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Auction House

  • LadyInTheWater
    LadyInTheWater
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    No!
    Brennan wrote: »
    I want to propose a possible compromise - just to get a feel for what people think.

    As things stand currently, all Guild Stores have sell orders but no way to advertise the stuff you want to buy. What if there was both a sell and a buy option?

    Now this I could completely get behind. EVE has that; You can set up a "buy" order. Then, whomever wanders along can sell directly into your buy order. It makes it ridiculously easy to sell things, as well as buy things. I wouldn't want to see anything like this on a global AH (because I've seen what EVE's prices are like), but for Guild Stores I think it would be extremely convenient.
    The moment you call someone stupid, or try to display your opinion as "fact", you lose all credibility.
  • Seroczynski
    Seroczynski
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    No!
    With the megaservers an AH would have a too large impact on server economy. I'd rather have they improve the Guild Store functionality than include a continent-wide AH.
    “To alcohol! The cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.” ― Homer J. Simpson
  • Viverim
    Viverim
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    Yes!
    With the megaservers an AH would have a too large impact on server economy. I'd rather have they improve the Guild Store functionality than include a continent-wide AH.

    What economy? I mean, we really don't have one. A few people spamming chat and making side deals is not an economy. Sporatic trading in small pockets is not an economy. Why don't we get a working economy and then decide if it's broken?

  • Shimizu
    Shimizu
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    Yes!
    Even in guilds of 500 people, of which I'm a member of a few, there might be 4, 5 of an item (like turpen, for example) and that's all there is. Of course, they don't actually show up next to each other in the list. Or on the same page. Or at the same price. The badly functioning search feature worsens this lack of availability by waiting, lagging, refreshing, relogging your way to finding what you want for each of your five guilds.

    Trying to price compare between guilds is even worse, multiply all of the above waiting, lagging, refreshing, relogging while trying to find an item and then what, write down prices on paper?

    So, if I need a turpen, and I'm not sure what a good price is, I have to either pay whatever the first one I find costs, or spend no less than 20 minutes fighting with the interface to find an average price that may/may not be indicative of the larger market. How would I know if the trading guilds I am in have reasonable prices or not without going through the above?

    The result is I find myself withdrawing from the market completely. After listing fees and waiting and nobody wanting to bother with the guild store, I just vendor everything I don't need. Its instant money gratification and probably as much as I'd get after listing fees in most cases anyway.

    Oddly enough, the first week of the game the guild stores were jammed with hundreds of pages of stuff. Now, even though there's been no decrease in activity and there's actually been increases in membership, I'm in a guild of 480 people that has a total of 86 items listed on the guild market, over half of which are listed for under 10g and are like "sip of magicka". Because nobody's bothering. It isn't worth the hassle to list anything when the trade channel offers instant gratification with no delay, lag, clunky interface, waiting for mail to send you the stuff you actually bought (or your money).

    People just ignore the guild shops 'cause its so bad and so limited. Unless a decent global system is implemented I imagine more and more will do the same.
  • Jeremy
    Jeremy
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    Yes!
    Krym wrote: »
    Jeremy wrote: »

    Exactly. What we have now is already ruined so it could only be an improvement.

    If this game actually had a system that was working I could understand the resistance to risk change. But judging by the current state of it, I really don't see how it could get any worse and we have nothing to lose.

    global market cornered by goldsellers and dupers (remember they only took care of the "worst offenders"), same fee & deductions but *** sells less cause everybody undercuts you to get at least the fee back which also makes selling high-priced item unattractive, design changes that affect pve to make up for the loss of pvp stores. and when has any form of selling platform ever prevented WTB/WTS spam?

    maybe it's better, maybe it's not, but a kneejerk "fix" can end up much worse.
    remember, we're talking about a company that let dupe bugs run free over at least a week and launched with no anti-goldseller and bot prevention anywhere. I still see 10+ bottrains circling around in coldharbour....

    be careful what you wish for, just saying.
    Abeille wrote: »
    Krym wrote: »
    However,..

    I didn't say that :o

    But it's not a "knee jerk fix".

    Public Auction Houses have been used frequently in other successful games and all of them have worked a million times better than what we have on this game. Not to mention the values of a free and competitive market place have been tested to the point their superiority is widely recognized as economic fact.

    So there is nothing knee-jerk going on here Krym. We are simply asking that a tried and true solution be applied to fix this very broken system.

    And while a public market may not completely eradicate trade spam - it would certainly cut it back dramatically. And I would bet you my life on that. No game I have ever played that had a public auction house was infested with trade spam. Not a single one.

    The only people who willingly participate in trade spam are those who like to role play as merchants. Everyone else only does it out of desperation or necessity.
    Edited by Jeremy on April 28, 2014 1:54PM
  • methjester
    methjester
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    Yes!
    Auction houses are used in every MMO. With a game of this scale it's needed. The weird way crafting is set up there will still be a need to trade crafted good between crafters so the trade guilds will always have their uses.

    I love the game, but getting the trade goods, armor, and various other items out to other players is without a doubt the worst implemented system I have ever seen in any large scale MMO. Seriously, Every AAA MMO has a a game wide auction house.
  • Viverim
    Viverim
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    Yes!
    methjester wrote: »
    but getting the trade goods, armor, and various other items out to other players

    You can get your items out to other players?!?!
    Wow! That's Awesome! B)

    I wish I could do that... :'(


    (Yes, for those who are confused, the above is, indeed, sarcasm mixed with humor.) :)
  • Jeremy
    Jeremy
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    Yes!
    Shimizu wrote: »
    The result is I find myself withdrawing from the market completely. After listing fees and waiting and nobody wanting to bother with the guild store, I just vendor everything I don't need. Its instant money gratification and probably as much as I'd get after listing fees in most cases anyway.

    .

    Same here. I've pretty much just stopped trying to participate in this game's economy all-together. It's almost always a waste of time and I'm better off spending that time doing something more productive.

  • Rousseaux
    Rousseaux
    No!
    Heck no.
    You can have up to 5 of guild stores, which is 2500 potential customers/traders.
    It's more than enough.
  • Jeremy
    Jeremy
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    Yes!
    Rousseaux wrote: »
    Heck no.
    You can have up to 5 of guild stores, which is 2500 potential customers/traders.
    It's more than enough.

    If that's true and it really is more than enough, then why is it I can rarely ever find what I am looking to buy in any of these guild stores?
    Edited by Jeremy on April 28, 2014 5:36PM
  • Malediktus
    Malediktus
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    No!
    GW2 basically has a cross server world wide trading post and its horrible. Its full of people trying to manipulate prices. These 500 men guilds basically make it impossible to corner the market or manipulate it.
    @Malediktus --- Ebonheart Pact, EU-Megaserver
  • ChillBilly
    ChillBilly
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    Yes!
    If you would have asked me before launch, I would have said no to the Auction House.

    Now, however, with the impending doom of the economy due to inside and outside factors. I have to say that an Auction House would restore a somewhat pseudo economy. More or less what we have now so far as an economy goes is a single player game on the selling side and a typical multiplayer game on the buying side.

    This isn't to say things couldn't work without an Auction House. They could. Chat needs to be overhead instead of in a chat box in order to do it though.

    There clearly aren't enough money sinks. Players aren't farming, they are doing dungeon circuits and selling to the vendor. Unfortunately, with the broken mechanics and broken dungeons, the economy is in the pipes.

    The easiest solution is an Auction House. It would revitalize what little of an economy we have left.
  • Jeremy
    Jeremy
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    Yes!
    Malediktus wrote: »
    GW2 basically has a cross server world wide trading post and its horrible. Its full of people trying to manipulate prices. These 500 men guilds basically make it impossible to corner the market or manipulate it.

    I played Guild Wars 2. That game's economy was miles above this one. I was able to sell my stuff almost instantly. Could always find what I was looking for at a reasonable price. In fact, it was the only thing I liked about that game.

    So I would suggest your example proves the opposite of what you are trying to say ^^

    Also, the smaller the market is the easier it is to manipulate. I get ripped off every time I get lucky enough to find something I want to buy from one of these guild stores.
    Edited by Jeremy on April 28, 2014 5:54PM
  • ShinChuck
    ShinChuck
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    Yes!
    Rousseaux wrote: »
    Heck no.
    You can have up to 5 of guild stores, which is 2500 potential customers/traders.
    It's more than enough.

    2500 potential customers, if you have five guilds maxed out and dedicated specifically to buying and selling and zero players who are inactive.

    Perhaps you're arguing that Zenimax should allow five trading guilds, and five regular guilds. Maybe they could split the designations somehow. That would be better.

    But as it stands, the only way to have 2500 customers/sellers is to have five AH-type guilds. Anything smaller, more personal, elite dungeoning or raiding, or whatever, doesn't fit into that picture, gimping players on that end of things just to have 2500 customers.

    Edit: it's nice to see the pro-AH vote widening the gap. I'd venture it would be even higher if it were open to the general public and not just forum goers.
    Edited by ShinChuck on April 28, 2014 6:07PM
    "It's morally wrong to suggest gameplay changes for an MMO."
    ...seriously, someone told me that once here. The things people will do to win their internet arguments!
  • Viverim
    Viverim
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    Yes!
    ShinChuck wrote: »
    I'd venture it would be even higher if it were open to the general public and not just forum goers.

    Forum goers! We are a special breed!

    ... or it's a maintenance day and we can't get into the game...

    ... or, y'know, have to head off to work or bed or some other such thing and don't have time to play...

    ... or are somewhere with a really horrible internet connection...

    :\

    Edited by Viverim on April 28, 2014 6:33PM
  • LadyInTheWater
    LadyInTheWater
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    No!
    Jeremy wrote: »
    If that's true and it really is more than enough, then why is it I can rarely ever find what I am looking to buy in any of these guild stores?

    A global AH wouldn't guarantee that anything you're looking for would be for sale.
    The moment you call someone stupid, or try to display your opinion as "fact", you lose all credibility.
  • LadyInTheWater
    LadyInTheWater
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    No!
    Viverim wrote: »
    What economy? I mean, we really don't have one. A few people spamming chat and making side deals is not an economy. Sporatic trading in small pockets is not an economy. Why don't we get a working economy and then decide if it's broken?

    You and I have very different definitions of "economy". People have the ability to buy, sell, and trade goods or services in exchange for other goods, services, or currency. I fail to see how this isn't an economy.
    The moment you call someone stupid, or try to display your opinion as "fact", you lose all credibility.
  • Viverim
    Viverim
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    Yes!
    You and I have very different definitions of "economy". People have the ability to buy, sell, and trade goods or services in exchange for other goods, services, or currency. I fail to see how this isn't an economy.

    People having the ability to buy, sell, and trade goods is not an economy.

    People actually buying, selling and trading goods..... that's an economy.

  • Jeremy
    Jeremy
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    Yes!
    Jeremy wrote: »
    If that's true and it really is more than enough, then why is it I can rarely ever find what I am looking to buy in any of these guild stores?

    A global AH wouldn't guarantee that anything you're looking for would be for sale.

    It would guarantee a much better selection than what we have now.
    Edited by Jeremy on April 28, 2014 6:48PM
  • LadyInTheWater
    LadyInTheWater
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    No!
    Viverim wrote: »
    People having the ability to buy, sell, and trade goods is not an economy.

    People actually buying, selling and trading goods..... that's an economy.

    I have purchased stuff from my guild store, so I know other people are selling things. I have also sold stuff on my guild store, so I know that other people are buying things. How is this not an economy?
    Jeremy wrote: »
    It would guarantee a much better selection than what we have now.

    How would it guarantee a much better selection? If all your arguments are valid, then wouldn't it be the exact same items for sale now, but in much larger quantities?
    The moment you call someone stupid, or try to display your opinion as "fact", you lose all credibility.
  • Abigail
    Abigail
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    Yes!
    Will guarantee those opposed to a global marketplace are not dedicated crafters. Those fully engaged in crafting and economy understand the value of reaching the broadest customer base.

    Non-crafters and dilettante-crafters will obviously prefer the current system because it does not favor those fully engaged in the economy in any way.

    But, hey, it is what it is and I can make do until another MMO offering a more robust economic system emerges.
  • LadyInTheWater
    LadyInTheWater
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    No!
    Abigail wrote: »
    But, hey, it is what it is and I can make do until another MMO offering a more robust economic system emerges.

    Have you tried EVE Online? I think that may have the type of economic system you're looking for. It also has huge corporations full of warships that'll blast you into space dust if you try to manipulate the system. I'm a big fan.
    The moment you call someone stupid, or try to display your opinion as "fact", you lose all credibility.
  • Malediktus
    Malediktus
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    No!
    Jeremy wrote: »
    Malediktus wrote: »
    GW2 basically has a cross server world wide trading post and its horrible. Its full of people trying to manipulate prices. These 500 men guilds basically make it impossible to corner the market or manipulate it.

    I played Guild Wars 2. That game's economy was miles above this one. I was able to sell my stuff almost instantly. Could always find what I was looking for at a reasonable price. In fact, it was the only thing I liked about that game.

    So I would suggest your example proves the opposite of what you are trying to say ^^

    Also, the smaller the market is the easier it is to manipulate. I get ripped off every time I get lucky enough to find something I want to buy from one of these guild stores.
    Instant selling yes, but no player interaction, anonymous, prone to market manipulation. The whole economy was balanced toward playing the market instead of normal playing. Getting legendary weapons was at least 10x faster with messing with the TP than playing the game. Believe me I played GW2 for over 5k hours. It was simply horrible.
    If they add an auction house to this game similar to GW2 I am done with this game, it was one of the reasons why I have no interest in GW2 anymore.
    @Malediktus --- Ebonheart Pact, EU-Megaserver
  • Turkwise
    Turkwise
    Soul Shriven
    No!
    Anyone who played Diablo 3 (not an MMO, I know) knows what a disaster a mega-server AH would be. I feel it would be even worse in a persistent world like ESO.
  • Abigail
    Abigail
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    Yes!
    Malediktus wrote: »
    Instant selling yes, but no player interaction, anonymous... .

    That's not an absolute by any measure if the global marketplace if implemented properly, particularly when character names are applied to each item listing. Yeah, not bloody likely when everything is tied to an account name.

    On another MMO I played for years, I made numerous in-game friends by way of marketplace listings. Frankly, I'm not the most social player who ever came along, I have a disability that has sapped me of the confidence needed for many group combat scenarios, and I have difficulty engaging in the game and trying to use the chat screen. As much as I like ESO, I have never felt so totally cutoff from other players, and I most definitely blame much of that on the gimped economic system. Crafting and economics are my thing and I'm finding ESO increasingly restrictive.

    In short, ESO is an absolutely wonderful game in most respects, but its economic meta game is a disaster, primarily because there's no global marketplace and all that entails. Those rarely engaging in economics and deep crafting activities will never fully appreciate the limitations. But I do get it, with the game's server architecture some trade-offs had to be made and all this guild store hoopla is merely management putting a positive spin on it.

  • Jeremy
    Jeremy
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    Yes!


    Viverim wrote: »
    People having the ability to buy, sell, and trade goods is not an economy.

    People actually buying, selling and trading goods..... that's an economy.

    I have purchased stuff from my guild store, so I know other people are selling things. I have also sold stuff on my guild store, so I know that other people are buying things. How is this not an economy?
    Jeremy wrote: »
    It would guarantee a much better selection than what we have now.

    How would it guarantee a much better selection? If all your arguments are valid, then wouldn't it be the exact same items for sale now, but in much larger quantities?

    It would guarantee a better selection because it would have more people supplying the market.
  • sociald100ub17_ESO
    No!
    It would guarantee a better selection because it would have more people supplying the market.[/quote]

    It would only guarantee anyone who tries to sell for a fair price gets bought out by a bot who shorts the market of an item and then puts it up for a high price when they are the only seller. it will happen.

  • Opioid
    Opioid
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    Yes!
    Turkwise wrote: »
    Anyone who played Diablo 3 (not an MMO, I know) knows what a disaster a mega-server AH would be. I feel it would be even worse in a persistent world like ESO.
    The only thing disastrous about the D3 AH was the real money portion of it. That coupled with the horrendous loot tables that basically required you to either farm endlessly for gear upgrades that had an incredibly slim chance of dropping, farm endlessly for gold to buy upgrades from the AH, or spend real money to bypass the endless farming entirely.

    Thankfully the loot 2.0 patch resolved much of the loot table woes. Otherwise, the gold AH was actually fairly useful for buying low to mid-tier upgrades, crafting mats and gems when you just had bad luck getting drops yourself.

    There's no reason why a large scale AH system wouldn't work in ESO. It doesn't suffer from the problems that D3 had. Loot tables aren't as wonky, crafted gear is a viable upgrade path and crafting mats are plentiful with the exception of the most rare items like purple and gold upgrade mats.

  • Jeremy
    Jeremy
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    Yes!
    Malediktus wrote: »
    Jeremy wrote: »
    Malediktus wrote: »
    GW2 basically has a cross server world wide trading post and its horrible. Its full of people trying to manipulate prices. These 500 men guilds basically make it impossible to corner the market or manipulate it.

    I played Guild Wars 2. That game's economy was miles above this one. I was able to sell my stuff almost instantly. Could always find what I was looking for at a reasonable price. In fact, it was the only thing I liked about that game.

    So I would suggest your example proves the opposite of what you are trying to say ^^

    Also, the smaller the market is the easier it is to manipulate. I get ripped off every time I get lucky enough to find something I want to buy from one of these guild stores.
    Instant selling yes, but no player interaction, anonymous, prone to market manipulation. The whole economy was balanced toward playing the market instead of normal playing. Getting legendary weapons was at least 10x faster with messing with the TP than playing the game. Believe me I played GW2 for over 5k hours. It was simply horrible.
    If they add an auction house to this game similar to GW2 I am done with this game, it was one of the reasons why I have no interest in GW2 anymore.

    Guild Stores operate much the same as auction houses. They just suck a lot more.

    So I don't understand your point about why these Guild Stores offer such a great social experience when compared to other more public auction houses.

    Why are you interacting on some new social level when you browse a guild store listing rather an auction house listing? It doesn't make any sense to me.


    And like I said, I thought the auction house on Guild Wars 2 was amazing. So I just disagree with your basic premise about this.
  • RomedyMC
    RomedyMC
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    No!
    This entire thread makes my head hurt. So, I'm going to challenge some of these basic "facts" everyone wants to debate.

    1.) "More sellers in the market means more buyers in the market."

    NO! In the venn diagram of the "market", buyers and sellers are separate circles! Adding more "buyers" to the market only increases the number of buyers. So 1 hot dog stand sells 5 hot dogs per day. Then 2 more stands open up next to the original. How many hot dogs do they sell? Given the current information, there is no way to make any logical statement about the circle of hot dog buyers.

    Still think I'm wrong? Our video game market gives us the advantage of being clearly defined. The entire market is the players. No more and no less. Every possible buyer and seller already exists in the market. (players unsub and players start playing, so the physical numbers change daily. However, the fact that the market is clearly defined with all buyers/sellers necessarily in it does not change.)

    2.) "A larger market means better prices."

    The term "better" is not an absolute, so better for whom? It means "better with reference to the total amount of currency in the market." It does not necessarily mean better for the buyer and almost certainly does not mean better for the seller. I'll expound on this in my second post.

    3.) "I cannot find the item I need."

    This sentence carries the necessary caveat, (for the price that I want.) No further evaluation here. I can certainly see the instance of,"I cannot find a shield with X trait that I MUST HAVE NOW!" and it is valid. However, there are a number of arguments, relative to 4/28/14, that can be made for why you actually don't need that particular item right this instant.

    In an interesting side note, what exactly is the market for the above situation? I bet you answered "our video game market, duh." And you would be wrong. The market given in the directly above shield example consists on exactly one buyer and 0 sellers. What does that demand curve look like mathematicians? That's right, it's infinite. Meaning someone deciding to sell that shield can set the price wherever they please. (See infinite demand curve.) Is it polite, or even ethical, to demand 50,000g for that shield w/ trait? No. But is it valid? Absolutely.

    So, if you really must ABSOLUTELY have that item RIGHT NOW!, you have no right to get upset when someone demands an unreasonable price. You (and you alone) made the demand curve infinite.

    I'll follow this with a second post entirely of my own thoughts to avoid extreme lengthyness.



    Edited by RomedyMC on April 28, 2014 8:51PM
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