Gold for Crowns (not free). Hear me out.

Vhozek

What if there's a place in the shop that players can sell Crowns for gold?
Player A buys Crowns and puts them up for sale in the store.
Player B pays gold for however many Crowns its worth.
Player A gets the gold.
The player selling the Crowns set the value so there's no such thing as worrying about inflation because the players will always adjust their values on their own.
Zeni still makes their money, probably even more since there's a new reason to buy Crowns and people who either have no money or don't want to spend their money on Crowns can just purchase them from people who already did, but with ingame gold.
Expanded accessibility of content if you ask me.

Players with no money are essentially playing for free. This opens the possibility for them to spend money in some way, increasing the amount of players buying from the shop. Free for them but not free for those who were willing to buy Crowns and sell them for gold.

Why not? What are the downsides?
There's no way it's illegal, right? Is it?

I_killed_Vivec

Off the top of my head....

1. It is essentially selling in game gold for cash, not a good look.

2. It would be a nightmare setting the exchange rate - is it constant, despite the in-game inflation? Do you vary it, if so based on what criteria?

3. There are people in the game with literally billions of gold, who could corner the market in crowns without even denting their reserves!

Deathgiggle

Doesn't that already happen? I see people offering gold for crowns all the time. In fact there is even a Discord service that advertises safe transactions. I think this is why you can't gift crown crates anymore. I'm pretty sure the gold for crowns buyers a used the system.

Dagoth_Rac

Deathgiggle wrote: »

Doesn't that already happen? I see people offering gold for crowns all the time. In fact there is even a Discord service that advertises safe transactions. I think this is why you can't gift crown crates anymore. I'm pretty sure the gold for crowns buyers a used the system.

ZOS 100% openly supports those services. The gifting crowns things seems to be related to legal issues, probably that some countries have laws against gamble boxes and gifting crates makes it harder to implement those restrictions. If you are in a country that outlaws gamble boxes, can you still gift them to someone in another country? Vice versa? It definitely seems to be a crate thing and so almost certainly a gambling regulations thing, but not a gifting in general thing. You can still gift non-gambling items.

I think the crowns for gold thing, but only in a roundabout way via gifting, is kind of like addons. ZOS support addons, and many addons implement desired functionality, but ZOS don't want to be in the position of having to put too much time and money and resources into maintaining that stuff. If people want it badly enough, here are the tools to do it yourselves.

valenwood_vegan

This already exists, unofficially (but ZoS allows it to occur) - players make these sorts of deals all the time and there are discords to facilitate crown buyers and sellers finding each other.

An official in-game UI of some kind... would be a nice improvement and would greatly reduce the risk of getting scammed in these transactions.

An official in-game crown market, if that's what OP is asking for, seems a bit more complicated and may cause some unforseen issues... may have some interesting effects on crown for gold prices... may cause a substantial increase in gold-bot-farming and black market gold for RL cash deals... there may be reasons why ZoS wants to stay somewhat "hands off" in regard to these transactions... perhaps the more directly involved they are, the more legal issues may arise. Or they may just think it's not worth the dev time. I'm not sure.

There's already been some kind of issue, about which we haven't been given much information. that caused crown crate gifting to be disabled for months now. But then maybe a more official trading system would be a way to resolve that issue. Hard to say.

At the very least some kind of crown trading UI would be nice and could probably be implemented more quickly.

Vhozek

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

Off the top of my head....

1. It is essentially selling in game gold for cash, not a good look.

2. It would be a nightmare setting the exchange rate - is it constant, despite the in-game inflation? Do you vary it, if so based on what criteria?

3. There are people in the game with literally billions of gold, who could corner the market in crowns without even denting their reserves!

The Crown sellers call the price and if nobody wants to buy from them, then people buy from the other person.
Also, how much worse can a company with the goal to make money look by trying to make more money? It's not like it's child labor.
If anything, it's a positive look. Allowing the players to buy from their shop essentially with the ingame currency and without losing any money doing it since those Crowns come from somewhere.
It makes them even more money since it opens the market to people with no money and the people with money are the ones spending theirs to provide the Crowns.

If you think about it, it compliments low income and high income players.
People with the time to make gold have no money.
People without the time to make gold have money because they're working.
It's similar to "I wanna get home and relax" type of deal. They get home, collect the gold from their crown sells, don't have to make that gold anymore.
It plays perfectly into the philosophy around these games these days.

tmbrinks

I would love if ZoS would implement an in-game crown:gold trading system.

There aren't any real world issues.. since both crowns and gold have "zero" real world value once they have been converted in game, which is why the exchange of gifts from the crown store for in-game gold is allowed, since they are both in-game currencies.

Crowns should be a currency that can be traded in a trade window just like other items in the game. You click on crowns put them into the window (say 2000 of them), and when the person puts the agreed upon amount in gold, you both accept and they are transferred.

Regional restrictions for the purchase of crown crates would still apply, since the buyer would then have to use the crown store to purchase, and those items are region locked.

Tandor

I'd much prefer it if ZOS banned all Crown/gold transactions. All they do is inflate the prices that ZOS charge in the Crown Store because they know that players can use the millions of gold they get from the trading system to subsidise their cosmetic purchases.

Necrotech_Master

Tandor wrote: »

I'd much prefer it if ZOS banned all Crown/gold transactions. All they do is inflate the prices that ZOS charge in the Crown Store because they know that players can use the millions of gold they get from the trading system to subsidise their cosmetic purchases.

i dont necessarily think this is a reason, as someone is still paying real money for the crowns

but i do agree that everything in the crown store is aggressively overpriced and needs to be slashed at a minimum in half of what they are

Kiyonami

Tandor wrote: »

I'd much prefer it if ZOS banned all Crown/gold transactions. All they do is inflate the prices that ZOS charge in the Crown Store because they know that players can use the millions of gold they get from the trading system to subsidise their cosmetic purchases.

For some players, this is the only way to buy DLC/Chapters. They don't have the ability to pay directly for Crowns. Do not forget that in some countries they live on 200-300 USD per month. If you remove the ability to exchange Crowns to Gold, these players will be separated by Paywall.

Vhozek

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

Tandor wrote: »

I'd much prefer it if ZOS banned all Crown/gold transactions. All they do is inflate the prices that ZOS charge in the Crown Store because they know that players can use the millions of gold they get from the trading system to subsidise their cosmetic purchases.

i dont necessarily think this is a reason, as someone is still paying real money for the crowns

but i do agree that everything in the crown store is aggressively overpriced and needs to be slashed at a minimum in half of what they are

There's far too many things that are like 3000 crowns that do not seem they need to be 3000 crowns.
It makes me wonder just how many resources they're using to develop that purchasable content for it to justify that price. A banker is not worth half of a whole expansion.

Vhozek

Kiyonami wrote: »

Tandor wrote: »

I'd much prefer it if ZOS banned all Crown/gold transactions. All they do is inflate the prices that ZOS charge in the Crown Store because they know that players can use the millions of gold they get from the trading system to subsidise their cosmetic purchases.

For some players, this is the only way to buy DLC/Chapters. They don't have the ability to pay directly for Crowns. Do not forget that in some countries they live on 200-300 USD per month. If you remove the ability to exchange Crowns to Gold, these players will be separated by Paywall.

Some people also get paid cash and/or flatout refuse to get a card, even if it's temporary. Not even pre-paid cards for their platform.
They might think about it but later on decide not to cause they're too lazy and it's easier to just get home and play a game, maybe a different game even.

Kendaric

Doesn't STO (Star Trek online) use something like this?

Basically an exchange where you can buy their premium currency for some sort of in-game currency.

Amottica

Vhozek wrote: »

The player selling the Crowns set the value so there's no such thing as worrying about inflation because the players will always adjust their values on their own.

Having a central point where we can trade crowns and gold between players works well in other games and is a much healthier design than what we have in ESO.

However, in games I have played that had such a design the price adjusted in a manner we could not see directly but was based on supply and demand. A fixed price, as is suggested, would lead to a failure of the system since the price of the crowns to high and no one will buy them, too low and players will not sell them. This is life since real-world money is involved.

Set the price based on supply-demand and the price will balance out to the point that people are willing to point that enough people will decide to part with their real-world money and enough are willing to part with their in-game gold.

That is the only way it would work well.

Amottica

Deathgiggle wrote: »

Doesn't that already happen? I see people offering gold for crowns all the time. In fact there is even a Discord service that advertises safe transactions. I think this is why you can't gift crown crates anymore. I'm pretty sure the gold for crowns buyers a used the system.

@Deathgiggle

Zenimax is not eliminating the ability to gift crates. They have indicated many times in the thread pinned to the Dev Tracker they are investigating why they cannot be gifted anymore. They have also stated in that thread, very clearly, that they are not getting rid of crate gifting.

There is a long history of Zenimax communication concerning the issue and it also seems to be specific to PC. So this issue is not relevant to what is being suggested, which is a formal system that is not as ripe for scammers taking advantage of players in general trading of crowns.

shadyjane62

WoW has a great system for converting gold to tokens then tokens can be used to pay for sub. Every single day I hear a sad story of some new person being scammed. If Zos is not willing to deal with the scammers, they should offer an alternative.

Ten years of this... sheesh!

katanagirl1

Would be a nice addition, I can never find a trusted Crown seller when I need to buy something.

virtus753

Amottica wrote: »

Deathgiggle wrote: »

Doesn't that already happen? I see people offering gold for crowns all the time. In fact there is even a Discord service that advertises safe transactions. I think this is why you can't gift crown crates anymore. I'm pretty sure the gold for crowns buyers a used the system.

@Deathgiggle

Zenimax is not eliminating the ability to gift crates. They have indicated many times in the thread pinned to the Dev Tracker they are investigating why they cannot be gifted anymore. They have also stated in that thread, very clearly, that they are not getting rid of crate gifting.

There is a long history of Zenimax communication concerning the issue and it also seems to be specific to PC. So this issue is not relevant to what is being suggested, which is a formal system that is not as ripe for scammers taking advantage of players in general trading of crowns.

They know and have publicly stated why the crates can't be gifted anymore: they turned it off to prevent fraud. They are investigating how to offer crown crate gifting while preventing that fraud. It "primarily" - but not exclusively - impacts PC, hence why they haven't turned it off for other platforms. They are developing a "program" to allow for crown crate gifting in the future on PC.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/7893060/#Comment_7893060

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/7898187#Comment_7898187

Luckylancer

I have a guide for any trifecta achievment, all dungeon and trial perfected gear.

1. Get a real world job
2. Buy crowns with $
3. Sell crowns for gold
4. Buy trial/dungeon runs
5. Unlock anything and everything you want except solo arena achievments and items.

Amottica

shadyjane62 wrote: »

WoW has a great system for converting gold to tokens then tokens can be used to pay for sub. Every single day I hear a sad story of some new person being scammed. If Zos is not willing to deal with the scammers, they should offer an alternative.

Ten years of this... sheesh!

Gold trading has not been available for anywhere near 10 years.

But I agree. Zenimax is well aware that trading directly between players is open to scamming which means the gold/crown trading is ripe for scamming.

With far superior examples in many games, it is surprising that our current gold-to-crown trading system is so substandard.

Braffin

Kendaric wrote: »

Doesn't STO (Star Trek online) use something like this?

Basically an exchange where you can buy their premium currency for some sort of in-game currency.

Yes, cryptic games is using this method in STO as well as Neverwinter. The prices are set by players, similar to crown/gold trading in eso, but the company ensures a clean transaction.

chessalavakia_ESO

You would hit some risk that it might mess up the economy further.

While making it easier would potentially increase the supply as some people may be afraid to sell/not want to bother, it would also significantly impact the demand.

For example, I've got a bit over 8 million gold at the present. I'm not actively looking to buy crowns at the moment because I'm not sure what I want most at the moment but, if it was easier and lower risk I'd convert virtually all of it over and I'm less wealthy than many other players. I'd expect that you would see the Crown price surge which might drive the cost of goods higher.

You could end up in the SWTOR position where most normal gameplay doesn't produce anywhere near enough money to buy much of anything from players and you either spend IRL $ or forget about dealing with the player economy.

Kiralyn2000

Kendaric wrote: »

Doesn't STO (Star Trek online) use something like this?

Basically an exchange where you can buy their premium currency for some sort of in-game currency.

Yep, and it's been great for f2p players for a long time. Only current problem is that the exchange rate has gone to the dogs (it's been pegged to the maximum allowed for quite awhile), because they haven't done a good job of keeping enough reasons to want both currencies.


(another point about the Star Trek exchange is that it trades "crowns" for another limited currency that you can farm in-game, but only a limited amount each day. Rather than gold/credits which you can generate infinitely.)

NoSoup

Personally I think the game should just allow you to buy crowns with in game gold. Sure it will never happen as it chews into their cash flows but it would work wonders for the game economy. Currently we don't have big enough effective gold sinks, so each year the total gold in the game is growing massively leading to the stupidly high prices. These stupidly high prices affect new players the most and would be a huge put off to new players.

GooGa592

Judging by the crown crate gifting thread this is not a system ZOS would ever implement, at least not on PC.

Vhozek

GooGa592 wrote: »

Judging by the crown crate gifting thread this is not a system ZOS would ever implement, at least not on PC.

Well the fact that they can add it on separate regions/servers rules out any argument anyone could have against the idea due to foreign countries seeing it as illegal.
ZOS could just not include it in those countries.

Deathgiggle

Amottica wrote: »

Deathgiggle wrote: »

Doesn't that already happen? I see people offering gold for crowns all the time. In fact there is even a Discord service that advertises safe transactions. I think this is why you can't gift crown crates anymore. I'm pretty sure the gold for crowns buyers a used the system.

@Deathgiggle

Zenimax is not eliminating the ability to gift crates. They have indicated many times in the thread pinned to the Dev Tracker they are investigating why they cannot be gifted anymore. They have also stated in that thread, very clearly, that they are not getting rid of crate gifting.

There is a long history of Zenimax communication concerning the issue and it also seems to be specific to PC. So this issue is not relevant to what is being suggested, which is a formal system that is not as ripe for scammers taking advantage of players in general trading of crowns.

I think you missed a post! They did say that crates were being gifted in a manner that was not intended by them! Sounds like fraud to me!

Amottica

Deathgiggle wrote: »

Amottica wrote: »

Deathgiggle wrote: »

Doesn't that already happen? I see people offering gold for crowns all the time. In fact there is even a Discord service that advertises safe transactions. I think this is why you can't gift crown crates anymore. I'm pretty sure the gold for crowns buyers a used the system.

@Deathgiggle

Zenimax is not eliminating the ability to gift crates. They have indicated many times in the thread pinned to the Dev Tracker they are investigating why they cannot be gifted anymore. They have also stated in that thread, very clearly, that they are not getting rid of crate gifting.

There is a long history of Zenimax communication concerning the issue and it also seems to be specific to PC. So this issue is not relevant to what is being suggested, which is a formal system that is not as ripe for scammers taking advantage of players in general trading of crowns.

I think you missed a post! They did say that crates were being gifted in a manner that was not intended by them! Sounds like fraud to me!

If you are speaking to the posts Zenimax has made in the related thread they tagged in the Dev Tracker section then I have not missed any posts. I have read every single one of them. I kept my reply to your previous comment here germaine to your comment. I saw no reason to hash out everything Zenimax has said concerning the current crown gifting issue on PC.

Haenk

I assume the problem is with stolen credit cards - buy crowns, trade for gold, sell gold via sketchy online "shop".

A simple solution would be a hard limit for transactions and some reputation system, i.e. account has to be older than 6 months or something like that.

RhinoDemise

Kendaric wrote: »

Doesn't STO (Star Trek online) use something like this?

Basically an exchange where you can buy their premium currency for some sort of in-game currency.

Warframe allows you to trade items for platinum (their in game currency) so you can literally play warframe for free. You don't even have to pay for dlc/chapters.

_Zathras_

Kendaric wrote: »

Doesn't STO (Star Trek online) use something like this?

Basically an exchange where you can buy their premium currency for some sort of in-game currency.

GW2 does as well. It's been in place for years.

Tandor wrote: »

All they do is inflate the prices that ZOS charge in the Crown Store because they know that players can use the millions of gold they get from the trading system to subsidise their cosmetic purchases.

The player economy has bloated in some areas, like gold mats and motifs. The Cash Shop's broadening monetization has nothing to do with catering to a niche gold seller economy. They are primarily targeting the population that buys Crates en masse to get the Radiant Apex, and then creating Gem dumps so they have a tier 2 method of spending, while still getting value for the hundreds of real life dollars they spend for sparkle fluff. Housing and cosmetic prices are pricey, but have remained stable.