PS4 na ghost traders

akl77

Traders just flipped 1.5 hours ago, logged in to reapers march, 3 out of the 5 traders are empty with nothing listed in reapers march.
This is just one town of the current traders scene on ps4 na, those ghost traders really what it’s intended for game to be?
ZOS please do something about this, if possible, as it’s getting ridiculous.
The problem is after 5+ hours those empty ghost traders are bought up with some traders guild, the scam of the traders scene and buying under the table instead of a fair bid should be dealt with.

Kidgangster101

So then what do you do about the people that are selling spots on console? That people claim doesn't happen but I'm 100% telling you it does, I have seen it first hand when my guild didn't get a spot lol.

Also what about all the people that are creating fake eso accounts so they can run multiple traders? They buy up entire areas (the most popular areas on top of that) with every single guild. Therefore others guilds have to submit to that person's will and join them for a good spot, or they have to buy a spot barely anyone goes to? (PS the leader of my trader guild is level 7............)

If you do get a good city spot the guilds that are there demand you price match them or you won't be able to get that spot again because they have more than enough money to jack up the price and kick you out.

Some guilds force you to pull down items that are more than 3 days old it has been reported on other threads just like this. How is that fair they are being told how to sell their items?

So please tell me how a global auction house wouldn't be better than guild mafias that can lock anyone out that they want? I have even heard of players being blackballed and not allowed into any trading guild on console. That is not fair.

Just on those examples alone it shows that having a trader system like this where the players are in charge of it is a terrible idea. The reason this doesn't happen in other games is you don't need a guild/trader to post items. Pugs won't care who you are they just want the item, therefore anyone can sell.

How is this alright? So you claim a player that could potentially corner a market is worse that guild traders cornering markets now?

I have posted this in numerous places and people ignore me lol. They say this stuff doesn't happen and we don't need to change but here we are once again so I will post this and see if people can answer it.

generalmyrick

Kidgangster101 wrote: »

So then what do you do about the people that are selling spots on console? That people claim doesn't happen but I'm 100% telling you it does, I have seen it first hand when my guild didn't get a spot lol.

Also what about all the people that are creating fake eso accounts so they can run multiple traders? They buy up entire areas (the most popular areas on top of that) with every single guild. Therefore others guilds have to submit to that person's will and join them for a good spot, or they have to buy a spot barely anyone goes to? (PS the leader of my trader guild is level 7............)

If you do get a good city spot the guilds that are there demand you price match them or you won't be able to get that spot again because they have more than enough money to jack up the price and kick you out.

Some guilds force you to pull down items that are more than 3 days old it has been reported on other threads just like this. How is that fair they are being told how to sell their items?

So please tell me how a global auction house wouldn't be better than guild mafias that can lock anyone out that they want? I have even heard of players being blackballed and not allowed into any trading guild on console. That is not fair.

Just on those examples alone it shows that having a trader system like this where the players are in charge of it is a terrible idea. The reason this doesn't happen in other games is you don't need a guild/trader to post items. Pugs won't care who you are they just want the item, therefore anyone can sell.

How is this alright? So you claim a player that could potentially corner a market is worse that guild traders cornering markets now?

I have posted this in numerous places and people ignore me lol. They say this stuff doesn't happen and we don't need to change but here we are once again so I will post this and see if people can answer it.

Totally agree.

akl77

It does happen every single week, only getting worse.
When ghost trader scams happening it’s time for ZOS to take action and change the trading scene, global auctioning house or other ways of controls, or it’s just a joke that bidding are all under the table with the scammers.

Vicinia

It happens more often than people think. Although some on this forum seem to think this system is infallible, (The fact we only got a search function only recently as console is a joke entirely) it has many many flaws.

People reselling traders, groups of people dominating certain spots, the time consumption due to traveling to different zones paired with long loading screens and price fixing to name a few.

Of course I'd love a GAH (it has flaws of course, what doesn't but it would be far better than what console players deal with). But I'd settle for a NPC that lets us search the realm.

Maybe if you purchase a guild trader for that week, you cannot disband your guild during that week in order to give trader guilds a fair shot at it.

Tan9oSuccka

Unfortunately, this post will go largely unnoticed.

No one seems to care, but it could be a “pick your battle kind of thing” on the Zenimax side.

I’d like to see the official stance on this “practice”.

Kidgangster101

It's a shame that this is going no where. Maybe op should change the title to something about an auction house then you will see people come in ignore any logic and defend their corrupt system lol

YOB

Seems like alot of shady things happens in the trading community. haha

MandyMae

I'm so confused... So they are not bidding on the traders just selling them? How do they get them to sell in the first place? Do they bid on them? If so is that not what we are supposed to do? Blind bid says they can be beat?

DragonRacer

Yup, this is a continuous problem every single week. And, of course, all those Rawl'kha ghosts have been purchased as of this morning, so you'd never even know what happened last night. There's also 3 ghosts sitting in Brass Fortress, 2 in Bandaari Trading Post, 1 in Marbruk, 1 in Coldharbour, and 1 in Lillandril. I am sure there are and were more, but that's as far as I could get with my travels last night/this morning before work.

When my guild got pushed out of Alinor last week, I did a heck of a fundraiser and managed to win in Elden Root last night, first time in a capital. I sat there and watched two ghost guilds also win in Elden Root, then were quickly bought/switched out with 2 of the 8 billion Harbingers guilds once hiring opened.

No naming and shaming since I didn't specify which two, by the way.

I also know for a fact a specific guild had bid on the Elden Root spot that I had bid on because someone in their guild tabard was watching the spot beside me at flip. When they saw I'd won, they disappeared. One of my officers spotted a ghost in Mournhold... and lo and behold, that particular guild I beat suddenly had that spot in Mournhold quite magically about 10 minutes later. And then had the gall to send someone back over to Elden Root to advertise their 10k weekly guild in zone chat with their "trader in Mournhold"! Which I called out in zone chat.

I've drummed up this issue again and again, with no ZOS response. And just last week, I PM'd the following to one of our "community managers". No response as of yet:

Hello, *name redacted*.

Today's Update 22 patch notes article regarding the new Guild Finder (https://elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/56483) was a very good read. I am the GM of a large trading guild on PS4 NA and while I have found some aspects of Guild Finder to be a bit wonky (most distressing is the disappearing/reappearing applications list when vetting applications), overall it has been a very helpful tool for us in recruiting, and I believe I can speak for most of the PS4 NA GMs when I say it was a much appreciated quality of life improvement for guilds in this game. My only other suggestion for improving Guild Finder would be: please do not allow applicants to apply if they are already in 5 guilds; and if a guild has a minimum CP level requirement, please do not let applicants who are below that level apply. Both situations cause me to send a decline with a note as to why and then often my remaining list of applicants to sort through disappears. Both suggestions would help refine what is already a nice addition, if it's possible to consider.

However, my main reason for messaging you in regards to today's blog article is that it repeatedly shows ZeniMax Online's desire for players to have good guild experiences, to make it easier for guilds to find the right applicants and easier for applicants to find the right guilds. "“A Guild is a great way to enrich your experience in ESO,” says Bobby Weir, ESO’s UI Design Lead." - as the article states. And I couldn't agree more. But there is currently a VERY big problem on console - especially on PS4 NA, from what I'm seeing with talking to NA and EU GMs on XBox and PC here on the forums - that is affecting trade guilds in particular that I... and many other PS4 NA GMs... fear may be actively harmful to enriching players' experiences.

We call them "ghost guilds", for lack of any other vernacular. They are guilds - sometimes created by the larger capital city trader guild alliances and sometimes by a few independent players looking to get in-game rich - that gather up the 50 player requirement in order to have a guild store, win bids on Sunday night, and then negotiate with other trading guilds for the spot. Very often, these ghost guilds have no items for sale - which certainly isn't helpful to players who are shopping. And once they work out their backroom deals with another guild, that guild pays their GM (instead of going into the gold sink ZeniMax intended with guild trader bids) with in-game money, the ghost guild GM then DISBANDS that guild, and the "buying" guild then hires that guild trader for 10,000 in-game gold.

I cannot imagine how sadly confusing and disruptive such a thing must be to any new players who got conned into joining that ghost guild to build its number to 50, only to log in Monday or Tuesday and see their guild gone. And some of us have screenshot photographic evidence that some of these predatory ghost guild-creating GMs pluck such unsuspecting recruits out of the Coldharbour tutorial area. Effectively setting up what will be an obviously bad guild and gaming experience for the new players.

If this were just one or two instances, that would be one thing. But there is an alliance of trading guild GMs on PS4 NA who go to every city on Sunday flip night and screenshot the ghost guilds, and then screenshot the legitimate guilds who have bought that spot by the next day. It is NOT a small number. Some nights, you will see half of a city's traders are ghost guilds for these purposes. It is a rampant problem especially on PS4 NA. It is highly disruptive to the guilds who play by the rules and end up losing bids to these ghost guilds, it is highly disruptive to any new players within those ghost guilds when they disband to sell their trader location, and instead of serving as the gold sink ZeniMax intended, much of this gold is exchanging players' hands on these deals. One especially - an independent ghost guild seller - admitted in a PSN private message that he's built up his vast in-game fortune through this practice, which cannot possibly be the intended behavior ZeniMax wanted with this guild trader system. This shady practice is also causing some legitimate GMs to leave the game and/or causing legitimate guilds to give up, since ghost guilds are commonly used by larger guilds to bully mid-level and smaller guilds out of cities. That is lost players and lost ESO+ subscriptions/lost future Crown store sales.

I am not asking for any players to be banned or punished. All I am asking is for some sort of acknowledgement from ZeniMax that you are aware of this problem and do consider it a problem. And maybe some sign of hope that you might be working on a fix for the future at some point. I am not a coder, so I don't pretend to know what is simple or complex for resolving this issue. But my very first thoughts are that ghost guilds would very naturally go away and cease to be an issue if either: 1) a guild currently holding a guild trader cannot disband or 2) if a guild holding a guild trader disbands, then that guild trader should sit empty with no guild at all until the next trader flip time. Either option would mean that ghost guild GMs could not recoup their bid money by disbanding the guild and selling the guild trader space to someone else, and if they cannot recoup that money and/or make use of that spot, then ghost guilds will cease to be.

Please let me know your thoughts. it would be very much appreciated.


Thank you kindly,
DragonRacer a.k.a. *name redacted*
GM of The PTK's, PS4 NA

Kagukan

The auction system in this game is the worst designed auction system of any other MMO I have played. It is time for a complete redesign of the system.

jazsper77

On top of that those BOTS You see running patterns and not standing at one nose are mainly MAFIA MEMBERS using scripted controllers. Basically Gold sellers to fund this terrible behavior.

Kidgangster101

MandyMae wrote: »

I'm so confused... So they are not bidding on the traders just selling them? How do they get them to sell in the first place? Do they bid on them? If so is that not what we are supposed to do? Blind bid says they can be beat?

Yes they are "technically winning the bet" but the problem is it is a ghost trader that wins the bet then sells it for 4-8x the amount they won the bet for, (not the intended way it is suppose to work).

So see the problem we are facing on console? It is just not fair/right and until zos steps in it will never be fixed.

Micah_Bayer

You're mad you aren't getting rich, but if you got the spot, those other players wouldn't be getting rich. Seems fair to me, just bid more. It's a bidding war afterall.

DragonRacer

Micah_Bayer wrote: »

You're mad you aren't getting rich, but if you got the spot, those other players wouldn't be getting rich. Seems fair to me, just bid more. It's a bidding war afterall.

Nah, I'm mad when my guild gets beat out by folks who are acquiring in-game wealth through gaming the system, thus accumulating more money to continue monopolizing trader spots.

You sound very supportive of the practice; congratulations on your successful venture.

And patently false - I got the spot last night and instead of the one who lost "not getting rich" from that spot, they circumvented the system by buying a ghost from a friend in another city. Good for them, I guess? But definitely not how ZOS intended the system to function, I presume.

Wolfpaw

Kagukan wrote: »

The auction system in this game is the worst designed auction system of any other MMO I have played. It is time for a complete redesign of the system.

Agree.

Vicinia

Micah_Bayer wrote: »

You're mad you aren't getting rich, but if you got the spot, those other players wouldn't be getting rich. Seems fair to me, just bid more. It's a bidding war afterall.

You're making a lot of assumptions. This isn't about not making gold and being upset about it. It is the fact that people are manipulating the system. If anything this practice screws over smaller trader guilds/new players, as the larger ones can almost always foot the reseller bill.

I can't speak for others but I'm in a large trading guild (If they lose their spot they buy from a reseller but it's a rarity), it isn't hard to make enough gold to want for nothing in this game. My concern lies with newer players and smaller trader guilds being muscled out of the economy due to resellers.

It breeds unnecessary toxicity. If console must deal with the guild trader system, reselling the means to sell shouldn't be a thing so that more people can participate in the system. Nothing wrong with being outbid, you just have to keep that trader.

Trusting the player base with the means to sell was and is a horrible idea.

xxthir13enxx

Tbh....the Answer is pretty simple.... if no Guild buys the spot off the Ghost Trader....than the Ghost Trader will be Broke in no time....they only profit if someone is willing to buy it off them afterwards.

DragonRacer

xxthir13enxx wrote: »

Tbh....the Answer is pretty simple.... if no Guild buys the spot off the Ghost Trader....than the Ghost Trader will be Broke in no time....they only profit if someone is willing to buy it off them afterwards.

Sure, that's the simple solution.

Now, tell me how to get guilds to stop buying ghost trader stalls. Across the entire server.

akl77

It’s just annoying to see 3 out of 5 guild traders in main town are selling 0 items, with silly guild names like “L-A-M-O”, etc.
Then after a few hours they being changed to some big trading guilds, and you know they have to pay those spots under the table elsewhere to the mafia monopoly of the guild trading scene on ps4 na, like everyone have to be their alliance of friend or pay x5 the money to get a trading spot.
I don’t know how ZOS don’t see this is a scam and exploit of how the bidding market is intended to be.
@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom please stop the ridiculous exploit week on week that we see on ps4 na, if anyone cares.

Kidgangster101

akl77 wrote: »

It’s just annoying to see 3 out of 5 guild traders in main town are selling 0 items, with silly guild names like “L-A-M-O”, etc.
Then after a few hours they being changed to some big trading guilds, and you know they have to pay those spots under the table elsewhere to the mafia monopoly of the guild trading scene on ps4 na, like everyone have to be their alliance of friend or pay x5 the money to get a trading spot.
I don’t know how ZOS don’t see this is a scam and exploit of how the bidding market is intended to be.
@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom please stop the ridiculous exploit week on week that we see on ps4 na, if anyone cares.

Yep it is sad, I really want them to do something about it. I am in a large trading guild, but this doesn't help any of the smaller guilds get a spot. And with that 5x profit ghost traders are getting soon they can have enough money to buy like 10+ zones of this it's crazy and these players should be banned for exploiting the system.

Tan9oSuccka

DragonRacer wrote: »

xxthir13enxx wrote: »

Tbh....the Answer is pretty simple.... if no Guild buys the spot off the Ghost Trader....than the Ghost Trader will be Broke in no time....they only profit if someone is willing to buy it off them afterwards.

Sure, that's the simple solution.

Now, tell me how to get guilds to stop buying ghost trader stalls. Across the entire server.

I tried recommending that in one of my guilds and was met with a fair amount of hostility.

Members were not happy about not having a stall, which I can understand.

Kidgangster101

@ZOS_GinaBruno can we get a confirmation that you are aware of this behavior? Maybe at least if you come out and say if you guys intended it to work this way or if this is something you are working on a fix for?

Vicinia

Well I can't say I'm surprised that this is dead now. Quite unfortunate.

DragonRacer

Vicinia wrote: »

Well I can't say I'm surprised that this is dead now. Quite unfortunate.

Yeah, literally the only people who care about this problem are us folks on PS4 NA.

It's a shame.

Skwor

So let me see if I understand the OP's premise.
The ghost traders win the bid then somehow the traders are sold for more to someone else when no one was willing to bid high enough to win it. Somehow the bid winner finds someone to pay more than what anyone was willing to bid for it originally.

Does no one else see the flaw in that logic?

Geesh PS4 na up your bids already and just win the spot, no drama required.

Pevey

Skwor wrote: »

So let me see if I understand the OP's premise.
The ghost traders win the bid then somehow the traders are sold for more to someone else when no one was willing to bid high enough to win it. Somehow the bid winner finds someone to pay more than what anyone was willing to bid for it originally.

Does no one else see the flaw in that logic?

Geesh PS4 na up your bids already and just win the spot, no drama required.

This from the player who claims there are billionaires standing ready to corner the market and inflate prices if we were to get an auction house. Those billionaires could easily corner the trader market on PC like they have on consoles. If this ever became an issue on PC, how quickly you might change your tune.

I would love to hear some response from ZOS on this. It boggles my mind that it has not been addressed already.

Tan9oSuccka

DragonRacer wrote: »

Vicinia wrote: »

Well I can't say I'm surprised that this is dead now. Quite unfortunate.

Yeah, literally the only people who care about this problem are us folks on PS4 NA.

It's a shame.

It really is.

Most are oblivious to the practice or directly involved. That’s why most of these posts go silent.

There’s also the very real possibility of being blacklisted from the major guilds, so people choose to be quiet.

Vicinia

Tan9oSuccka wrote: »

DragonRacer wrote: »

Vicinia wrote: »

Well I can't say I'm surprised that this is dead now. Quite unfortunate.

Yeah, literally the only people who care about this problem are us folks on PS4 NA.

It's a shame.

It really is.

Most are oblivious to the practice or directly involved. That’s why most of these posts go silent.

There’s also the very real possibility of being blacklisted from the major guilds, so people choose to be quiet.

The fact that you can be blacklisted for a dissenting opinion sums up another major flaw with this system.

Ridiculous.

Kidgangster101

Skwor wrote: »

So let me see if I understand the OP's premise.
The ghost traders win the bid then somehow the traders are sold for more to someone else when no one was willing to bid high enough to win it. Somehow the bid winner finds someone to pay more than what anyone was willing to bid for it originally.

Does no one else see the flaw in that logic?

Geesh PS4 na up your bids already and just win the spot, no drama required.

Yeah easier said than done as a small trading guild, or how about the players that have billions of dollars to blow exploiting the system?

Why are you even here as a PC player trying to detail our thread? This thread is about PS4 na system that has people cornering the market and prohibiting us from using a feature in the game and one that is free in most other games on top of that.

It is easy to say hey don't buy from that guy that got a prime spot and trying to flip it, because the big trade guilds that lost their spot pay their premium price just to ensure they have a spot for the week. 👌

geonsocal

wow, talk about the game behind the game...

as much as I love pvp, seems there are lots of other folks whom invest just as much (actually probably much more) time in eso's merchant and guild game...

it's a tough situation, on the one hand it wouldn't be too cool if zos micromanaged the game - on the other hand though, the in-game community definitely needs some help keeping things in a fair and even playing field - including the guild trader stall system...

left entirely to their own devices people will always push (and exceed) the envelope of fair play...