Kagukan wrote: »

I agree. Would be better to just kill it but I don't see that happening.
Two things need to happen.
1. A system anyone can fully use without having to join a guild.
2. A global search option.

And you CAN have both of those without the need for an Auction House.
You could have a "traditional AH style" interface, but where the price is fixed by the Seller.

The one complaint most frequently trotted out in opposition to an AH is the idea that someone can "corner the market".
a) That is exactly what is happening with Ghost Guilds - but they are not cornering the market on a single commodity, they are cornering the market on the very means of sale, so it affects ALL commodities.

b) In 12 years of playing MMORPGs - all of which have an AH - I have never even once seen a successful attempt to corner a market. Don't get me wrong, I've seen attempts, but they ALL fail because when EVERYONE is potentially both a Seller and a Buyer it is effectively impossible for one person to have enough money to do so.


All The Best

Gandrhulf_Harbard wrote: »

Kagukan wrote: »

I agree. Would be better to just kill it but I don't see that happening.
Two things need to happen.
1. A system anyone can fully use without having to join a guild.
2. A global search option.

And you CAN have both of those without the need for an Auction House.
You could have a "traditional AH style" interface, but where the price is fixed by the Seller.

The one complaint most frequently trotted out in opposition to an AH is the idea that someone can "corner the market".
a) That is exactly what is happening with Ghost Guilds - but they are not cornering the market on a single commodity, they are cornering the market on the very means of sale, so it affects ALL commodities.

b) In 12 years of playing MMORPGs - all of which have an AH - I have never even once seen a successful attempt to corner a market. Don't get me wrong, I've seen attempts, but they ALL fail because when EVERYONE is potentially both a Seller and a Buyer it is effectively impossible for one person to have enough money to do so.


All The Best

There are over 200 traders in the game. That alone is enough to insure there will never be a monopoly.

I've only played two other MMOs and both for a brief period of time. Both had multiple successful attempts at price controlling specific items. Going to other MMO forums I still see a lot of complaints about rare items being monopolized. I find those complaints near the top of the forum each time I look (almost every time we have this discussion) so obviously it is an ongoing problem.
I will admit it wasn't one person involved in creating a monopoly on items. It was a small team of individuals working together. Four or five people committed to controlling rare items can easily do it with a central trader. With over 200 traders in game it would take a few hundred players to have even a remote chance of pulling off price control.

redmoonga wrote: »

Kidgangster101 wrote: »

@redmoonga you do realize the reason people have hundreds of millions even billions in this game is because of this trading system right? If we had a global ah in this game a lot more people would be actually selling items. (People that have that kind of money now have little to no competition to drive the prices of items down)

I have to disagree with "little to no competition". The term I usually hear is "cut throat" even within the same guild, let alone across all traders. There is plenty of people willing to use the current system and the competition is fierce.

The things I addressed had to do with the economy, which still exists regardless of the system used to sell. I did tailor the message to use the current system, yes. Sometimes we don't get to pick a system, sometimes we just have to roll with what's there and give some good input to make it as good as it can be.

Maybe there needs to be some sort of interactive tutorial on how to join a guild, sell items, etc. Maybe it should finish with the option to join an existing help guild (by way of the guild invite tool). I'm all for making the path easier and more inclusive.

That being said, I know there are a lot of people who would prefer an auction house of some type. I feel that brings back memories of a different game and I don't think that Zos wants to move in that direction imo.

Kidgangster101 wrote: »

@Vicinia is absolutely right. We wanted a chest piece say, we use to have to set search options to "heavy chest" and literally go through every single heavy chest piece in the game. If we wanted a full set of that heavy piece we had to do it at least 5 times. Then we had to do that at every single trader in the entire game.......... This right here is the major reason we have a guild Monopoly (mafia) at the major cities because no one wants to go all over the world when we just need 1 item. People also can't find crafting items easy either (getting low level alchemy mats just as an example) are very very hard/impossible to find in current trader. But if we had a global ah it would be posted and I could make potions easier for my low level in PvP/pve or even to level my crafting with.

I'm totally for some sort of global search tool. In the meantime there is the Tamriel Trade Center website.

Kidgangster101 wrote: »

These problems exists because people claim this trading system is so great. (This is great for people that put in time not casual players who want to save up gold to make a purchase of items or housing or whatever it is. This game is one of the easiest most casual friendly MMOs out there except when it comes to trading).

Selling is one of the best ways to save up for weekly luxury housing items or houses. See my earlier note on requesting a trade tutorial. There are other ways to make things better and more accessible rather than telling them to reinvent the wheel with systems that other games have had. I think that would be much to large of an undertaking for a game that is this developed imo.

-Redmoonga, GM of Black Dragon Apothecary
http://tiny.cc/dragonscore

I'm sorry I would have to disagree on the tutorial to trade, people don't trade on ps4na at least due to sheer inconvience to travel the world to buy/find prices. Web sites/add-ons don't help us like on PC. And why should there be a training on trading? Trading is just a feature of the game that is free in other games not something you pay to join.

I have personally known a lot of people that have quit over the trading system.

Personally I love BDO's central market. No need to join a guild, just hop over to a central market NPC in a town and buy and sell. Once I'm level 50 I plan on spending most my time farming, cooking etc to make silver.

I never cared much for the trading guilds in ESO. Either too high of a weekly fee or too high of a minimum sales. I joined Dotts guild and did ok-ish, but that was mostly 'cos I sold those winter skin things early on. After the guild lost any good locations any of my sales died too. Hate relying on guilds.

barney2525 wrote: »

You lost me on " To many of the players, this is our reason for playing."

If trading is the only reason you are playing in this game, you are missing the vast majority of the game. And thus, I question your use of the term ' Many ' .

Nope, there are many of us that this is what we are here for. Take a look at the complaint threads about the api being squished for sale history if you don't believe me.

kargen27 wrote: »

Gandrhulf_Harbard wrote: »

Kagukan wrote: »

I agree. Would be better to just kill it but I don't see that happening.
Two things need to happen.
1. A system anyone can fully use without having to join a guild.
2. A global search option.

And you CAN have both of those without the need for an Auction House.
You could have a "traditional AH style" interface, but where the price is fixed by the Seller.

The one complaint most frequently trotted out in opposition to an AH is the idea that someone can "corner the market".
a) That is exactly what is happening with Ghost Guilds - but they are not cornering the market on a single commodity, they are cornering the market on the very means of sale, so it affects ALL commodities.

b) In 12 years of playing MMORPGs - all of which have an AH - I have never even once seen a successful attempt to corner a market. Don't get me wrong, I've seen attempts, but they ALL fail because when EVERYONE is potentially both a Seller and a Buyer it is effectively impossible for one person to have enough money to do so.


All The Best

There are over 200 traders in the game. That alone is enough to insure there will never be a monopoly.

I've only played two other MMOs and both for a brief period of time. Both had multiple successful attempts at price controlling specific items. Going to other MMO forums I still see a lot of complaints about rare items being monopolized. I find those complaints near the top of the forum each time I look (almost every time we have this discussion) so obviously it is an ongoing problem.
I will admit it wasn't one person involved in creating a monopoly on items. It was a small team of individuals working together. Four or five people committed to controlling rare items can easily do it with a central trader. With over 200 traders in game it would take a few hundred players to have even a remote chance of pulling off price control.

I'm sorry, but I beg to differ, there is a limited number of traders in this game, and that actually does make in possible to control the market with a hand full of active players that are motivated to do this. Especially on the PC with the TTC addon. It helps them to accomplish this by pointing out where items are that are listed under their arbitrary price. They can quickly buy those up and re-list at the higher price.


In a larger playing field, it is harder to corner the market due to the shear volume that goes thru the market.

I found it funny one week when I noticed a player was buying up an item and re-listing them at a much higher price. As I had a good supply of that particular item in my inventory, I kept posting mine at the lower price, and when other players added theirs to match my price... This continued for a couple of days. I made a lot of sales that week, and he eventually gave up. The price stayed low!

So of I understand correctly... You want a global auction house?

Since your post has a lot of points, I feel like I need to quote different points separately to make a clearer response. Pardonnez-moi, this'll be a long post.

redmoonga wrote: »

I believe the guild trader system in ESO is an experience on its own and worth saving. To many of the players, this is our reason for playing.

I agree with this statement/opinion. I am mostly a PvX player and often times trading is the part of the game that keeps me playing. When I have finished gearing, decorating and exploring, all I have left is the trading - I do it actively and without the trading, I would have very little to do in between DLCs/expansions. So yes, my opinions are biased.

redmoonga wrote: »

First, we need an investment by ZOS into the trading economy. I've seen the trend of the desired items and gear being Bind on Pickup, leaving what is available in stores as a second or third alternative to what is Best in Slot. There has been zero progression of gear levels, leaving the demand for raw materials lacking. The advent of great shopping tools like Tamriel Trade Center allow members to instantly teleport to the lowest cost items, driving prices on consumable items to barely above creation cost. Any deals that can be found are quickly found with these tools by professional traders and relisted.

I question the effectiveness of using TTC to flip items. Personally I've found TTC to be inefficient when it comes to flipping, because it is not up-to-date. The most effective way I know is to travel from trader to trader and sort the items by most recent to find the best deals. (because there's a high change older items are not worth flipping, that the best deals from older items are already bought)

redmoonga wrote: »

I would like to see some positive changes that increase the amount of Bind on Equip items that are Best in Slot. These items could be quite rare and demand for them would nearly always be present. I would like to see the gear level progressed to 200 CP and new materials introduced. The ability to update current gear to CP200 gear would improve the economy without player backlash.

Okay, now in this quote there are two points: more BoE BiS and CP200 gear.

I think it would be a bad thing for the game to have BoE BiS sets. (notice the plural) It would mean the player doesn't need to do the content in order to gear themselves - which means players would not have a purpose to play the content, other than for the sake of playing the content. It would mean less trial farming, less AP farming and to an extent less Tel Var farming. I am fine with the idwa to have near BiS BoE gear, because we would still need to plsy the content to get the max performance. And thanks to having more obstacles in the trading system, the not-BiS items are not worth next to nothing.

If the item level cap would be rised to CP200, it would mean CP160 is no longer the cap - which means their powerlevel is lowered and thus means everybody would be nerfed. This means everybody would need to do the grind again and it would mean a lot of people would be pissed off, because their power level was lowered. I do not think we should trade boost in trading for a lot of negativity from community. I think it would be a bad deal, a shot to the leg.

redmoonga wrote: »

As ZOS is interested in balance, cost at various traders could be balanced by a city buyer tax as well. Buying from a non-city, single trader would have no added cost. Buying from a city where the combined bids are a 100 Million gold plus would have a balancing city tax added (gold sink). City tax would vary between those points based on the combined trader bids, and be very evident at the point of sale before purchase. There may be even better solutions available, but seeing progress in the area of investment into the economy, by any means, is needed.

Would the seller be paying the tax? If so, I'm neutral about this proposition. Of course, it would mean I would be paying premium for being in a great selling spot, but it would add to the gold sink.

redmoonga wrote: »

Next, we need an a larger investment by ZOS into the trading guilds. Recently we have seen this bar being raised with items like the Guild Finder Tool. This was great and for a little thing, helped out tremendously. That will do much to equalize the differences between larger and smaller guilds. I feel that more needs to be done though. Guilds can not progress, they do not have anything they can work toward collectively besides donating for the weekly trader bids. There are no guild achievements, levels or any sort of progression. Surely something could be found to fill this void and be done on the scale to add flavor to existing guilds. Perhaps Guilds need perk trees. Depending on the way you earn and fill them out, your guild could be as unique as an individual character. (Maybe even could mitigate some of that city tax if everyone works hard at it!!, or PVP perks, or crafting material reductions). Give people more reasons to be excited about helping out the guilds they are in while making them unique and interesting.

I think it would be good to expand the current system and enhance the experience. The perks however should not affect the individual, but the guild. If there was a perk "being in a guild of awesomeness, crafting requires half the materials" it would mean being kicked out of the guild would take the perk away - and thus nerf you, you would be at the hands of others who might or might not be nefarious. It would create a new way to grief. So how would a perk affecting the guild instead of the player look like? Maybe something like "your members have 5 extra items slots on the trader" or maybe a guild hall and affecting the guild hall trough perks?

redmoonga wrote: »

Lastly, create incentive for selling through a guild. Even if it's just some achievements, it could have a large impact on the economy. Selling an item worth over 100k, selling a ta (snake oil seller), filling up your 30 selling slots in a guild (here to get rich), Member for 1 year (Loyal to the Guild), etc. I know these things would take some time, they would take some effort.

It would be really awesome and inspire much confidence if we could hear that these issues are on the radar. That these issues (not necessarily my suggested solutions) are important to ZOS and really, that ZOS has a plan to address them.

Thank you,

Redmoonga, GM of Black Dragon Apothecary
http://tiny.cc/dragonscore

I would love to have achievements based on the guild trader. It would further incentivise the trading and reward those who enjoy it.

And a bit off-topic, here's some of my thoughts about ghost guilds:

Thorvik_Tyrson wrote: »

kargen27 wrote: »

Gandrhulf_Harbard wrote: »

Kagukan wrote: »

I agree. Would be better to just kill it but I don't see that happening.
Two things need to happen.
1. A system anyone can fully use without having to join a guild.
2. A global search option.

And you CAN have both of those without the need for an Auction House.
You could have a "traditional AH style" interface, but where the price is fixed by the Seller.

The one complaint most frequently trotted out in opposition to an AH is the idea that someone can "corner the market".
a) That is exactly what is happening with Ghost Guilds - but they are not cornering the market on a single commodity, they are cornering the market on the very means of sale, so it affects ALL commodities.

b) In 12 years of playing MMORPGs - all of which have an AH - I have never even once seen a successful attempt to corner a market. Don't get me wrong, I've seen attempts, but they ALL fail because when EVERYONE is potentially both a Seller and a Buyer it is effectively impossible for one person to have enough money to do so.


All The Best

There are over 200 traders in the game. That alone is enough to insure there will never be a monopoly.

I've only played two other MMOs and both for a brief period of time. Both had multiple successful attempts at price controlling specific items. Going to other MMO forums I still see a lot of complaints about rare items being monopolized. I find those complaints near the top of the forum each time I look (almost every time we have this discussion) so obviously it is an ongoing problem.
I will admit it wasn't one person involved in creating a monopoly on items. It was a small team of individuals working together. Four or five people committed to controlling rare items can easily do it with a central trader. With over 200 traders in game it would take a few hundred players to have even a remote chance of pulling off price control.

I'm sorry, but I beg to differ, there is a limited number of traders in this game, and that actually does make in possible to control the market with a hand full of active players that are motivated to do this. Especially on the PC with the TTC addon. It helps them to accomplish this by pointing out where items are that are listed under their arbitrary price. They can quickly buy those up and re-list at the higher price.


In a larger playing field, it is harder to corner the market due to the shear volume that goes thru the market.

I found it funny one week when I noticed a player was buying up an item and re-listing them at a much higher price. As I had a good supply of that particular item in my inventory, I kept posting mine at the lower price, and when other players added theirs to match my price... This continued for a couple of days. I made a lot of sales that week, and he eventually gave up. The price stayed low!

Yeah and that limit is over 200 traders. TTC isn't anywhere near up to date so depending on TTC to corner a market isn't going to be very successful. Even if it were up to date and accurate you would still need much more than a handful of players to try and control any prices. You would need players on around the clock in numbers able to quickly get to multiple traders. TTC could actually hinder players trying to corner a market as they are not the only ones that will be looking to take advantage of a low price. There have been some semi successful attempts to monopolize very rare items in the game by players who worked together and planned ahead. They saw there would be an increase in demand for certain items while they were on the PTS and tried to grab all the items before the update went live. It worked for maybe a day but the sheer number of players willing to farm those rare items made the pay out from their efforts short lived.

If there were a central market three or four players could rotate scanning the items list and easily control the prices on rare items. Would be harder to do with more common drops. Thing is the price of common items like crafting mats would drop to near vendor prices because of the increased volume going through the market.

The guild trader system needs some tweeks especially when considering console players but it is a good system and helps maintain a healthy game economy.

Perhaps as an alternative to raising the gear level, we can get "improved" enchanting that will require new materials? Something like how hakeijo, or special food works.

-Red