Clothier Writs and Dreugh Wax prices

furiouslog

Hi ZOS folks! I'm not sure what is going on with Dreugh Wax prices, but they have gone up by about 30% over the past two months, and Dreugh Wax was already expensive relative to other gold mats. The crafted cost per voucher for a Gold Clothier Writ is ranging between 700-1000 per voucher, which prices them out of viability.

Like you all did with the Jewelry economy, can you take a look and see if this needs an adjustment? I'm just destroying Gold writs because it makes no sense to do them, and it makes me feel bad that I'm doing that when I should be happy that I got a rare drop with an opportunity to earn vouchers.

Veinblood1965

I just came back myself and it does "feel" I get less Wax than I did before I left. You might check our this link which is quite nice.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/506083/1-year-of-tracking-writ-drops-and-refining-rates#latest

tmbrinks

furiouslog wrote: »

Hi ZOS folks! I'm not sure what is going on with Dreugh Wax prices, but they have gone up by about 30% over the past two months, and Dreugh Wax was already expensive relative to other gold mats. The crafted cost per voucher for a Gold Clothier Writ is ranging between 700-1000 per voucher, which prices them out of viability.

Like you all did with the Jewelry economy, can you take a look and see if this needs an adjustment? I'm just destroying Gold writs because it makes no sense to do them, and it makes me feel bad that I'm doing that when I should be happy that I got a rare drop with an opportunity to earn vouchers.

People are busy golding out their New Moon Acolyte sets, hence the increases in price.

The fact that the master writs have gone up as a result is an unfortunate side effect, that will probably remedy itself in the future. This is compounded by fact that voucher values have fallen fairly drastically, and are down to only being about 600g a piece, instead of nearly 1000 a piece like they were a year ago.

Perhaps by the price of vouchers going up to accommodate.
Perhaps by the price of Druegh Wax coming back down.

The beauty of a free market at work

furiouslog

tmbrinks wrote: »

furiouslog wrote: »

Hi ZOS folks! I'm not sure what is going on with Dreugh Wax prices, but they have gone up by about 30% over the past two months, and Dreugh Wax was already expensive relative to other gold mats. The crafted cost per voucher for a Gold Clothier Writ is ranging between 700-1000 per voucher, which prices them out of viability.

Like you all did with the Jewelry economy, can you take a look and see if this needs an adjustment? I'm just destroying Gold writs because it makes no sense to do them, and it makes me feel bad that I'm doing that when I should be happy that I got a rare drop with an opportunity to earn vouchers.

People are busy golding out their New Moon Acolyte sets, hence the increases in price.

The fact that the master writs have gone up as a result is an unfortunate side effect, that will probably remedy itself in the future. This is compounded by fact that voucher values have fallen fairly drastically, and are down to only being about 600g a piece, instead of nearly 1000 a piece like they were a year ago.

Perhaps by the price of vouchers going up to accommodate.
Perhaps by the price of Druegh Wax coming back down.

The beauty of a free market at work

The issue is not market price volatility (well, it is, I suppose), it's that voucher compensation does not float with the rest of the market, so writ value is unstable across writ type. Writs that ostensibly are meant to be higher value due to their rarity, trait/set, and voucher compensation are provided as rewards to players who have invested time and effort into crafting - but these rewards end up being valueless. If you lose money by doing the writs and selling the merchandise at guild traders for the average price, something is wrong with the market.

If it were a real world free market, Rolis Hlaalu would be paying attention to the marketplace and setting compensation according to the value of the mats and skills required to make a particular piece of equipment. Writ drops could potentially have voucher values set on a rolling average basis dependent on the actual sales prices of the mats (stripping outliers that are clearly gold laundering jobs), which would stabilize the value of a voucher and actually allow ZOS to appropriately reward crafters who invest time into crafting by having rarity, skill, compensation volume, and value correlating properly based on ZOS's intended distribution of gold/voucher exchange rates.

I started playing a lot more a year ago, and voucher values were never at 1000 on average, from my recollection at that time, jewelry crafting excepted - which was broken enough that ZOS adjusted it.

tmbrinks

furiouslog wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

furiouslog wrote: »

Hi ZOS folks! I'm not sure what is going on with Dreugh Wax prices, but they have gone up by about 30% over the past two months, and Dreugh Wax was already expensive relative to other gold mats. The crafted cost per voucher for a Gold Clothier Writ is ranging between 700-1000 per voucher, which prices them out of viability.

Like you all did with the Jewelry economy, can you take a look and see if this needs an adjustment? I'm just destroying Gold writs because it makes no sense to do them, and it makes me feel bad that I'm doing that when I should be happy that I got a rare drop with an opportunity to earn vouchers.

People are busy golding out their New Moon Acolyte sets, hence the increases in price.

The fact that the master writs have gone up as a result is an unfortunate side effect, that will probably remedy itself in the future. This is compounded by fact that voucher values have fallen fairly drastically, and are down to only being about 600g a piece, instead of nearly 1000 a piece like they were a year ago.

Perhaps by the price of vouchers going up to accommodate.
Perhaps by the price of Druegh Wax coming back down.

The beauty of a free market at work

The issue is not market price volatility (well, it is, I suppose), it's that voucher compensation does not float with the rest of the market, so writ value is unstable across writ type. Writs that ostensibly are meant to be higher value due to their rarity, trait/set, and voucher compensation are provided as rewards to players who have invested time and effort into crafting - but these rewards end up being valueless. If you lose money by doing the writs and selling the merchandise at guild traders for the average price, something is wrong with the market.

If it were a real world free market, Rolis Hlaalu would be paying attention to the marketplace and setting compensation according to the value of the mats and skills required to make a particular piece of equipment. Writ drops could potentially have voucher values set on a rolling average basis dependent on the actual sales prices of the mats (stripping outliers that are clearly gold laundering jobs), which would stabilize the value of a voucher and actually allow ZOS to appropriately reward crafters who invest time into crafting by having rarity, skill, compensation volume, and value correlating properly based on ZOS's intended distribution of gold/voucher exchange rates.

I started playing a lot more a year ago, and voucher values were never at 1000 on average, from my recollection at that time, jewelry crafting excepted - which was broken enough that ZOS adjusted it.

I am talking about the value for which you could sell items that Rolls and his assistant sell (Transmute stations were regularly selling for 1.1-1.2 million gold 18 months ago... they're at 800k gold today)

So, the cost of getting the vouchers, due to druegh wax going up in price (for legendary clothing writs) has gone up... but there has been no corresponding increase in the prices that items bought with vouchers can sell for.

Now, there are plenty of other master writs that can be done for way less than 600g per voucher... most alchemy are 100-200g a voucher, most enchanting are less than 100g a voucher (unless they use hakeijo), most provisioning are under 25g a voucher (unless they use perfect roe). Purple clothing are like 200g a voucher or less. Gold blacksmithing (especially if rare trait or even nirn) are under 200g a voucher. Gold woodworking are in the same range.

Now... Hakeijo enchanting, Perfect Roe Provisioning, Purple Woodworking, and Gold Clothing are more expensive than the others.

Personally, I make the determination on which ones are valuable for me to do and which ones are not. I haven't done a gold clothing master writ in like 3 months, I still do the purple woodworking, because I can sustain those through my gameplay and writs alone. And I haven't done a hakeijo or perfect roe master writ in years.

Some things are better to do than others, but there doesn't necessarily need to be a knee-jerk change to something (what is it you'd like changed?) because of a price increase in one of the materials, where there really hasn't been time for the market to react.

I use the WritWorthy add-on to do my master writs, and with all the ones I do combined, I'm usually between 300-350g per voucher on average to complete, but I do choose to not do some.

The problem with adjusting the voucher values for gold clothing, would be that there would be an equivalent change in gold blacksmithing and gold woodworking (since they're all formula based on the traits needed to craft, the materials to upgrade, the rarity of the motif), and those are already among the most efficient writs to do.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

I am a firm believer in looking at the demand side of things. Biggest issue is that writ vouchers just arent that useful anymore. I am sitting on close to 5 figures of them. Big guilds have their crafting stations, transmutes and target dummies already.

Put a wayshrine in the writ vendor for like 3k-5k vouchers. Problem solved for 6-12 months.

tmbrinks

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am a firm believer in looking at the demand side of things. Biggest issue is that writ vouchers just arent that useful anymore. I am sitting on close to 5 figures of them. Big guilds have their crafting stations, transmutes and target dummies already.

Put a wayshrine in the writ vendor for like 3k-5k vouchers. Problem solved for 6-12 months.

Agreed. The only things added into the voucher vendor recently have been the pouches for furnishing plans, along with a few other furnishing plans for 125 vouchers each.

I've still had good luck selling attunable crafting stations (I don't know if it's just because people are getting ready for the 3 new sets coming out Monday on PC)

ganzaeso

Just need to put hakeijo in there and resource bags. The utility of vouchers will sky rocket.

Basically the utility of Rolis Hlaalu's inventory has matured and is starting to smell 😁

Oreyn_Bearclaw

tmbrinks wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am a firm believer in looking at the demand side of things. Biggest issue is that writ vouchers just arent that useful anymore. I am sitting on close to 5 figures of them. Big guilds have their crafting stations, transmutes and target dummies already.

Put a wayshrine in the writ vendor for like 3k-5k vouchers. Problem solved for 6-12 months.

Agreed. The only things added into the voucher vendor recently have been the pouches for furnishing plans, along with a few other furnishing plans for 125 vouchers each.

I've still had good luck selling attunable crafting stations (I don't know if it's just because people are getting ready for the 3 new sets coming out Monday on PC)

Guessing that is a good guess. There are enough guilds/collectors that want every station in their residence. As far as I can tell, new crafting sets are the only thing keeping the master writ vendor alive.

I think we can all agree the system needs some work. A good chunk of master writs across multiple crafts simply arent worth doing. I am also not going to use writ vouchers to play a RNG slot machine with furniture plans. These are too tedious to acquire to gamble with. Also I did it once. Wont say I got totally burned, but I would have been better off selling a transmute station from a gold perspective.

Mr_Walker

Put transmute stones in there. Value of writs all of a sudden will go up to being worthwhile again. Best part is they're a consumable, so they will always be in demand.

snoozy

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Put a wayshrine in the writ vendor for like 3k-5k vouchers. Problem solved for 6-12 months.

ganzaeso wrote: »

Just need to put hakeijo in there and resource bags. The utility of vouchers will sky rocket.

Mr_Walker wrote: »

Put transmute stones in there. Value of writs all of a sudden will go up to being worthwhile again. Best part is they're a consumable, so they will always be in demand.

please zos!!!

Hapexamendios

Mr_Walker wrote: »

Put transmute stones in there. Value of writs all of a sudden will go up to being worthwhile again. Best part is they're a consumable, so they will always be in demand.

Awesome idea.

furiouslog

tmbrinks wrote: »

Some things are better to do than others, but there doesn't necessarily need to be a knee-jerk change to something (what is it you'd like changed?) because of a price increase in one of the materials, where there really hasn't been time for the market to react.

I use the WritWorthy add-on to do my master writs, and with all the ones I do combined, I'm usually between 300-350g per voucher on average to complete, but I do choose to not do some.

This is not a knee jerk reaction, I track Writ Worthy as well. I had this observation about the jewelry writs long ago, and it was obvious to me that mat prices had a significant impact on my available choices. This is the same issue.

I choose not to do most of my writs, because the cheap ones I receive have a small number of vouchers which considerably increases grinding time, or they are too costly to be worth it. These are also unsaleable (exception: food/rune writs that are purchased by people trying to get the GMC achievement). That is my complaint. Why even bother getting writs that I won't use and can't sell?

As said, my proposed solution is to tie writ value to the in game materials market to stabilize the gold/voucher exchange in order to make the writs worth doing. Yes, some writs would lose relative value, but at least they would all be worth doing, so when you actually receive one, you're not just destroying it. The alternative is to adjust material prices by increasing supply (tie drop rates to prices), which would create a new set of problems that extend beyond the writ economy.

The market I have observed over the past year is so volatile it has the potential to continually render some writs highly valuable and others worthless. The question is then this: what is the intent of the writs? I thought that it was to provide an incentive to crafters and give them an opportunity to collect and/or sell content with limited access. The current system limits those opportunities. If that is not the intent of the writs, carry on, I guess.

Zulera301

Supply and demand. ZOS purged a ton of bots recently, including a bunch of ones that used to farm leather. That, coupled with increased demand, has cranked up the prices.

Less leather to refine = less wax to obtain.
Less wax to obtain = smaller supply
Increased demand + decreased supply = higher prices. See also: Iridium.

TL;DR—capitalism. Love it. Embrace it. Immerse yourself in it.

tmbrinks

furiouslog wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

Some things are better to do than others, but there doesn't necessarily need to be a knee-jerk change to something (what is it you'd like changed?) because of a price increase in one of the materials, where there really hasn't been time for the market to react.

I use the WritWorthy add-on to do my master writs, and with all the ones I do combined, I'm usually between 300-350g per voucher on average to complete, but I do choose to not do some.

This is not a knee jerk reaction, I track Writ Worthy as well. I had this observation about the jewelry writs long ago, and it was obvious to me that mat prices had a significant impact on my available choices. This is the same issue.

I choose not to do most of my writs, because the cheap ones I receive have a small number of vouchers which considerably increases grinding time, or they are too costly to be worth it. These are also unsaleable (exception: food/rune writs that are purchased by people trying to get the GMC achievement). That is my complaint. Why even bother getting writs that I won't use and can't sell?

As said, my proposed solution is to tie writ value to the in game materials market to stabilize the gold/voucher exchange in order to make the writs worth doing. Yes, some writs would lose relative value, but at least they would all be worth doing, so when you actually receive one, you're not just destroying it. The alternative is to adjust material prices by increasing supply (tie drop rates to prices), which would create a new set of problems that extend beyond the writ economy.

The market I have observed over the past year is so volatile it has the potential to continually render some writs highly valuable and others worthless. The question is then this: what is the intent of the writs? I thought that it was to provide an incentive to crafters and give them an opportunity to collect and/or sell content with limited access. The current system limits those opportunities. If that is not the intent of the writs, carry on, I guess.

What metric are we going to use to determine the adequate price?

TTC? MM? What guilds? All data? .

What platform?

PC/NA, PC/EU, Xbox? PS4? All of them combined?

How often will it change?

Daily? Weekly? Monthly?

What's the "ZoS approved" price for vouchers?

500? 600? 1000?

Will the voucher values adjust so that if you hang onto a writ for a few months it might dynamically change as the prices change?

The idea is fine... it's just simply not feasible and realistic, in my opinion.

furiouslog

tmbrinks wrote: »

What metric are we going to use to determine the adequate price?

TTC? MM? What guilds? All data? .

What platform?

PC/NA, PC/EU, Xbox? PS4? All of them combined?

How often will it change?

Daily? Weekly? Monthly?

What's the "ZoS approved" price for vouchers?

500? 600? 1000?

Will the voucher values adjust so that if you hang onto a writ for a few months it might dynamically change as the prices change?

The idea is fine... it's just simply not feasible and realistic, in my opinion.

I disagree. With respect, you're asking questions and then concluding that the premise is flawed because you don't have the answers, which is fallacious reasoning. So I will answer your questions.

1 and 3. The metric and frequency: The simplest one would be to use a rolling measure of the median price of all actual sales since the last maintenance event, then writ drops can be adjusted along with all other roll outs occurring at the time. The median works best, since it is resistant to outliers (e.g. gold laundering or mistaken default price entries). Having over a week of data would probably be a robust enough sample to get a read on the current market - if the sample were insufficient, you can simply extend the measurement period back until your N is high enough to be confidence that you have an adequate measure of center, e.g. rolling months - adjustments could occur when they refresh the dailies,.

2. All platforms would need to have their own writ values established separately based on the markets within those environments to maintain internal market consistency. I imagine prices are different on difference servers, particularly platform versus PC due to the higher crafting burden on platforms who don't have access to add-ons.

4. I don't know the answer to this question, but ZOS clearly already had a number in mind when they put this together in the first place, which is why they adjusted the entire jewelry economy. There are a certain number of attunable crafting stations, target dummies, and frog callers that they want out in the world. There are a certain number of writs that they want done. And, they want to keep people engaged and playing the game, because exposure = crowns. I presume that they would set the price based on their overall business objectives for the content available in the store, which I can infer, but do not know. But ZOS knows, so this is not an issue.

5. Writ values would not adjust as they go - they would be pinned when they were issued. This would be necessary because I figure the coding is too problematic, but it's not necessary anyway. This will provide incentive to complete the writs when they are received, which is a behavior I think ZOS would want to reinforce, as it would increase short term player engagement. Some players might play the market, choosing to hang onto a writ in case it increases in value and then executing or destroying it after a value change, an analogue to real world commodity and stock exchanges that represent a risk/reward trade off that players can choose to make. Risk averse players would do writs when they were issued. Others can "play the market" and hoard writs if they speculate that it will change.

The concept therefore seems to me to be not only feasible and realistic, but also key to what I believe ZOS's business objectives to be: increasing player engagement by making the crafting rewards of the game more stable and subsequently enjoyable, and increased engagement translates to crown sales.

snoozy

I'd also love to see skill respec scrolls on the writ vendor

DaveMoeDee

tmbrinks wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am a firm believer in looking at the demand side of things. Biggest issue is that writ vouchers just arent that useful anymore. I am sitting on close to 5 figures of them. Big guilds have their crafting stations, transmutes and target dummies already.

Put a wayshrine in the writ vendor for like 3k-5k vouchers. Problem solved for 6-12 months.

Agreed. The only things added into the voucher vendor recently have been the pouches for furnishing plans, along with a few other furnishing plans for 125 vouchers each.

I've still had good luck selling attunable crafting stations (I don't know if it's just because people are getting ready for the 3 new sets coming out Monday on PC)

Wait, what? Pouches for furniture plans? More storage? I had no idea that was a thing. I will definitely grab those today.

furiouslog

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am a firm believer in looking at the demand side of things. Biggest issue is that writ vouchers just arent that useful anymore. I am sitting on close to 5 figures of them. Big guilds have their crafting stations, transmutes and target dummies already.

Put a wayshrine in the writ vendor for like 3k-5k vouchers. Problem solved for 6-12 months.

Agreed. The only things added into the voucher vendor recently have been the pouches for furnishing plans, along with a few other furnishing plans for 125 vouchers each.

I've still had good luck selling attunable crafting stations (I don't know if it's just because people are getting ready for the 3 new sets coming out Monday on PC)

Wait, what? Pouches for furniture plans? More storage? I had no idea that was a thing. I will definitely grab those today.

He's referring to the coffers that randomly drop a furnishing plan from a given set.

DaveMoeDee

furiouslog wrote: »

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am a firm believer in looking at the demand side of things. Biggest issue is that writ vouchers just arent that useful anymore. I am sitting on close to 5 figures of them. Big guilds have their crafting stations, transmutes and target dummies already.

Put a wayshrine in the writ vendor for like 3k-5k vouchers. Problem solved for 6-12 months.

Agreed. The only things added into the voucher vendor recently have been the pouches for furnishing plans, along with a few other furnishing plans for 125 vouchers each.

I've still had good luck selling attunable crafting stations (I don't know if it's just because people are getting ready for the 3 new sets coming out Monday on PC)

Wait, what? Pouches for furniture plans? More storage? I had no idea that was a thing. I will definitely grab those today.

He's referring to the coffers that randomly drop a furnishing plan from a given set.

Oh. Pass.

redlink1979

@furiouslog Price's fluctuation always relates to supply n demand...

tmbrinks

furiouslog wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

What metric are we going to use to determine the adequate price?

TTC? MM? What guilds? All data? .

What platform?

PC/NA, PC/EU, Xbox? PS4? All of them combined?

How often will it change?

Daily? Weekly? Monthly?

What's the "ZoS approved" price for vouchers?

500? 600? 1000?

Will the voucher values adjust so that if you hang onto a writ for a few months it might dynamically change as the prices change?

The idea is fine... it's just simply not feasible and realistic, in my opinion.

I disagree. With respect, you're asking questions and then concluding that the premise is flawed because you don't have the answers, which is fallacious reasoning. So I will answer your questions.

1 and 3. The metric and frequency: The simplest one would be to use a rolling measure of the median price of all actual sales since the last maintenance event, then writ drops can be adjusted along with all other roll outs occurring at the time. The median works best, since it is resistant to outliers (e.g. gold laundering or mistaken default price entries). Having over a week of data would probably be a robust enough sample to get a read on the current market - if the sample were insufficient, you can simply extend the measurement period back until your N is high enough to be confidence that you have an adequate measure of center, e.g. rolling months - adjustments could occur when they refresh the dailies,.

2. All platforms would need to have their own writ values established separately based on the markets within those environments to maintain internal market consistency. I imagine prices are different on difference servers, particularly platform versus PC due to the higher crafting burden on platforms who don't have access to add-ons.

4. I don't know the answer to this question, but ZOS clearly already had a number in mind when they put this together in the first place, which is why they adjusted the entire jewelry economy. There are a certain number of attunable crafting stations, target dummies, and frog callers that they want out in the world. There are a certain number of writs that they want done. And, they want to keep people engaged and playing the game, because exposure = crowns. I presume that they would set the price based on their overall business objectives for the content available in the store, which I can infer, but do not know. But ZOS knows, so this is not an issue.

5. Writ values would not adjust as they go - they would be pinned when they were issued. This would be necessary because I figure the coding is too problematic, but it's not necessary anyway. This will provide incentive to complete the writs when they are received, which is a behavior I think ZOS would want to reinforce, as it would increase short term player engagement. Some players might play the market, choosing to hang onto a writ in case it increases in value and then executing or destroying it after a value change, an analogue to real world commodity and stock exchanges that represent a risk/reward trade off that players can choose to make. Risk averse players would do writs when they were issued. Others can "play the market" and hoard writs if they speculate that it will change.

The concept therefore seems to me to be not only feasible and realistic, but also key to what I believe ZOS's business objectives to be: increasing player engagement by making the crafting rewards of the game more stable and subsequently enjoyable, and increased engagement translates to crown sales.

All this would do is make things even more confusing for people who (I suspect a majority) already don't know what's really going on with writs vs. master writs vs. vouchers, etc...

How are we as players going to know what is happening with prices. Nobody, outside of ZoS has access to the data to accurately determine for their own purposes what the prices are actually at, since we can see either just sales, in MM, for the guilds we are in... or listed prices on TTC, both of which are inaccurate.

Thanks for using some technical terms (I have a math degree and teach finance classes)

As I said, I don't think it's a bad idea, but I do think that it is overly complex and untenable in a game like this.

I get that it sucks that some writs aren't worth doing... but there have been some that have been that way for years (enchanting and provisioning) yet there wasn't much chatter about those, but now that it's happening to clothing, there seems to be more. (Even if purple clothing are among the best to do still for the crafted materials ones)

Asardes

I'm doing writs every day on 18 characters and I haven't seen any change in legendary upgrade drop rates. Since it's quite a large sample I would have detected such a change. So it's either decreased supply elsewhere and/or increased demand.

Concerning the former, I suppose ZOS finally manned up and start banning bots. I've gone past some of the favorite botting spots and I haven't seen any in the last couple of months. Certainly taking bots out of the game would dry up an important source of materials. Since most were running around and killing animals for leather scraps, Dreugh Wax would be impacted disproportionately. Another factor might have been a free ESO+ week in January, so players who don't normally sub could have taken advantage of this event to stock up on various materials, including Dreugh Wax.

As for increased demand, the New Moon Acolyte set has been in game for nearly 4 months, but the prices increased only recently. I remember prices in November and December, right after Dragonhold launch, and they were much lower than they are now. Had New Moon Acolyte been an important factor, they would have jumped then. Also most players don't upgrade their armor to legendary, only the weapons so Dreugh Wax should have been affected less than either Tempering Alloy (stamina - melee weapons) and Rosin (Magicka - staves).

furiouslog

redlink1979 wrote: »

@furiouslog Price's fluctuation always relates to supply n demand...

I agree, in which case you should endorse my idea (the concept, not necessarily the specifics). I already explained this, but perhaps I was unclear.

Rolis Hlaalu, master crafter and writ dispenser extraordinaire, is the sole source brokerage for master crafting contracts. He takes orders from patrons, issues writs, randomly dispenses them to crafters, and the crafters decide to execute the contracts, sell them, or destroy them. He unilaterally sets compensation on the writs.

In a free market, Rolis would set compensation based on the value of the equipment, which is derived from skill value, effort required, and crafting costs. If he systematically undervalued his writs, no one would do them, and his contracts would all expire. Consumer desire goes unfulfilled. He would lose his position as an influential broker because his paying customers would go elsewhere to actually get the item they needed.

A real world analogue that examines the converse: imagine that you post something on Ebay at a certain price. Ebay overrides your price with a set price that they believe to be appropriate. You don't sell your item. Over time, you fail to sell all of your items due to Ebay's pricing policies. Consumer desire goes unfulfilled. You would stop using Ebay.

All I am proposing is that we make adjustments to make sure that writ value is actually tied to the supply and demand of goods, instead of being a tyrannical and unrealistic soul-crushing meritocracy that undermines free markets which subsequently harms immersion and player engagement.

furiouslog

tmbrinks wrote: »

All this would do is make things even more confusing for people who (I suspect a majority) already don't know what's really going on with writs vs. master writs vs. vouchers, etc...

How are we as players going to know what is happening with prices. Nobody, outside of ZoS has access to the data to accurately determine for their own purposes what the prices are actually at, since we can see either just sales, in MM, for the guilds we are in... or listed prices on TTC, both of which are inaccurate.

Thanks for using some technical terms (I have a math degree and teach finance classes)

As I said, I don't think it's a bad idea, but I do think that it is overly complex and untenable in a game like this.

I get that it sucks that some writs aren't worth doing... but there have been some that have been that way for years (enchanting and provisioning) yet there wasn't much chatter about those, but now that it's happening to clothing, there seems to be more. (Even if purple clothing are among the best to do still for the crafted materials ones)

I don't see how it would make things more confusing. Players get a writ that is reasonably valued and can choose to do it or save it. Crafters who pay attention to Writ Worthy would be more sophisticated traders that would take advantage of market changes. Everyone else just gets a writ that makes sense even if they don't have Writ Worthy or TTC installed.

Because ZOS data is essentially perfect, they will set the right prices, so that's not an issue. Player add-on measurement error is already a problem. That won't change.

I'm going to push back on the idea's complexity. All of the coding and management happens on the ZOS end. If anything it makes it simpler for the player to make a decision to execute a writ, because they will have confidence that the writ value will reasonably approximate a certain amount of in-game gold value. What we have now is more complex than that, because we rely on unreliable data (as you pointed out) that get imported into formulas whose management would be unsustainable without add-ons. You already live in an overly confusing environment, you are just used to it. What I am proposing is actually simpler.

And finally, it is fallacious to argue that just because something has been bad for a long period of time, that you might as well keep it that way.

On the issue of provisioning/enchanting writs: those are not worth doing for someone who already has GMC, but they are highly valuable to someone trying to achieve GMC, because they are low effort and low cost relative to the credit you get, accelerating and improving the accessibility of the GMC achievement. I know this because I reliably sell those writs at a voucher price well over the average. I figure ZOS actually wants to promote this accessibility to a certain point, which can be accommodated by pinning those writ values appropriately if that is their objective.

DaveMoeDee

furiouslog wrote: »

redlink1979 wrote: »

@furiouslog Price's fluctuation always relates to supply n demand...

I agree, in which case you should endorse my idea (the concept, not necessarily the specifics). I already explained this, but perhaps I was unclear.

Rolis Hlaalu, master crafter and writ dispenser extraordinaire, is the sole source brokerage for master crafting contracts. He takes orders from patrons, issues writs, randomly dispenses them to crafters, and the crafters decide to execute the contracts, sell them, or destroy them. He unilaterally sets compensation on the writs.

In a free market, Rolis would set compensation based on the value of the equipment, which is derived from skill value, effort required, and crafting costs. If he systematically undervalued his writs, no one would do them, and his contracts would all expire. Consumer desire goes unfulfilled. He would lose his position as an influential broker because his paying customers would go elsewhere to actually get the item they needed.

A real world analogue that examines the converse: imagine that you post something on Ebay at a certain price. Ebay overrides your price with a set price that they believe to be appropriate. You don't sell your item. Over time, you fail to sell all of your items due to Ebay's pricing policies. Consumer desire goes unfulfilled. You would stop using Ebay.

All I am proposing is that we make adjustments to make sure that writ value is actually tied to the supply and demand of goods, instead of being a tyrannical and unrealistic soul-crushing meritocracy that undermines free markets which subsequently harms immersion and player engagement.

I would love to see your formula for this. Keep in mind that a formula would also lead to decreasing the voucher value of high margin master writs. And how would you handle the prices of items that require motif pages that don't have significant available sales data for a given week? We obviously can't include guild stores without a kiosk since people can easily manipulate those either of a profit, or just to troll people. When is the voucher amount determined? At the time of sale or at pickup? If at the time of sale, you don't necessarily know the value of a master writ before you turn it in. How often are input costs computed? Probably has to be time of pickup so that people can't manipulate prices to inflate voucher value. Obviously input prices can't be determined in real time. Is it weekly? Maybe new prices happen when kiosks are assigned based on previous week data?

Considering how many times guild store kiosk assignment has had issues, I don't see them adding another weekly task to worry about.

Prices should just be based on drop rates because those are static and it means less complexity behind the scenes and less chances for players to distort prices through whatever funny business. If there is a temporary spike in the price of an input, you just have to wait.

Ebay analogy is odd. No one sets your sales prices in ESO or Ebay. Both involve the same analysis: is it worth trying to sell X based on what people are willing to pay and how much it will cost me to acquire stock. Sometimes the answer is no. In that case, you can wait until the market makes sense.

In a free market, Rolis will base the price he pays on the price his buyers are willing to pay. He isn't going to pay you so he can sell at a loss. It turns out that the people Rolis deals with aren't interested in buying the items at a higher price. On the other hand, they also don't expect to be able to buy at lower prices when input prices crash. Most markets probably aren't like this IRL, but this one is.

tmbrinks

furiouslog wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

All this would do is make things even more confusing for people who (I suspect a majority) already don't know what's really going on with writs vs. master writs vs. vouchers, etc...

How are we as players going to know what is happening with prices. Nobody, outside of ZoS has access to the data to accurately determine for their own purposes what the prices are actually at, since we can see either just sales, in MM, for the guilds we are in... or listed prices on TTC, both of which are inaccurate.

Thanks for using some technical terms (I have a math degree and teach finance classes)

As I said, I don't think it's a bad idea, but I do think that it is overly complex and untenable in a game like this.

I get that it sucks that some writs aren't worth doing... but there have been some that have been that way for years (enchanting and provisioning) yet there wasn't much chatter about those, but now that it's happening to clothing, there seems to be more. (Even if purple clothing are among the best to do still for the crafted materials ones)

I don't see how it would make things more confusing. Players get a writ that is reasonably valued and can choose to do it or save it. Crafters who pay attention to Writ Worthy would be more sophisticated traders that would take advantage of market changes. Everyone else just gets a writ that makes sense even if they don't have Writ Worthy or TTC installed.

Because ZOS data is essentially perfect, they will set the right prices, so that's not an issue. Player add-on measurement error is already a problem. That won't change.

I'm going to push back on the idea's complexity. All of the coding and management happens on the ZOS end. If anything it makes it simpler for the player to make a decision to execute a writ, because they will have confidence that the writ value will reasonably approximate a certain amount of in-game gold value. What we have now is more complex than that, because we rely on unreliable data (as you pointed out) that get imported into formulas whose management would be unsustainable without add-ons. You already live in an overly confusing environment, you are just used to it. What I am proposing is actually simpler.

And finally, it is fallacious to argue that just because something has been bad for a long period of time, that you might as well keep it that way.

On the issue of provisioning/enchanting writs: those are not worth doing for someone who already has GMC, but they are highly valuable to someone trying to achieve GMC, because they are low effort and low cost relative to the credit you get, accelerating and improving the accessibility of the GMC achievement. I know this because I reliably sell those writs at a voucher price well over the average. I figure ZOS actually wants to promote this accessibility to a certain point, which can be accommodated by pinning those writ values appropriately if that is their objective.

I don't think most people are doing Enchanting and Alchemy master writs to get GMC on their alt characters. They are doing them because it's the most efficient and quickest way to level from 1-50, and to level new skills when respeccing a character.

furiouslog

tmbrinks wrote: »

I don't think most people are doing Enchanting and Alchemy master writs to get GMC on their alt characters. They are doing them because it's the most efficient and quickest way to level from 1-50, and to level new skills when respeccing a character.

Good point, although I've never used those writs that way, because by the time I can do the purple stuff I'm already at 50. Maybe I should try it out. I only have anecdotal evidence on that from talking to guildies.

tmbrinks

furiouslog wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

I don't think most people are doing Enchanting and Alchemy master writs to get GMC on their alt characters. They are doing them because it's the most efficient and quickest way to level from 1-50, and to level new skills when respeccing a character.

Good point, although I've never used those writs that way, because by the time I can do the purple stuff I'm already at 50. Maybe I should try it out. I only have anecdotal evidence on that from talking to guildies.

My alt account that I do writs only on. I literally leveled 17 of the 18 characters with primarily master writs

Collect enough skyshards/levels for 11 skill points (to max out alchemy 8/8 + 3/3 in Chemistry + 1 in Lab). Learn traits and level alchemy to 50. Do alchemy master writs, unlock/level enchanting (10/10 in Potency, 4/4 in Aspect), then you can do alchemy/enchanting to level 50.

I can, during an XP event and with a 150% scroll, can be done in under 90 minutes 1-50 with the help of WritWorthy add-on.

furiouslog

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

I would love to see your formula for this. Keep in mind that a formula would also lead to decreasing the voucher value of high margin master writs. And how would you handle the prices of items that require motif pages that don't have significant available sales data for a given week?

I'm aware that the margins will stabilize. It is based on the premise that ZOS wants two things: stability in access to GMC content, and consumer engagement with in-game tasks.

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

We obviously can't include guild stores without a kiosk since people can easily manipulate those either of a profit, or just to troll people. When is the voucher amount determined? At the time of sale or at pickup? If at the time of sale, you don't necessarily know the value of a master writ before you turn it in. How often are input costs computed? Probably has to be time of pickup so that people can't manipulate prices to inflate voucher value. Obviously input prices can't be determined in real time. Is it weekly? Maybe new prices happen when kiosks are assigned based on previous week data?

I don't know how ZOS currently implements their RNG items. When you get a coffer, does it hit the loot table when you receive the coffer or when you open it? I'm sure the answer would be fixed to that mechanic. As I suggested earlier, you'd need a representative sample in order for the median to be a reliable measure of value. It seems like monthly makes the most sense, since once the formula is established it's just a matter of updating loot tables to reflect the adjusted values and pushing the content with the rest of the patch, which mitigates your concern about mismanaging frequent updates.

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Prices should just be based on drop rates because those are static and it means less complexity behind the scenes and less chances for players to distort prices through whatever funny business. If there is a temporary spike in the price of an input, you just have to wait.

I'm not sure how the proposed system could be exploited, unless individuals have the ability to purchase enough to significantly move the median price of crafting materials (you'd basically have to be able to buy/sell about a 10th of the market capacity, in which case, the economy has broader issues than unrealistic writ voucher values. It is entirely possible that if this capacity exists, the writ market is already subject to secondary manipulation, which would be an argument for value adjustments that stabilize writ value and preserve the time investment crafters and put into the game.

I don't think that the dreugh wax prices are a temporary spike, it's been ramping like this since before MYM, but I could be wrong. The point is that upgrading all of the dps and healer armor sets are dependent on that material. Another solution would be to increase drop rates to maintain stabler prices, but I'm not focused on the prices themselves which I can accept, I'm focused on the writ values and the intended purpose of writs.

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Ebay analogy is odd. No one sets your sales prices in ESO or Ebay. Both involve the same analysis: is it worth trying to sell X based on what people are willing to pay and how much it will cost me to acquire stock. Sometimes the answer is no. In that case, you can wait until the market makes sense.

Rolis sets the prices in ESO, it's a reverse auction instead of an auction, I was using Ebay as an example of the auction format under a similar mechanic to illustrate the point. I am also assuming that the "consumer demand" in the game is legitimate.

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

In a free market, Rolis will base the price he pays on the price his buyers are willing to pay. He isn't going to pay you so he can sell at a loss. It turns out that the people Rolis deals with aren't interested in buying the items at a higher price. On the other hand, they also don't expect to be able to buy at lower prices when input prices crash. Most markets probably aren't like this IRL, but this one is.

I do not agree. Here is another real world example. I collect production cels from cartoons. I took one that I had from Lady and the Tramp to a cel shop to put on consignment. During the transaction, I had a discussion with the store owner in order to get a sense of the market and put my price at a level so that it would sell within a reasonable amount of time. The store owner has an incentive to get me to put it lower in order to get the commission quicker, so I grabbed historical data from Ebay and other sites to gather additional benchmarks. If I set the price too high, it just sits and nothing ever happens, at which point I go back to the store and get updated advice from the owner, and I will either adjust my price to sell or I will take it off the market. If it sits long enough at a hot store the owner would opt to rescind the consignment because they can give floor space to something that will actually sell.

The problem here is that we appear to be operating under different assumptions about the ESO economy, which is not to simulate an economy, it's to provide an economy to facilitate player engagement and enjoyment by providing an exchange mechanic that allows for people to play the game the way they want to. The point of having the writs in the first place is to provide incentives that make sure the exchange happens in one way or another, because writs are a reward for achieving something in the game. I am therefore assuming that the inherent value of the transaction itself is fixed as far as ZOS is concerned. They want people to do writs to enjoy the rewards of investing time into the game and the additional assets that can be purchased, and consumed or sold as a result of that effort.

Coming back to Holis, his function is to acquire rare items for his clients. Holis pays in his vouchers, (for which he has an infinite supply but a theoretical intended limit based on how many vouchers ZOS wants in the economy), which are exchanged for his goods (that also have an infinite supply with a theoretical limit based on ZOS objectives). You are assuming that the "client" sets the price and Holis is just moving paper around at a fixed gold/voucher exchange rate. That's not my assumption, because Holis' actual measure of success as a gaming function (and also would be in real life) is not reliably acting as a paper pusher, it's to maximize the transactions that apply to player enjoyment. That's why the Ebay example is closer, because their incentive is to maximize successful transactions.

Ultimately, I posted this in the first place because I invested time to get skill points to level crafting on toons, knowing that a reward was writ vouchers. If I destroy those rewards, I'm not capturing the intended value of my time spent, which is frustrating and reduces my desire to engage in crafting pursuits. I don't think I'm the only one who feels this way, and I don't think ZOS wants me to feel that way, but maybe I am wrong about that.

I think I've made all of the points about this that I'm going to make, but if anyone still needs further clarification, I'll try to explain.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

Mr_Walker wrote: »

Put transmute stones in there. Value of writs all of a sudden will go up to being worthwhile again. Best part is they're a consumable, so they will always be in demand.

@Mr_Walker
Oh man, that would be great. Not sure why I didnt think of that. It is the perfect place for them from a lore standpoint. 50-100 vouchers for a 50 stone geode would be perfect.

My account for the most part is pretty loaded when it comes to currency, but transmute is the one place I struggle. I burned most of my stash last summer with all the jewelry transmuting and then took a bit of a hiatus. First thing I did when i got back was to put 10 toons on the boards for the 30 day campaign, and I feel like its not going to be enough. Haha