Another Well Known Trading Guild Basically bites the Dust

SeaGtGruff · August 4

oldbobdude wrote: »

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

LaintalAy wrote: »

No spot is 'premium' that's a myth made up to pander to lazy players.
Or those players that misunderstood how much time is needed to play ESO.

'Ankle Biters' will soon discover what percentage of their customers are 'loyal'.

What guilds should could be doing is specialising in range of products so that people remember the name and not the location.

I also think that more "specific" or "specialized" trading guilds would be a good idea-- for instance, sellers who specialize in crafting mats, or furnishings, or potions, or crafting motifs, etc. It seems like most guilds try to be "your one-stop shopping destination" by carrying everything imaginable, but then you just have a lot of competition from everyone else. Not that having competition between sellers is bad, but I think having some more highly-specialized sellers might be a good thing.

Guilds sell what their members put in the guild store to sell. That is a hodgepodge of different stuff. People don’t specialize in what they sell. They sell whatever they’ve found while playing. Are you saying that guilds should restrict what their members put up for sale in order to be “specialized”?

I'm not saying that trading guilds should actively restrict what their members put up for sale in the guild store-- and hence, at the guild trader if the guild has a trader.

But there are guilds which specialize in different things, and they advertise and recruit as such. So if a guild specializes in, say, PvP, then they could encourage their members to put PvP-related items up for sale in the guild store. If a guild specializes in furnishings, they could encourage their members to put furnishings-related items up for sale.

On the other hand, many guilds already have strict rules about what types of things they want their members to deposit, or to not deposit, in the guild bank in order to keep it from getting filled up with "garbage" items that players dump in the bank to get it out of their inventory but which no one has any interest in withdrawing and using. So, yeah, why shouldn't trading guilds who have a guild trader try to enforce some rules about what their members put up for sale in the guild store? Or do you think it would be A-OK for the guild store to be nothing more than a dumping grounds for all of the trash items that its members want to unload from their inventories? Many, if not most, trading guilds already have rules about how much their members should sell in order to avoid getting kicked, so what's so horrifying or stupid about having some trading guilds that might want to control what their members are putting up for sale?

In the real world, we have generalized department stores and super stores that try to sell just about everything imaginable. But those kinds of stores often have incomplete inventories because they don't have room to carry all available choices for all departments in the store. And often they will carry the cheaper items because those are the ones that sell the most. So if you want to buy, say, a musical keyboard, you can go to Sam's Club or Walmart and buy a cheap keyboard with limited features and low quality, or you can go to a store that specializes in musical instruments and be able to choose from a much larger selection of keyboards that are of higher quality and that boast many more features.

The same is true of any other kind of item-- gardening equipment and supplies, art supplies, books, computer equipment, etc. You might be able to get a great deal on something at Walmart, assuming they happen to have what you're looking for. But if you need to be able to choose from a larger pool of alternatives, you'd probably be better off going to a store that specializes in whatever it is you're shopping for.

Veritaz · August 4

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

Veritaz wrote: »

LaintalAy wrote: »

They are not forced to bid on any location at all; they choose the location that they prefer.
When bidding, they choose the amount; it is not pre-defined.

This is like saying people are not forced to buy the game if they don’t like the price. It’s an intentionally simplistic interpretation of the situation. Guilds are not forced to pay for popular locations of course, but if they want to participate in the game in the way they and their members have come to enjoy it, then yes they need to achieve top bid to secure the spot. And if they don’t bid high then some other guild will do so. I love this game and I will continue trying to make trading work, but these latest changes are having a very negative effect. Your point about this being the only change ever made to the trading system just proves the point that it has obviously been working mostly fine for many years.

Many bad things in the game persist not because they are good, but because people tolerate them.

Yes, and these latest changes to guild trading are proving intolerable.

Sepultura_13 · August 4

It's entirely possible that the changes exposed certain guilds for their untenable practices, which is awesome as far as I'm concerned.

I haven't lost anything with the new changes, and my gameplay / playstyle hasn't been affected other than the need to clear out my hireling mails more often.

I have my opinions about those complaining the most with their "the sky is falling" histrionics, but I don't need to state them.

Others will be overtly offended, and I'm not interested in being banned over another's selective offense.

FlopsyPrince · August 4

Sepultura_13 wrote: »

It's entirely possible that the changes exposed certain guilds for their untenable practices, which is awesome as far as I'm concerned.

I haven't lost anything with the new changes, and my gameplay / playstyle hasn't been affected other than the need to clear out my hireling mails more often.

I have my opinions about those complaining the most with their "the sky is falling" histrionics, but I don't need to state them.

Others will be overtly offended, and I'm not interested in being banned over another's selective offense.

Sorry for your posturing, but noting problems is not proclaiming "the sky is falling". Problems do exist and we should not go to the "Don't Worry, Be Happy" end of things either!

Learn to read things and evaluate them, but that requires thinking things through, not just repeating stock claims to eliminate any questions.

Are you really arguing that nothing bad could ever happen to ESO? You may disagree on what is "bad" but can you proclaim that only you can decide what is good or bad?

CGPsaint · August 4

DenverRalphy wrote: »

CGPsaint wrote: »

I used to move 40-50 items per day across 10 traders and now I call it a good day if I move 5-10 items per day. Same general items that I'm selling. Most of my mail these days are expired items that didn't sell. Good times. Several of my guilds are regularly doing raffles to generate enough gold to maintain traders in main cities. I'm not going to try and pinpoint the reason for the decline, but I will say that West Weald is a ghost town outside of primetime, which is not encouraging. Mayhem is going on and outside of Gray Host, most of the servers are also a ghost town until the evening. Here's hoping that it's just a summer slowdown and that things will pick back up in the Fall.

I bolded the part that likely shows why your sales have dropped. You haven't shifted with the market. You're trying to sell the same thing when realistically, the market demands shift. Myself personally, lately I've been grumbling that I can't keep my slots filled because they empty so quickly (a good problem to have).

So you're saying that motif chapters, furnishing plans, style pages, and gold food are no longer what the market demands??? Somehow I have a hard time believing that my wares are the problem!

sarahthes · August 4

CGPsaint wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

CGPsaint wrote: »

I used to move 40-50 items per day across 10 traders and now I call it a good day if I move 5-10 items per day. Same general items that I'm selling. Most of my mail these days are expired items that didn't sell. Good times. Several of my guilds are regularly doing raffles to generate enough gold to maintain traders in main cities. I'm not going to try and pinpoint the reason for the decline, but I will say that West Weald is a ghost town outside of primetime, which is not encouraging. Mayhem is going on and outside of Gray Host, most of the servers are also a ghost town until the evening. Here's hoping that it's just a summer slowdown and that things will pick back up in the Fall.

I bolded the part that likely shows why your sales have dropped. You haven't shifted with the market. You're trying to sell the same thing when realistically, the market demands shift. Myself personally, lately I've been grumbling that I can't keep my slots filled because they empty so quickly (a good problem to have).

So you're saying that motif chapters, furnishing plans, style pages, and gold food are no longer what the market demands??? Somehow I have a hard time believing that my wares are the problem!

There is a glut of motif chapters and furnishing plans circulating right now. You need to list them almost free to move most of them.

People also got a ton of recipes during recent e events as well as mats. They're probably crafting their own foods (I know I used to buy bear haunch but I've been making my own lately.)

spartaxoxo · August 4

CGPsaint wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

CGPsaint wrote: »

I used to move 40-50 items per day across 10 traders and now I call it a good day if I move 5-10 items per day. Same general items that I'm selling. Most of my mail these days are expired items that didn't sell. Good times. Several of my guilds are regularly doing raffles to generate enough gold to maintain traders in main cities. I'm not going to try and pinpoint the reason for the decline, but I will say that West Weald is a ghost town outside of primetime, which is not encouraging. Mayhem is going on and outside of Gray Host, most of the servers are also a ghost town until the evening. Here's hoping that it's just a summer slowdown and that things will pick back up in the Fall.

I bolded the part that likely shows why your sales have dropped. You haven't shifted with the market. You're trying to sell the same thing when realistically, the market demands shift. Myself personally, lately I've been grumbling that I can't keep my slots filled because they empty so quickly (a good problem to have).

So you're saying that motif chapters, furnishing plans, style pages, and gold food are no longer what the market demands??? Somehow I have a hard time believing that my wares are the problem!

Furnishing plans, style pages, and motifs are the items that were flooded by Zeal and Anni. List the cheap stuff for peanuts and hold onto the nice things until Witches Festival.

FlopsyPrince · August 4

I bought a few motifs today to keep at the task of filling out my knowledge. Many were not as cheap as indicated. But I have also listed some with prices consistent within 1 or more of my guilds (usually a bit below a different guild) and I very often get them back in mail because no one happened to see them and need them during the now brief listing window.

My point is they don't turn over as quickly as other items in the game and thus not focusing on those minimizes the impact of these changes.

The market will adapt, but many will never acknowledge any limitations of the current system, especially with the shorter listing time and risk of losing things if mail is not checked quickly enough. That is unfortunate.

LaintalAy · August 4

edited

CGPsaint · August 4

LaintalAy wrote: »

CGPsaint wrote: »

So you're saying that motif chapters, furnishing plans, style pages, and gold food are no longer what the market demands??? Somehow I have a hard time believing that my wares are the problem!

Pretty much.

Just out of curiosity, who do you think was buying all the motifs?
New players, desperate for a book of 'Celestial' or 'Hollowjack' styles?

I'm not talking about trash chapters. I farm and sell mostly motif chapters from newer DLC dungeons or dailies and have not had any problems selling them until recently. Even Ancient Daedric and Kindred's Concord are not really moving. As far as furnishings plans are concerned, even plans from West Weald have slowed to a trickle. It is what it is. All good things must come to an end at some point.

FlopsyPrince · August 4

CGPsaint wrote: »

LaintalAy wrote: »

CGPsaint wrote: »

So you're saying that motif chapters, furnishing plans, style pages, and gold food are no longer what the market demands??? Somehow I have a hard time believing that my wares are the problem!

Pretty much.

Just out of curiosity, who do you think was buying all the motifs?
New players, desperate for a book of 'Celestial' or 'Hollowjack' styles?

I'm not talking about trash chapters. I farm and sell mostly motif chapters from newer DLC dungeons or dailies and have not had any problems selling them until recently. Even Ancient Daedric and Kindred's Concord are not really moving. As far as furnishings plans are concerned, even plans from West Weald have slowed to a trickle. It is what it is. All good things must come to an end at some point.

Which ones are "trash" ones? Do they have that bit/label set?

All can have merit. The ones over 20K are inherently going to move much slower since many will not want to spend that much. You can do well if you are getting rarer ones as you note, but those are not what a majority of players have to sell and thus the point remains.

FlopsyPrince · August 4

I should probably try to stock up on mats..... Though I am not slogging through dailies on so many characters lately.

Pevey · August 4

It’s sort of a truism in finance that once an asset bubble is ready to pop, it does so quickly. Even the Fed is very limited in its ability to slow it down. Bubbles inflate slowly over time, and then let the air out all at once.

I understand this is frustrating for some people who play the trading game, and I know it must be extremely stressful for trade guild leaders.

But for trading game players, is it really a game if prices are just going up and up and up? Is it a game if you can never lose? People played the trading game before the great inflation.

Some ppl are exiting that game, sure. Frankly, if all they were doing was buying items and reselling for more… IMO the negative externalities of such players on other players’ enjoyment of the game (in the form of constant inflation) make it not worth trying to keep them happy. There are relatively few of them compared to the large number of players impacted by the economic distortion.

There are many players who see absolutely nothing wrong with the in-game economy, so none of them are here saying anything about it.

ClowdyAllDay · August 4

Just fyi, I never heard of them.

Elsonso · August 4

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

I bought a few motifs today to keep at the task of filling out my knowledge. Many were not as cheap as indicated. But I have also listed some with prices consistent within 1 or more of my guilds (usually a bit below a different guild) and I very often get them back in mail because no one happened to see them and need them during the now brief listing window.

My point is they don't turn over as quickly as other items in the game and thus not focusing on those minimizes the impact of these changes.

What I like to do is post a few crafting items for trait research, and I started doing this on XBox. These are really low volume items, as I expect most people have friends/guildies custom craft them. For those who do not go that route, for a little gold, they can buy mine, and that does happen. Since I frequently get these back at the end of 30 days, I just relist them. Now I get them back after 15 days, and it costs me twice the gold and twice the work.

GuuMoonRyoung · August 4

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

The popular flowers used to sell for 300 gold. Then they shot up to 3000+ gold. Now that prices are going down, but still well above what they were in the past, it is an economic catastrophe that is going to kill the game? How did the game thrive with much lower prices in the past but cannot survive now?

I think the problem is that the auction price of guild stores have not gone down accordingly. Prices going down is good for all but when we need to pay 10-100 times more of our income to get a guild store going, it is a bust.

DenverRalphy · August 4

CGPsaint wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

CGPsaint wrote: »

I used to move 40-50 items per day across 10 traders and now I call it a good day if I move 5-10 items per day. Same general items that I'm selling. Most of my mail these days are expired items that didn't sell. Good times. Several of my guilds are regularly doing raffles to generate enough gold to maintain traders in main cities. I'm not going to try and pinpoint the reason for the decline, but I will say that West Weald is a ghost town outside of primetime, which is not encouraging. Mayhem is going on and outside of Gray Host, most of the servers are also a ghost town until the evening. Here's hoping that it's just a summer slowdown and that things will pick back up in the Fall.

I bolded the part that likely shows why your sales have dropped. You haven't shifted with the market. You're trying to sell the same thing when realistically, the market demands shift. Myself personally, lately I've been grumbling that I can't keep my slots filled because they empty so quickly (a good problem to have).

So you're saying that motif chapters, furnishing plans, style pages, and gold food are no longer what the market demands??? Somehow I have a hard time believing that my wares are the problem!

Actually, yes.

Motif chapters are currently selling at an all time low because there are too many in the world right now (semi-niche item and oversupplied). Style pages are a dime a dozen. And Gold Food is over supplied due to Perfect Roe and all the other needed mats being so cheap at the moment. As for furnishing plans (which I typically sell a lot of), the Gold Road release is still new enough that you can sell Colovian/Dawnwood pretty reliably, but any other style takes a while (though slowly coming back) and at relatively high risk to hit the re-listing time limit regardless of price.

LikiLoki · August 4

I always wanted the economy in the game to be more diverse. But the latest steps of ZOS make it more primitive, boring and unprofitable. Guild leaders are beginning to get frustrated that their work is becoming meaningless and not enjoyable

Sepultura_13 · August 4

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

Sepultura_13 wrote: »

It's entirely possible that the changes exposed certain guilds for their untenable practices, which is awesome as far as I'm concerned.

I haven't lost anything with the new changes, and my gameplay / playstyle hasn't been affected other than the need to clear out my hireling mails more often.

I have my opinions about those complaining the most with their "the sky is falling" histrionics, but I don't need to state them.

Others will be overtly offended, and I'm not interested in being banned over another's selective offense.

Sorry for your posturing, but noting problems is not proclaiming "the sky is falling". Problems do exist and we should not go to the "Don't Worry, Be Happy" end of things either!

Learn to read things and evaluate them, but that requires thinking things through, not just repeating stock claims to eliminate any questions.

Are you really arguing that nothing bad could ever happen to ESO? You may disagree on what is "bad" but can you proclaim that only you can decide what is good or bad?

[snip]

I'm not arguing anything. I stated that the predatory practices of certain guilds have finally been exposed, and I hope that those types of guild disappear.

[snip]
[edited for flaming]

LaintalAy · August 4

edited

LaintalAy · August 4

Pevey wrote: »

It’s sort of a truism in finance that once an asset bubble is ready to pop, it does so quickly. Even the Fed is very limited in its ability to slow it down. Bubbles inflate slowly over time, and then let the air out all at once.

I understand this is frustrating for some people who play the trading game, and I know it must be extremely stressful for trade guild leaders.

But for trading game players, is it really a game if prices are just going up and up and up? Is it a game if you can never lose? People played the trading game before the great inflation.

Some ppl are exiting that game, sure. Frankly, if all they were doing was buying items and reselling for more… IMO the negative externalities of such players on other players’ enjoyment of the game (in the form of constant inflation) make it not worth trying to keep them happy. There are relatively few of them compared to the large number of players impacted by the economic distortion.

There are many players who see absolutely nothing wrong with the in-game economy, so none of them are here saying anything about it.

Flippers exist, but if an item gets sold twice, that's because the second buyer isn't a flipper and still has too much gold.
And they're too lazy or impatient to look for cheaper versions. These are the people that enable this mythical 'inflation'.
The only items that the price goes out of control on, are the rare ones. Just look at the value change of cornflower in the past 12 months. It was almost as worthless as dragonthorn, last time I looked.

TTC enables flipping. Without TTC, flipping would be a minor issue.

Pevey · August 4

LaintalAy wrote: »

Flippers exist, but if an item gets sold twice, that's because the second buyer isn't a flipper and still has too much gold.
And they're too lazy or impatient to look for cheaper versions. These are the people that enable this mythical 'inflation'.
The only items that the price goes out of control on, are the rare ones. Just look at the value change of cornflower in the past 12 months. It was almost as worthless as dragonthorn, last time I looked.

TTC enables flipping. Without TTC, flipping would be a minor issue.

Asset price inflation (aka bubbles) driven by speculation is absolutely a type of inflation. And that was what we had, when every "how to make gold in ESO" guide out there was basically: Farm until you make your first 1m in capital, and then start flipping.

Desiato · August 4

CGPsaint wrote: »

So you're saying that motif chapters, furnishing plans, style pages, and gold food are no longer what the market demands??? Somehow I have a hard time believing that my wares are the problem!

The highly rewarding Jubilee event saturated the market with motifs, plans and mats, so there is definitely less demand for a lot of things. Plus lot of players, like me, felt then was as good time to complete their collections. I spent around 10M on motifs during the event and not one gold since.

In the aftermath of the event, many traders sat on their inventory expecting a big boost from the chapter launch. When that didn't happen, they started to dump their inventory. That process fed itself as the more prices dropped, the more traders felt the need to sell-off what they had.

And they had a lot. They probably still do. When prices are consistently rising, players begin to speculate by buying up items either to re-sell in the future or to protect themselves against further price increases. For example, I bought a ton of Hakeijos during the previous PVP event, anticipating a price rise that never occurred. I did that for a lot of items and I know it's a common practice among experienced players.

As speculating was so profitable for so long, more players engaged in the practice. Ultimately, more than the market support. for a while, a significant amount of activity was probably speculators selling to speculators.

On top of all that, part of grinding scripts is completing dailies, which earn players motifs, plans and set items.

When it comes to things like carries and expensive vanity items, when the economy is booming, players are more willing to splurge on those things. When activity slows, then players become more conservative about spending gold.

So we're in a big adjustment period now. It wasn't just the Jubilee event. To me the main two factors were the waning impacts of the introduction of the Arcanist and the Epic giveaway on PC last year. The adjustment means players will, over time, change their activities. They will hoard less, speculate less, grind less and eventually prices will stabilize.

CrashTest · August 4

hiyde wrote: »

PDarkBHood wrote: »

Sounds like a protest vote scenario. To the remaining trader guilds, please lower your prices. Some of those prices are still way too high. Again, very happy about the market correction, and if a few guilds fold, then so be it!

Guilds do not set prices of items, members do. I can't imagine the time & efforts it would take to enforce some sort of price controls on 500 members (or that a guild trying to do that would have 500 members lol).

There were actually guilds who did this years ago when the kiosks were new. Not only did they enforce price setting, but they also controlled what you could sell. Those guilds are all long dead and gone now, and good riddance because those are horrible requirements.

Guilds now have to adjust to the new market or die. The guilds who have adjusted are still going.

LaintalAy · August 4

edited

freespirit · August 4

LaintalAy wrote: »

Just on the 'specialisation' issue.

A lot of people arguing against the 14-day thing appear to be wanting to make and sell furniture.

A some point recently I wondered how a guild specialising in furniture would fare. If it's just made up of people making selling furniture, it possibly wouldn't even need a kiosk. Players could just discuss what they need in guild chat and put it up for sale internally. Join and leave whenever.

Sounds simple enough, but I'm sure someone could come along and unnecessarily complicate it. They always do.

Funny fact, on my second and third account I have switched to selling a fair amount of crafted furniture, so far it is selling well, I pick and choose the items, some are really old designs others are brand spanking new. For me the items that aren't selling are Luxury Vendor items, infact I think people are panic selling these items below their original cost right now, so I switched to crafted items.

I have noticed that many people are asking three, four, five times the amount items cost to craft...... why still do that???

As discussed over and over here and elsewhere materials are plentiful and really cheap atm, take advantage of that and stop being too greedy! 🤨

FlopsyPrince · August 4

LaintalAy wrote: »

Pevey wrote: »

It’s sort of a truism in finance that once an asset bubble is ready to pop, it does so quickly. Even the Fed is very limited in its ability to slow it down. Bubbles inflate slowly over time, and then let the air out all at once.

I understand this is frustrating for some people who play the trading game, and I know it must be extremely stressful for trade guild leaders.

But for trading game players, is it really a game if prices are just going up and up and up? Is it a game if you can never lose? People played the trading game before the great inflation.

Some ppl are exiting that game, sure. Frankly, if all they were doing was buying items and reselling for more… IMO the negative externalities of such players on other players’ enjoyment of the game (in the form of constant inflation) make it not worth trying to keep them happy. There are relatively few of them compared to the large number of players impacted by the economic distortion.

There are many players who see absolutely nothing wrong with the in-game economy, so none of them are here saying anything about it.

Flippers exist, but if an item gets sold twice, that's because the second buyer isn't a flipper and still has too much gold.
And they're too lazy or impatient to look for cheaper versions. These are the people that enable this mythical 'inflation'.
The only items that the price goes out of control on, are the rare ones. Just look at the value change of cornflower in the past 12 months. It was almost as worthless as dragonthorn, last time I looked.

TTC enables flipping. Without TTC, flipping would be a minor issue.

Flipping happens on console.

And buying it at the higher price may be because no way exists to find who might have the product at a cheaper price. Your logic is flawed on console at least.

Though try going to the lowest 20 priced vendors of a motif on TTC and you will find it also happens on PC.

KiltMaster · August 5

Elsonso wrote: »

Jaraal wrote: »

Stafford197 wrote: »

People are losing interest very quickly in Gold Road and as a result the game itself this year. ESO feels neglected. There is such a long list of issues this year from terrible failures during the Anniversary and Transmute Events, the Environmental changes, and the Gold Road mini-Chapter. Constant boss immunity phases, a half-baked zone full of locked doors, and a much worse-Spellcraft system which was set up to be barely usable until months later.

Agreed. It's not one single thing, it's the continued erosion of the player experience, as well as the never ending quality of life nerfs purported in the name of performance.

I disagree, at least in part. I can certainly see that Gold Road might not hold interest, as the only real long term engagement is Scribing, and that is a grind system. I also don't expect that Scribing will catch up with Arcanist.

I do think that the best way to describe West Weald is as a 4Q DLC elevated to the stature of a Chapter. I expect that the engagement with Gold Road zone content will mirror content like Murkmire and Clockwork City rather than what we got in Chapters like Necrom, Elsweyr, Morrowind, and Summerset.

However, what I am seeing in the game is definitely not a lack of interest. I get that there is an event going on, and that is going to attract more players.

I do think that there are certain parts of the game where ZOS has chased away players. Like with many decisions they have made recently, guild trader and mail retention changes are a case of them doing things that don't engage with portions of the player base. That part of the player base, once they realize this, does tend to wander away.

I don't think that extends to the larger population, but anyone immersed in the part that is impacted, it might look like it is.

Edit: To be fair, there is nothing to stop ZOS from taking this sort of thing on tour and incrementally annoying and chasing away different parts of the player-base every few months. Some might say they have been doing this since Update 35...

Experience trader here and trade guild GM - couldn't have said it any better myself.

LaintalAy · August 5

edited

katanagirl1 · August 5

So the response to the flagging economy seems to be that the Anniversary event is to blame, according to most of posts here.

I believe the argument was that more reward boxes get opened because of the excessive grinding for the limited time pages. So what kind of multiplier would have to have been achieved for this to flood the market with significantly more motifs than previous years? It’s certainly not unusual for players to grind as many reward boxes as possible for every event, The fact that items other than motifs are falling in price would seem to not follow the argument. The price of mats is supposedly falling because of more farming for mats for ink. Again, how much more farming would cause this? From hearing so many complaints about West Weald I am not sure the number of players farming for themselves would account for that, but perhaps more players who did not buy Gold Road are farming to sell.

We have the Anniversary event every year. We recover from it eventually. If the market recovers in a few months then I guess the argument will be considered valid.

I still believe the news of guild trader changes were enough to cause a market crash ahead of the actual event, combined with everything else. If the market does not recover by the end of the year then I think we could rule out plain saturation.