No AH (Auction House) = crap

sotonin · July 2014

Guild stores are terrible and a huge flipping joke. Guild kiosks will be no better. Quit trying to be "different" and just give your playerbase what they want, a CONVENIENT method to buy and sell their goods with a wide audience. Revamp the guild system back to what it SHOULD be. 1 guild per character slot and be done with it. This whole thing feels like a rollercoaster ride to nowhere and by nowhere i mean people leaving because the rather good crafting system is handicapped by not having a realistic way to sell your goods without wasting a ton of your time and effort.

sotonin · July 2014

wrlifeboil wrote: »

Cogo wrote: »

When Blizzard initially designed and implemented the auction houses for Diablo III, the driving goal was to provide a convenient and secure system for trades. But as the team mentioned on different occasions, it became increasingly clear that despite the benefits of the AH system and the fact that many players around the world use it, it ultimately undermines Diablo's core game play: kill monsters to get cool loot. With that in mind, Blizzard wants to let everyone know that they've decided to remove the gold and real-money auction house system from Diablo III.

Source
http://news.mmosite.com/content/2013-09-18/blizzard_to_shut_down_diablo_iii_auction_houses.shtml

That's what came out of the public relations flak filters.

Guess you weren't in on that 200+ page forum thread where Blizzard's CEO posted an apology to D3 fans. He got lots of credit for wading into the D3 general discussion mosh pit though.

That's an entirely different scenario that came about because of the fact that their auction house was trading in REAL MONEY. Also after they fixed the damn game to actually have decent drops there was no longer a need for an auction house in that game. (You automatically get legendaries off bosses the first time you kill them, etc)

In addition, D3 is NOT a MMORPG. it's a fake halfway sort of kind of multiplayer game. Not in the same class, plays by different rules and has different expectations from the playerbase.

sotonin · July 2014

Bramir wrote: »

No AH also means that gold buyers (you know...the reason we had to live with bots when the game went live) can't necessarily get the advantage they are trying to get...

Personally, I like things to be rare, and I like to craft, which makes you fairly self-sufficient in this game.

Not really considering a lot of the chinese gold farmers are simply grinding and selling EVERYTHING to the vendor for vendor gold. It adds up quite quickly when you have 10+ bots all going 24/7. They don't need to sell anything to players at all.

Orizuru · July 2014

Kulthax wrote: »

SFBryan18 wrote: »

I believe they should add an official traders guild to this game, with questlines and all. One feature of this guild would be placing items for sale on the global server. This would make a lot of sense. It could also stop the zone chat spam which I hate so much.

I like this idea but the zone chat spam will never go away sadly.

It's naive to think a global AH would eliminate trade spam in zone chat. Every game that offers an AH still has trade spam in chat channels. While it's perfectly true that an AH could reduce the amount of trade spam in chat, it's naive to think it would prevent it.

Some people believe they can reach a wider market in chat channels than an AH because an AH requires that the players visit a terminal or location in-game where they can interact with the AH. A public chat channel simply requires that the potential customers be logged in and playing the game in an area where the channel is available. Other players will prefer chat spam because it allows them to target the impulsive shoppers who do not even realize they can't live without the particular item being sold.

wrlifeboil · July 2014

sotonin wrote: »

wrlifeboil wrote: »

Cogo wrote: »

When Blizzard initially designed and implemented the auction houses for Diablo III, the driving goal was to provide a convenient and secure system for trades. But as the team mentioned on different occasions, it became increasingly clear that despite the benefits of the AH system and the fact that many players around the world use it, it ultimately undermines Diablo's core game play: kill monsters to get cool loot. With that in mind, Blizzard wants to let everyone know that they've decided to remove the gold and real-money auction house system from Diablo III.

Source
http://news.mmosite.com/content/2013-09-18/blizzard_to_shut_down_diablo_iii_auction_houses.shtml

That's what came out of the public relations flak filters.

Guess you weren't in on that 200+ page forum thread where Blizzard's CEO posted an apology to D3 fans. He got lots of credit for wading into the D3 general discussion mosh pit though.

That's an entirely different scenario that came about because of the fact that their auction house was trading in REAL MONEY. Also after they fixed the damn game to actually have decent drops there was no longer a need for an auction house in that game. (You automatically get legendaries off bosses the first time you kill them, etc)

In addition, D3 is NOT a MMORPG. it's a fake halfway sort of kind of multiplayer game. Not in the same class, plays by different rules and has different expectations from the playerbase.

The D3 AH was basically a global AH for millions of players. With that many players buying and selling, both the gold AH and the real money AH were extremely efficient. You could see the prices of similar gear and mats change virtually in tandem in the GAH and RMAH based on pegs to gold seller rates. A global AH in eso would be a mini-D3 GAH. Even if an eso global AH was one-tenth the size of D3's GAH/RMAH, there would still be a huge pool of buyers and sellers trading a limited number of items.

Blackwidow · July 2014

Orizuru wrote: »

Kulthax wrote: »

SFBryan18 wrote: »

I believe they should add an official traders guild to this game, with questlines and all. One feature of this guild would be placing items for sale on the global server. This would make a lot of sense. It could also stop the zone chat spam which I hate so much.

I like this idea but the zone chat spam will never go away sadly.

It's naive to think a global AH would eliminate trade spam in zone chat. Every game that offers an AH still has trade spam in chat channels. While it's perfectly true that an AH could would reduce the amount of trade spam in chat, it's naive to think it would prevent it.

Yes, AHs do reduce spam chat a lot, but there will always be players who prefer to not use AHs.

So, the overall effect would be lower sales chat.

Cogo · July 2014

Blackwidow wrote: »

Yes, AHs do reduce spam chat a lot, but there will always be players who prefer to not use AHs.

So, the overall effect would be lower sales chat.

This is very true.

ESO is TRYING to create a world where players interact. Sales chat IS interacting. The end.

Either someone think its spam or not, THAT's another question and is a personal opinion.

I suggested 2 months ago that they would put in a special "trade" chat channel just like zone, which you could choose to turn off and on.
Got shot down right away. By you as well

SFBryan18 · July 2014

TBQH, I've turned zone chat off because of all the trade spam. So if their intent was interaction, they've gotten the opposite results from me.

Makkir · July 2014

Blackwidow wrote: »

Makkir wrote: »

Blackwidow wrote: »

gcalex5 wrote: »

I don't understand why people are so against this.

Fear of WoW. WoW had it, so it's evil.

That is the only real reason. All else is B.S.

Once again, the farse comparisons. WoW is a game where the best gear comes from PvE content, not player crafted like ESO.
Auction House serves a different purpose in WoW, and works based on it's type of MMO and economy.
You're talking about a Rhino and an Elephant here.

Okay, so why would player crafted items not want to be on an AH?

I'm not an economist, so please use small words.

Well I will break it down. Did you happen to play SWG? Or any MMO (maybe UO) where crafter made gear was pivotal?

Basically if you and I were Clothiers, our "Fancy Robe of the Bear" would have identical stats, assuming we both crafted the exact same level and used the same traits. The only difference in our Robes would be the price on the Auction House. If you listed yours yesterday for 500 gold, mine would be listed 499 gold or vice versa. This is basically how it works in a game like World of Warcraft. It's an under cutting war.

Luckily in ESO, vendors offer a bench mark price for a stack of materials. I believe it's 400 gold. I don't remember. Currently among my 5 guilds, the prices on a stack of materials are very very inconsistent. Jute is 450 gold in one guild, 650 gold in another. I just checked.

The global auction house sets a world wide standard price, in this case it would be 401 gold for a stack of materials because only an idiot would list a stack for under vendor value (assuming it was 400 gold). That fluctuation in the price I just listed in the above paragraph would be gone.

The next thing to put in the back of your mind is your gear is not consumable. It is repaired and restored. In SWG, your gear could break after being repaired and would be rendered useless and needed to be replaced. Gear was consumable. Consumables make the MMO Market go round and round.

The best gear in TESO comes from crafters (in one way or another) because Legendary gear does not drop. If a purple drops and you like it's traits, you need a crafter to upgrade it to Legendary. Otherwise, you are going to be using crafter made gear and weapons.

Once the auction house sets the price on materials (401gold), everything else that requires those materials trickles down from that point. Since materials are readily available and cheap on an AH, and in theory available in unlimited supply (since materials come from spawned resource nodes), and with botters become even more available on an AH, more and more crafting materials are put into circulation making purple and orange materials more and more common. As availability increases, the price drops as people have a harder time moving the items and are forced to undercut each other. Eventually the auction house would be flooded with pages upon pages of legendary gear since there is a ceiling right now (Your gear isn't consumed so once you have your final set, you won't be buying gear again until the next tier is released/ more levels).

Right now, there is such a price fluctuation you have a lot of options. Sometimes you have to shop around to find a good deal or score a good price for an item. Face it, a lot of people want an auction house because it saves them time. I don't think MMOs were ever designed to be "Quick and Efficient" especially MMOs designed with Crafters in mind. To some people, crafting IS end game for them. For others, it's Combat and Game Play. I am an older gamer (in my early 30s) and prefer games that aren't exactly "life easy." Achievements/Milestones are more brag worthy that way.

If an auction house is implemented in this game, a number of other changes would need to occur for it to work, assuming gear will never been consumable:

a) Would probably need to nerf the drop rate of legendary/epic materials from decon
b) Vendors should offer more than 400g for a stack of materials
c) Heavier gold sinks needed at higher levels

Cogo · July 2014

Makkir wrote: »

Blackwidow wrote: »

Makkir wrote: »

Blackwidow wrote: »

gcalex5 wrote: »

I don't understand why people are so against this.

Fear of WoW. WoW had it, so it's evil.

That is the only real reason. All else is B.S.

Once again, the farse comparisons. WoW is a game where the best gear comes from PvE content, not player crafted like ESO.
Auction House serves a different purpose in WoW, and works based on it's type of MMO and economy.
You're talking about a Rhino and an Elephant here.

Okay, so why would player crafted items not want to be on an AH?

I'm not an economist, so please use small words.

Well I will break it down. Did you happen to play SWG? Or any MMO (maybe UO) where crafter made gear was pivotal?

Basically if you and I were Clothiers, our "Fancy Robe of the Bear" would have identical stats, assuming we both crafted the exact same level and used the same traits. The only difference in our Robes would be the price on the Auction House. If you listed yours yesterday for 500 gold, mine would be listed 499 gold or vice versa. This is basically how it works in a game like World of Warcraft. It's an under cutting war.

Luckily in ESO, vendors offer a bench mark price for a stack of materials. I believe it's 400 gold. I don't remember. Currently among my 5 guilds, the prices on a stack of materials are very very inconsistent. Jute is 450 gold in one guild, 650 gold in another. I just checked.

The global auction house sets a world wide standard price, in this case it would be 401 gold for a stack of materials because only an idiot would list a stack for under vendor value (assuming it was 400 gold). That fluctuation in the price I just listed in the above paragraph would be gone.

The next thing to put in the back of your mind is your gear is not consumable. It is repaired and restored. In SWG, your gear could break after being repaired and would be rendered useless and needed to be replaced. Gear was consumable. Consumables make the MMO Market go round and round.

The best gear in TESO comes from crafters (in one way or another) because Legendary gear does not drop. If a purple drops and you like it's traits, you need a crafter to upgrade it to Legendary. Otherwise, you are going to be using crafter made gear and weapons.

Once the auction house sets the price on materials (401gold), everything else that requires those materials trickles down from that point. Since materials are readily available and cheap on an AH, and in theory available in unlimited supply (since materials come from spawned resource nodes), and with botters become even more available on an AH, more and more crafting materials are put into circulation making purple and orange materials more and more common. As availability increases, the price drops as people have a harder time moving the items and are forced to undercut each other. Eventually the auction house would be flooded with pages upon pages of legendary gear since there is a ceiling right now (Your gear isn't consumed so once you have your final set, you won't be buying gear again until the next tier is released/ more levels).

Right now, there is such a price fluctuation you have a lot of options. Sometimes you have to shop around to find a good deal or score a good price for an item. Face it, a lot of people want an auction house because it saves them time. I don't think MMOs were ever designed to be "Quick and Efficient" especially MMOs designed with Crafters in mind. To some people, crafting IS end game for them. For others, it's Combat and Game Play. I am an older gamer (in my early 30s) and prefer games that aren't exactly "life easy." Achievements/Milestones are more brag worthy that way.

If an auction house is implemented in this game, a number of other changes would need to occur for it to work, assuming gear will never been consumable:

a) Would probably need to nerf the drop rate of legendary/epic materials from decon
b) Vendors should offer more than 400g for a stack of materials
c) Heavier gold sinks needed at higher levels

WOW! Outstanding post that describes ESO current economy!

1000 Awesome to you!

SFBryan18 · July 2014

Um, the undercutting war is how a real economy works though? If something is cheaper at Walmart, I go there. That's how economies work. It prevents the really greedy businesses from taking advantage of the customers. Price is set by supply and demand. If you offer a product that is rare, you can up the price. It seems the only people who would not want a fair trade global economy are the players trying to get over and make the largest profit they can. This is why I don't even participate in buying from other players, because their prices are a rip off.

Alphashado · July 2014

For the record, I do not want global auction house. I've seen one in action with GW2 and I didn't care for it at all. The concept of everyone having almost instant access to almost everything in the game doesn't appeal to me. And as a crafter in ESO you are fairly unique and in demand based on what traits you have. That would be gone with a global AH. Every piece of gear with every trait would be worth next to nothing and too easy to get.

I do love regional auction houses though. If someone could convince me that such a thing would be possible on a mega server than I would be all ears. But the only thing that I hear is "it's not that hard" or " it can easily be done". Even if they somehow broke it down to factions, there would still be potentially hundreds of thousands of people all using the same watered down AH.

This isn't wow or rift or swtor. There aren't individual servers.

I suggest that we wait and see how the kiosks work. The guild store system certainly has it's flaws, but a global auction house with a million users is not the answer for those of us that enjoy the rewards of effort.

And why there isn't a trade channel is beyond me. Seems like a no brainer.

Fleymark · July 2014

Blackwidow wrote: »

gcalex5 wrote: »

I don't understand why people are so against this.

Fear of WoW. WoW had it, so it's evil.

That is the only real reason. All else is B.S.

Nah, pretty much every game has it but there are good reasons not to have one all encompassing bazaar on megaservers.

Problem is, in classic form for this game, what we do have is way too restrictive. Maybe I'm just in the wrong 4 trading guilds, but even tho the ones I'm in are full and active, they never seem to have what I'm looking for when I'm looking for it and most of what I try to sell doesn't seem to have much of a market in them. And since I joined veteran trade guilds this has gotten even worse since I started playing alts.

So I can see not having a global bazaar, but we need more than what we have now, even if it's just more guild slots. Something.

Looking forward to the guild store vendors coming up but I'm not confident that's going to really fix the problem.

It's always entirely one direction or the other with this game. I don't know why these people are so challenged with risk/effort vs reward and simple balance. Was chatting with a guy in the same boat as me with our crafting...talked about how many alts we've rolled to farm blue recipes for provisioning, what we are doing with hirelings etc...I commented that it's easier to kill the boss of the game, solo at that, than make good food.

Thought about it later and it kind of sums up the bass ackwardness of this gamein general. You can insert any number of things in that statement...inventory, banking, buying, selling, etc. Feats of epic heroics are stupid easy but managing your inventory and buying/selling is where our challenge lies? It's ridiculous.

If nothing else put a freaking in game message board system up so people can arrange trades or put up a forum for that here. Something.

Everybody freaks out about people farming and using alts for hirelings, etc but if you can't do that and you can't find people to buy or sell to, not in theory but what you need to when you need to, then what else are you supposed to do? Guild hop till you find what you need then do it again the next time? That's great for community.

If the designers of this game will ever decide if they want it to be an MMO or a single player game with PvP and chat for interaction and just make everything fit that design we will all be a lot better off.

Blackwidow · July 2014

Makkir wrote: »

Well I will break it down. Did you happen to play SWG? Or any MMO (maybe UO) where crafter made gear was pivotal?

I played UO, but it did not have an AH.

Basically if you and I were Clothiers, our "Fancy Robe of the Bear" would have identical stats, assuming we both crafted the exact same level and used the same traits. The only difference in our Robes would be the price on the Auction House. If you listed yours yesterday for 500 gold, mine would be listed 499 gold or vice versa. This is basically how it works in a game like World of Warcraft. It's an under cutting war.

I'm following you so far.

Luckily in ESO, vendors offer a benchmark price for a stack of materials. I believe it's 400 gold. I don't remember. Currently among my 5 guilds, the prices on a stack of materials are very very inconsistent. Jute is 450 gold in one guild, 650 gold in another. I just checked.

The global auction house sets a world wide standard price, in this case it would be 401 gold for a stack of materials because only an idiot would list a stack for under vendor value (assuming it was 400 gold). That fluctuation in the price I just listed in the above paragraph would be gone.

Yes, stacks sell to vendors for 400, and we usually can sell them to players for around 600.

So far, we agree.

The next thing to put in the back of your mind is your gear is not consumable. It is repaired and restored. In SWG, your gear could break after being repaired and would be rendered useless and needed to be replaced. Gear was consumable. Consumables make the MMO Market go round and round.

This is the same as WoW, so that is not differing in that respect.

The best gear in TESO comes from crafters (in one way or another) because Legendary gear does not drop. If a purple drops and you like it's traits, you need a crafter to upgrade it to Legendary. Otherwise, you are going to be using crafter made gear and weapons.

Yep, true.

Once the auction house sets the price on materials (401gold), everything else that requires those materials trickles down from that point. Since materials are readily available and cheap on an AH, and in theory available in unlimited supply (since materials come from spawned resource nodes), and with botters become even more available on an AH, more and more crafting materials are put into circulation making purple and orange materials more and more common. As availability increases, the price drops as people have a harder time moving the items and are forced to undercut each other. Eventually the auction house would be flooded with pages upon pages of legendary gear since there is a ceiling right now (Your gear isn't consumed so once you have your final set, you won't be buying gear again until the next tier is released/ more levels).

Materials will not become less rare in the world. How much access we have to those materials can wax and wane, but it is a constant as far as how rare they are.

This is no different than what happens on WoW, except with finding rare gear it will be finding the rare materials.

I'm not sure why it makes a difference if it is player made.

If you are saying the rare materials would suddenly be easy to get, I would have to disagree.

They would be easier to find on the AH, that is true, but they would still be rare, and therefore still expensive, even on the AH.

If the rare materials are expensive, then it will be expensive to make items.

Right now, there is such a price fluctuation you have a lot of options. Sometimes you have to shop around to find a good deal or score a good price for an item. Face it, a lot of people want an auction house because it saves them time.

Yes, that is the selling point.

I don't think MMOs were ever designed to be "Quick and Efficient" especially MMOs designed with Crafters in mind.

I think some things were meant to be quick and easy and some things were meant to be a challenge.

I think questing. fighting, collecting gold, and even collecting rare items should be a challenge.

I don't think things like banking or selling items should be a challenge.

You might say that buying rare materials off the AH is not challenging, and I would agree. But getting the gold to buy the rare items is the challenge in this case.

This is just my opinion, you might disagree.

To some people, crafting IS end game for them. For others, it's Combat and Game Play. I am an older gamer (in my early 30s) and prefer games that aren't exactly "life easy." Achievements/Milestones are more brag worthy that way.

There should be many ways to achieve the same goals, because we all have our own playstyle.

If an auction house is implemented in this game, a number of other changes would need to occur for it to work, assuming gear will never been consumable:

a) Would probably need to nerf the drop rate of legendary/epic materials from decon
b) Vendors should offer more than 400g for a stack of materials
c) Heavier gold sinks needed at higher levels

I disagree. Adding an AH does not change the rate at which rare items drop in the world. A rare item is still a rare item.

Now, as I said earlier, I am not an economist, so if I blatantly got something wrong, or if I missed some key idea, don't be upset with me, please.

Tell me what I am not understanding.

Makkir · July 2014

SFBryan18 wrote: »

Um, the undercutting war is how a real economy works though? If something is cheaper at Walmart, I go there. That's how economies work. It prevents the really greedy businesses from taking advantage of the customers. Price is set by supply and demand. If you offer a product that is rare, you can up the price. It seems the only people who would not want a fair trade global economy are the players trying to get over and make the largest profit they can. This is why I don't even participate in buying from other players, because their prices are a rip off.

You realize WalMart is the greedy business right? It puts Americans out of a job because it runs sweatshops on foreign soil where it can pay children and women a nickel per hour to mass produce shoes, clothing, furniture, etc hence avoid American Wage laws. That is why Walmart is cheaper. The same can be said about the Chinese Gold Farmers who work in computer warehouses in China where the American Dollar is worth much much more to them than it is to you and I. You never see any American Gold Farming businesses. Why not? Because we have a minimum wage, whereas the Chinese don't. So they can employ thousands at 5 cents per hour to farm gold and materials all day and night, literally 24/7. If an American business did that, they'd be considerably undercut by every Chinese competitor...hence why you don't see any legit American Gold Farming businesses...they are ALL Chinese.

The reason I mention this is because the gold farmers have brought a massive amount of gold in to the game (through duping and by means of farming it) and giving players too much gold is dangerous, especially when it was obtained on the black market (real money trade). I did a simple google search and found one site selling 100k gold for $35. It's a multi-billion dollar industry and unfortunately you cant avoid it in any MMO today (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_economy).

A global auction house lets you compare prices all in one spot within the game. In real life we have the internet yes, but we don't have a real life auction house to compare prices of every store selling milk and eggs. People shop at Paul's Big M supermarket for milk and eggs whereas Walmart may be much cheaper, but they don't make the commute because of distance or because they simply do not know that Walmart is cheaper. It's "blind." Currently that's how it is in ESO now. I could be selling your Epic Necklace of ButtKicking much cheaper than the other guy, but you wouldn't know because you're not in my guild store. It gives players a challenging opportunity to score a good deal, make a heavy profit, and interact with players for trade. It's an exciting break from the staple Auction House in every other MMO.

You don't want an undercutting war in a game where your gear doesn't rot. You say the price is set by supply and demand. While that works in the real world, not so much in this MMO. The reason is, there is a gear ceiling. That means you will reach a point where you have the best possible gear and no longer need to purchase it. That's why I said consumables make the MMO economy go round and round. You don't want a ceiling to be the reason demand decreases. Otherwise, you will eventually be sitting on an inventory full of crap no one wants anymore. The ONLY stuff that will be selling on the AH would be the end game gear as people finish up their sets, and of course the consumables (food, potions, etc). You are thinking in the present rather than the future. There is a large population still finishing their adventure to 50 (Hell, I am only 48 on my main) and going through their VR levels. Project to when 80% of the population is VR12.

Blackwidow · July 2014

Makkir wrote: »

You realize WalMart is the greedy business right? It puts Americans out of a job because it runs sweatshops on foreign soil where it can pay children and women a nickel per hour to mass produce shoes, clothing, furniture, etc hence avoid American Wage laws. That is why Walmart is cheaper. The same can be said about the Chinese Gold Farmers who work in computer warehouses in China where the American Dollar is worth much much more to them than it is to you and I. You never see any American Gold Farming businesses. Why not? Because we have a minimum wage, whereas the Chinese don't. So they can employ thousands at 5 cents per hour to farm gold and materials all day and night, literally 24/7. If an American business did that, they'd be considerably undercut by every Chinese competitor...hence why you don't see any legit American Gold Farming businesses...they are ALL Chinese.

None of that has anything to do with AHs.

He was saying people use supply and demand. Prices fluctuate based on demand of the item.

Gold farmers do not need an AH. The whole gold farmer argument is false. If anything AH would hurt gold farmers, because prices would more stable.

A global auction house lets you compare prices all in one spot within the game. In real life we have the internet yes, but we don't have a real life auction house to compare prices of every store selling milk and eggs. People shop at Paul's Big M supermarket for milk and eggs whereas Walmart may be much cheaper, but they don't make the commute because of distance or because they simply do not know that Walmart is cheaper. It's "blind." Currently that's how it is in ESO now. I could be selling your Epic Necklace of ButtKicking much cheaper than the other guy, but you wouldn't know because you're not in my guild store. It gives players a challenging opportunity to score a good deal, make a heavy profit, and interact with players for trade. It's an exciting break from the staple Auction House in every other MMO.

It's "blind" says it all.

You just made an argument that no AH is a good thing because prices can be wildly unfair to people who do not know any better and there is no way to price check in a safe way.

I'm not seeing to the upside.

Makkir · July 2014

I have an alternative suggestion that I hope is popular. Since our characters have all these fabulous items in our backpacks wanting to be sold...why can't our characters go to a market place and act as a Vendor where others can right click on your character and search your backpacks for items to buy (Think of the EverQuest Bazaar)???
It wouldn't be a global Auction House where everyone's goods are listed, but rather an option to turn your character in to a vendor while you are AFK or going to sleep for the night.

Seems like a win-win to me.

Blackwidow · July 2014

Makkir wrote: »

I have an alternative suggestion that I hope is popular. Since our characters have all these fabulous items in our backpacks wanting to be sold...why can't our characters go to a market place and act as a Vendor where others can right click on your character and search your backpacks for items to buy (Think of the EverQuest Bazaar)???
It wouldn't be a global Auction House where everyone's goods are listed, but rather an option to turn your character in to a vendor while you are AFK or going to sleep for the night.

Seems like a win-win to me.

That is just a complicated global AH, but I would even take an antiquated idea like that over guild stores.

BTW, do you remember the horrid lag back then in the bazaar with so many players all in one room?

I guess we can test that megaserver player load now.

SFBryan18 · July 2014

I'll spare all the quoting of the really long post about China and whatever...

Let's assume the people of Tamriel don't have the internet for Amazon and Walmart, would it at least be fair to have an official trading post in each zone, maybe located in the large cities, where members could go and list their items for sale. Deposit them and set a price, or whatever, so other players could purchase them? Maybe have a deposit limit or whatever. And for even more immersion, they would physically have to go to that location to collect their money, or maybe just to add or buy stuff and the gold can be delivered by a messenger or whatever. Anything that helps people trade without the need to spam chat would be good, in my opinion.

Seriously, I have a Breton motif I don't need, and I don't even want to try to sell it because the idea of spamming the zone chat is incredibly awkward. Some kind of location to sell our items would be nice. And before anyone says trade guild, no thanks. I rather spam zone chat.

Makkir · July 2014

Blackwidow wrote: »

I disagree. Adding an AH does not change the rate at which rare items drop in the world. A rare item is still a rare item.

Now, as I said earlier, I am not an economist, so if I blatantly got something wrong, or if I missed some key idea, don't be upset with me, please.

Tell me what I am not understanding.

No problem. I'll go back to the price on raw materials. Vendor gives 400 gold, you said currently you can fetch roughly 600 gold per stack. With Trade Guilds, you are in a strategic position to sell your goods. You have far less undercutting and opportunity to list your items at a price you want without interference from other players/bots/farmers/whatever. What a player is willing to pay is what your item is worth.

When an Auction House is introduced we will eventually see a point where 600g/stack is no longer. It will be set to 401g/stack (Well, lets put aside AH fees for a moment for sake of example) due to the under cutting war and hundreds of players putting stacks of materials up daily. The undercutting of 1 gold will eventually drop the stack price from 600g to 550g to 515g to 493g to 410g then to 401g.

With 3/3 of the appropriate craft, it's very easy to get rare crafting items from deconstructing raw materials, which would now be available in abundance on an auction house. Maybe that's the part you overlooked? Here's a helpful gold farming hint by the way...don't deconstruct all your raw materials until you are 3/3 in that craft...you are literally blowing your money away.

You also said getting gold to purchase rare items is the challenge. Well yeah, unfortunately there is millions of gold in the economy that wasn't exactly challenging to obtain (Paypal, swiping the credit card, etc). Yes, I am hinting at all the players who purchased gold. The multi-billion dollar industry we created (I don't mean you or I literally) has put a dangerous amount of gold in the economy where your weapons and armor don't break. There are also not enough end game gold sinks.

Phinix1 · July 2014

JoseDelgadoCub17_ESO wrote: »

That's how they envisioned the game, not only that a global AH would remove player interaction.

"That's how they envisioned the game, not only that a global AH would remove endless impersonal zone chat spam."

There, fixed that for you. Seriously? Player interaction? Does anybody honestly use their trade guilds for anything but the AH? Everyone I know simply sets up filters to ignore all guild related chat.

There is no meaningful player interaction taking place due to the absence of an Auction House. Simply having the crafter's name on items you buy is good enough for that.

The only other reason given, "it would destroy the economy," seems equally thin when you consider that if rare items are appropriately rare, and now that they have fixed all their dupe bugs and banned the exploiters, the economy should be able to balance itself out over time like every other game.

It sounds more like smoke to cover current technical limitations, and they will probably phase in larger and larger auction houses once they get that snag worked out.

Makkir · July 2014

Blackwidow wrote: »

It's "blind" says it all.

You just made an argument that no AH is a good thing because prices can be wildly unfair to people who do not know any better and there is no way to price check in a safe way.

I'm not seeing to the upside.

Well, why is there such negative connotation attached to that? Why can't "wild" prices be viewed as a good thing? Maybe that's our difference?

Here- If I walked in to a store today looking for a grill and found one priced at 59.99 when I was ready to spend 199.99 yes I would be very very happy. But consider they had to list it at 59.99 only because the D-Bags next door had all their grills listed for 60.99. If the D-Bags next door did not exist, I probably would still have purchased the grill for 199.99. So, to me it was worth the 200 bucks.

I am not promoting the idea that people should intentionally take advantage of other players, but I also don't think there is a scandalous difference between selling something for 450 gold versus 650 gold. But I AM willing to work twice as hard to sell my item for the latter price. In the world of an Auction House, that opportunity would never be there.

Phinix1 · July 2014

Makkir wrote: »

Well, why is there such negative connotation attached to that? Why can't "wild" prices be viewed as a good thing? Maybe that's our difference?

Here- If I walked in to a store today looking for a grill and found one priced at 59.99 when I was ready to spend 199.99 yes I would be very very happy. But consider they had to list it at 59.99 only because the D-Bags next door had all their grills listed for 60.99. If the D-Bags next door did not exist, I probably would still have purchased the grill for 199.99. So, to me it was worth the 200 bucks.

I am not promoting the idea that people should intentionally take advantage of other players, but I also don't think there is a scandalous difference between selling something for 450 gold versus 650 gold. But I AM willing to work twice as hard to sell my item for the latter price. In the world of an Auction House, that opportunity would never be there.

Never go full greed. It sounds like you are arguing AGAINST fair competition and supporting price fixing and collusion. Not exactly a popular perspective.

SFBryan18 · July 2014

This add-on already gives an average price for items:
http://www.esoui.com/downloads/info599-DataDaedra.html
So players will find a way to get a fair deal, with or without a trading post.

PhoenixWing · July 2014

This is one of the aspects I liked the most about this game. I have made a lot of friends due to selling / buying already! I sell potions and there is a guy who always contacted me whenever he need potions. We became good friends and have been chatting a lot even now that he leveled alchemy already.

But I agreed that we need a separate trade channel though.

Makkir · July 2014

Blackwidow wrote: »

Makkir wrote: »

You realize WalMart is the greedy business right? It puts Americans out of a job because it runs sweatshops on foreign soil where it can pay children and women a nickel per hour to mass produce shoes, clothing, furniture, etc hence avoid American Wage laws. That is why Walmart is cheaper. The same can be said about the Chinese Gold Farmers who work in computer warehouses in China where the American Dollar is worth much much more to them than it is to you and I. You never see any American Gold Farming businesses. Why not? Because we have a minimum wage, whereas the Chinese don't. So they can employ thousands at 5 cents per hour to farm gold and materials all day and night, literally 24/7. If an American business did that, they'd be considerably undercut by every Chinese competitor...hence why you don't see any legit American Gold Farming businesses...they are ALL Chinese.

None of that has anything to do with AHs.

He was saying people use supply and demand. Prices fluctuate based on demand of the item.

Gold farmers do not need an AH. The whole gold farmer argument is false. If anything AH would hurt gold farmers, because prices would more stable.

Well it does have to do with the AH because the CGF (chinese gold farmers) are kind of like the Walmart example. They're selling a large amount of gold for a very cheap American price. I interviewed a gold farmer in 2004 for a college paper I was writing. It had more to do with the exchange of the untaxed dollars over the internet, but I was very interested in this guy's story about how it was "just a job to feed my family." He worked for IGE (very large virtual currency company) at the time, and he said they rely heavily on the auction house to move farmed goods like materials.

When I was selling WoW Gold in my post-college years, I relied heavily on the auction house to bring in 50k gold/week. Yeah that's not much, but it was just me alone selling privately to friends/guildmates.

Basically we can only speculate how gold farmers will or will not affect an Auction House. It seems like 50/50 of those on the forums are on one side or the other. It hasn't affected WoW much because again the gear comes from raids and the crafting materials aren't exchanged like they are here. Deconstruction has added a very interesting element to this MMO.

Blackwidow · July 2014

Makkir wrote: »

Blackwidow wrote: »

I disagree. Adding an AH does not change the rate at which rare items drop in the world. A rare item is still a rare item.

Now, as I said earlier, I am not an economist, so if I blatantly got something wrong, or if I missed some key idea, don't be upset with me, please.

Tell me what I am not understanding.

No problem. I'll go back to the price on raw materials. Vendor gives 400 gold, you said currently you can fetch roughly 600 gold per stack. With Trade Guilds, you are in a strategic position to sell your goods. You have far less undercutting and opportunity to list your items at a price you want without interference from other players/bots/farmers/whatever. What a player is willing to pay is what your item is worth.

When an Auction House is introduced we will eventually see a point where 600g/stack is no longer. It will be set to 401g/stack (Well, lets put aside AH fees for a moment for sake of example) due to the under cutting war and hundreds of players putting stacks of materials up daily. The undercutting of 1 gold will eventually drop the stack price from 600g to 550g to 515g to 493g to 410g then to 401g.

Yes, stacks of 100 common materials will sell for 400 on the AH. I agree.

You will never see 100 deadra hearts or tomatoes for 400 gold on the AH.

With 3/3 of the appropriate craft, it's very easy to get rare crafting items from deconstructing raw materials, which would now be available in abundance on an auction house. Maybe that's the part you overlooked?

I understand how you get rare items. I do use the 3/3.

My point is, items will not drop any faster with an AH in the game. We agree on this, yes?

If that is true, what you will see at first is a bunch being put on there, because nobody really uses the guild store so there is a lot in banks atm.

However, once that clears out, and it will clear out (because rare items are rare) and eventually rare items will be expensive on the AH, becuase they are rare.

Even in WoW, rare mats are expensive and it is not even a "player item made" economy.

You also said getting gold to purchase rare items is the challenge.

I was saying it should be a challenge, if the game is made right.

Well yeah, unfortunately there is millions of gold in the economy that wasn't exactly challenging to obtain (Paypal, swiping the credit card, etc). Yes, I am hinting at all the players who purchased gold. The multi-billion dollar industry we created (I don't mean you or I literally) has put a dangerous amount of gold in the economy where your weapons and armor don't break.

Yes, some people use gold farmers to get gold, but all that gold, every coin, came from in the game.

I don't want to make a game based on the fact a few people cheat to avoid a challenge.

Most players don't cheat and the game should be based around us, yes?

There are also not enough end game gold sinks.

I don't know if that is true, but I agree there will always be need for balance one way or the other.

Makkir · July 2014

Blackwidow wrote: »

That is just a complicated global AH, but I would even take an antiquated idea like that over guild stores.

BTW, do you remember the horrid lag back then in the bazaar with so many players all in one room?

I guess we can test that megaserver player load now.

Dude, come on. That was what....2002? I think technology has come a way since then.

Makkir · July 2014

In a game centered around crafters, and by that I mean the gear comes from them, the developers cant bone the crafters. There needs to be compensation for Crafters and all the time/gold it took to reach top tier.

babylon · July 2014

Makkir wrote: »

In a game centered around crafters, and by that I mean the gear comes from them, the developers cant bone the crafters. There needs to be compensation for Crafters and all the time/gold it took to reach top tier.

They need to add more crafted sets that favour spell crit for a start, right now with 3.1 they will favour stamina builds, which makes crafted sets far less useful for most of us.

Not really sure though how an AH or lack of one is a max level crafter problem though.