to favourite my searches, including the filters and sorting I've used.

Imagine a situation where I'm looking for multiple really rare items over a period of weeks or even couple of months (this has happened in the past and will surely happen again). In that time period, I'll want to buy lots of other things as well and not having to always specify my search conditions again would be highly useful. It would be a) a convenience b) a time saver c) prevent mistakes in re-entering the search criteria. The game wouldn't need to remember too many favourites, 3-6 would already help immensely.

Another thing I'd like to be able to do with the search history is remove items from it. Let's say that I searched for a weapon damage glyph. After finding it & making a purchase, I no longer have need for that search, but I might want to keep some of my previous searches in the history as those I do have use for.

Filters
Firstly, I think they are highly useful and show what I expect. I don't mind them being located on different parts of the window too much as they are clearly visible and I can find them if I need them. However, there is one filter that is missing that I desperately need to have added in: known/unknown.

The use case for unknown is pretty self-evident, but the known could be useful in some cases too. I want at least the unknown filter implemented before Wraithstone goes live as it is by far the most requested feature for guild traders, and has been for some time. Frankly, I'm shocked that it isn't in the game already given the amount of player learnable things, and their ever increasing number. Known/Unknown should be applicable to multiple types of items as detailed below:

1. Motifs & Style Pages. The most obvious use case for known/unknown is when you're looking for those one or two elusive motif chapters. Instead of having to type in each individual style or slot name, you could instantly see if the trader has what you're looking for with this filter. Or even see if it has something you didn't even know you were missing!
2. Recipes. There are a lot of them in-game and locating the handful that I'm missing is a daunting task, even if I manually checked the name of each recipe I know against a list of all known recipes in the game (which I've done). Having a simple "show me unknown recipes" would be so much easier, and require fewer searches as well. It would also encourage me to complete my collection on other characters besides my main.
3. Furnishing plans. In case you didn't already know, there are a lot of them! I think I know all the green and blue ones (except for Murkmire), but I'm still missing many of the purple ones, especially the rarer items. Scrolling through pages and pages of plans in the default UI, it makes me not want to shop for them, at all.
4. Armor, Weapons and Jewelry. This isn't that important to me personally as I can just craft any trait I need for research, but I believe newer players would find this very useful. Unknown could easily be added to the bottom of All Traits drop down box.
5. Runeboxes. There are so many now that it's (almost) impossible to remember if you have them all, especially if you have multiple accounts. But even barring that, being able to just see the ones you haven't collected yet, without knowing their name would be really handy. I'd like that a lot.

Then for all the other filters I'd like to see implemented:
Jewelry category should have a filter for destructible. Searching for only deconstructible jewelry would be much appreciated. The filter would be even better if it had option both for indestructible and deconstructible. Indestructible for those older rings when you want to make extra sure you can't accidentally deconstruct them and deconstructible for levelling jewelry crafting and/or obtaining materials.

I would also want to be able to filter by when an item was added to the game. Not all furnishing plans, for example, have easily searchable string in their name such as Alinor or Murkmire (they probably aim for it but always seem to miss a few items). So a filter with options such as latest update, previous chapter (including the items added in that chapter and after its release), previous story DLC and within last year (all items added in the updates released within the timeframe) would be great. That would make viewing things recently added so much easier across all the categories. It would also give nice control on which items would show up in the search results when using broader search criteria. I chose chapter and story DLC as time points in the past because they are released six months apart from each other and people generally know them.

Lastly, I would want to be able to filter for items by how they are acquired within the game. So filters for PvP (Rewards of the Worthy, AP/telvar merchants, battleground rewards, etc.), overland (everything looted within zones), dungeons (for those furnishings and plans I don't necessarily know the name of or even that they exist) and merchant (luxury furnishings comes to mind immediately, but also for other things that can only be bought not crafted). This one would require quite a bit of work, so I'm not holding my breath for it.

Searcing for potions
Why can't user-made potions and poisons be color-coded similarly to food? That would make finding the one you're after a lot faster. Simplest color system to implement would be just changing all user made potions & poisons to green quality while the ones dropped in-game remained normal (white) quality. A better system would be to make potions & poisons with 2 effects green and those with 3 effects blue.

However, the optimal solution for this would be to make all potions with 2 components green. Potions with 3 effects would be either blue (if there's an opposing effect) or purple (if all 3 effects are either positive or negative). This categorization would require a bit more work on the developers side, but the game already has this distinction of positive and negative effects built in (Alchemy passive Snakeblood).

Miscellaneous
The guild store interface seems much more responsive than before. It's a huge relief as I was kinda worried that adding the keyword search would mean that I would be waiting for the results even longer.

I'd like the game to remember the way I want to sort my results. I want there to be a default custom setting basically, one that I don't have to always activate when I switch guild stores or login. It should automatically always sort my things with the time remaining for example.

The order of sub-categories in Materials struck me as odd. I realized after a while that they were organized by equipment crafts followed by consumable crafts and then the miscellaneous. However, I would find alphabetical ordering of the crafts much more logical, but maybe that's just me.

Sometimes, it would be nice to be able to search by seller's name to see all the items they've listed. This could also prove real handy for (trade) guild masters getting reports of one player constantly undercutting others with their prices.

That's all for now. Thanks for all the hard work you've clearly put into this and reading this far

IntelligentAmsomniac

Maybe I should've read what other had posted before writing up my own feedback as they had many of the same reactions and thoughts. It could've saved me some time.

ninibini wrote: »

Provisioning recipes (food/drink) could benefit from a level filter as well, as it has been added for added for the actual food/drink. I'm often search for specific level recipes when I'm leveling provisioning.

I would find this a really nice addition and kinda feel bad for not thinking it myself.

Jayne_Doe wrote: »

Agreed! When I'm looking for a specific plan or recipe, the new text search function is great. But, if I'm looking to fill in my collections, it would be nice to just set a filter to unknown and just browse through those.

Completely agree. I used to go window shopping all the time, but as they've added new items to the game, and I know so many of them already, it's gotten to be a real chore to find something I don't already know. That's why I want the known/unknown filter implemented so badly. So I could finally find the items that are hiding among the hundreds if not thousands of others.

silvereyes wrote: »

• Craftable/not-craftable filters for master writs
• Per-voucher cost filters for master writs
• ...
• The ability to pin / star / save favorite searches and give them a pretty name

I would really appreciate adding this functionality for master writs! It would be so useful and make purchasing them something that isn't a daunting task requiring a calculator and frequent checking your motif knowledge. Because purchasing them is so cumbersome on live I never do it, so it didn't even occur to me that it could be made so pleasant and easy. Using the Unit cost column for per-voucher cost would be great and then you could even sort master writs based on it!

The ability to name your favourite searches would make the fuctionality even better. I love the idea!

cokkto

Does *name search* search by item name, or set name? Because of some items has unique names, name search should include these items as well. Correct me if it is implemented

FilteredRiddle

Overall the guild changes are a huge improvement.

The additions I think would be helpful are:
- Filter for unknown Motifs
- Filter for unknown Recipes
- Filter for unknown Runeboxes
- Filter for unknown Trait
- Filter for unknown Style Pages
- Filter for deconstructable/not deconstructable Jewelry
- Filter for craftable/not craftable (for Master Writs)
- Cost of gold per voucher (for Master Writs)

Elsonso

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

This is the official feedback thread for the improvements to the Guild Trader UI. Specific feedback that the team is looking for includes the following:

• Were there any items that didn’t show up in your search that you believe should have?
• Are there any additional filters that would help you find things faster?
• Are there any additional UI-specific issues that this change won’t address?
• Which UI were you using – keyboard/mouse or gamepad mode?
• Do you have any other general feedback?

1) I did not notice any.

2) Known vs unknown traits checkbox or icon would be nice, since multiple traits cannot be selected. Unknown motif and provisioning recipe checkbox or icon in list to easily identify unknowns.

3)

4) Keyboard/mouse

5) I like this and it does a huge amount of stuff that was previously handled by an add-on.

I am concerned about the lack of a favorite or saved searches feature. The recent search list seems to grow quite large. I did not find a limit, but I am sure that there is a limit. A saved, or favorite, search designation that had a visible cue and never rolled off (deleted when list reached max) would help in locating the search.

Aurielle

I’m just so happy that we can finally text search for items on console! When I think of all those hours upon hours spent scrolling through pages upon pages of purple motifs to find that one specific chapter until my eyes literally started watering...

silvereyes

cokkto wrote: »

Does *name search* search by item name, or set name? Because of some items has unique names, name search should include these items as well. Correct me if it is implemented

Item name only, unfortunately.

@ZOS_GinaBruno, it would be very helpful to have items with unique names still match the text search for their base items. A few examples I tested on PTS:

• "Vanus's Ice Staff" => Staff of the Crystal Tower
• "Champion of the Hist Restoration Staff" => Rootmender's Staff
• "Witchman's Battle Axe" => Wormcrusher's Axe
• "Maul of Trinimac's Valor" => Morkul's Mighty Mallet

Jolipinator

Could someone post a screenshot of the search function in action? Preferably with no add-ons so I know what I am looking at. Also, what happens if you search multiple terms at once?

For example, what would the results be if you searched "Necropotence Akaviri"?

Zer0oo

Can the text search also include set names? maybe an extra check-box to search for the set name instead of the item name or even some smart drop menu to select what set you are looking for.

A range for quality would also be nice. e.g i want only blue-golden jewelry or purple-gold

unknown motif, style page... filter would be nice

Can we get the text search also for the bank and inventory? searching for a set would then show all items of that set in your inventory and would make changing/finding gear easier

IntelligentAmsomniac

Zer0oo wrote: »

Can the text search also include set names? maybe an extra check-box to search for the set name instead of the item name or even some smart drop menu to select what set you are looking for.

A range for quality would also be nice. e.g i want only blue-golden jewelry or purple-gold

unknown motif, style page... filter would be nice

Can we get the text search also for the bank and inventory? searching for a set would then show all items of that set in your inventory and would make changing/finding gear easier

I really like all of these suggestions and would be happy to see them implemented into the game. They are so good that I can't even choose a favourite!

FrancisCrawford

I have trouble testing because the guilds have little to sell.

Perhaps carry over existing guild ownership and merchandise in the copies, so that the stores are full?

kengur22

You should add a possiblity to reprice an item in the guild store. This would lead to server perfomance and reduce time lost by players. If you want to reprice an item now, you need to cancel it first, pick it up from mail and post it again. The implementation for repricing an item should be doable in one day if your code is clean.

Jayne_Doe

I tested the Guild Trader UI in gamepad mode.

I REALLY like that we can now see more results per page. I also love the text search option. I didn't test it that much, but it seemed to work well with what I searched for.

There are a couple of things I'd like to see added:

--Filter for known/unknown motifs/recipes - Sometimes we want to browse all the furnishing plans, provisioning recipes, or motifs to see what we don't know, so that we can fill in our collections. Or, sometimes we might not know the name of what we don't yet know.

--Additional filters in the recipes dropdown - There is currently only "All recipe types" which includes all provisioning recipes AND furnishing plans. Then there are "food recipes," "drink recipes," and then all the various furnishing recipes listed by type - diagrams, patterns, etc. It would be great to add two additional filters: "all provisioning recipes" and "all furnishing recipes." As it stands now, one has to browse each individual category separately for any recipes they might not know. Granted, if they wanted to look at ALL recipes (provisioning AND furnishings), then it works, but if one is only interested in looking at furnishing plans, they have to look through each type of plan separately. An "unknown" filter would help narrow down what we're browsing, but we'd still have to browse each category individually.

--Additional categories to the furnishings dropdown - Right now, there are the following categories: crafting stations, target dummies, lighting, seating, and ALL OTHER FURNISHINGS. What the...? The first two are extremely narrow and then the last one is extremely broad. Granted, we have text search now, but if someone wanted to browse all plants, they'd have to either wade through a rather huge selection of furnishings, or they'd have to search for trees, plants, flowers, bushes, shrubs, saplings, etc. INDIVIDUALLY, rather than just being able to browse a general category of plants. Or what about someone wanting bedroom furniture. Sure, they can do a text search, but they have to search for beds, wardrobes, armoires, dressers, chests, bureaus, vanities, nightstands, etc. Please add some additional broad categories to assist the players who don't really know what's out there, but want to browse for items they might like: bedroom/suite, kitchen/dining, hearth, conservatory, gallery, etc. These categories were in the previous trader interface. Why were they removed? Text search is great when looking for specific items, but when furnishings of the same type/function have more than one name used (wardrobe/armoire, e.g.) then players have to know to search for both. Especially categories such as food. They'd have to search for all the various food names, and various kitchen items, rather than just being able to browse a specific category. Bottom line - we need more categories for browsing when we DON'T know the specific names of what we're looking for or if we're not looking for any particular item (say Redguard bed), but rather for bedroom furniture in general.