Proposal for Improving ESO’s Trading System

Furyous

Good idea – Makes trading easier and more accessible. Worth the effort, while keeping the current system for those who enjoy it.

katanagirl1 wrote: »

You’re a new ESO player, right? How about learning how this 10+ year old game works, take into account all of the suggestions made by the experienced players here in the forums, and work with it? Instead you are demanding that the game cater to your view of it and work like other games work, requiring a ton of development effort and money and time.

I want to correct a few assumptions.

I am not new to ESO. I was part of the beta, have played through years of updates, and my suggestions come from that long experience. If you had bothered to click on my name (on the left), you would have seen my join date of Nov 9, 2013. Instead of making even that minimal effort to fact‑check, you chose to libel me.

Calling my post "demanding" is inaccurate. It was a polite suggestion, framed for discussion, and even put to a vote. That is the opposite of a demand. A demand is when someone insists on a change without input or compromise. A suggestion with open voting is an invitation to dialogue.

What is disappointing is that instead of engaging with the ideas, you dismissed them by labeling me inexperienced and mischaracterizing my tone. That does not move the discussion forward.

The point was to highlight barriers in the current trading system and propose improvements. Whether or not you agree, the ideas deserve to be considered on their merits.

And yes, I have my beta monkey. Perhaps once you have caught up to those of us who were there from the start, you will have the experience needed to comment meaningfully on these issues. (That last line is a joke, in case they don't have humor where you come from.)

kargen27

"The point of my post was to highlight how the current trading system creates unnecessary barriers compared to other MMOs, and to propose ways it could be improved."

I do not believe this premise to be true. This game has a layered and structured trading system. It has levels and the more you participate the more you get out of it. Just like trials. You don't just start out trying for the leader board and trifectas on your first trial. You start with normal trials get in a progression group and work up. Not being able to do hard mode trials right off the start doesn't mean you are locked out of doing trials. I don't see it as unnecessary barriers but levels of play.

With trading entry level is selling to venders and zone chat. Join a guild and if they are large enough to can buy/sell using a vendor exclusive to the guild. Personally I think this part of trading doesn't get near as used as it should and players lose out not taking advantage. Next step is a guild that often gets one of the outlier traders. Even a trader out in the boonies can generate 100sof thousands of gold a week if you have the items to sell. End game could be getting into a prime trading guild and spending a good chunk of time in game pursuing items to flip.

This game is the only one I've played that has this diverse a market that accommodates so many styles of play. A central market would severely damage a vibrant trading community and damage the economy. I suggested my idea for making the current system (my opinion) better earlier in the thread. I don't know how feasible my idea would be when considering server performance but I think it would allow players who just want to find items quick and those that want to chase down bargains the chance to do that.

Furyous

Good idea – Makes trading easier and more accessible. Worth the effort, while keeping the current system for those who enjoy it.

kargen27 wrote: »

"The point of my post was to highlight how the current trading system creates unnecessary barriers compared to other MMOs, and to propose ways it could be improved."

I do not believe this premise to be true. This game has a layered and structured trading system. It has levels and the more you participate the more you get out of it. Just like trials. You don't just start out trying for the leader board and trifectas on your first trial. You start with normal trials get in a progression group and work up. Not being able to do hard mode trials right off the start doesn't mean you are locked out of doing trials. I don't see it as unnecessary barriers but levels of play.

With trading entry level is selling to venders and zone chat. Join a guild and if they are large enough to can buy/sell using a vendor exclusive to the guild. Personally I think this part of trading doesn't get near as used as it should and players lose out not taking advantage. Next step is a guild that often gets one of the outlier traders. Even a trader out in the boonies can generate 100sof thousands of gold a week if you have the items to sell. End game could be getting into a prime trading guild and spending a good chunk of time in game pursuing items to flip.

This game is the only one I've played that has this diverse a market that accommodates so many styles of play. A central market would severely damage a vibrant trading community and damage the economy. I suggested my idea for making the current system (my opinion) better earlier in the thread. I don't know how feasible my idea would be when considering server performance but I think it would allow players who just want to find items quick and those that want to chase down bargains the chance to do that.

Trials are an end‑game level of PvE combat, but they are the culmination of a clear and well‑designed path. Players start with quests, overland content, delves, and dungeons, and can progress naturally into trials if they choose to take PvE that far. It is an incredibly robust and accessible road.

Trading is not like that. Trading is a basic function of MMOs, it should be available to every player as part of the core game. In ESO, however, it starts at end‑game. The only way new players can participate is by latching onto the coattails of a few trading guilds, without ever having a realistic chance at securing a trader of their own.

No one is locked out of PvE. You don’t need third‑party add‑ons or membership in an exclusive trial guild to do quests, dungeons, or trials. Trading, by contrast, requires outside tools and insider access just to function. That is not progression, it is exclusion from a fundamental part of the MMO experience.

Pops_ND_Irish

Bad idea – This would create more problems than it solves.

Move to a Market Board
Works great and no one can take control. Everything is searchable in one place by category
Guilds can save money for guildies, no need to spend millions on trading spots.
And guilds have no need to charge people to join.

Furyous

Good idea – Makes trading easier and more accessible. Worth the effort, while keeping the current system for those who enjoy it.

BagOfBadgers wrote: »

Adding a global trader would allow me to flip stuff when I got bored, and I know of people with much more than my 10's of millions, that would spend all day doing it, and what would happen to the prices if only a few people control the flow of that/those? I would suggest up (and the many on here that are anti the Guild system would suffer) as reflected in real life supply, demand.

What is preventing you from doing this now?

Flipping items when you are bored is already completely doable and done quite often in the current system. Guild traders, zone chat, and direct trades all allow for buying low and selling high. The scenario you describe does not require a global trader, it is already part of the existing mechanics.

That is why this feels like a red herring argument. The concern about a few people controlling prices applies just as much to the current guild trader system, where a handful of guilds already dominate the market. A global trader would not suddenly create that dynamic; it already exists.

Furyous

Good idea – Makes trading easier and more accessible. Worth the effort, while keeping the current system for those who enjoy it.

bmnoble wrote: »

Might work for cheaper stuff people want to sell but when it comes to high value items, had more than a few people join the trade guilds I am in then try to sell the items in guild chat directly to avoid the listing fees, then proceed to sulk or leave when they are told not to sell directly in chat but use the guild trader since the fees in part pay for the trader bid.

If this other global trader your proposing had even higher listing fees, I think you would either end up with people continuing to sell in zone chat to avoid those fees or just selling via the existing guild traders.

Think it would cause guild traders to drop cheaper stuff and focus on more expensive items, since you would have people prepared to pay a little bit more for cheaper stuff, it is one of the reasons locations with high foot traffic get such high trader bids. More expensive stuff however I think people will still shop around, especially if those listing on this global trader mark up the prices to try and mitigate how much they are losing in fees.

Though I think it would likely kill most remote guild traders, only customers I see them getting are flippers, looking to buy cheap and re list on the global trader. While further inflating the cost of traders in high foot traffic areas.

Overall it would depend on how high the listing fee ends up being, if it is too high people looking to sell low end stuff won't make much, people selling high end stuff, will lose out to lower prices and higher profit margins on guild traders, about the only exception would be stuff with an extremely limited supply, plenty of billionaires who would be able to buy out all the stock and then list for stupidly high prices on the global trader.

What you describe is already happening under the current system.

Players already avoid listing fees by selling in zone chat or guild chat, guilds already prioritize high‑value items in prime locations, and flippers already buy cheap from remote traders to re‑list for profit. None of this requires a global trader, it is how the guild trader system currently works.

The difference is that a global trader would simply add another option. It would not remove guild traders, zone chat, or direct trades. Those who prefer the current system could continue using it exactly as they do now, while players who are locked out today would finally have a way to participate.

Higher fees or market dynamics are not new problems; they already exist. A global trader does not replace the system, it expands it.

Zodiarkslayer

Bad idea – This would create more problems than it solves.

Furyous wrote: »

...
The point was to highlight barriers in the current trading system and propose improvements. Whether or not you agree, the ideas deserve to be considered on their merits. ...

Ironically it is these barriers that keep the economy from spiraling out of control.

What do I mean? Well, it is a common trope among economists that market entry barriers should be removed in order to maximise the market's efficiency. But that is only true for complete markets of commodities, with all the other attributes that come along with a regular market. Production costs, logistical costs, complete information on quality of the product, etc.
What is traded in ESO, however, are digital goods with no cost of production, transfer, storage or opportunity. And that means there is no force that determines value except perceived rarity (scarcity) and amount of currency available at the transaction. And here lies the danger.
Studies in game theory have shown that on markets like these, the product will change hands without being consumed until it reaches a certain threshold, where nobody is willing to pay the pricetag anymore. This threshold, it has been shown, is only determined by the amount of circulating currency.
Now the next point in this long form explanation people have difficulties to understand and comprehend. The amount of gold in ESO has to be assumed to be infinite. Because its creation is not tied to any regulatory "federal" institution, there is no limit to the amount. Every second of gameplay of every player in ESO there is gold generated. Hundreds of thousands of players over eleven and a half years have created this inconceivable amount of gold. Also there is no pension in ESO, no reason to spare currency for a rainy day. Every piece of gold that you make will go into the economy. The amount that goes out is not even closely high enough to create a balance and stability. Gold set sinks in ESO are largely ineffective, only the guild trader bidding and players leaving the game for good have measurable effect.
And therefore this previously mentioned threshold will eventually be so high that noone except the ultra rich, that have spend the most amount of time in game can engage in trade anymore.

So you can see that the entire setup of ESO's economy accepts the circumstances of a digital economy and tries to alleviate its most serious downsides.
Prioritising convenience isn't the point here. That is keeping the entire economy healthy in the long term.

SolarRune

Bad idea – This would create more problems than it solves.

It comes down to ease, it's so much easier with a central auction house to control a market, especially where things are based on a single mega server per region/platform, the distributed model in eso combats this for all the things you say are negatives. Surely you can see that, as you see it as a barrier anyway.

That's not to say there haven't been attempts to control, I remember on PCEU a large group of traders were trying to control alchemy ingredients, but the distributed model meant they were never in full control and it fell apart.

Some games accpet this market control risk - these games tend to end up with out of control pricing with rare items going through the roof but common items being a race to the bottom. Or they have different server instances that effectively work as a distributed model very similar to eso by hiding items on a different server and you need to change through the servers (if possible) to be able to see the entire market. There are plenty of other MMOs that take other routes, usually based on limiting direct player to player sales, with the most common process essentially being selling to a NPC for a variable price (depending on how much of a certain item has been sold recently) with these then sold by NPCs for a centrally controlled price, these are the games that tend to have the least inflation, because its not strictly a player driven econ because resale prices are highly controlled, but they can claim player driven because the pricing is based on what players sell.

Of the options I've experienced and taking into account the structure of ESO, I much prefer the current status, I beleive eso would be much more open to manipulation should there be a single auction house. I also think markets are much more agreeable with lore and the general look and feel of eso.

I can understand where the suggestion comes from, I had similar feelings when first getting into trading, and yes ESO could make the process of getting into it easier. Better ways of interacting with guilds, that were promised by ZOS in the GM meeting over a year ago and were mentioned in the letter last year but we have seen nothing. To imply that it's the norm that trading guilds require dues or charge is incorrect - through my trading journey I have been a transient member of many guilds that had traders and didn't charge or expect sales.

frogthroat

Bad idea – This would create more problems than it solves.

Furyous wrote: »

TL;DR: You get the best of both worlds: keep the thrill of the hunt and guild strategy, while giving casuals and small guilds a fair shot at selling their loot without begging for a spot in a trading-guild.

Beautiful idea, but I don't think it would work. I am not an economist, but I know about natural selection. These two systems would be competing. That will drive natural selection. I can see two outcomes:

1. Normal distribution will remain, but there will be positive selection towards one system and negative selection towards the other and the result will be one dominating system and one dead system.
2. The selection pressure will favour one type of items for one system, other type of items towards the other and they will have different positive and negative pressures, creating a bimodal system. That would create two separate economies where you would need to know what to trade in which separate system.

My suspicion is that the outcome 1 would be more likely.

ZhuJiuyin

Bad idea – This would create more problems than it solves.

I'm also dissatisfied with the current in-game economy, but the current trading system isn't inherently flawed; it does create a sense of immersion. I think the biggest problem is that there are too few truly valuable items in the game that people are willing or forced to spend gold on.

Most of our alchemy materials are cheap (because most alchemy products have little practical use), most food ingredients are useless (most food items have little practical use), most tradable equipment is useless in both PvP and PvE (again, because most equipment has little practical use), and most style materials are cheap.

Most equipment styles only sell well when they're first released; most older styles are ignored.

Since there's no demand for goods, the economy is naturally poor. This is why I previously requested the addition of tradable and attractive items to Trials and Cyrodiil, such as rare drops for AS+2. If these could be rewarded with rare drops, like the well-known Phoenix mount in WoW, it would undoubtedly increase players' enthusiasm for trials and give new value to older ones. Imagine if vMOL dropped Luminous Moon Dials, vHRC dropped Gargoyle Training Dummies, vAA dropped Polymorphs of Mage Constellation, vKA dropped Bat Pets, or randomly provided tradable skill styles in Cyrodiil's Rewards for the Worthy. Especially when the equipment from these older trials is no longer attractive, these rare drops will continue to keep players enthusiastic about participating in them and PvP.

As long as market demand increases, even guild vendors in less popular areas will attract people to explore and hunt for gold. Currently, because most items are unattractive, and the more attractive items are often inexpensive, people just want to buy what's conveniently available in town, regardless of the price.

SolarRune

Bad idea – This would create more problems than it solves.

Interesting take on it ZhuJiuyin, the lack of real rewards for actually participating in content has long been an eso issue, the closest we have is mask styles from dungeons, but more of these type of things that are tradeable would not only make trading better but would also make replayability of parts of the game more rewarding.

frogthroat

Bad idea – This would create more problems than it solves.

ZhuJiuyin wrote: »

I'm also dissatisfied with the current in-game economy, but the current trading system isn't inherently flawed; it does create a sense of immersion. I think the biggest problem is that there are too few truly valuable items in the game that people are willing or forced to spend gold on.

Most of our alchemy materials are cheap (because most alchemy products have little practical use), most food ingredients are useless (most food items have little practical use), most tradable equipment is useless in both PvP and PvE (again, because most equipment has little practical use), and most style materials are cheap.

Most equipment styles only sell well when they're first released; most older styles are ignored.

Since there's no demand for goods, the economy is naturally poor. This is why I previously requested the addition of tradable and attractive items to Trials and Cyrodiil, such as rare drops for AS+2. If these could be rewarded with rare drops, like the well-known Phoenix mount in WoW, it would undoubtedly increase players' enthusiasm for trials and give new value to older ones. Imagine if vMOL dropped Luminous Moon Dials, vHRC dropped Gargoyle Training Dummies, vAA dropped Polymorphs of Mage Constellation, vKA dropped Bat Pets, or randomly provided tradable skill styles in Cyrodiil's Rewards for the Worthy. Especially when the equipment from these older trials is no longer attractive, these rare drops will continue to keep players enthusiastic about participating in them and PvP.

As long as market demand increases, even guild vendors in less popular areas will attract people to explore and hunt for gold. Currently, because most items are unattractive, and the more attractive items are often inexpensive, people just want to buy what's conveniently available in town, regardless of the price.

This is exactly what would drive my assumption of the two outcomes. One system would have the few expensive items that are worth selling at a high price and pay for the higher listing fee. The other system would have the cheap trash. The cheap trash side would either evolve to be its own, separate entity with very little overlap with the other system, or it would just shrivel up and die.

ZhuJiuyin

Bad idea – This would create more problems than it solves.

I once joined a guild that aimed to establish itself as a high-value black market guild selling valuable black market goods in the Crime Shelter. However, they eventually discovered that most items in ESO weren't worth trading, and truly high-value items were few and far between, failing to attract attention. Ultimately, the guild disbanded.

I believe that while the current trading environment is indeed poor, it's not due to guild traders, but rather because most goods lack appeal. They're neither eye-catching luxury items nor necessities, so people's indifference to trading is to be expected, especially considering the market-disrupting tactics employed during the 10th anniversary celebration.

Toanis

Good idea – Makes trading easier and more accessible. Worth the effort, while keeping the current system for those who enjoy it.

bmnoble wrote: »

plenty of billionaires who would be able to buy out all the stock and then list for stupidly high prices on the global trader.

That is exactly what is happening with ESO's guild traders, though. With an auction house, thousands of casual buyers have the same chance at fetching a bargain as a dozen of "pros". And even when someone tries to overtake the market, eventually they have all their money bound in goods and listing fees, while their business goes to the ones who are making a fortune just slightly underbidding them.

In both system prices regulate themselves. In any global auction house prices eventually settle to what both sellers and buyers think is fair. In ESO the big trading guilds determine what is an adequate price for an item.

ESO's system is unfair to casual buyers, who can't be bothered to use external tools or suffer through dozens of loadscreens to find a bargain, as well as to casual sellers, who either have no idea what a fair price is, or simply can't meet the demands of a big trading guild and need to sell on a remote trader where stuff only sells at a low price.

Northwold

The inflation discussion has as it often does come up. While I don't personally think a fully centralised auction house is a great idea and would prefer a "softer" compromise that doesn't lead to two competing trade systems that are mechanically completely different, it's worth pointing out two things about the existing system.

1) The gating of easy to use selling behind guild membership is itself inflationary. It leads would-be buyers who do not engage with guild traders on the selling side to gold farm within the game (eg public dungeon farming, repeated writ dailies, etc). So, instead of using gold they have acquired by selling items through traders, which is gold they get from other players being recirculated in the game economy, they are creating new gold in order to fund their purchases. That drives inflation.

2) In price-setting itself, the very gold sink people hold up as the crown jewel that justifies the current trader system -- the trader bids -- itself incentivises sellers to drive up their prices simply to be able to fund the trader bids. So, while it might be removing some gold from the in game economy, it's questionable whether it actually has any useful effect in the end beyond (maybe) cancelling out the very inflation the trader bids are pushing in the first place.

Obviously, we can't see the counterfactual of any kind of compromise system because it has never been attempted. But my suspicion is that getting rid of the selling gate, at the very least, would do much more to stabilise the economy than preserving the status quo, not least by providing a more consistent level of supply of items and tamping down the need for high levels of gold farming. At the moment you have what is presumably quite a high number of players who will from time to time buy things but never sell, instead junking all their items and raw materials.

Furyous

Good idea – Makes trading easier and more accessible. Worth the effort, while keeping the current system for those who enjoy it.

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

Ironically it is these barriers that keep the economy from spiraling out of control...

Most of the arguments here are speculation about what might happen. We don’t have to guess. Nearly every other MMO uses a centralized trader or auction house, and their economies function without collapsing. ESO is the outlier. Barriers here don’t stabilize value, they exclude players. Gold inflation and monopolies already exist under the current guild trader system.

SolarRune wrote: »

It comes down to ease, it's so much easier with a central auction house to control a market...

Market manipulation already happens today. Flippers and monopolies thrive in high traffic kiosks, while zone chat bypasses fees. A global trader doesn’t replace guild traders, zone chat, or direct trades, it adds another option. Those who prefer the distributed model can keep using it, while excluded players finally gain a path to participate.

frogthroat wrote: »

Beautiful idea, but I don't think it would work... natural selection... one system would dominate...

There are really two ways to look at this. The fact that players are already using zone chat and guild chat to bypass the current system shows there’s a need for something more accessible. That’s not a sign of convenience, it’s a sign of demand.

And there’s nothing wrong with natural selection between systems. If the current guild trader model truly works best, then a global trader will fail. But if the new system fits player needs better, it will succeed.

ZhuJiuyin wrote: »

I'm also dissatisfied with the current in-game economy, but the current trading system isn't inherently flawed...

Your dissatisfaction, which many players share, shows there might be a better way forward. Demand is weak, yes, but accessibility is a separate issue. Right now 92 percent of guilds are excluded from trading entirely, and of the small fraction that do get traders, fewer than 10 percent (less than one percent of guilds) land in good spots. That artificial scarcity is what causes problems.

Even if more valuable items were introduced, the current system would still lock most players out of trading them. A global trader ensures that when demand does exist, everyone can participate, not just the few guilds with kiosks.

ZhuJiuyin wrote: »

...the current trading environment is indeed poor, it's not due to guild traders, but rather because most goods lack appeal...

Think of it like Saks Fifth Avenue versus Walmart. A few selections of high‑value luxury items don’t generate nearly the amount of sales as getting cheaper goods to more people. Who do you think generates more revenue, the boutique with limited access, or the store that serves the masses? ESO’s system artificially limits trading to the boutique model, when the broader MMO market shows that opening access drives far more participation and stability.

Northwold wrote: »

The gating of easy to use selling behind guild membership is itself inflationary...

I think you’re spot on about how gating selling behind guild membership drives inflation. When players can’t sell, they end up farming new gold instead of circulating existing gold, which expands the money supply. That’s not healthy for the economy long term.

You’re also right that trader bids push prices upward just to cover kiosk costs. Instead of acting as a stabilizing sink, they often cancel out their own effect by forcing sellers to inflate prices further.

CatoUnchained

First thing ZOS should do to restore trading in to give us back 30 day listing times.

After that I don't know what to suggest. There just aren't the number of players there used to be to support trade guilds. I've almost completely stopped dealing with trading in ESO when just a couple years ago it was one of my main activities.