Is the Guild Trader System evolving beyond the casual players?

CaineCarver · June 2016

I have been playing the game for about a year and a half. In that time I have seen the gradual change of the trade guilds and the requirements of the guilds to belong to them. In the beginning most of these 500 member guilds just required you to be an active player to remain a member. But as with selling items in real life the Location of the vendor is the key to good sales. Once a week the guilds frantically try to out bid one one another for the best locations.

The constant increase in bids for all (prime and low traffic) locations has dramatically increased the weekly amount of gold guilds need to keep a guild trader. In response the guilds have over time increased the requirements for members to remain part of the guilds. It started with requiring small minimum sales by the member and the guilds kept increasing these. Then when the actual sales from the vendors did not keep up with the ever increasing weekly bids some resourceful leaders came up with the idea of using raffles to raise more funds.

The proceeds from the raffles where slowly over run by the sky rocketing bids and more of the guilds are/have added a minimum requirement of buying anywhere from a couple thousand to many thousand in gold of raffle tickets to help fund the bid. More and more of the trade guilds are adding these requirements to remain a member of the guild and be able to sell in ESO. Many guilds now need/require you to sell at least 10k-25k and/or buy 5k-10k in raffle tickets a week.

Not a problem for me or most other established players but where does this leave the part time, casual or new players who have very limited funds, get very few items that sell for large profits and are not playing everyday to stay qualified or part of the guild traders? As more and more trade guilds find themselves needing more and more gold for the weekly bids the new and little guys are finding the trade guilds do not want them and can not help them. I run into many players who are having a hard time selling and making gold in ESO and the lack of selling opportunities for what few things they do get is a major problem. Could be me but looks like we need to rethink the guild trader system?

Rainteal · June 2016

Inflation has happened.

Every time you kill an enemy in the game or complete a quest, more gold is "printed." The more money entering the economy, the more people easily have, the more there is to spend, the less it is really worth.

The guild trader system, like repair bills, are meant to flush some of this money out of the system. Be it weekly bids or listing fees, these costs eliminate gold from the economy. But, people's creation of gold happens at a faster rate than it is destroyed, thus the economy continues to inflate.

Guild trader prices are crazy right now. I have been outbid on an "off the beaten path" trader I have maintained in my guild for weeks these past two weeks with outrageous bids for the location. Needless to say, I will not post location or price here, but I will say I bid 10x what the trader normally makes in a week and I was outbid yesterday.

I assume that this can make things a bit more challenging for new and casual players, but I guess that is the cost of the trader mini-game these days. As of now, I do not believe it is too hard for those folks, but it could become a real problem in the future that ZoS may have to reconsider their design.

Zerok · June 2016

Because this game requires you to be in a trading guild to sell stuff, it can only get worse for casual players.

Rainteal · June 2016

Zerok wrote: »

Because this game requires you to be in a trading guild to sell stuff, it can only get worse for casual players.

Am I missing sarcasm on this one, or do you truly believe that to be the case? I am not trying to be a jerk here, as this is an honest question.

I see people selling stuff like crazy via trades and the mail on an ESO PS4 Facebook page. To be honest, I am really surprised at how much commerce flows through that page. Also, I constantly hear people selling and buying in populated areas via area chat. I assume that this method will improve when console gets a zone chat. Often the prices on these two mediums of trade are far better than guild trader prices. Many folks sell and trade in the many guild chats for which I belong as well, both voice and PSN group chats. None of the guilds that I belong to are trading guilds either.

Peekachu99 · June 2016

Prices are too high to A.) Even bother joining a guild or paying for a kiosk B.) To buy anything aside from the most menial supplies from traders--can get it faster just by farming than by running to a dozen different places and using the ghastly marketplace UI.

xblackroxe · June 2016

Peekachu99 wrote: »

Prices are too high to A.) Even bother joining a guild or paying for a kiosk B.) To buy anything aside from the most menial supplies from traders--can get it faster just by farming than by running to a dozen different places and using the ghastly marketplace UI.

If you are PC use the awesome guild store addon really helps.

Also I don't know where those fees are all coming from. I've been in several trading guilds and I am now in the top 2 traders of PC/EU and I never had to put a single coin into guild bank. Sure the top guilds require minimum sales but 10k sales/week is easy to achieve for people that play a little more and for the rest there are many partner guilds in less frequent places without any requirement. Just from experience though don't join guilds that actively search for members that mostly means they just want your cash.

peniku8 · June 2016

I'm running three trading guilds, and my two Mournhold guilds (Traders of the Ebonheart and Pact Veteran Trade 2) have a quite low sales minimum (if you sell 1k a week your chance of being kicked is close to none).
Both guilds sold about 30M each last week, so the minimum requirements you're speaking of are either just the top notch of the elite guilds (Craglorn PC EU) or poorly run.
Considering that Mournhold is one of the best locations in the game, casual players shouldn't have a problem staying in starter locations such as Ebonheart, Daggerfall or Skywatch.

I guess you're talking about PC EU here?

Dubhliam · June 2016

xblackroxe wrote: »

Peekachu99 wrote: »

Prices are too high to A.) Even bother joining a guild or paying for a kiosk B.) To buy anything aside from the most menial supplies from traders--can get it faster just by farming than by running to a dozen different places and using the ghastly marketplace UI.

If you are PC use the awesome guild store addon really helps.

Also I don't know where those fees are all coming from. I've been in several trading guilds and I am now in the top 2 traders of PC/EU and I never had to put a single coin into guild bank. Sure the top guilds require minimum sales but 10k sales/week is easy to achieve for people that play a little more and for the rest there are many partner guilds in less frequent places without any requirement. Just from experience though don't join guilds that actively search for members that mostly means they just want your cash.

Agree.

I have been playing for some time now, and I never purchased a "lottery ticket" in any of my guilds.
I am currently in two trading guilds, and I manage to sell everything and anything I get my hands on in just those two guilds (out of 5).
They both have very well placed traders, and kick people based on sales. A few people with lowest sales get kicked. If you have a best spot trader and don't sell - you had it coming.
Items in those guilds are often underpriced, you can get really good deals. Why? Simply because kicking based on sales enforces a competitive environment.
They even have a ranking system that grants you kick immunity for X days of being offline. If somebody knows he is going to be away from the game, and wishes to stay in the guild, he can prolong his immunity with a donation.

All in all, this is the best way I find trading guilds should operate:
- kick based on lowest sales
- don't buy a trader you can't pay with your sale cuts

There is no need for a change.

Clerics1985 · June 2016

market cornering is in Every MMO game since the Dawn of Time. as long as there's Gold to be made some Ppl will look to THAT as their source of Fun, Rolling CTA's Anyone?

Lynx7386 · June 2016

I just got an invite to a trading guild, only to find that I'd need to "donate" several thousand gold per week to remain a member.

They need to scrap this dumbarse guild trader system. It was a bad idea at the start, and it's only getting worse.

Malakisidious · June 2016

participation is required but some fantastic and OLD guilds require nothing but it is important to at least TRY to make gold you are in a TRADE guild !!!!! \o/

Malakisidious · June 2016

Malakisidious wrote: »

participation is required but some fantastic and OLD guilds require nothing but it is important to at least TRY to make gold you are in a TRADE guild !!!!! \o/

why be in a TRADE guild if your not participating

Giraffon · June 2016

quoting myself from last year...

Giraffon wrote: »

I like the guild trader system but I think it could be improved by doing the following:

Allow sellers to sell more than 30 items. How about 50?

If I buy something from a guild store, please hold my place on the merchandise list instead of putting me back at the top of the 100 item list that I'm browsing.

Revamp the way you get a guild trader.

Tier 1 - best locations - highest bidder wins just like it always has been.
Tier 2 - lower traffic areas - Highest bidder lottery with randomly assigned trader. So you put your highest best bid in. If there are 100 available traders and you make one of the top 100 bids then you are randomly assigned a trader.

And finally, for the love of Sky Shards, please allow key word searching in guild stores!

Lieblingsjunge · June 2016

I agree. The guild trader system is beyond casual. I'm a dedicated member of Blobsky's trading guild "The Traveling Merchant" on PC/EU. Last night was the bidding, our trader spot in Craglorn costed us 9 mill. (Probably cus we are in a Trader-war with another guild, but whatevs). And it'll be a challenge this week to cover the cost of a Trader - a month ago they were around 2,5m if my memory serves me right.

But I also think that the guild trader-bidding system is partly the reason. You got no way of knowing how much the guilds you bid against are bidding. You don't know the highest bid on the traider. So you basically have to bid blind - and hope you're the winning bid. Naturally that'll sky-rocket the prices for a Trader, cus people will try to blindly overbid each other.(At least that's my understanding of it, not that I ever hired a trader...)

AlnilamE · June 2016

I'm in two trading guilds. One very large one that's been around since launch, another a bit smaller. Both have a lottery that you are not required to participate in, but I do every other week or so. I actually won one of the prizes once. Walking home with a set of gold improvers was really nice!

That said, I try to keep my 30 slots filled at all times, which is not hard to do.

I have a third guild that keeps a trader most weeks, but that's based on sales and donations. 'To that one, I donate weekly.

My other two guilds try for a trader sometimes but haven't gotten one in a while. But they have internal stores, which I also keep filled, and one of them is a PvP guild so they often claim keeps too.

I think as long as you try to keep your slots filled with stuff that is priced reasonably, you would not have any issues staying in a good trade guild. But remember that getting a trader every week is a fair amount of work and if they are asking members to help with that (either via a raffle or a donation) then that is really not a big deal if you are selling enough items.

code65536 · June 2016

Holy hell, 9M for a trader bid on PC/EU?! I don't think I've ever heard of a PC/NA guild bidding that high at any location.

On PC/NA, the prime spots are, of course, expensive and hotly contested, and most guilds in those places do have various member requirements. But there are a lot of trader kiosks out there. There are midrange and casual trading guilds that often don't have member requirements because they don't try to grab prime real estate. On PC/NA, many of the kiosks in third-tier hubs (we're not even talking about wilderness or Outlaw traders, but 5-trader cities like Marbruk or Evermore) are taken by social or PvE guilds and not by trading guilds, and the bids in those places are usually pretty modest.

Lieblingsjunge · June 2016

code65536 wrote: »

Holy hell, 9M for a trader bid on PC/EU?! I don't think I've ever heard of a PC/NA guild bidding that high at any location.

On PC/NA, the prime spots are, of course, expensive and hotly contested, and most guilds in those places do have various member requirements. But there are a lot of trader kiosks out there. There are midrange and casual trading guilds that often don't have member requirements because they don't try to grab prime real estate. On PC/NA, many of the kiosks in third-tier hubs (we're not even talking about wilderness or Outlaw traders, but 5-trader cities like Marbruk or Evermore) are taken by social or PvE guilds and not by trading guilds, and the bids in those places are usually pretty modest.

We all know the Europeans are crazy 8D (Plsplsplspls dont report me for racism, I was just trying to be funny!

)
Yeah. I think the guild we won against bid 8.88m or something. It's a crazy time, lol.
Oh. I'm not even sure what the places in Evermore, Eldenroot etc. go for atm. But I'm pretty sure it's not as crazy as 9m -.- lol

Giraffon · June 2016

Come on guys. This is brilliant! How about a shout out?

Tier 1 - best locations - highest bidder wins just like it always has been.
Tier 2 - lower traffic areas - Highest bidder lottery with randomly assigned trader. So you put your highest best bid in. If there are 100 available traders and you make one of the top 100 bids then you are randomly assigned a trader.

Duiwel · June 2016

Actually inflation happens because a small greedy ( but clever ) select few don't give back into the economy. Thus the wealth is not shared and monopolies are created. Because it doesn't circulate back to the point of origin most people are forced to make more the conventional way and usually end up increasing the wealthy's wealth even more.

In the end they will just be billionaires with nothing to spend it on.

Imo if there were a way to ensure a temper once purchased HAS to be used and cannot be resold I would say a few of the elite should buy out all the tempers make them like ^ and sell em for like 1 or 2k.

Thereby normalising the economy back to a reasonable level.

Unfortunately this is borderline communism and cannot work because the rich only have X amount and the masses will always require more than they have.

ThePonzzz · June 2016

High traffic locations are the hardest to appease. These guilds need a lot of gold every week to keep their kiosk. And not only that, each person is a potential value to the guild. People who don't perform at a specific level aren't worth the guild's time. Plenty of people will do anything to get into a 500 person guild in one of the golden locations (Mournhold, Wayrest, Rawl'kha).

I think there is a lot wrong with the current setup. I think it's too much work for guild masters to maintain these guilds. Outside "being a leader" there is nothing to be gained. The economy has mostly collapsed, the only thing you can really do is try to get an edge on new content. But the days of selling big ticket items are gone. Supply is saturated, demand is hardly there. Materials have been capped since Imperial City, and the Thieves Guild DLC introduced ease of V16 (CP 160) materials. Real slap to the face to how we had to handle it with Imperial City. And now we have this non-linear growth of material needs that is now just weird.

People will say there are friendly guilds out there. And some guilds are pretty relaxed. It's not exactly new user/very casual friendly.

bastianwulfblood · June 2016

sell in zone

fluffycannibalb16_ESO · June 2016

peniku8 wrote: »

I'm running three trading guilds, and my two Mournhold guilds (Traders of the Ebonheart and Pact Veteran Trade 2) have a quite low sales minimum (if you sell 1k a week your chance of being kicked is close to none).
Both guilds sold about 30M each last week, so the minimum requirements you're speaking of are either just the top notch of the elite guilds (Craglorn PC EU) or poorly run.

Seconded.
I was in PVT for months and rarely achieved more than average sales. There were times I went inactive for ~3 weeks and didn't get kicked. I think I was out of game for around 2 months before I finally got booted. Now I'm saving up for my epic comeback xD

Khajiit_Ri · June 2016

This one has stated in another thread that he is part of an amazing guild, we don't seem to suffer from the same ailments as other citizens of Tamriel. This one wonders why even bother with guilds primarily focused on turning a quick coin?

In our guild we go out and farm all the mats to make gear legendary, with a group of people working together with the proper passives it does not take very long at all. Perhaps Khajiit-Ri does not understand and blessed to be part of exciting guild. Guildmaster even goes out of the way to meet every recruit. He says not to trust those who are playing the money game. He is a wise leader and helps everyone, he charges nothing, no fees for guild, this one admires his courage. This one has even seen him give money freely to beggers in the street. But to get back on topic...

Khajiit-Ri doesn't believe it has moved on beyond the casual gamer, it seems it is the casual player that will pay anything and everything. This one is just completely baffled by how much people are willing to pay. But of course some ideas of "fun," are slippery in this one's paws.

CasNation · June 2016

Giraffon wrote: »

Come on guys. This is brilliant! How about a shout out?
Tier 1 - best locations - highest bidder wins just like it always has been.
Tier 2 - lower traffic areas - Highest bidder lottery with randomly assigned trader. So you put your highest best bid in. If there are 100 available traders and you make one of the top 100 bids then you are randomly assigned a trader.

I disagree with this. Part of establishing a good trade guild is that your customers know where to find you. Even if a guild manages to only get a second tier trader, they can still make a name for themselves by pricing competitively, and maintaining a steady location.

It would be a tremendous difficulty to trade guilds if they ended up in a random location each week, especially if they are a specialized trader that markets to a certain demographic. Besides, how does the game know which traders are the best? That is too subjective for a computer to figure out, and I don't trust ZoS to decide that for us.

code65536 · June 2016

Giraffon wrote: »

Come on guys. This is brilliant! How about a shout out?
Tier 1 - best locations - highest bidder wins just like it always has been.
Tier 2 - lower traffic areas - Highest bidder lottery with randomly assigned trader. So you put your highest best bid in. If there are 100 available traders and you make one of the top 100 bids then you are randomly assigned a trader.

As much as the current trader system is frustrating for those of us who lead trade guilds, this is, IMHO, a solution that's worse than the problem.

Shadesofkin · June 2016

Business is business, I've yet to meet a "casual" video gamer who didn't understand that when they play an online rpg like this one.

Turelus · June 2016

I'm in one of the larger EU PC ones and all I have to do is have things listed and bring in some gold.

Right now I am selling very little of value because I am levelling a new alt and not really farming end game items. I still am not kicked though because I sell stuff and am active.

I think the bigger issue right now is inflation and not as many gold sinks.

Giraffon · June 2016

CasNation wrote: »

Giraffon wrote: »

Come on guys. This is brilliant! How about a shout out?
Tier 1 - best locations - highest bidder wins just like it always has been.
Tier 2 - lower traffic areas - Highest bidder lottery with randomly assigned trader. So you put your highest best bid in. If there are 100 available traders and you make one of the top 100 bids then you are randomly assigned a trader.

I disagree with this. Part of establishing a good trade guild is that your customers know where to find you. Even if a guild manages to only get a second tier trader, they can still make a name for themselves by pricing competitively, and maintaining a steady location.

It would be a tremendous difficulty to trade guilds if they ended up in a random location each week, especially if they are a specialized trader that markets to a certain demographic. Besides, how does the game know which traders are the best? That is too subjective for a computer to figure out, and I don't trust ZoS to decide that for us.

Okay, forget the Tier 1 highest bidder option. Go full "block" lottery system. These NPCs claim to be part of a trade guild. Where the heck is their guild hall? I should be able to go to their guild hall and check some kind of roster that lists all the guild traders and who (including location & show on map feature) has them for the week. I should be able to sort the list by guild name (not the stupid NPC's).

This does raise a few questions about guild traders working in the outlaw refuges, but maybe they should have some kind of special set up. I don't think they would be listed on the main roster. You'd probably have to go to a refuge and view a separate list for those guys and they would be in a different lottery block system as well.

So this would make any guild that has built a reputation able to be found no matter where they are.

I personally would love this set up.

Tandor · June 2016

Although a committed player with two accounts and someone who's been playing since PC launch, I would still be classified a casual player in that I'm neither hardcore nor competitive. As such I have taken no part in the guild trader system other than for a couple of trivial purchases for crafting writs. The system simply isn't designed for casual players and I doubt that many of them participate in it.

Slurg · June 2016

I don't know about the other platforms but on PC NA there are only a few cities where guilds who compete for locations there have high sales and/or raffle contribution requirements to stay in the guild. Players who don't want to do that can choose one of the many, many other trade guilds that have established themselves in the less popular locations that don't have these requirements. They have plenty of options already. Just not in Rawl'kha.

Asking for the guild trader system to be overhauled to cater to players who only log in a couple times a week (i.e. Ultra casuals) does not make sense. It would be kind of like me demanding a spot on the leader board for bringing my Argonian into a highly competitive min-maxed trial.

Now the default search UI- that does need to be completely rebuilt. I think sales could improve in the less popular locations if the search menu was not as tedious to navigate without addons.

Dubhliam · June 2016

Slurg wrote: »

I don't know about the other platforms but on PC NA there are only a few cities where guilds who compete for locations there have high sales and/or raffle contribution requirements to stay in the guild. Players who don't want to do that can choose one of the many, many other trade guilds that have established themselves in the less popular locations that don't have these requirements. They have plenty of options already. Just not in Rawl'kha.

Asking for the guild trader system to be overhauled to cater to players who only log in a couple times a week (i.e. Ultra casuals) does not make sense. It would be kind of like me demanding a spot on the leader board for bringing my Argonian into a highly competitive min-maxed trial.

Now the default search UI- that does need to be completely rebuilt. I think sales could improve in the less popular locations if the search menu was not as tedious to navigate without addons.

I completely agree.
They should have a good look at the AwesomeGuildStore add-on and learn something from it.

I mean, seriously? If a single person can code an add-on pro bono and make it far better than the in-game UI, how hard can it really be?

That would not be the first time they implement an add-on (LootDrop) into their game, and I really fail to see the reason they keep their robust Guild Store menu.