silvereyes wrote: »phaseadept wrote: »It's hard not to look at this thread with some cynicism, mainly because of all the grief big trading guilds give players that are looking for other options to trade, like a public trader type system....
These are 500 man active guilds, there should be far more incentive than just selling stuff to people who can't afford to join the 1% Wall Street players.
Is it so strange that the kiosk is what *makes* a top trade guild? In-guild sales usually only account for about 10% of the total.
This isn't about guild traders vs. auction house, although that is certainly a valid debate. This is about the most experienced, fanatical players for a particular aspect of the game not being able to do 90% of the thing they like to do most in the game. This is about their leaders being forced to turn their lives upside down dealing with asinine management decisions in order to ensure that doesn't happen.
Think of it this way ... what if an elite PvE guild were, overnight, only allowed by an arcane game mechanic to run 10% of the trials and dungeons they normally do? Or an elite PvP guild only allowed to queue for Cyrodiil on Thursdays?
But, if the officers wanted to avoid that situation, they could be online 4 AM on Monday to submit a form, but only a limited number of forms are accepted and the last one in wins. But the officers would not find out whether it was accepted or rejected by ZOS until maintenance was over; maybe at 9 AM, maybe at 5 PM, depending on how the maintenance went.
To the rank-and-file members of the guild, not being able to play how they normally do 90% of the time would be inconvenient for 1 week. It would be highly annoying for 2. By week 3, they would start looking around for another guild.
It's a game. It's meant to be fun. None of the situation with kiosk bidding is fun right now, neither for the officers nor for the members of guilds that lose their bids because of it.
silvereyes wrote: »phaseadept wrote: »It's hard not to look at this thread with some cynicism, mainly because of all the grief big trading guilds give players that are looking for other options to trade, like a public trader type system....
These are 500 man active guilds, there should be far more incentive than just selling stuff to people who can't afford to join the 1% Wall Street players.
Is it so strange that the kiosk is what *makes* a top trade guild? In-guild sales usually only account for about 10% of the total.
This isn't about guild traders vs. auction house, although that is certainly a valid debate. This is about the most experienced, fanatical players for a particular aspect of the game not being able to do 90% of the thing they like to do most in the game. This is about their leaders being forced to turn their lives upside down dealing with asinine management decisions in order to ensure that doesn't happen.
Think of it this way ... what if an elite PvE guild were, overnight, only allowed by an arcane game mechanic to run 10% of the trials and dungeons they normally do? Or an elite PvP guild only allowed to queue for Cyrodiil on Thursdays?
But, if the officers wanted to avoid that situation, they could be online 4 AM on Monday to submit a form, but only a limited number of forms are accepted and the last one in wins. But the officers would not find out whether it was accepted or rejected by ZOS until maintenance was over; maybe at 9 AM, maybe at 5 PM, depending on how the maintenance went.
To the rank-and-file members of the guild, not being able to play how they normally do 90% of the time would be inconvenient for 1 week. It would be highly annoying for 2. By week 3, they would start looking around for another guild.
It's a game. It's meant to be fun. None of the situation with kiosk bidding is fun right now, neither for the officers nor for the members of guilds that lose their bids because of it.
Nope. An analogy of this would be Zos building a baseball park, set aside a few tables for people to do small-scale yard-sale level lunch sales, and you being pissed off because they didn't do enough to support the concession stand business you built upon the picnic table foundation... They built a baseball park, for people to play baseball and do small scale trading on the side, not a shopping mall where people play baseball on the side.Shadowshire wrote: »By definition, the economy is created by the transactions performed by humans.
....
Well, at least you got that right. As to the rest of your remarks, evidently you do not understand the role of the Guild Traders, i.e., of the "economy", in the play of the game. It is possible to design a game such as ESO without any provision for exchanging goods and/or services among players at all. But it would be a much less interesting game to play.
Trading allows players who have something that their characters don't need to exchange it for something that their characters do need. It also encourages and rewards players to use their characters to obtain and/or to create items that other players might need in order to exchange them for other items which they need for themselves.
One ESO feature allows us to trade items in "face-to-face" meetings between our respective characters, whether to exchange an item for Gold Pieces (GP) or as barter for another item instead. The Guild Store is another way to "sell" items for GP that we can then use to "buy" other items which we want. With the Guild Store, the seller does not have to be present, or currently playing the game, in order for the buyer to obtain what they want. This is convenient for both parties to the transaction.
Guild Traders simply make the content of a Guild Store available to players who are not members of its guild. This approach has its advantages, but also has disadvantages. In particular, there is no limit to the number of guilds that players may organize, but there must be a limit to the number of Guild Traders. Arguably, Bethesda Software could increase the number of Traders beyond the current number, in order to offer more guilds an opportunity to sell goods in their stores to non-members. But it is doubtful whether there will ever be enough Traders for every guild that seriously wants one.
As to whether any player produces or otherwise obtains items for the sake of simply accumulating GP from selling them, I suppose that their greed does not, in and of itself, adversely affect anyone. Personally, I only sell items because I want to get the GP that I will need to buy others. Of course, the more GP that I earn, the more likely it becomes that I can buy rare items which are currently in high demand. Regardless, in ESO the Gold Piece primarily functions as a medium of exchange, not as a store of wealth.
Note that it is Bethesda Software which is responsible for whether an item is plentiful or is scarce, not the players. So, if you don't like the economy, then you know to whom you should complain.
Oh, I understand the role of guild traders. What is apparently not widely understood is that the guild traders were not intended to be put to use this intensely.
There are signs that things with guild traders have gone beyond what they were made to handle.
And that is the fault of ZOS' faulty mechanics, *not* the players. You are blaming the players for something that was poorly implemented by ZOS.
Edited to add: And furthermore, stop telling people how to play. This game has something for everyone. You are tut-tutting people for not playing the game the way *you* think it should be played. How arrogant.
Play however you want. I'm just telling you that you're trying to wedge a commerce driven business into a space that wasn't built for it, and it might work for a while but there will be problems. Play however you want - go ahead and play an altmer stamina Templar with all your points into health if that's what you like - but don't expect it to be zos's fault if you find it hard to function like that.
silvereyes wrote: »phaseadept wrote: »It's hard not to look at this thread with some cynicism, mainly because of all the grief big trading guilds give players that are looking for other options to trade, like a public trader type system....
These are 500 man active guilds, there should be far more incentive than just selling stuff to people who can't afford to join the 1% Wall Street players.
Is it so strange that the kiosk is what *makes* a top trade guild? In-guild sales usually only account for about 10% of the total.
This isn't about guild traders vs. auction house, although that is certainly a valid debate. This is about the most experienced, fanatical players for a particular aspect of the game not being able to do 90% of the thing they like to do most in the game. This is about their leaders being forced to turn their lives upside down dealing with asinine management decisions in order to ensure that doesn't happen.
Think of it this way ... what if an elite PvE guild were, overnight, only allowed by an arcane game mechanic to run 10% of the trials and dungeons they normally do? Or an elite PvP guild only allowed to queue for Cyrodiil on Thursdays?
But, if the officers wanted to avoid that situation, they could be online 4 AM on Monday to submit a form, but only a limited number of forms are accepted and the last one in wins. But the officers would not find out whether it was accepted or rejected by ZOS until maintenance was over; maybe at 9 AM, maybe at 5 PM, depending on how the maintenance went.
To the rank-and-file members of the guild, not being able to play how they normally do 90% of the time would be inconvenient for 1 week. It would be highly annoying for 2. By week 3, they would start looking around for another guild.
It's a game. It's meant to be fun. None of the situation with kiosk bidding is fun right now, neither for the officers nor for the members of guilds that lose their bids because of it.
I wish I could have expressed it so eloquently. I love running a trading guild. Contrary to popular belief, I do not get rich from it, quite the opposite. These maintenance/switchover overlap times are just destroying my sleep, and increasing the amount of money we have to bid on even a mid-range trading kiosk. I take on a huge responsibility when I take money donated by members and tax income and bid on a trader, this is not something I do for myself. I don't sit here for hours waiting to see whether we won our bid for myself.
silvereyes wrote: »phaseadept wrote: »It's hard not to look at this thread with some cynicism, mainly because of all the grief big trading guilds give players that are looking for other options to trade, like a public trader type system....
These are 500 man active guilds, there should be far more incentive than just selling stuff to people who can't afford to join the 1% Wall Street players.
Is it so strange that the kiosk is what *makes* a top trade guild? In-guild sales usually only account for about 10% of the total.
This isn't about guild traders vs. auction house, although that is certainly a valid debate. This is about the most experienced, fanatical players for a particular aspect of the game not being able to do 90% of the thing they like to do most in the game. This is about their leaders being forced to turn their lives upside down dealing with asinine management decisions in order to ensure that doesn't happen.
Think of it this way ... what if an elite PvE guild were, overnight, only allowed by an arcane game mechanic to run 10% of the trials and dungeons they normally do? Or an elite PvP guild only allowed to queue for Cyrodiil on Thursdays?
But, if the officers wanted to avoid that situation, they could be online 4 AM on Monday to submit a form, but only a limited number of forms are accepted and the last one in wins. But the officers would not find out whether it was accepted or rejected by ZOS until maintenance was over; maybe at 9 AM, maybe at 5 PM, depending on how the maintenance went.
To the rank-and-file members of the guild, not being able to play how they normally do 90% of the time would be inconvenient for 1 week. It would be highly annoying for 2. By week 3, they would start looking around for another guild.
It's a game. It's meant to be fun. None of the situation with kiosk bidding is fun right now, neither for the officers nor for the members of guilds that lose their bids because of it.
I wish I could have expressed it so eloquently. I love running a trading guild. Contrary to popular belief, I do not get rich from it, quite the opposite. These maintenance/switchover overlap times are just destroying my sleep, and increasing the amount of money we have to bid on even a mid-range trading kiosk. I take on a huge responsibility when I take money donated by members and tax income and bid on a trader, this is not something I do for myself. I don't sit here for hours waiting to see whether we won our bid for myself.
I have noticed a theme here, that those who are blaming the GMs for these problems (and not ZOS for implementing a faulty mechanic) seem to think that those who run top trading guilds are guilty of some sort of sin for *striving* to do well in the game, and that they deserve any *punishment* that they get in the form of losing kiosks, sleep etc. That supposed 'greed' and the desire to do well should be *punished* in some fashion.
silvereyes wrote: »phaseadept wrote: »It's hard not to look at this thread with some cynicism, mainly because of all the grief big trading guilds give players that are looking for other options to trade, like a public trader type system....
These are 500 man active guilds, there should be far more incentive than just selling stuff to people who can't afford to join the 1% Wall Street players.
Is it so strange that the kiosk is what *makes* a top trade guild? In-guild sales usually only account for about 10% of the total.
This isn't about guild traders vs. auction house, although that is certainly a valid debate. This is about the most experienced, fanatical players for a particular aspect of the game not being able to do 90% of the thing they like to do most in the game. This is about their leaders being forced to turn their lives upside down dealing with asinine management decisions in order to ensure that doesn't happen.
Think of it this way ... what if an elite PvE guild were, overnight, only allowed by an arcane game mechanic to run 10% of the trials and dungeons they normally do? Or an elite PvP guild only allowed to queue for Cyrodiil on Thursdays?
But, if the officers wanted to avoid that situation, they could be online 4 AM on Monday to submit a form, but only a limited number of forms are accepted and the last one in wins. But the officers would not find out whether it was accepted or rejected by ZOS until maintenance was over; maybe at 9 AM, maybe at 5 PM, depending on how the maintenance went.
To the rank-and-file members of the guild, not being able to play how they normally do 90% of the time would be inconvenient for 1 week. It would be highly annoying for 2. By week 3, they would start looking around for another guild.
It's a game. It's meant to be fun. None of the situation with kiosk bidding is fun right now, neither for the officers nor for the members of guilds that lose their bids because of it.
I wish I could have expressed it so eloquently. I love running a trading guild. Contrary to popular belief, I do not get rich from it, quite the opposite. These maintenance/switchover overlap times are just destroying my sleep, and increasing the amount of money we have to bid on even a mid-range trading kiosk. I take on a huge responsibility when I take money donated by members and tax income and bid on a trader, this is not something I do for myself. I don't sit here for hours waiting to see whether we won our bid for myself.
I have noticed a theme here, that those who are blaming the GMs for these problems (and not ZOS for implementing a faulty mechanic) seem to think that those who run top trading guilds are guilty of some sort of sin for *striving* to do well in the game, and that they deserve any *punishment* that they get in the form of losing kiosks, sleep etc. That supposed 'greed' and the desire to do well should be *punished* in some fashion.
""Clearly the trading guild mechanic is not constructed to support the likes of the trading guilds that have come to dominate the market.""
The faulty implementation of this mechanic is what is driving up the bid prices for the best kiosk locations.
This what you don't seem to understand.
""Clearly the trading guild mechanic is not constructed to support the likes of the trading guilds that have come to dominate the market.""
The faulty implementation of this mechanic is what is driving up the bid prices for the best kiosk locations.
This what you don't seem to understand.
What you don't seem to understand is that they implemented a game that has a trading system attached like a sidecar.
It is the game, the hack and slash of sword and sorcery, that is the primary element.
Thought experiment - which would continue to remain functional if the other were erased? If the guild kiosks were erased, the entire rest of the game would survive. People would farm their own ancestor silk, willpower rings, psijics and so on. But if you kept the traders while erasing the gameplay, then NOTHING would ever arrive into those stores.
Your massive failure of comprehension is in understanding from which is dependent on which. You keep acting like the game depends on the trading, as if it were a game of economics and commerce. You. Are. Wrong. People can play the game without ever interacting with a guild kiosk - the kiosk can be cut out of their play entirely. But people cannot do anything with a guild kiosk if they do not also play the game. Even flipping, buying low at A and selling higher at B, cannot be done without initial gold to invest - so it is true that the kiosks' survival depends on people playing the game, not the way you think of it.
They didn't build for an economic commerce megastore game, they built a fantasy sword and sorcery game. So trying to jackhammer an economic commerce megastore into a fantasy sword and sorcery game is YOUR issue, not the people who built for swords and spells.
I see people here I've had on /ignore for over a year, but we're all agreeing right here right now. This is your core community right here.
""Clearly the trading guild mechanic is not constructed to support the likes of the trading guilds that have come to dominate the market.""
The faulty implementation of this mechanic is what is driving up the bid prices for the best kiosk locations.
This what you don't seem to understand.
What you don't seem to understand is that they implemented a game that has a trading system attached like a sidecar.
It is the game, the hack and slash of sword and sorcery, that is the primary element.
Thought experiment - which would continue to remain functional if the other were erased? If the guild kiosks were erased, the entire rest of the game would survive. People would farm their own ancestor silk, willpower rings, psijics and so on. But if you kept the traders while erasing the gameplay, then NOTHING would ever arrive into those stores.
Your massive failure of comprehension is in understanding from which is dependent on which. You keep acting like the game depends on the trading, as if it were a game of economics and commerce. You. Are. Wrong. People can play the game without ever interacting with a guild kiosk - the kiosk can be cut out of their play entirely. But people cannot do anything with a guild kiosk if they do not also play the game. Even flipping, buying low at A and selling higher at B, cannot be done without initial gold to invest - so it is true that the kiosks' survival depends on people playing the game, not the way you think of it.
They didn't build for an economic commerce megastore game, they built a fantasy sword and sorcery game. So trying to jackhammer an economic commerce megastore into a fantasy sword and sorcery game is YOUR issue, not the people who built for swords and spells.
As I keep saying, you are wrong. I direct you to comment #123:
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/3262428/#Comment_3262428
Lost my spot this week, didn't have a chance to scramble to get a backup like I normally would because I was at work.
This feeling of complete helplessness as a Guild Master is quite possibly the most depressing mixture of emotions one can feel when playing a game that's supposed to be fun and an escape from the BS happening IRL. I was awake, at my PC, waiting for the servers to come up this morning as I always am, at 8AM, patiently anticipating the server coming back up so I could check in and scramble if need be, and still the servers weren't up until well over an hour after they normally would be, and I couldn't sit around and miss work.
Despite that, I still sat around long enough that I ended up being more than 30 minutes LATE to work in the hopes that I might be able to get online in time to check in and make sure everything was okay (and, as I learned several hours later, everything was NOT okay, and my guild is completely screwed over for the next 7 days).
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, FIX THIS.
silvereyes wrote: »@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_KaiSchober @ZOS_RichLambert:
It's so simple. Just repeat after me:
"I have forwarded your request on to the management team, and will keep you informed of any progress."
There. Was that so hard?
We really appreciate you guys and gals. We love ESO and all the hard work ZOS does. We would just really appreciate at least the respect of acknowledging our request to deconflict kiosk flipping and maintenance times.
You're right about the tone. It did come out that way, although it was intended to be lighthearted. It's now been rephrased.UltimaJoe777 wrote: »Except you can never deconflict it because no matter when it happens it will disadvantage someone. Furthermore you're condescending tone towards gina and jessica is gonna be seriously frowned upon
phaseadept wrote: »It's hard not to look at this thread with some cynicism, mainly because of all the grief big trading guilds give players that are looking for other options to trade, like a public trader type system.
It also is a shame that a trading guild must have a guild trader every week or it falls apart. There's no loyalty or reason to be in the guild other than having a kiosk?
These are 500 man active guilds, there should be far more incentive than just selling stuff to people who can't afford to join the 1% Wall Street players.
silvereyes wrote: »@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_KaiSchober @ZOS_RichLambert:
To be clear, this is all we are asking for right now:
"I have forwarded your request on to the management team, and will keep you informed of any progress."
We really appreciate you guys and gals. We love ESO and all the hard work ZOS does. We would just really appreciate at least the respect of acknowledging our request to deconflict kiosk flipping and maintenance times.
[edited for tone]
silvereyes wrote: »@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_KaiSchober @ZOS_RichLambert:
To be clear, this is all we are asking for right now:
"I have forwarded your request on to the management team, and will keep you informed of any progress."
We really appreciate you guys and gals. We love ESO and all the hard work ZOS does. We would just really appreciate at least the respect of acknowledging our request to deconflict kiosk flipping and maintenance times.
[edited for tone]
The team has been forwarding this feedback for a couple of months now and there has not been any followup, care, or response other than "it's been forwarded." In the mean time, the game is bleeding top tier GMs and stressing out the others that are remaining. I know several that have left; one of which is a close friend. I know others have cancelled their subs and I know that the part of me that loved this game has taken a huge hit. I only keep logging in presently because I care greatly for the people in my guild, but I've basically stopped playing the game otherwise.
Nothing is changing, nothing is indicating that anything is changing; it feels like there's a group of people that are thumbing their noses at our suffering.
I have always been very positive and supportive of ZOS in the past, but I cannot feel that way again until there is REAL change here on the issues we've stated as our BIGGEST PAIN POINTS:
(1) Bid Spying - we've BEGGED for a real fix for this for about a year and a half
(2) Maintenance Overlap w/Trader Turnover - I don't know how many other ways we can state how this horribly compounds the stress
The silent ignore treatment is BS; people's real lives are being impacted. We believed in a system that was put in place and are trying to live within the system while doing right by the communities we invested in. This is a FANTASTIC way to turn your biggest supporters toxic if that's what you're seeking.
If you can't turn this around easily (the presented solutions feel easy!), then please at least have the courtesy to explain 'why' and perhaps 'how long' it would take. It honestly feels like there's an active choice being made by one or more people to do nothing and just let this fester... or maybe there's a hope that we'll just give up and go away.
phaseadept wrote: »It's hard not to look at this thread with some cynicism, mainly because of all the grief big trading guilds give players that are looking for other options to trade, like a public trader type system.
It also is a shame that a trading guild must have a guild trader every week or it falls apart. There's no loyalty or reason to be in the guild other than having a kiosk?
These are 500 man active guilds, there should be far more incentive than just selling stuff to people who can't afford to join the 1% Wall Street players.
ANYONE can join a guild with a trader in a high traffic zone. I don't know where this idea came from that trading guilds with high traffic traders are exclusive in any way. When I decided I wanted to start heavily selling stuff I joined 3 trading guilds in just a week. 2 of those 3 always have a trader in mournhold and rawlka.
So can we please stop pretending like people are unable to join guilds with traders. If you want to sell things in a trader all you have to do is ask to join the guilds that you always see with a trader. If the first one is full go to the next. I believe people just want to be greedy and not pay whatever fee the guild has or participate in any of the raffles. Find a trade guild and regularly contribute and problem solved.
Have gotten way off topic here, so I will throw this in as well. There really is no good reason as to why maintenance and trader flip time overlap when both are set entirely by ZOS.