ZoS, We Need to Address the Mat Price Increase 2x-5x

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  • DaveMoeDee
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    Kwoung wrote: »
    Prices fluxuate, just look at everything XP potion related right now, the price on Aetherial Dust seemed to have capped at 650K last week, and looks to have plummeted into the 450K range now. The market is volatile and completely based on supply & demand, regardless of what all the conspiracy theorists feel.

    As for the gentleman above wondering about overland gear sets you can wear... Mothers Sorrow/Juliannos & Briarheat/Hundings. Both options Overland/Crafted and available to everyone, both setup capable of completing *all* content in ESO. Heck, I have seen 90K parses on MS/Juli!

    Rare mats will always plummet during Jubilee. So many drops.
  • JKorr
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    I agree with the original poster. Fortunately, I have a large supply of materials from years ago, but I try to imagine how a new player might deal with the current situation. I mean, imagine needing to come up with nearly 1 million gold for your first set of Gold-gear!

    Actually, inflation is worse then the original poster states. He remembers when Dreugh Wax was 6k. I bought 800 Dreugh Wax years ago for 2700 gold each (still have them), but now wax is selling for 16k or more! Up by a factor 6. Similar stories for items like Potent Nirncrux and Perfect Roe. And, of course, jewelry mats have always been high, but the blue mat used to be 4k and is now 16k to 20k!

    The value of gold-mats is now so high, it makes no sense to do Master Writs most of the time. Some folks do them just to get the XP, but I rarely do them because the value of the resulting Voucher is less than the value of the materials. (Also, the drop-rate of Master Writs and the average Vouchers per Writ are now significantly lower than when the Master Writ system first started.) I don't do any jewelry Master Writs anymore. And I don't do gold-level non-jewelry writs unless the voucher-value makes it worth it.

    Some folks have said inflation is all due to "supply and demand." I think not. I mean, that may be a part of it, but not the most important part.

    As others have explained, I think much of the inflation is being caused by price manipulation by folks (individuals and guilds) with huge amounts of gold and an understanding of how to manipulate the market and how to manipulate the listings on Tamriel Trade Centre.

    I suppose ZOS can (and has) made changes affecting the amount of materials and gold in the game. But what can ZOS do to control price manipulation? They could stop Crown-selling. But that's not going to happen. They could ban Tamriel Trade Center. But that's not going to happen. And how could they stop a rich player or guild from cornering the market on certain items by going to every guild trader and buying that item if it is below their target price? I can't think of a way.

    Yes, imagine doing something like.....farming mats while running around doing other things. Hypothetical new player doesn't want to do the refining to get the tempers? Raw mats sell too, in some cases better than refined ones.

    Know the outrageous price for cornflower? I've watched people run by it, and columbine, mushrooms, whatever and ignore it. If even half the people I've seen race past mats they could easily pick up would pick them up, supply would greatly increase.
  • Kwoung
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    DaveMoeDee wrote: »

    Rare mats will always plummet during Jubilee. So many drops.

    It's not just the rare mat drops, the diminished dusts you buy for vouchers are not selling as well either. Apparently the market for Mythic Ambrosia may have been saturated or demand for the product has waned, either way that has near instantly caused a market reversal. People can try to manipulate the market, even with some limited success occasionally, but in the end it is always supply vs demand. You can make the price as high as you want, until no one wants, needs or feels the price of the product is still worth it, at which point it just sits there, unsold.
  • Rex-Umbra
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    Prices on xbox are so low no one farms its a pointless waste of time theres 1000s of bots on the server at any given time zos does nothing about it which causes more people to make bots.
    Edited by Rex-Umbra on April 9, 2021 7:44PM
    Xbox GT: Rex Umbrah
    GM of IMPERIUM since 2015.
  • jaws343
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    Kwoung wrote: »

    It's not just the rare mat drops, the diminished dusts you buy for vouchers are not selling as well either. Apparently the market for Mythic Ambrosia may have been saturated or demand for the product has waned, either way that has near instantly caused a market reversal. People can try to manipulate the market, even with some limited success occasionally, but in the end it is always supply vs demand. You can make the price as high as you want, until no one wants, needs or feels the price of the product is still worth it, at which point it just sits there, unsold.

    The diminished dust prices have probably dropped due to the large amount of Master Writs being done which is flooding the market with diminished dust people are buying with the writ rewards.
  • remosito
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    jaws343 wrote: »

    The diminished dust prices have probably dropped due to the large amount of Master Writs being done which is flooding the market with diminished dust people are buying with the writ rewards.


    ambrosia prices and mats went through the roof. everybody wanted in on the gold rush. and created boatloads and bought diminished dust like crazy.

    alot of cp grinders bought pots upfront for fear prices would skyrocket even more. are grind burnt out. or have reached their cp goals.

    now market is oversaturated with pots and mats. somebody made 2for1 flash sale the ither day..

    basic supply and demand.
    ShutYerTrap (selectively mute NPC dialogues (stuga, companions); displayleads (antiquity leads location); UndauntedPledgeQueuer (small daily undaunted dungeon queuer window)
  • Jeremy
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    This is how economies work. Basic supply and demand.

    This game's economy does not function like a free economy. Supply is intentionally kept out of the market to artificially raise prices. That is literally how this game's market structure was designed. Add that to the use of addons to hawk the market and buy up competing prices and what you have is something more akin to how a cartel would operate. So you can't really apply the rules of supply and demand to this game's economy. It was deliberately designed to keep the demand high in proportion to its supply.
    Edited by Jeremy on April 9, 2021 9:23PM
  • ThorianB
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    Jeremy wrote: »

    This game's economy does not function like a free economy. Supply is intentionally kept out of the market to artificially raise prices. That is literally how this game's market structure was designed. Add that to the use of addons to hawk the market and buy up competing prices and what you have is something more akin to how a cartel would operate. So you can't really apply the rules of supply and demand to this game's economy. It was deliberately designed to keep the demand high in proportion to its supply.

    The player economy is a free market. I can set whatever price i want for anything i want to sell. People can either buy it for that price from me, pay a different price from someone else, or farm it themselves. That is about as free as you can get. What addons make the trading in game cartel like? What items have demand that is high in proportion to their supply?
  • Goregrinder
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    ThorianB wrote: »

    The player economy is a free market. I can set whatever price i want for anything i want to sell. People can either buy it for that price from me, pay a different price from someone else, or farm it themselves. That is about as free as you can get. What addons make the trading in game cartel like? What items have demand that is high in proportion to their supply?

    That's about as clear cut as it gets right there. Don't like the price of something? Farm it or build it yourself.
  • Jeremy
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    ThorianB wrote: »

    The player economy is a free market. I can set whatever price i want for anything i want to sell. People can either buy it for that price from me, pay a different price from someone else, or farm it themselves. That is about as free as you can get. What addons make the trading in game cartel like? What items have demand that is high in proportion to their supply?

    No they can't. Unless you belong to a trading guild in possession of a guild trader, you can't set the prices for anything. A free economy would be one that everyone could participate in and put up their goods for sale on the market no matter what guild they belong to. This was intentional, and done deliberately by the developers to keep prices artificially high by limiting the amount of supply coming into the market.

    The "cartel" element I alluded to comes into the picture when you consider that the more popular trading hubs are dominated by specific guilds who hawk the market and then buy out their competition so they can control prices. If this was actually a free economy the prices of materials would not be what they are now. That I can promise you.
    Edited by Jeremy on April 9, 2021 10:22PM
  • Jeremy
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    That's about as clear cut as it gets right there. Don't like the price of something? Farm it or build it yourself.

    That may be true. But it doesn't change the fact this game's economy is not free or driven solely by the law of supply and demand. If it was, prices would not be as high as they are.

    To be clear: I'm not trying to wholly bash the system. There are both good and bad things about this game's economy. I'm just not going to pretend it's a free market governed purely out of supply and demand or that it's not structured in such a way to benefit consortiums of rich players, when it clearly is.
    Edited by Jeremy on April 9, 2021 10:10PM
  • ThorianB
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    Jeremy wrote: »

    No they can't. Unless you belong to a trading guild in possession of a guild trader, you can't set the prices for anything. A free economy would be one that everyone could participate in and put up their goods for sale on the market no matter what guild they belong to. This was intentional, and done deliberately by the developers to keep prices artificially high by limiting the amount of supply coming into the market.

    The "cartel" element I alluded to comes into the picture when you consider that the more popular trading hubs are dominated by specific guilds who hawk the market and then buy out their competition so they can control prices. If this was actually a free economy the prices of materials would not be what they are now. That I can promise you.

    1) You don't need to be a trading guild to sell items. People sell stuff in zone chat all the time. You can post stuff for sale on TTC without being in a guild. You could make your own buy and sell discord. A trade guild is like storefront. Its a lot better to sell out of a store in a strip mall than it is out of your garage on Suburbia St.

    2) There is nothing stopping people from joining trade guilds but themselves. There is nothing stopping players from forming guilds and and securing their own trader if they don't like how any of the current trade guilds are run.

    3) Actually it wasn't to keep the prices artificially high. It was to create a healthy player economy. It is not hard for experienced traders like me to control and manipulate a centralized system. Not saying i would do it myself, but i have both the experience and skillset to control the market on an AH with relative ease and i am not uncommon in that skill and experience among serious traders. The ONLY thing keeping this market in a healthy competitive state is that it uses a fractured trader system that doesn't allow one person to stand at one NPC and continuously hoover up deals and set the prices higher.

    I have played dozens of games with an AH and not a single one of them had a player economy that was worth two ***. You end up with really high priced rare items controlled by traders/bots and noobs posting random junk and also penny wars. Only people who don't have a clue about player economies/markets think an central AH is a good thing. Eve Online has probably the best player economy in any game ever to exist. You want this economy to follow that one and fractured traders do that.

    4) Your cartel statement is a conspiracy theory. I am in those guilds in tops spots. I am also in second tier guilds and have been in guilds that got lucky to get in places like Firsthold and outlaw refuges and really random places. Ive sold stuff and made profits in.every.single.guild i have been in. Yes you can make more in those top spots than others but it typically cost more in activity or fees to be in those spots. Those aren't top spots because trade guilds have some secret mafia that dictates where the top spots are. Those are top spots because the cities appeal to players who want to shop where they hang out and they will pay stupid prices for items in those cities.

    Guess where a lot of the people in those spots get their supply? Lower tier traders. The people in those trade guilds in top spots know how to price stuff and know how to sell. That is why they are there selling incorrectly priced stuff off backwater traders. The people who post on traders in remote places have no clue what they are doing. I buy motif pages for 100 gold, Alloys for 200, I once bought 200 butterfly wings for 250 gold. And there are like 10-15 pages of items. My traders all run 50 plus pages of items. You can't make any money to afford a good trader if you can only fill 10-20 pages a week and half the stuff is way underpriced so it makes no money and the other half is way overpriced so it never sells.

    You want a trader in a good spot you have to earn it by being good at trading. You can't sell your flea market items in a mall next to Chanel, Armani, and Gucci stores. Top tier locations require players that sell hundreds of thousands to millions of gold worth of items weekly or buy a bucket load of raffle tickets. Just like in the real world you pay for location but you don't need a top location to sell. You just need to know how to properly price things and what to put on the market.

    Edit: Fixed some typos.
    Edited by ThorianB on April 9, 2021 11:45PM
  • Jeremy
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    ThorianB wrote: »

    1) You don't need to be a trading guild to sell items. People sell stuff in zone chat all the time. You can post stuff for sale on TTC without being in a guild. You could make your own buy and sell discord. A trade guild is like storefront. Its a lot better to sell out of a store in a strip mall than it is out of your garage on Suburbia St.

    2) There is nothing stopping people from joining trade guilds but themselves. There is nothing stopping players from forming guilds and and securing their own trader if they don't like how any of the current trade guilds are run.

    3) Actually it wasn't to keep the prices artificially high. It was to create a healthy player economy. It is not hard for experienced traders like me to control and manipulate a centralized system. Not saying i would do it myself, but i have both the experience and skillset to control the market on an AH with relative ease and i am not uncommon in that skill and experience among serious traders. The ONLY thing keeping this market in a healthy competitive state is that it uses a fractured trader system that doesn't allow one person to stand at one NPC and continuously hoover up deals and set the prices higher.

    I have played dozens of games with an AH and not a single one of them had a player economy that was worth two ***. You end up with really high priced rare items controlled by traders/bots and noobs posting random junk and also penny wars. Only people who don't have a clue about player economies/markets think an central AH is a good thing. Eve Online has probably the best player economy in any game every to exist. You want this economy to follow that one and fractured traders do that.

    4) Your cartel statement is a conspiracy theory. I am in those guilds in tops spots. I am also in second tier guilds and have been in guilds that got lucky to get in places like Firsthold and outlaw refuges and really random places. Ive sold stuff and made profits in.every.single.guild i have been in. Yes you can make more in those top spots than others but it typically cost more in activity or fees to be in those spots. Those aren't top spots because trade guilds have some secret mafia that dictates where the top spots are. Those are top spots because the cities appeal to players who want to shop where they hang out and they will pay stupid prices for items in those cities.

    Guess where a lot of the people in those spots get their supply? Lower tier traders. The people in those trade guilds in top spots know how to price stuff and know how to sell. That is why they are there selling incorrectly stuff off backwater traders. The people who post on traders in remote places have no clue what they are doing. I buy motif pages for 100 gold, Alloys for 200, I once bought 200 butterfly wings for 250 gold. And there are like 10-15 pages of items. My traders all run 50 plus pages of items. You can't make any money to afford a good trader if you can only fill 10-20 pages a week and half the stuff is way underpriced so it makes no money and the other half is way overpriced so it never sells.

    You want a trader in a good spot you have to earn it by being good at trading. You can't sell your flea market items in a mall next to Chanel, Armani, and Gucci stores. Top tier locations require players that sell hundreds of thousands to millions of gold worth of items weekly or buy a bucket load of raffle tickets. Just like in the real world you pay for location but you don't need a top location to sell. You just need to know how to properly price things and what to put on the market.

    I'll admit I only skimmed some of this, so I'll respond briefly (my time on here is short).

    Zone chat is not an effective way to sell items, and is no replacement for a guild trader. So I don't find that a convincing argument. But even if you believe otherwise, it still remains unequal access to the market as some players must rely on zone chat to sell while others do not. So it is still not a free market with equal access.

    In relation to my so-called "conspiracy" - I can assure it it is very much accurate to say guilds flip items on the market and then resell them at a higher value to keep prices high. I've seen it done myself. It is no conspiracy, trust me. It is a routine practice and you can go observe it taking place yourself by watching activity on Tamriel Market.

    And to once again reiterate the main thrust of my comment: the whole point of the guild trader system and why it was developed by the developers in the first place was to limit the supply flow into the market and thus keep prices artificially high. That was their stated goal (I read the post myself). So not only is this game's economy not based on supply and demand, but it was purposely designed to circumvent it.
    Edited by Jeremy on April 9, 2021 11:35PM
  • VaranisArano
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    Jeremy wrote: »

    I'll admit I only skimmed some of this, so I'll respond briefly (my time on here is short).

    Zone chat is not an effective way to sell items, and is no replacement for a guild trader. So I don't find that a convincing argument. But even if you believe otherwise, it still remains unequal access to the market as some players must rely on zone chat to sell while others do not. So it is still not a free market with equal access.

    In relation to my so-called "conspiracy" - I can assure it it is very much accurate to say guilds flip items on the market and then resell them at a higher value to keep prices high. I've seen it done myself. It is no conspiracy, trust me. It is a routine practice and you can go observe it taking place yourself by watching activity on Tamriel Market.

    And to once again reiterate the main thrust of my comment: the whole point of the guild trader system and why it was developed by the developers in the first place was to limit the supply flow into the market and thus keep prices artificially high. That was their stated goal (I read the post myself). So not only is this game's economy not based on supply and demand, but it was purposely designed to circumvent it.

    Perhaps you can point me to your source. The one I'm familiar with is talking about their desire to keep high level, desirable gear from flooding the market at cheap prices.

    That being said, you can still talk about supply and demand in the ESO economy.

    There's the supply of items on guild traders, which is not synonymous with the supply of the item across the whole game but is correlated to some degree. Certainly, demand applies regardless.

    Consider a common example when players complain about flipping: housing mats spike in price when ZOS releases a giant house as an event reward.

    Demand is crystal clear: lots and lots of players want housing mats in order to furnish their brand new giant house!

    Supply is predictably low. Why? Because, if you've done any amount of farming, you know that Housing materials drop in much lower quantities than regular materials. Plus, if you've done any Housing crafting, you know that most expensive ones like heartwood and mundane runes are needed for a lot of housing staples and nice-looking furnishings.

    What happens when ZOS releases a new house? Demand increases across the active playerbase. Supply is already pretty low, so players buy cheap and relist high, or if they were like me and stock up on housing mats to throw onto the market at exactly this moment, list high. And players buy at the high price. I literally can't keep mundane runes and Heartwood stocked in the my guild store when that rush in housing materials is going on. Even though players like me releasing our stock should bring down the price somewhat, demand is just so high. Moreover, the price only slowly comes down in the next months because so much of the available supply gets turned into furnishings, and that supply only slowly increases as players farm.

    The fact that ZOS has constructed the economy so that we're dealing with "the supply of a thing on guild traders" rather than "the complete supply of a thing throughout the whole game" doesn't invalidate that we absolutely CAN use supply/demand to evaluate the impact on pricing.


    But if you wanna talk about how ZOS keeps prices artificially high on materials, we really ought to discuss the giant materials sink that is the Crafting Bag. Players with the Crafting Bag don't have to sell their mats. They can just let them accumulate, constantly generating materials that don't enter the economy (until players who read the market dump their stock of housing mats or perfect roe/aetherial dust, etc.). Still, we can absolutely discuss this in terms of Supply/Demand. If ZOS wants to take in some of the supply of Mats, they run an ESO+ free trial. You know those free mats we're getting from the Anniversary Event boxes? Now recall that ZOS has run ESO+ trials at the end of the Anniversary Jubliee the last couple years. That's ZOS controlling Supply, and yes, we can evaluate the impact on pricing in conjuction with player demand.


    Side note: yes, players flip items and resell them at the going price in their guilds. It happens pretty frequently. I'll sell Potent Nirncrux for 25k and see it resold for 28-29k in Mournhold. Suggesting that these many, many traders are doing it as part of a "cartel" or that guilds are mandating the selling price of items in their guilds is where that strikes into conspiracy territory. Cartels aren't setting the price of Potent Nirncrux. Those sales are just a richer trader going "Hmm, that sells for 28-29k in MY guild store, let me buy cheap and sell high." And as long as players are buying at 28-29k, the demand is there to match that price.
    Edited by VaranisArano on April 10, 2021 12:13AM
  • kargen27
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    Jeremy wrote: »

    No they can't. Unless you belong to a trading guild in possession of a guild trader, you can't set the prices for anything. A free economy would be one that everyone could participate in and put up their goods for sale on the market no matter what guild they belong to. This was intentional, and done deliberately by the developers to keep prices artificially high by limiting the amount of supply coming into the market.

    The "cartel" element I alluded to comes into the picture when you consider that the more popular trading hubs are dominated by specific guilds who hawk the market and then buy out their competition so they can control prices. If this was actually a free economy the prices of materials would not be what they are now. That I can promise you.

    If your guild doesn't have a trader you can still sell to other members in your guild. Not in a guild and you can sell in zone. I see a lot of players doing that. Want to sell more I also see trade guilds advertising for members almost nightly. The guild finder tool lists all kinds of trade guilds that are not near capacity. No trade guild I have ever been in has dictated prices to me.
    There is not a limited supply set by ZOS on any item in the game as everything sold in game can be obtained in game by any player willing and able. The supply is dictated by player behavior. ZoS can influence that behavior and does so through events. If ZoS announced for the next week fishing has a rare chance of dropping a unique home as reward prices on Perfect Roe would plummet. More players would fish meaning more supply. Simple as that.

    There are over 200 guild traders in the game. No cartel is able to monitor all 200 even with add-ons. What players can do and have done is anticipate an increase in demand. Players that get on the PTS gain an advantage in this area as they have an idea of how the changes on that server will affect the game when it goes live.

    Prices of materials are where they are now for a variety of reasons. More players crafting for the current event. Players that PvP golding out gear they were not worried about making gold when they thought the proc change was just two weeks. New CP has some players rethinking sets they use. Less players farming as they take part in back to back events.

    We have a fluid, vibrant and strong economy that every player can participate in on some level. Players willing to put more time into trading will get more out of it just like every other aspect of the game. Prices on materials will eventually drop. It takes some time though. Items stay in the store for thirty days. Players are sometimes reluctant to take items out of the store that are not selling. Other players might see those prices and list their stuff at or slightly below keeping them in for another thirty days. A few months out everybody figures out hey the price is way to high and down it comes. I see that happen often. That is why I plan my sales six to eight months out on a lot of items.
    and then the parrot said, "must be the water mines green too."
  • ThorianB
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    Jeremy wrote: »

    I'll admit I only skimmed some of this, so I'll respond briefly (my time on here is short).

    Zone chat is not an effective way to sell items, and is no replacement for a guild trader. So I don't find that a convincing argument. But even if you believe otherwise, it still remains unequal access to the market as some players must rely on zone chat to sell while others do not. So it is still not a free market with equal access.

    In relation to my so-called "conspiracy" - I can assure it it is very much accurate to say guilds flip items on the market and then resell them at a higher value to keep prices high. I've seen it done myself. It is no conspiracy, trust me. It is a routine practice and you can go observe it taking place yourself by watching activity on Tamriel Market.

    And to once again reiterate the main thrust of my comment: the whole point of the guild trader system and why it was developed by the developers in the first place was to limit the supply flow into the market and thus keep prices artificially high. That was their stated goal (I read the post myself). So not only is this game's economy not based on supply and demand, but it was purposely designed to circumvent it.

    I was telling you all the options you have in this free market system. Using the analogy in my previous post: Selling out of your garage on Suburbia St is going to be the cheaper option. If you want to sell in the strip mall... well got to pay strip mall rent. It is not hard to get into a trade guild and it is not hard to get in one that doesn't charge any dues. 90% of the trade guilds i have been in didn't/don't charge me fees or have minimum requirements. And two of the current ones i am in are consistently in top 10 trading locations and always have a trader. So all of that is in your head.

    As for your conspiracy- No traders, like me, pull incorrectly priced items off the market and sell them for a profit at the correct price. It's not some conspiracy we have going about artificially keeping prices high. We see item X on the market for 150 gold. We know we can sell item X on our trader for 750 gold. We buy item X for 150 gold and sell it for 750 gold. The motivation behind this trade is not to keep item X at a certain price, it's to make a profit on flipping. I already stated that a lot of top tier traders bargain shop at other locations. This happens daily in the real world market. Person A will part with an item for X. Person B sees the item and knows they can get Y for it. Person B buy the item from Person A for X then sells it for Y and makes Z profit on the trade. Welcome to the free market system.

    Link the post you are talking about from the developers. This trader system is to keep players from manipulating the market to such a degree it ruins the market. It allows for fair trade based on supply and demand. If such a post exists, i think you misinterpreted it's meaning. And yes all of this sounds like a conspiracy theory based on how you want to look at the information.
  • kargen27
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    "In relation to my so-called "conspiracy" - I can assure it it is very much accurate to say guilds flip items on the market and then resell them at a higher value to keep prices high. I've seen it done myself. It is no conspiracy, trust me."

    Players flip items. Guilds do not flip items. Guilds provide an outlet through a trader that allows players one way to sell those items.
    and then the parrot said, "must be the water mines green too."
  • AlnilamE
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    Jeremy wrote: »

    No they can't. Unless you belong to a trading guild in possession of a guild trader, you can't set the prices for anything. A free economy would be one that everyone could participate in and put up their goods for sale on the market no matter what guild they belong to. This was intentional, and done deliberately by the developers to keep prices artificially high by limiting the amount of supply coming into the market.

    The "cartel" element I alluded to comes into the picture when you consider that the more popular trading hubs are dominated by specific guilds who hawk the market and then buy out their competition so they can control prices. If this was actually a free economy the prices of materials would not be what they are now. That I can promise you.

    This is not Black Desert Online, where you can't trade directly with another player, outside of giving them some basic potions and food.

    People buy and sell in Zone all the time. If that wasn't effective, they wouldn't do it.

    Players do what works.
    The Moot Councillor
  • Kiralyn2000
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    ThorianB wrote: »
    Only people who don't have a clue about player economies/markets think an central AH is a good thing.

    I don't care about "player economies/markets". I just want to sell stuff, with low effort, with low volume. (i.e, I'm not a "trader", I'm just a player who would periodically like to sell something).

    In an AH system, I can do this - on some random day, I have one or two items that might be worth something, so I can throw them on the AH for a slight undercut (having looked at the AH to see the price; as opposed to having to have addons to poll sales across many vendors), and sell them quick. Total time/effort - a minute or two.

    I don't sell enough volume to bother belonging to a trading guild, and I'm not going to stand in chat yelling "<_____> for sale!" for who knows how long, and dealing with some number of /whisper conversations. A few more gold isn't worth all that hassle.

    So I just vendor or delete 95% of the drops I get from the game, that I don't personally use. Which, as Jeremy mentioned, helps keep prices high by keeping supply out of the market. Every copy of a motif/recipe/etc that I (and everyone like me) just throws away, keeps supply down to keep prices higher for the people who are willing to jump through the hoops of this game's system.


    Now, if that's what you mean by "maintaining a healthy economy"... then, yeah. This system is set up to do that. But it does it by making it hard for most players to actually participate in said economy.


    tl;dr - games with an AH, I actually interact with the 'economy'. This game, I don't bother, because they made it annoying & tedious for anyone who doesn't enjoy Trading as an activity.
    Edited by Kiralyn2000 on April 10, 2021 2:57AM
  • Dunning_Kruger
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    We know.
    Edited by Dunning_Kruger on April 10, 2021 3:00AM
    ____________________________________
    A G G R O - the legendary stamplar GM of <HALL MONITORS>

    For the Queen bby
  • ThorianB
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    I don't care about "player economies/markets". I just want to sell stuff, with low effort, with low volume. (i.e, I'm not a "trader", I'm just a player who would periodically like to sell something).

    In an AH system, I can do this - on some random day, I have one or two items that might be worth something, so I can throw them on the AH for a slight undercut (having looked at the AH to see the price; as opposed to having to have addons to poll sales across many vendors), and sell them quick. Total time/effort - a minute or two.

    I don't sell enough volume to bother belonging to a trading guild, and I'm not going to stand in chat yelling "<_____> for sale!" for who knows how long, and dealing with some number of /whisper conversations. A few more gold isn't worth all that hassle.

    So I just vendor or delete 95% of the drops I get from the game, that I don't personally use. Which, as Jeremy mentioned, helps keep prices high by keeping supply out of the market. Every copy of a motif/recipe/etc that I (and everyone like me) just throws away, keeps supply down to keep prices higher for the people who are willing to jump through the hoops of this game's system.


    Now, if that's what you mean by "maintaining a healthy economy"... then, yeah. This system is set up to do that. But it does it by making it hard for most players to actually participate in said economy.


    tl;dr - games with an AH, I actually interact with the 'economy'. This game, I don't bother, because they made it annoying & tedious for anyone who doesn't enjoy Trading as an activity.

    It is low effort to sell stuff. You stand at any banker and put things on a guild store for the price you want them. It is literally as easy as an AH. Every single part of the process is the same. The only difference is you have to join a guild that has enough members to post items. It doesn't need to be a trade guild, they don't need a trader. The function you want is there and take no more effort than an AH.Traders, like me, buy off guild stores without traders all the time. Its a great place to get exclusive deals that at most only 498 other people will have access to.

    The function and the ease is there, you just have to be willing to put the same effort into it that you put into an AH.
  • VaranisArano
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    Nvm.
    Edited by VaranisArano on April 10, 2021 4:01AM
  • Adenoma
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    To preface this, I belong to just one, near top-tier trading guild. I can hit my premiums just listing intricate items everyday or by selling gold mats. I do my writs on 8 characters which takes 30 minutes in Vivec. I’ve been selling gold mats because I’ve already made all the weapons I need gold and there aren’t huge returns on gold armor (like 3-5% upgrade for enormous investment). I predominately PvP, so from a trading perspective, total amateur.

    There is no cartel. Beyond certain items, it would be very difficult to price fix. I can pop around to traders using TTC and buy all sorts of stuff (tempers, was, svarra’s heavy/light armor) at will and get under-costed prices. I repeat, there is no cartel.

    Yes, things geared towards improvement are over-costed at present, but price fixing on gold materials is too large of a scale to reasonably fix. Even for big guilds, this requires multiple billions of gold. Motifs are dropping in price and despite that, just logging in and doing random normals for CP grind (fake tank, lol), I’ve made probably 20+ million selling gold mats and motifs. This is the best possible economy I can dream of and people that are advocating for a global auction house or any revision to the current globalized system are simply ignorant to the current system of supply and demand.
    Adenoma-Badenoma-Sadenoma
  • JKorr
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    Jeremy wrote: »

    This game's economy does not function like a free economy. Supply is intentionally kept out of the market to artificially raise prices. That is literally how this game's market structure was designed. Add that to the use of addons to hawk the market and buy up competing prices and what you have is something more akin to how a cartel would operate. So you can't really apply the rules of supply and demand to this game's economy. It was deliberately designed to keep the demand high in proportion to its supply.

    You do realize not everyone uses the addons? One addon only tracks prices in your own guilds. The other one only works if you actually upload the information to it. If you don't, then it doesn't track anything.

    Hate to break it to you, but some players don't want to farm mats....until the prices are high enough its worth the effort for them. They do farm, and sell, and the added mats in the supply chain, because people set the prices they want to set, drop the prices and fulfill the demand.
  • Kwoung
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    I love how people keep saying "guilds" are setting the prices, buying up stuff, etc... You do realize that a guild is 500 individuals, who are basically all in competition with each other. never mind the fact that is neigh impossible to tell 500 random people with differing motivations what to do... Guilds can't buy, sell or set prices on anything, as has been said a ton of times... Only individual *players* can.

    BTW, there is a reason you see the same 30 something guilds in all the top spots, it is because it is incredibly hard to run a guild capable of generating enough income to consistently do it. My guild has a decent enough trader for our needs in an outlaw refuge, and that alone is enough stress, competition and flat out work both in and out of game to make that happen for my tastes. I probably could, but have zero desire to build my guild to the point where we could afford to bid and keep one of those big city spots, I refuse to put that much "work" into a game and my members are quite happy with having the one we have. We are a social newbie based guild that runs trailing trials, has outfitted many a new player in their first real set of armor and our Discord is all about helping each other, and getting better and succeeding at the game, we are not a trade guild at all. I am aware of many other guilds like mine as well, so quite bluntly, you don't need to even be in a trade guild to have access to a public trader, which puts a huge hole in the whole "you have to join a trade guild" statements.

    Also, I have been playing for a while and have noticed those "top" guilds in Mournhold, are not all the same ones as last year, or even last month or last week for that matter. So it really isn't the same guilds at all there consistently... Trade guilds come and go, succeed and fail... just like every other type of guild in the game.
  • ThorianB
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    Kwoung wrote: »
    I love how people keep saying "guilds" are setting the prices, buying up stuff, etc... You do realize that a guild is 500 individuals, who are basically all in competition with each other. never mind the fact that is neigh impossible to tell 500 random people with differing motivations what to do... Guilds can't buy, sell or set prices on anything, as has been said a ton of times... Only individual *players* can.

    BTW, there is a reason you see the same 30 something guilds in all the top spots, it is because it is incredibly hard to run a guild capable of generating enough income to consistently do it. My guild has a decent enough trader for our needs in an outlaw refuge, and that alone is enough stress, competition and flat out work both in and out of game to make that happen for my tastes. I probably could, but have zero desire to build my guild to the point where we could afford to bid and keep one of those big city spots, I refuse to put that much "work" into a game and my members are quite happy with having the one we have. We are a social newbie based guild that runs trailing trials, has outfitted many a new player in their first real set of armor and our Discord is all about helping each other, and getting better and succeeding at the game, we are not a trade guild at all. I am aware of many other guilds like mine as well, so quite bluntly, you don't need to even be in a trade guild to have access to a public trader, which puts a huge hole in the whole "you have to join a trade guild" statements.

    Also, I have been playing for a while and have noticed those "top" guilds in Mournhold, are not all the same ones as last year, or even last month or last week for that matter. So it really isn't the same guilds at all there consistently... Trade guilds come and go, succeed and fail... just like every other type of guild in the game.

    I am in a guild that 18-24 months ago use to secure the same trader in mournhold every week. We held that trader successfully for about 9 months. We started to struggle to keep it and that led us to a period in which we secured random traders. Some of those were low tier and a few weeks we went without a trader at all. We finally started to stabilize and have had a trader every week for the last year or so but we will move between vivec, wayrest, elden root, rawl, and belkarth. We have held the same exact trader for about 2 months now but that doesn't mean we will have it next week.

    Like you, i see changes to trader owners in Mournhold, Vivec, Alinor, and Elden Root regularly.
  • Sylvermynx
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    The most annoying thing is that over three years I have developed a fondness for certain guilds (three in particular) who always used to be in Vivec - and now they're not reliably IN Vivec any more. I actually don't know how to find them without spending all my time running around multiple cities instead of y'know, just playing the game (I don't spend my game time in cities outside of doing writs on my mains in Vivec).

    Most of the traders in Vivec now are.... not guilds I want to buy from. WAY too expensive for the most part, and they're mostly guilds I used to see in Mournhold (where I wouldn't buy from them there either). Fortunately, I don't need a whole lot from traders....
  • JKorr
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    Kwoung wrote: »
    I love how people keep saying "guilds" are setting the prices, buying up stuff, etc... You do realize that a guild is 500 individuals, who are basically all in competition with each other. never mind the fact that is neigh impossible to tell 500 random people with differing motivations what to do... Guilds can't buy, sell or set prices on anything, as has been said a ton of times... Only individual *players* can.

    BTW, there is a reason you see the same 30 something guilds in all the top spots, it is because it is incredibly hard to run a guild capable of generating enough income to consistently do it. My guild has a decent enough trader for our needs in an outlaw refuge, and that alone is enough stress, competition and flat out work both in and out of game to make that happen for my tastes. I probably could, but have zero desire to build my guild to the point where we could afford to bid and keep one of those big city spots, I refuse to put that much "work" into a game and my members are quite happy with having the one we have. We are a social newbie based guild that runs trailing trials, has outfitted many a new player in their first real set of armor and our Discord is all about helping each other, and getting better and succeeding at the game, we are not a trade guild at all. I am aware of many other guilds like mine as well, so quite bluntly, you don't need to even be in a trade guild to have access to a public trader, which puts a huge hole in the whole "you have to join a trade guild" statements.

    Also, I have been playing for a while and have noticed those "top" guilds in Mournhold, are not all the same ones as last year, or even last month or last week for that matter. So it really isn't the same guilds at all there consistently... Trade guilds come and go, succeed and fail... just like every other type of guild in the game.

    If people who have their own agendas don't try to "prove" that some sort of criminal cartel is manipulating prices and trade their constant pleading for an auction house that would be much easier to manipulate and control would fall on even deafer ears.

    ALL TRADING GUILDS DEMAND ELEBENTY BILLION GOLD DUES a WEEK. Except players post dozens of guilds that charge low to no dues. ALL TRADING GUILDS DEMAND ELEBENTY BILLION SALES A WEEK Except players post dozens of guilds that have low to no sales requirements. YOU HAVE TO JOIN A TRADING GUILD BECAUSE ONLY HIGH-END GUILDS GET TRADERS. Except players post dozens of casual social guilds that consistently get traders. If the "Guilds set prices" people repeat the same lines over and over someone who doesn't check things might believe them.

    Another statement was going around at one point. All Guild masters were absolutely swimming in gold the scammed from guild members because hub traders cost next to nothing to win. A group decided to "prove" their lie was fact by taking over the traders in Rawlkha. The leader of the group tried to claim they won all the traders in Rawlkha for several thousand gold. Which was promptly blown out of the water when a GM, fed up with the lies and misinformation posted her LOSING bid, for almost 23 million, for one trader.

    Apparently some people believe if you repeat a statement often enough people will believe it, even when there is evidence to the contrary.
    Edited by JKorr on April 10, 2021 3:46PM
  • GreenHere
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    Sylvermynx wrote: »
    The most annoying thing is that over three years I have developed a fondness for certain guilds (three in particular) who always used to be in Vivec - and now they're not reliably IN Vivec any more. I actually don't know how to find them without spending all my time running around multiple cities instead of y'know, just playing the game (I don't spend my game time in cities outside of doing writs on my mains in Vivec).

    Most of the traders in Vivec now are.... not guilds I want to buy from. WAY too expensive for the most part, and they're mostly guilds I used to see in Mournhold (where I wouldn't buy from them there either). Fortunately, I don't need a whole lot from traders....

    Out of sheer curiosity, may I ask what makes you prefer or dislike buying from certain trade guilds @Sylvermynx ? Just pricing?

    The only ones I've ever actively avoided are ones with somehow offensive names. :P
  • AlnilamE
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    Sylvermynx wrote: »
    The most annoying thing is that over three years I have developed a fondness for certain guilds (three in particular) who always used to be in Vivec - and now they're not reliably IN Vivec any more. I actually don't know how to find them without spending all my time running around multiple cities instead of y'know, just playing the game (I don't spend my game time in cities outside of doing writs on my mains in Vivec).

    Most of the traders in Vivec now are.... not guilds I want to buy from. WAY too expensive for the most part, and they're mostly guilds I used to see in Mournhold (where I wouldn't buy from them there either). Fortunately, I don't need a whole lot from traders....

    If you want to let me know which guilds those are, I can keep an eye out. I do trader bids for my social guild and I also hop around a lot shopping for motifs, so I'm sure I'll find them.
    The Moot Councillor
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