price ceiling for dreugh wax and tempering alloys

Waseem · November 2016

some people buy alloys for 10k and sell 12k, others buy all prices under 12k and sell for 14k.. and another does the same until price is 20k
and what you do? blame the game creator

thanks zenimax for introducing the alchemy sacks in tel var.. now the flower mafia can choke on the thousands of flowers hoarded in their craft bag and start selling/trading them

hope you do something similar with the yellow upgrading materials to make hoarders cry out loud about how miserable their life is XD

yellow upgrade materials and flowers are all meant to be traded between players, when some players choose to buy all available quantities for sale to hoard them instead using them and increase the price, blaming the developer is the most stupid thing you can do.

THEDKEXPERIENCE · November 2016

Waseem wrote: »

some people buy alloys for 10k and sell 12k, others buy all prices under 12k and sell for 14k.. and another does the same until price is 20k
and what you do? blame the game creator

thanks zenimax for introducing the alchemy sacks in tel var.. now the flower mafia can choke on the thousands of flowers hoarded in their craft bag and start selling/trading them

hope you do something similar with the yellow upgrading materials to make hoarders cry out loud about how miserable their life is XD

yellow upgrade materials and flowers are all meant to be traded between players, when some players choose to buy all available quantities for sale to hoard them instead using them and increase the price, blaming the developer is the most stupid thing you can do.

It's funny how different we can all see many of the same things.

I fancy myself as a wholesaler. I intentionally list the materials I farm at a discount over the market rate with enough margin left over so that these power sellers can flip my stuff and make a profit. Last week it was 9k rosins and wax, 7k stacks of ruby ash, and 15k for 50 Lady's Smock. Next week it'll be something different like 5k for a stack of random ingredients. All of these prices are high enough where flipping them quickly gets me enough coin to feel my time was justified but low enough where someone can still resell them at a profit.

That said, until they separate heavy armor and weapons while lowering the need for heavy armor in Cyrodiil I won't be selling a single tempering alloy. As currently constituted they are the ONLY thing that is guaranteed to go up in value. In the absence of a major change in how ESO operates tempering alloys will be 50k each this time next year. If memory serves one year ago they were 8k each and have gone up to 20k on average. 50k would be a similar pattern.

anitajoneb17_ESO · November 2016

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

I also disagree about the merchant being too strict and inflexible. I'm assuming they could change the prices quite frequently to meet their metrics without pushing a patch or anything, similar to how they just changed the drop rate on those new experience things. At they very least it could be updated in the weekly maintenance cycles.

Well the two effects are quite different in nature.

- Drop rates impact supply and demand (of which the price is the result) whereas fixing the price negates the very notion of supply and demand - and makes trading simply unfun. It's like a job without any perspective in salary, no risk/results/rewards... just plain boring.

- Drop rates can be "ninja changed" by ZOS and the effect is not "immediate". NPC prices on the other hand are out in the open, a given parameter, with immediate effect.

- Also, if they changed them with every patch, the impact would be negative. Business require a stable environment. If a government changes tax or VAT rates every week, businesses just flee abroad. Many players including me would probably stop/quit if that happened, because, what's the point in making up a strategy, farming, choosing what to keep, what to sell for now... if such a decisive parameter as NPC prices are changed every week by God's hand ?

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

danielpatrickkeaneub17_ESO wrote: »

Waseem wrote: »

some people buy alloys for 10k and sell 12k, others buy all prices under 12k and sell for 14k.. and another does the same until price is 20k
and what you do? blame the game creator

thanks zenimax for introducing the alchemy sacks in tel var.. now the flower mafia can choke on the thousands of flowers hoarded in their craft bag and start selling/trading them

hope you do something similar with the yellow upgrading materials to make hoarders cry out loud about how miserable their life is XD

yellow upgrade materials and flowers are all meant to be traded between players, when some players choose to buy all available quantities for sale to hoard them instead using them and increase the price, blaming the developer is the most stupid thing you can do.

It's funny how different we can all see many of the same things.

I fancy myself as a wholesaler. I intentionally list the materials I farm at a discount over the market rate with enough margin left over so that these power sellers can flip my stuff and make a profit. Last week it was 9k rosins and wax, 7k stacks of ruby ash, and 15k for 50 Lady's Smock. Next week it'll be something different like 5k for a stack of random ingredients. All of these prices are high enough where flipping them quickly gets me enough coin to feel my time was justified but low enough where someone can still resell them at a profit.

That said, until they separate heavy armor and weapons while lowering the need for heavy armor in Cyrodiil I won't be selling a single tempering alloy. As currently constituted they are the ONLY thing that is guaranteed to go up in value. In the absence of a major change in how ESO operates tempering alloys will be 50k each this time next year. If memory serves one year ago they were 8k each and have gone up to 20k on average. 50k would be a similar pattern.

Can I ask why you employ this strategy? If you know someone is going to flip them for more, then why not just sell them at or just below that price and reap the profit for yourself? Just doesn't make sense to me I guess.

THEDKEXPERIENCE · November 2016

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

danielpatrickkeaneub17_ESO wrote: »

Waseem wrote: »

some people buy alloys for 10k and sell 12k, others buy all prices under 12k and sell for 14k.. and another does the same until price is 20k
and what you do? blame the game creator

thanks zenimax for introducing the alchemy sacks in tel var.. now the flower mafia can choke on the thousands of flowers hoarded in their craft bag and start selling/trading them

hope you do something similar with the yellow upgrading materials to make hoarders cry out loud about how miserable their life is XD

yellow upgrade materials and flowers are all meant to be traded between players, when some players choose to buy all available quantities for sale to hoard them instead using them and increase the price, blaming the developer is the most stupid thing you can do.

It's funny how different we can all see many of the same things.

I fancy myself as a wholesaler. I intentionally list the materials I farm at a discount over the market rate with enough margin left over so that these power sellers can flip my stuff and make a profit. Last week it was 9k rosins and wax, 7k stacks of ruby ash, and 15k for 50 Lady's Smock. Next week it'll be something different like 5k for a stack of random ingredients. All of these prices are high enough where flipping them quickly gets me enough coin to feel my time was justified but low enough where someone can still resell them at a profit.

That said, until they separate heavy armor and weapons while lowering the need for heavy armor in Cyrodiil I won't be selling a single tempering alloy. As currently constituted they are the ONLY thing that is guaranteed to go up in value. In the absence of a major change in how ESO operates tempering alloys will be 50k each this time next year. If memory serves one year ago they were 8k each and have gone up to 20k on average. 50k would be a similar pattern.

Can I ask why you employ this strategy? If you know someone is going to flip them for more, then why not just sell them at or just below that price and reap the profit for yourself? Just doesn't make sense to me I guess.

Speed. If I can flip something at 80% of it's value in 1-2 days or wait 10 to get full value I would rather do the first. Then I have a free selling slot to use on something else.

Adding: To get a little deeper, in real life I've been in sales and support for a long time. I've always sold products at lowest "non special" price I can to get that part out of the way. My first offer is always my best offer. Then I can just focus on good customer service and repeat business.

While many competitors often squeeze every dollar they can out of 1 sale, I'm more concerned with getting sales for life. Worked very well for me.

olsborg · November 2016

BigES wrote: »

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

Nothing prevents you from farming your own tempers.
It's not like any player has a monopoly on them.

Clearly you've never attempted to farm dreugh wax in an area dominated by macro-enabled Chinese robot pet sorcs.

This, and yes, prices of gold tempers are severe and something needs to be done, 8-10k telvar for 1 gold temper would help alot

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

I also disagree about the merchant being too strict and inflexible. I'm assuming they could change the prices quite frequently to meet their metrics without pushing a patch or anything, similar to how they just changed the drop rate on those new experience things. At they very least it could be updated in the weekly maintenance cycles.

Well the two effects are quite different in nature.

- Drop rates impact supply and demand (of which the price is the result) whereas fixing the price negates the very notion of supply and demand - and makes trading simply unfun. It's like a job without any perspective in salary, no risk/results/rewards... just plain boring.

- Drop rates can be "ninja changed" by ZOS and the effect is not "immediate". NPC prices on the other hand are out in the open, a given parameter, with immediate effect.

- Also, if they changed them with every patch, the impact would be negative. Business require a stable environment. If a government changes tax or VAT rates every week, businesses just flee abroad. Many players including me would probably stop/quit if that happened, because, what's the point in making up a strategy, farming, choosing what to keep, what to sell for now... if such a decisive parameter as NPC prices are changed every week by God's hand ?

I guess we just have a fundamental disconnect on the effect of supply and demand in this game. Your fundamental argument assumes perfect market conditions, whereas mine assumes this is not the case. Again I think the difference is between platforms and even servers. In a perfect market, people operate where marginal cost = marginal revenue. If I can find a way to do something for cheaper, I can lower my price a bit and capitalize on that advantage. In the case of Xbox NA, think of it in terms of economy of scale. Others may have a competitive advantage, but my cash on hand is much higher, as well as my access to the customers. So I can buy out those little guys and maintain my market share without impacting my bottom line overall. Its like AB Inbev's business practices. They have a targeted strategy of identifying competition within the craft beer market and buy those guys out immediately. Same basic principle. Limiting competition allows for the achievement of monopolistic profit.

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

danielpatrickkeaneub17_ESO wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

danielpatrickkeaneub17_ESO wrote: »

Waseem wrote: »

some people buy alloys for 10k and sell 12k, others buy all prices under 12k and sell for 14k.. and another does the same until price is 20k
and what you do? blame the game creator

thanks zenimax for introducing the alchemy sacks in tel var.. now the flower mafia can choke on the thousands of flowers hoarded in their craft bag and start selling/trading them

hope you do something similar with the yellow upgrading materials to make hoarders cry out loud about how miserable their life is XD

yellow upgrade materials and flowers are all meant to be traded between players, when some players choose to buy all available quantities for sale to hoard them instead using them and increase the price, blaming the developer is the most stupid thing you can do.

It's funny how different we can all see many of the same things.

I fancy myself as a wholesaler. I intentionally list the materials I farm at a discount over the market rate with enough margin left over so that these power sellers can flip my stuff and make a profit. Last week it was 9k rosins and wax, 7k stacks of ruby ash, and 15k for 50 Lady's Smock. Next week it'll be something different like 5k for a stack of random ingredients. All of these prices are high enough where flipping them quickly gets me enough coin to feel my time was justified but low enough where someone can still resell them at a profit.

That said, until they separate heavy armor and weapons while lowering the need for heavy armor in Cyrodiil I won't be selling a single tempering alloy. As currently constituted they are the ONLY thing that is guaranteed to go up in value. In the absence of a major change in how ESO operates tempering alloys will be 50k each this time next year. If memory serves one year ago they were 8k each and have gone up to 20k on average. 50k would be a similar pattern.

Can I ask why you employ this strategy? If you know someone is going to flip them for more, then why not just sell them at or just below that price and reap the profit for yourself? Just doesn't make sense to me I guess.

Speed. If I can flip something at 80% of it's value in 1-2 days or wait 10 to get full value I would rather do the first. Then I have a free selling slot to use on something else.

I kind of get that, but wouldn't you be able to do better just selling in chat? Would avoid the trader fees and all that. I mean more power to you but just would think you want to capitalize on your time.

AlnilamE · November 2016

Waseem wrote: »

some people buy alloys for 10k and sell 12k, others buy all prices under 12k and sell for 14k.. and another does the same until price is 20k
and what you do? blame the game creator

thanks zenimax for introducing the alchemy sacks in tel var.. now the flower mafia can choke on the thousands of flowers hoarded in their craft bag and start selling/trading them

hope you do something similar with the yellow upgrading materials to make hoarders cry out loud about how miserable their life is XD

yellow upgrade materials and flowers are all meant to be traded between players, when some players choose to buy all available quantities for sale to hoard them instead using them and increase the price, blaming the developer is the most stupid thing you can do.

They are also not that hard to obtain for yourself. There are multiple ways. Hirelings, writs and actual farming of nodes,which you can do as you go about your day. Even if all you do is dungeons, for example, harvest every heavy sack you come across.

anitajoneb17_ESO · November 2016

@SwaminoNowlino :

Can you please explain again, in different words ? Because I don't understand a thing of what you said :-)

How can you "eliminate competition" by buying them out in ESO ? The means of production themselves (nodes, mobs) are open and free to use.
Besides, I cannot capitalize on any competitive advantage : some people farm quicker than others but overall, the only "production factor" here is time - which, actually, costs nothing in game gold, and the only thing I can decide to make myself "more efficient" in my "production process" is to decide what to farm and where to do it in my available game time. In that regard, "economies of scale" are pretty hard to achieve... ?

How does that relate to what you've been trying to explain to me ?

BigES · November 2016

Stopnaggin wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

Stopnaggin wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Again a question of time and utility (happiness). Sure, we could all do what you do. I farmed ore this entire Orsinium event that I wasn't in Maelstrom. I hated it. It horrible and in no way rewarding to me. In fact, lets all just farm, trade, and sell. Wait - that is causing several people to leave the game who want to play competitively. Because farming (at unchecked, and unbalanced extreme levels) not enjoyable to them, and the time invested is not balanced. Even with double resource nodes it not worth it. No worries - we'll just save the time and buy the mats from people like you who enjoy it, so we can move on to other content we enjoy. Wait, what? Tempers are not reasonably priced?

Maybe eventually they will all leave the game and you and the 1000 other farmers can live in node farming

Maybe the 1000s of farmer will leave and you would have to farm yourself. It goes both ways. Again I ask, what would you consider a reasonable price? You admit you don't like it, so in reality what is it worth to you? So you don't have to do the tedious work. What actual price is reasonable? I keep hearing cap it, but what is that cap. Is it high enough for me to continue to farm and be profitable? Or is it low enough to make me stop farming? Where is that fine line?

But wait, people are leaving because they can't be competitive without getting gold gear. So someone who grinds end over end for gear leaves because they would have to grind to upgrade that gear? Oh my I don't even know where to start with that one.

There isn't a single point. Its a ever changing metric based on data such as the monetary base, supply, and barriers to acquisition. You set point, evaluate the performance in terms of these metrics, and adjust as needed. Your central bank and federal reserve do this every single day.

And with that how would they cap it? The economy is fluid, so where do they put this cap they everyone is talking about. I'm not one of those that sells mats on traders, I sell when I see ltb in chat. I sell gear in vendors because that has an easier chance of selling and tracking prices. My personal experience is alloy is 20k ea on vendors and about 15k open air, and about the same percentage on wax and rosin. So I'm not sure what the magical number people are looking for.

They can always regulate this with drop percentage, but they would have to keep altering it to suit the economy. I don't see that as viable in a video game.

They put a cap on alchemy reagents at the TV merchant. They set a price for TV. Which is no different than a price for gold. How did they come up with that number? Has that "crashed" the alchemy market, or just made it realistically affordable? TV can easily be converted to gold, so whether you want it or not, there is an exchange rate there.

Alchemy mats are just as important as gold gear when it comes to competitive play and affordable prices with realistic game play times. The principle is the same.

THEDKEXPERIENCE · November 2016

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

danielpatrickkeaneub17_ESO wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

danielpatrickkeaneub17_ESO wrote: »

Waseem wrote: »

some people buy alloys for 10k and sell 12k, others buy all prices under 12k and sell for 14k.. and another does the same until price is 20k
and what you do? blame the game creator

thanks zenimax for introducing the alchemy sacks in tel var.. now the flower mafia can choke on the thousands of flowers hoarded in their craft bag and start selling/trading them

hope you do something similar with the yellow upgrading materials to make hoarders cry out loud about how miserable their life is XD

yellow upgrade materials and flowers are all meant to be traded between players, when some players choose to buy all available quantities for sale to hoard them instead using them and increase the price, blaming the developer is the most stupid thing you can do.

It's funny how different we can all see many of the same things.

I fancy myself as a wholesaler. I intentionally list the materials I farm at a discount over the market rate with enough margin left over so that these power sellers can flip my stuff and make a profit. Last week it was 9k rosins and wax, 7k stacks of ruby ash, and 15k for 50 Lady's Smock. Next week it'll be something different like 5k for a stack of random ingredients. All of these prices are high enough where flipping them quickly gets me enough coin to feel my time was justified but low enough where someone can still resell them at a profit.

That said, until they separate heavy armor and weapons while lowering the need for heavy armor in Cyrodiil I won't be selling a single tempering alloy. As currently constituted they are the ONLY thing that is guaranteed to go up in value. In the absence of a major change in how ESO operates tempering alloys will be 50k each this time next year. If memory serves one year ago they were 8k each and have gone up to 20k on average. 50k would be a similar pattern.

Can I ask why you employ this strategy? If you know someone is going to flip them for more, then why not just sell them at or just below that price and reap the profit for yourself? Just doesn't make sense to me I guess.

Speed. If I can flip something at 80% of it's value in 1-2 days or wait 10 to get full value I would rather do the first. Then I have a free selling slot to use on something else.

I kind of get that, but wouldn't you be able to do better just selling in chat? Would avoid the trader fees and all that. I mean more power to you but just would think you want to capitalize on your time.

Even as a people person my tolerance for area chat isn't that high. Haha.

BigES · November 2016

gp1680 wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Stopnaggin wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Again a question of time and utility (happiness). Sure, we could all do what you do. I farmed ore this entire Orsinium event that I wasn't in Maelstrom. I hated it. It horrible and in no way rewarding to me. In fact, lets all just farm, trade, and sell. Wait - that is causing several people to leave the game who want to play competitively. Because farming (at unchecked, and unbalanced extreme levels) not enjoyable to them, and the time invested is not balanced. Even with double resource nodes it not worth it. No worries - we'll just save the time and buy the mats from people like you who enjoy it, so we can move on to other content we enjoy. Wait, what? Tempers are not reasonably priced?

Maybe eventually they will all leave the game and you and the 1000 other farmers can live in node farming

Maybe the 1000s of farmer will leave and you would have to farm yourself. It goes both ways. Again I ask, what would you consider a reasonable price? You admit you don't like it, so in reality what is it worth to you? So you don't have to do the tedious work. What actual price is reasonable? I keep hearing cap it, but what is that cap. Is it high enough for me to continue to farm and be profitable? Or is it low enough to make me stop farming? Where is that fine line?

But wait, people are leaving because they can't be competitive without getting gold gear. So someone who grinds end over end for gear leaves because they would have to grind to upgrade that gear? Oh my I don't even know where to start with that one.

You set a target rate

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Maybe eventually they will all leave the game and you and the 1000 other farmers can live in node farming and crafting bliss.

Well, if that happened (upper 10% players leaving the game) we would have vMSA nerfed, MSA weapons dropping in normal mode, or even purchasable from an NPC vendor.
Would I mind that ? No, I'd love it.
Would YOU mind that ? I bet you would.
Am I asking for that ? No.
Are you asking for the exact equivalent ? Yes.

"Make gold tempers available from NPC vendors at reasonable (aka "low") prices is the exact same thing as asking "nerf vMSA, we need the weapons".

You are absolutely all over the place with your comments and its very difficult to rebuttal because there is so much to rebuttal. [SNIP] This will probably be my last reply to you because I value diversity of opinion and balance. I equally farm, PvP, do trials, farm, and buy/sell. I have experienced all aspects of this game so its easy to identify deficiencies vs. a one-sided viewpoint.

Facts are... 1) prices are extreme, and time invested to farm and gold-out a reasonable set of gear is not balanced. 2) buying market priced tempers and dreugh wax is not reasonably priced to due to an unchecked gold supply and lack of information transparency (people don't know the true value and it is ambiguous because there is not a searchable item system or a main auction house). 3) A price ceiling - just like what is created with alchemy reagents offered at the TV merchant - would help realistically balance prices and set a price ceiling and target rate (like - I dunno - the real economy). 4) increasing the drop rate only slightly impacts the problem because again, these materials still get bought up by people with ample gold.

I understand your points and they are certainly reasonable, but on point #1, my argument would be this. I currently own a Honda, mostly because I can't afford that Acura NSX I've been dreaming of. I'm content with the fact that I won't own a NSX anytime soon because my job and paycheck can't reasonably support it. If I wanted to own that NSX, I'd have to work even harder, longer, and likely multiple jobs or get lucky and hit the lottery. I figure my Honda will suffice for now.

In ESO, if I want gold mats, sharpened Spriggan or Viper weapons, gold jewelry from "Golden", I'm going to have to farm my a** off to get them and/or earn the money to buy them. If I want Maelstrom weapons, I'm going to have to buy blood pressure medication and an ample supply of controllers (cuz I'm breaking them) to get through vMSA. You can't have everything just "handed" to you or the value of certain items lowered just because you want the best of what everyone else has worked hard for.

Your points are valid and I'm sure many agree with you, but I think you'll find a little bit of satisfaction when you "earn" that complete set of gold armor, weapons, and jewelry and you flaunt those shiny new maelstrom weapons that you burned so many hours obtaining.

[Edited for inappropriate content]

Not asking for a hand out. I play this game excessively as it is. It needs to be difficult. They are gold mats. But with constant shifts in traits, constant shifts in skills that dictate what armor you wear, constant shifts in the player base (# of people), constant shifts in so many different variables, obtaining gold gear is nowhere easy as it used to be. And I've played since day 1.

BigES · November 2016

BigES wrote: »

gp1680 wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Stopnaggin wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Again a question of time and utility (happiness). Sure, we could all do what you do. I farmed ore this entire Orsinium event that I wasn't in Maelstrom. I hated it. It horrible and in no way rewarding to me. In fact, lets all just farm, trade, and sell. Wait - that is causing several people to leave the game who want to play competitively. Because farming (at unchecked, and unbalanced extreme levels) not enjoyable to them, and the time invested is not balanced. Even with double resource nodes it not worth it. No worries - we'll just save the time and buy the mats from people like you who enjoy it, so we can move on to other content we enjoy. Wait, what? Tempers are not reasonably priced?

Maybe eventually they will all leave the game and you and the 1000 other farmers can live in node farming

Maybe the 1000s of farmer will leave and you would have to farm yourself. It goes both ways. Again I ask, what would you consider a reasonable price? You admit you don't like it, so in reality what is it worth to you? So you don't have to do the tedious work. What actual price is reasonable? I keep hearing cap it, but what is that cap. Is it high enough for me to continue to farm and be profitable? Or is it low enough to make me stop farming? Where is that fine line?

But wait, people are leaving because they can't be competitive without getting gold gear. So someone who grinds end over end for gear leaves because they would have to grind to upgrade that gear? Oh my I don't even know where to start with that one.

You set a target rate

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Maybe eventually they will all leave the game and you and the 1000 other farmers can live in node farming and crafting bliss.

Well, if that happened (upper 10% players leaving the game) we would have vMSA nerfed, MSA weapons dropping in normal mode, or even purchasable from an NPC vendor.
Would I mind that ? No, I'd love it.
Would YOU mind that ? I bet you would.
Am I asking for that ? No.
Are you asking for the exact equivalent ? Yes.

"Make gold tempers available from NPC vendors at reasonable (aka "low") prices is the exact same thing as asking "nerf vMSA, we need the weapons".

You are absolutely all over the place with your comments and its very difficult to rebuttal because there is so much to rebuttal. [SNIP] This will probably be my last reply to you because I value diversity of opinion and balance. I equally farm, PvP, do trials, farm, and buy/sell. I have experienced all aspects of this game so its easy to identify deficiencies vs. a one-sided viewpoint.

Facts are... 1) prices are extreme, and time invested to farm and gold-out a reasonable set of gear is not balanced. 2) buying market priced tempers and dreugh wax is not reasonably priced to due to an unchecked gold supply and lack of information transparency (people don't know the true value and it is ambiguous because there is not a searchable item system or a main auction house). 3) A price ceiling - just like what is created with alchemy reagents offered at the TV merchant - would help realistically balance prices and set a price ceiling and target rate (like - I dunno - the real economy). 4) increasing the drop rate only slightly impacts the problem because again, these materials still get bought up by people with ample gold.

I understand your points and they are certainly reasonable, but on point #1, my argument would be this. I currently own a Honda, mostly because I can't afford that Acura NSX I've been dreaming of. I'm content with the fact that I won't own a NSX anytime soon because my job and paycheck can't reasonably support it. If I wanted to own that NSX, I'd have to work even harder, longer, and likely multiple jobs or get lucky and hit the lottery. I figure my Honda will suffice for now.

In ESO, if I want gold mats, sharpened Spriggan or Viper weapons, gold jewelry from "Golden", I'm going to have to farm my a** off to get them and/or earn the money to buy them. If I want Maelstrom weapons, I'm going to have to buy blood pressure medication and an ample supply of controllers (cuz I'm breaking them) to get through vMSA. You can't have everything just "handed" to you or the value of certain items lowered just because you want the best of what everyone else has worked hard for.

Your points are valid and I'm sure many agree with you, but I think you'll find a little bit of satisfaction when you "earn" that complete set of gold armor, weapons, and jewelry and you flaunt those shiny new maelstrom weapons that you burned so many hours obtaining.

[Edited for inappropriate content]

Not asking for a hand out. I play this game excessively as it is. It needs to be difficult. They are gold mats. But with constant shifts in traits, constant shifts in skills that dictate what armor you wear, constant shifts in the player base (# of people), constant shifts in so many different variables, obtaining gold gear is nowhere easy as it used to be. And I've played since day 1.

I've thought long and hard about how "sunk" my time invested is in getting all my gold gear. And my maelstrom weapons. And how if ZoS better regulated these materials and the gold supply, how much easier it would be to obtain from players who play less than me. And you know what conclusion I came to? I don't care. It doesn't matter to me that I "wasted" time getting what I wanted and other might get it easier. Just like when Maelstrom items became a guaranteed drop. I don't care. As long as the path to get these top-tier gear and items is REASONBLE. Currently, it is not.

anitajoneb17_ESO · November 2016

BigES wrote: »

Has that "crashed" the alchemy market ?

Wait and see. I for one have completely stopped selling any alchemy material since the Tel Var merchant sells those bags.Simply because it's not worth it farming them for selling anymore.
Many people on the sellers' side might do just like me - not worth it anymore.

On the buyers' side, there's euphoria right now because people are sitting on TONS of TelVar stones. Wait until that stock is depleted and people will have to actually go back to IC to farm Tel Var stones. It won't be as easy and quick as it used to be because everyone will do the same - there will be actual PvP to be done in there.

I don't have a crystal bubble to predict exactly what is going to happen, but one thing is certain : it's far too soon to predict how things will evolve on the alchemy ingredients market. For now has totally crashed the alchemy market on the supply side. On the demand side, wait until people run out of Tel Var stones and see what happens...

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

@SwaminoNowlino :

Can you please explain again, in different words ? Because I don't understand a thing of what you said :-)

How can you "eliminate competition" by buying them out in ESO ? The means of production themselves (nodes, mobs) are open and free to use.
Besides, I cannot capitalize on any competitive advantage : some people farm quicker than others but overall, the only "production factor" here is time, and the only thing I can decide to make myself "more efficient" in my "production process" is to decide what to farm and where to do it in my available game time.

How does that relate to what you've been trying to explain to me ?

When you list your mats in traders, do you post them at the market price or at the price for what you value? If I wanted to start my guild trader, my strategy would be to offer these gold mats for less than what the big guilds are charging, and acquire money to support better trading locations. Thus expanding and providing competition. I'd be exploiting the cheaper trading locations to get a better return on my investment of a trader.

The ESO economy is driven through these traders. Many of the traders are purchased by people with millions of gold, and they put nothing in them. This limits peoples access to traders. They then buy the cheaper mats, and list them at the price they have established. They have so much money, it doesn't matter to them if they lose 1k here or there on listing fees, because it reinforces their overall share of the market. If there are no tempers available on the market and people need to gold their swords, then they are captive to the prices being charged or they must go farm for themselves.

Guilds collude back and forth all the time to decide who gets what spot and who is going to foot the bill for the dummy traders for the week. The guilds I am in do this regularly, and aren't even the biggest guilds. So without a way to control the money supply, this problem over time grows and allows monopolies to form. Same with the guild trader system. Introducing a merchant with a price cap, or a merchant for alternative currency, can combat this system, by placing a cap on what people can charge. Suddenly it becomes less profitable to corner the market like this.

It's by no means perfect. Like I said, I don't even experience this as a problem. I'm just taking the perspective of someone who can't invest as much time in the game as myself and am applying my experiences from working within these trading guilds on Xbox NA. Plus its just stimulating conversation to see other views and opinions on the issue.

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Has that "crashed" the alchemy market ?

Wait and see. I for one have completely stopped selling any alchemy material since the Tel Var merchant sells those bags.Simply because it's not worth it farming them for selling anymore.
Many people on the sellers' side might do just like me - not worth it anymore.

On the buyers' side, there's euphoria right now because people are sitting on TONS of TelVar stones. Wait until that stock is depleted and people will have to actually go back to IC to farm Tel Var stones. It won't be as easy and quick as it used to be because everyone will do the same - there will be actual PvP to be done in there.

I don't have a crystal bubble to predict exactly what is going to happen, but one thing is certain : it's far too soon to predict how things will evolve on the alchemy ingredients market.

Right, same as in any other market place. People will eat through the supply glut and prices will normalize. Probably won't be as high as before but certainly there will still be a profit to be made. Folks REALLY hate IC.

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

@anitajoneb17_ESO another example is, lets say cotton. Technically anyone can grow and harvest cotton to create clothing. Yet why do people pay for clothing? Because most lack the means to do so. In the case of ESO this means your time. You certainly should be rewarded for your time, but only where your marginal revenue is equal to your marginal costs. If everyone had to pay the actual costs of cotton production and monopolistic profit, a t-shirt would cost a couple hundred bucks. To control monopolies and allow small business to compete, governments heavily subsidize those industries. Otherwise there would only be one or two large corporations in that business and they could charge a price much larger than their marginal costs.

idk · November 2016

Enemy-of-Coldharbour wrote: »

I agree with the OP. Legendary mats need to be sold by an NPC vendor like they did with enchanting runes. I'm sure there are many people against this, but they are most likely bot masters who are controlling the market.

@Enemy-of-Coldharbour

They do not sell Kuta at NPC vendors which would be the appropriate comparison. Gold upgrading matts will never be sold at NPC vendors. Wearing gold armor is not intended to be common.

disintegr8 · November 2016

I sympathize with someone who only gets a few hours a week to play, I spend more than a few hours a week just on inventory and space management. What you can and can't do in this game is severely hampered with such time restrictions.

While I would not like to be in their shoes, I still do not think anything needs changing with regards to cost and availability of any farmable or collectible item. The bottom line is that anything for sale in a guild store had to be obtained by the seller, which means anyone else can also get that item without buying it. The game is designed for a broad audience and making things easier to achieve or get will always pit people against each other.

If I have 10 hours a week to play and choose to go farm for gear or mats and sell them, that is my choice. If I choose to do nothing but run trials and dungeons and buy anything I need, that is also my choice. If I have enough time to do both, well that is a bonus.

I choose to use all of my 7 leveled characters but prefer not to buy what I need at traders, so I have to sacrifice things. I might do 2 or 3 sessions of dungeons but then have a session where I do nothing but farm or collect treasure maps or writ surveys. I then might have to spend an hour or two on inventory, selling stuff to NPC's, deconstructing, making food and potions for my characters. I could just buy anything I need but I like it that the game gives me all of these choices.

The game was designed with a trading economy which enables people to buy what they can not get themselves (for whatever reason). They have recently severely restricted trade in pick up items by making a lot of gear bind on pickup. If they start moving anything more away from the open market to NPC traders, they might as well shut down the trading system.

The trading economy is affected every time they make a major change to the game. The recent removal of vet ranks, introduction of account wide CP levels, changing from BoE to BoP, changes to enchanting etc., have all impacted the trading economy. These changes impact item prices and availability, whether by reducing/increasing the supply of materials or increasing/decreasing the demand for items.

I suspect any further trading changes or restrictions made in the game would upset more players than it keeps happy.
BTW - I am not currently in a trading guild, even though I have been in the past.

EDIT: I am also on console and any assumption that anyone against changes to the trading system must be using bots is an insult.

alexkdd99 · November 2016

BigES wrote: »

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

Nothing prevents you from farming your own tempers.
It's not like any player has a monopoly on them.

Clearly you've never attempted to farm dreugh wax in an area dominated by macro-enabled Chinese robot pet sorcs.

Lol you say your on xbox and can't farm gold mats because bots? What game are you playing again?

Odd because I never see a single bot and never have any problems farming my own gold mats. Actually I have never upgraded ANY gear with mats I didn't farm myself. Stop making excuses and go farm your own items if you don't want to pay going market rate.

idk · November 2016

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Stopnaggin wrote: »

You just need to learn how to get better prices. I bought 3 tempers yesterday 10k ea. Never go to guild traders for stuff like that. Prime example is the Psijic ambrosia frags. 120-10k on traders. I get mine under 50k ea. Learn how to work the market. Alot of low level players will sell low to get gold for something, I was buying frags over the weekend and a guy offered them to me @ 4k ea. I still gave him fair market value but there are people that either don't care or don't know.

I'm aware you can find unsuspecting players who don't know what they have or the value of it. But I'm talking about the 90% market value, not the exception. I'm talking about the community price. If we all "looked for a deal" as you suggested, it wouldn't be a deal anymore, would it?

Exactly. If everyone or at least many people made the effort to look for deals (instead of complaining about prices but buying anyway) high priced goods would not sell and prices would drop for everybody.

Remember : everytime you buy something at a certain price, it means you agree on that price, because you have the choice to NOT BUY. In ESO there's nothing you cannot farm by yourself and thus obtain without gold (unlike RL where you have no choice but to buy some basic stuff regardless of price).

Again, this is not specifically about cost. Its also about time. Time is money.

@BigES

The person you quoted is correct that we agree to the price we buy it at. Market forces set the price.

Additionally, and more important, legendary quality gear is intended to be much rarer than epic. It's by obvious design in the game. The price should not be cheap.

It's a choice.

I don't think you understand the concept of inflation...

Lol. Inflation only occurred eso based on our choices and how it affects market pressures.

So no, you don't understand how inflation works. As long as we both accept that. "Market forces" isn't some abstract concept or something that just occurs in a vacuum. People control those "market forces" in your every day life, you just may not be aware of it.

You seem a tad confused if Your saying I do not know how inflation works. Or your not reading my posts.

Market forces absolute control inflation and deflation in eso. 100%. In the vacuum the game is. There are no other forces than supply and demand changes available to the game.

People control what via buying more and buying less. They control it by selling more and selling less.

Basic economics at work. Cannot get more basic than this.

Factors other than supply and demand that impact ESO, off the top of my head.

Monetary policy, substitute goods, complementary goods, imperfect information, monopolistic profit, barriers to entry. Just to name a few. All of these contribute to the supply and demand function, and are much more complex than your basic assessment. Saying things are a simple as supply and demand demonstrates a lack of understanding of the basic principles that drive any economy.

Dude. Lay off the skooma.

For starters you seem to like to argue with many in this thread like @anitajoneb17_ESO and @danielpatrickkeaneub17_ESO yet your wrong.

Honestly, monetary policy? Who sets it? Molag bal, the emporer?

There is not governing body in eso settings ng such things. There are no substitute goods for gold uigrade matts.

I can go on with your list because most of it is a complete joke.

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

The simplest problem I can point to is when you look at the market for gold mats, the games most valued asset. That's 250% inflation since IC dlc came out. It doesn't mean temps are more valuable than they were then, supposedly they are more common now than ever. Some of that is the increased value of heavy armor and new sets, but 250% inflation?

Edit: I was reminded that even dreugh wax and rosin are up about 250%. So that leads itself to being more inflationary (I.e the decrease in purchasing power of your gold).

Astanphaeus · November 2016

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

Astanphaeus wrote: »

There are 2 main reasons for the high prices of tempers.

1) With the introduction of so many new drop sets that greatly out-perform crafted sets, there is barely a market left for Ancstor Silk, Rubedite, Rubedo Leather, and Ruby Ash, and tempers being in the system are largely a biproduct of this market there are fewer tempers in the market.

2) The market has been destroyed by ZOS by placing BoP on so many sets, basically removing crafted gear from the game hich has decreased the value of motifs, and greatly increasing the abundance of other materials such as cp160 mats and now alchemy ingredients with the alchemy sacks. This has left very few items actually valuable. Since the amount of new gold being introduced to the market hasn't decreased, those few items of value remaining are naturally going to increase in price. It's also why you see desirable weapons and shields going for multi-hundreds of thousands. Introducing a temper price cap would just make prices for those weapons even worse with little way for new people to the market to make the needed gold.

Honestly, the only reason the problem isn't worse is because many of the wealthier members of the community are setting aside millions for the hosing update. If ZOS doesn't make housing an absolutely huge gold sink while introducing new items of value to the market, you will see the prices for these few remaining valuable items skyrocket even further. What OP is suggesting will just make things worse.

Some things that can be done to improve the market would include:
Increase the cost of Alchemy Sacks, 500tv is way too cheap and easy to get

Introduce a system to use your know motifs to restyle your gear (ZOS, this will help with your crown sales of motifs as well)

Have the upcoming furniture crafting use an amount of mats comparable to cp160 crafting and use the same mats as gear crafting does

Make nirnhoned great again

This. Agree with every point except the part about the price ceiling or merchant exacerbating the issue. If you cap the price I don't see what that has to do with prices going up. Should go the opposite direction.

It will go down for the tempers, but will increase for thing like sharpened spinners swords to account for it. ith fewer and fewer things affected by the free market, those that remain will increase in value.

BigES · November 2016

I think we can all agree here that there is a drastic issue with an unchecked money supply (gold). You can choose to believe whether this issue has lead to unchecked and inflated prices for gold materials, or not. Regardless, it is a simple economic principle that a large unregulated supply of gold both inflates and distorts relative prices, including dreugh wax and tempering alloys. That is what inflation does. The 1 gold you're holding how has less purchasing power, because there's more of it. To hedge against this, smart people buy up useful things like top tier items and gold materials, removing them from the market and raising prices. Because its not profitable for them to hold money when its constantly being devalued.

anitajoneb17_ESO · November 2016

I see what you mean now. And I know how monopolistic concentration IRL is built (your cotton example). In your view/experience, the mean of production that can be used to prevent a competitor from working is the guild trader.

But it doesn't apply to ESO PC/EU. Let me explain.

- In PC/EU, there are no "dummy guild traders".
- In PC/EU, "big guilds" in best trading spots are much cheaper than isolated smaller guild that use remote traders. Because in big trading hubs there's large offer and strict competition, whereas in remote places people seem to not know about prices (or believe that they can set the prices, not the market), and don't bother offering much desired items for sale. w
- In PC/EU, big guilds like the ones I'm in get organized in what is similar to a "federation" where we agree to not bid against each other, and to determine a common level of bidding - to prevent bids from going too high. But we can always be "sniped" any week by some isolated guild who has saved up enough gold for this. They usually don't last more than one or two weeks - you need a very solid sales volume + member contribution to keep up with the bids every week.

In a sense, we protect ourselves from outsiders' attacks, to a certain extent. But we don't, ever, (and noone does) buy traders to keep them empty just for the sake of crushing down other guilds.

That's why I didn't understand your analogy. And that's why I think there are, in ESO, no actual mean to suppress competition, since it's very easy for everyone to farm stuff for sale and to join a guild with a trader for achieving this. Even the reknown, famous big guilds have a pretty open policy for newcomers, it's easy to join them. All you have to do is taking care of your slots and keeping your stuff selling. Also, no trading guild afaik has ever tried to impose fixed prices or any pricing policy to its members.

Only "production factor" for goods in ESO is time - and you cannot steal that from anyone.

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

SwaminoNowlino wrote: »

Giles.floydub17_ESO wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

Stopnaggin wrote: »

You just need to learn how to get better prices. I bought 3 tempers yesterday 10k ea. Never go to guild traders for stuff like that. Prime example is the Psijic ambrosia frags. 120-10k on traders. I get mine under 50k ea. Learn how to work the market. Alot of low level players will sell low to get gold for something, I was buying frags over the weekend and a guy offered them to me @ 4k ea. I still gave him fair market value but there are people that either don't care or don't know.

I'm aware you can find unsuspecting players who don't know what they have or the value of it. But I'm talking about the 90% market value, not the exception. I'm talking about the community price. If we all "looked for a deal" as you suggested, it wouldn't be a deal anymore, would it?

Exactly. If everyone or at least many people made the effort to look for deals (instead of complaining about prices but buying anyway) high priced goods would not sell and prices would drop for everybody.

Remember : everytime you buy something at a certain price, it means you agree on that price, because you have the choice to NOT BUY. In ESO there's nothing you cannot farm by yourself and thus obtain without gold (unlike RL where you have no choice but to buy some basic stuff regardless of price).

Again, this is not specifically about cost. Its also about time. Time is money.

@BigES

The person you quoted is correct that we agree to the price we buy it at. Market forces set the price.

Additionally, and more important, legendary quality gear is intended to be much rarer than epic. It's by obvious design in the game. The price should not be cheap.

It's a choice.

I don't think you understand the concept of inflation...

Lol. Inflation only occurred eso based on our choices and how it affects market pressures.

So no, you don't understand how inflation works. As long as we both accept that. "Market forces" isn't some abstract concept or something that just occurs in a vacuum. People control those "market forces" in your every day life, you just may not be aware of it.

You seem a tad confused if Your saying I do not know how inflation works. Or your not reading my posts.

Market forces absolute control inflation and deflation in eso. 100%. In the vacuum the game is. There are no other forces than supply and demand changes available to the game.

People control what via buying more and buying less. They control it by selling more and selling less.

Basic economics at work. Cannot get more basic than this.

Factors other than supply and demand that impact ESO, off the top of my head.

Monetary policy, substitute goods, complementary goods, imperfect information, monopolistic profit, barriers to entry. Just to name a few. All of these contribute to the supply and demand function, and are much more complex than your basic assessment. Saying things are a simple as supply and demand demonstrates a lack of understanding of the basic principles that drive any economy.

Dude. Lay off the skooma.

For starters you seem to like to argue with many in this thread like @anitajoneb17_ESO and @danielpatrickkeaneub17_ESO yet your wrong.

Honestly, monetary policy? Who sets it? Molag bal, the emporer?

There is not governing body in eso settings ng such things. There are no substitute goods for gold uigrade matts.

I can go on with your list because most of it is a complete joke.

Monetary policy if determined by ZOS. If you don't comprehend what these basic economic factors are then you don't need to comment. It's okay. Monetary policy is set by the drop rate of gold from mobs, the prices NPCs give for vendoring items, things like the Undaunted Plunder, repair costs, trader fees etc. These things are all controlled by devs. The number of available gold sinks is also a contributor, and the chief issue.

These are all the basics of any economy, whether it's the international market, ESO, or a pre school snack time.

Edit: there is also a difference between argument and debate. No one is calling anyone ridiculous names or making outlandish claims. We are discussing ideas and policies, not insulting people.

jedtb16_ESO · November 2016

no price control... not now, not ever.

alexkdd99 · November 2016

BigES wrote: »

I think we can all agree here that there is a drastic issue with an unchecked money supply (gold). You can choose to believe whether this issue has lead to unchecked and inflated prices for gold materials, or not. Regardless, it is a simple economic principle that a large unregulated supply of gold both inflates and distorts relative prices, including dreugh wax and tempering alloys. That is what inflation does. The 1 gold you're holding how has less purchasing power, because there's more of it. To hedge against this, smart people buy up useful things like top tier items and gold materials, removing them from the market and raising prices. Because its not profitable for them to hold money when its constantly being devalued.

Inflation happens in EVERY economy. There can be no monopoly on gold upgrade mats in an economy like eso since everyone has access to obtain gold upgrade mats.

How do you know that these supposed bots (which I've never seen) are Chinese? I farm from time to time and have never seen these bots you speak of.

You just don't want to put the time farming in and don't want to pay the price. The buyers set the price in this economy. If a seller is not selling at a certain price they will lower it.

Definitely a big no to price ceiling, zos has already made everything incredibly easy to get. Why do you think you should be able to get the best quality gear so easily?

SwaminoNowlino · November 2016

alexkdd99 wrote: »

BigES wrote: »

I think we can all agree here that there is a drastic issue with an unchecked money supply (gold). You can choose to believe whether this issue has lead to unchecked and inflated prices for gold materials, or not. Regardless, it is a simple economic principle that a large unregulated supply of gold both inflates and distorts relative prices, including dreugh wax and tempering alloys. That is what inflation does. The 1 gold you're holding how has less purchasing power, because there's more of it. To hedge against this, smart people buy up useful things like top tier items and gold materials, removing them from the market and raising prices. Because its not profitable for them to hold money when its constantly being devalued.

Inflation happens in EVERY economy. There can be no monopoly on gold upgrade mats in an economy like eso since everyone has access to obtain gold upgrade mats.

How do you know that these supposed bots (which I've never seen) are Chinese? I farm from time to time and have never seen these bots you speak of.

You just don't want to put the time farming in and don't want to pay the price. The buyers set the price in this economy. If a seller is not selling at a certain price they will lower it.

Definitely a big no to price ceiling, zos has already made everything incredibly easy to get. Why do you think you should be able to get the best quality gear so easily?

YouTube abounds with videos of bot farmers and multi boxers, even on console.

No one is saying make them easy or cheap. No one. Inflation does happen in every economy, but every (functioning) economy also has tools to control inflation. All that's being suggested here is different ideas to combat inflation. Gold sinks are one, price ceilings are another. Since IC there has been approximately 250% inflation in the economy for xbox na. Maybe that's acceptable. Maybe not. Worth a debate.