SteveCampsOut wrote: »WardenofNirn wrote: »SteveCampsOut wrote: »
As I noted, it was a serious question. I'd like to hear more from people who are happy about this.
Can you explain how this will eliminate shadow (/ghost/whatever we want to call them) guilds?
This change (in Update 23) will not eliminate shadow guilds, in my opinion. A wealthy guild can more easily buy a primary location (placing multiple bids), and their shadow guild(s) can buy other locations (also placing multiple bids, given enough coin).
Now, if ZOS follows up with another change, say in Update 23 + n, that prohibits the resale of a purchased guild trader ...
That would be interesting, in my opinion. How do you make in game money off of a shadow guild, if you cannot resell the guild trader that the shadow guild is purchasing?
But why would they? Seriously Who wants to actually give up guild slots for "Shadow" guilds if they no longer have to do so? They have at best the bare minimum of 50 people in them to have aguild store. Those Shadow guilds are not going to eek out any profit worth mentioning. There really is no longer going to be any reason for people to give up a valuable guild slot just so their guild leader wants a shadow guild. There may be the rare few egotistical leaders who keep them going IF they have guild members stupid enough to support them for a guild that will not earn enough gold to make it worth the gold it costs to bid a second location. I mean seriously! The ONLY point of Shadow guilds was to have a backup location. It cost people valuable guild slots for a guild that would only end up being disbanded to give the main guild the trader at best.
Do you even read what the others have written?
Some shadow guilds buy up guild trader slots so that they can sell them on to the highest bidder after the trader flip is closed. They even sell it on with a 60% profit from what they gave for the trader. This is not going to stop.
I've skipped over a lot of whining sure. I still don't see people giving up guild slots so one guy can "Sell the spot" for profit. He must have oodles of really gullible friends.....
In the long run this is going to be very negative I think:
- More volatility in the market... easier to take a punt on taking a trader elsewhere if you know you have mutltiple backups... and unreliability in peoples traders is bad for everyone at every level.
- Higher bid costs due to above... and knock on effect on players having to pay more to support the bids.
- Medium/lower tier more disrupted by higher end trade guilds placing large backups on them. This will be FAR easier to do than creating ghost guilds so will become far more common.
- Trickle down effect increases costs on traders further down and increases the barrier to entry for newer guilds.
This is undoubtedly an overall benefit for the top tier trading guilds, but even then I see the potential for disruptive market behaviour which many may not like.
Feels like a poorly thought out solution to the ghost guild problem...
I would like to see them only deduct up to the highest bid, and that’s how I initially assumed it would work, because that is what makes sense. I don’t have faith that they will do what makes sense, however.
How it should work:
I bid 2 million on trader 1, system removes 1 million. I bid 2.5 million on trader 2, system removes an additional 500k. I bid 50k on trader 3, system removes nothing, I bid 3 million on trader 4, system removes an additional 500k. The total removed is 3 million, equal to the highest bid. I win trader 1, system refunds me 500k from trader 2, nothing from trader 3, and 500k from trader 4, a total of 1 million refunded.
The above would be still be consistent with ZOS’s short description, but require more work to implement. It would also be much more fair. I wish I had faith they were willing to put in the time and energy to adequately solve this problem instead exacerbating it
I would like to see them only deduct up to the highest bid, and that’s how I initially assumed it would work, because that is what makes sense. I don’t have faith that they will do what makes sense, however.
How it should work:
I bid 2 million on trader 1, system removes 1 million. I bid 2.5 million on trader 2, system removes an additional 500k. I bid 50k on trader 3, system removes nothing, I bid 3 million on trader 4, system removes an additional 500k. The total removed is 3 million, equal to the highest bid. I win trader 1, system refunds me 500k from trader 2, nothing from trader 3, and 500k from trader 4, a total of 1 million refunded.
The above would be still be consistent with ZOS’s short description, but require more work to implement. It would also be much more fair. I wish I had faith they were willing to put in the time and energy to adequately solve this problem instead exacerbating it
sirinsidiator wrote: »As a GM of a medium sized guild that has been around since launch, I am very worried about this change. We've always made a point of being casual friendly, allowing lenient inactivity limits and not requiring weekly fees. For us it also has been important to give a feeling of stability for both our sellers and our customers by sticking to our regular trader. In order to achieve this, we have conserved as much gold as possible by low-balling the bid whenever it was safe to do so. With the announced change I fear this will no longer be possible in the long run.
I'm worried that other guilds will start using the kiosk we had for many years as a backup spot and kick us out of our preferred spot
I'm worried that we will run out of gold after a few months in the new system and our current model of not requiring any fees won't work anymore if we want to survive for 5 more years
I'm worried that this will become even more stressful for GMs than it has been until now
So please ZOS, rethink this change before you make one of the worst systems in your game even worse and drive off some of the most dedicated members of your community. Try to think about what the people leading those guilds have to go through each and every week and change the system so it becomes awesome and rewarding for them.
there should be a real gold sink somewhere
Just implement a global AH, and all these clownish changes wouldn't need to be done any more. Then control how much of a gold sink you want it to be via taxes.
Dont_do_drugs wrote: »First time in history I'd prefer ah too...
Dont_do_drugs wrote: »First time in history I'd prefer ah too...
Beginning to think the same way. The bidding system is becoming too complicated to understand. And many players in this thread have laid out reasons why the changes are unlikely to benefit yer average trade guild.
If a global AH didn't lead to widespread, price gouging, the practice of flipping could be left untouched. Conversely, mass buying of cheap items and then flipping them at inflated prices, could only be stopped by introducing bound upon purchase. There would be a lot of complaints if that happened. All ZoS would need to say is "you brought this upon yourselves"
Motifs and recipes are obvious candidates, because players don't buy them then think..."nah...this motif is boring...I'll flog it" The only time I buy a cheap motif, one that I already know, is when I can sell it on at average value for a bit of profit. That's fine. Price gouging is not.
I'd prefer items were not made bound upon purchase through a global AH. But if greed kicks in, and bound upon purchase is needed to stop the greed, the greedy ones will have cut their own throats.
Bind upon purchase would also mean those players wanting to sell fast could price competitively. True price competition.
SammiSakura wrote: »This is just insane. I dont understand the reasoning behind this. If its to get rid of backups, just do what we asked and stop disbanding a guild from freeing the trader, that would fix it much more effectively. My small guild cant afford this!
SantieClaws wrote: »sirinsidiator wrote: »As a GM of a medium sized guild that has been around since launch, I am very worried about this change. We've always made a point of being casual friendly, allowing lenient inactivity limits and not requiring weekly fees. For us it also has been important to give a feeling of stability for both our sellers and our customers by sticking to our regular trader. In order to achieve this, we have conserved as much gold as possible by low-balling the bid whenever it was safe to do so. With the announced change I fear this will no longer be possible in the long run.
I'm worried that other guilds will start using the kiosk we had for many years as a backup spot and kick us out of our preferred spot
I'm worried that we will run out of gold after a few months in the new system and our current model of not requiring any fees won't work anymore if we want to survive for 5 more years
I'm worried that this will become even more stressful for GMs than it has been until now
So please ZOS, rethink this change before you make one of the worst systems in your game even worse and drive off some of the most dedicated members of your community. Try to think about what the people leading those guilds have to go through each and every week and change the system so it becomes awesome and rewarding for them.
Agreed one million billion percent.
This just gives the biggest and richest guilds an even bigger hold on traders and does nothing to address the most fundamental issue in the trading system - there are far too few traders and a greatly increasing number of guilds trying to get them.
It's not about getting a "good" spot for most guilds these days, apart from the exclusive few. It's about getting any spot at all.
Please be so good as to listen very carefully to what traders are telling you here. A lot of people have put in a huge amount of work into building up guilds and this is potentially very, very serious for the survival of many of them.
Yours with paws
Santie Claws
You don't need a "bound on purchase" mechanic, you only need taxes to prevent flipping, because the higher the tax, the fewer the number of items there will be below [average market price] - [tax] for the "flippers" to make profit on. And with easy access to global pricing information, the tax wouldn't have to be particularly high to discourage this behavior.
I think this might make shadow guilds a thing of the past if it works the way I think it will.
There is no reliable way to know who the second, third, fourth etc bidder is for any given kiosk.
So a trader is bid upon by multiple guilds, and the top bidder is a ghost guild. Im assuming the kiosk goes to the next highest bidder if the top guild disbands.
H ow is that shadow guild going to sell a kiosk if they have no idea who is second and the second place bidder cant tell for sure that he is next in line
Seriously who would risk it?
So a trader is bid upon by multiple guilds, and the top bidder is a ghost guild. Im assuming the kiosk goes to the next highest bidder if the top guild disbands.
I think this might make shadow guilds a thing of the past if it works the way I think it will.
There is no reliable way to know who the second, third, fourth etc bidder is for any given kiosk.
So a trader is bid upon by multiple guilds, and the top bidder is a ghost guild. Im assuming the kiosk goes to the next highest bidder if the top guild disbands.
How is that shadow guild going to sell a kiosk if they have no idea who is second and the second place bidder cant tell for sure that he is next in line
Seriously who would risk it?
Dont_do_drugs wrote: »I think this might make shadow guilds a thing of the past if it works the way I think it will.
There is no reliable way to know who the second, third, fourth etc bidder is for any given kiosk.
So a trader is bid upon by multiple guilds, and the top bidder is a ghost guild. Im assuming the kiosk goes to the next highest bidder if the top guild disbands.
H ow is that shadow guild going to sell a kiosk if they have no idea who is second and the second place bidder cant tell for sure that he is next in line
Seriously who would risk it?
Just offer spot in zone... Or through connections or checking hubs who hasn't got a trader. That's how backup works on pc EU as well. They always find someone to buy the backup spot.
Dont_do_drugs wrote: »I think this might make shadow guilds a thing of the past if it works the way I think it will.
There is no reliable way to know who the second, third, fourth etc bidder is for any given kiosk.
So a trader is bid upon by multiple guilds, and the top bidder is a ghost guild. Im assuming the kiosk goes to the next highest bidder if the top guild disbands.
H ow is that shadow guild going to sell a kiosk if they have no idea who is second and the second place bidder cant tell for sure that he is next in line
Seriously who would risk it?
Just offer spot in zone... Or through connections or checking hubs who hasn't got a trader. That's how backup works on pc EU as well. They always find someone to buy the backup spot.
Did you actually read what I wrote?
They can't sell it if it goes to the next highest bidder when they disband. They have no idea who is second in line or how many other bidders there may be.