ZoS, We Need to Address the Mat Price Increase 2x-5x

DaveMoeDee · April 2021

Vlad9425 wrote: »

I’ve rarely actually had to buy mats in this game because I took the time to level multiple crafters and all my mats were earned by me. Something to consider for those worried about this.

I'm pretty sure writs rewards were adjusted to be self-sustaining. Not sure if that is true if you don't do survey runs. Some people are claiming the event would lead to people grabbing more mats but that should really be a problem. The event actually leads to a significant bump in supply of all mats not used in writs.

The prices go up because people are willing to pay more. When I'm selling something, I'll keep incrementing the price as long as people keep paying more to buy it. Doesn't take anyone manipulating the market.

I will also flip things at times. Easy money. There are a lot of people who sell without understanding the market.

DaveMoeDee · April 2021

CrashofLorkhaj wrote: »

The reason for it is simple, price rigging is being actively organised and directed by a number of the biggest trading guilds and alliances on the servers.

Here is the proof [edited to remove names]:

https://imgur.com/a/sKOp9NZ

I am honestly surprised that this is not public knowledge... they did not try to hide it after all.

Oh, I hope there are a lot of people doing this! They can buy up my stuff at a premium and be left holding the bag!

xaraan · April 2021

There is definitely reselling and similar market manipulation going on, but it tends to be more focused than people think and not the blame for all the high prices.

The biggest reason for prices going up is that the value of gold is going down. Players have complained endlessly about gold costs in the game, for guild traders, for changing outfits, etc. But fact is, there are not enough gold sinks and it is just too plentiful now.

Obviously there are things that will effect demand, like changing metas requiring people to remake gear and need more upgrade mats. Or changing player pop with new DLCs, etc. All those effect prices, but too many players overlook gold value depreciation when looking at inflation.

ZoS could do things to combat those that are involved with market manipulation without trying to outright say it's against TOS. For example, if Hakejo was one of those materials being controlled, they could simply add a new method of acquiring it to the game, like adding it to the master writ voucher vendor in addition to IC - that would make it easier to acquire and make prices go down and if players were trying to control it, they would have to dump inventory to avoid losing money.

For gold value, they could add more gold sinks to the game, like adding a barber. Everyone would cry about the gold price because it would be expensive if it were to have a real effect, but it would help. They could even add some other basic mats to the NPC vendors, that would help control prices on certain mats and take any gold spent on them through the NPC out of the game.

Last idea for gold sink would be adding a crown merchant that works like the weekend gold sellers. Give pacrooti a spot to show up every weekend and sell something that would be available in the crown store for those that want to spend crowns or let him sell a couple of those items for gold as well. Not suggesting everything be available, just could do particular items with a one time purchase. Could even do a single crate at certain weekends as well. It wouldn't replace selling crowns for gold, but would pull a bit of gold out of the market as it vanishes into NPC coffers.

VaranisArano · April 2021

xaraan wrote: »

There is definitely reselling and similar market manipulation going on, but it tends to be more focused than people think and not the blame for all the high prices.

The biggest reason for prices going up is that the value of gold is going down. Players have complained endlessly about gold costs in the game, for guild traders, for changing outfits, etc. But fact is, there are not enough gold sinks and it is just too plentiful now.

Obviously there are things that will effect demand, like changing metas requiring people to remake gear and need more upgrade mats. Or changing player pop with new DLCs, etc. All those effect prices, but too many players overlook gold value depreciation when looking at inflation.

ZoS could do things to combat those that are involved with market manipulation without trying to outright say it's against TOS. For example, if Hakejo was one of those materials being controlled, they could simply add a new method of acquiring it to the game, like adding it to the master writ voucher vendor in addition to IC - that would make it easier to acquire and make prices go down and if players were trying to control it, they would have to dump inventory to avoid losing money.

For gold value, they could add more gold sinks to the game, like adding a barber. Everyone would cry about the gold price because it would be expensive if it were to have a real effect, but it would help. They could even add some other basic mats to the NPC vendors, that would help control prices on certain mats and take any gold spent on them through the NPC out of the game.

Last idea for gold sink would be adding a crown merchant that works like the weekend gold sellers. Give pacrooti a spot to show up every weekend and sell something that would be available in the crown store for those that want to spend crowns or let him sell a couple of those items for gold as well. Not suggesting everything be available, just could do particular items with a one time purchase. Could even do a single crate at certain weekends as well. It wouldn't replace selling crowns for gold, but would pull a bit of gold out of the market as it vanishes into NPC coffers.

ZOS already does impact certain high value items. Just not as much as some players would like. It's not long term, and it's not the sort of thing that's going to help an impatient player who wants something right now.

Hakeijo? Well, not only does it drop during the Anniversary Event and Midyear Mayhem from reward boxes, but the Imperial City event also doubles Tel Var, making Hakeijo much more affordable for a while.

Certain motifs have been controlled for a time - I remember the Minotaur chest motif being held at 100-150k for a month or two on PC/NA. ZOS' answer is a yearly glut of motifs in the Anniversary Event to make sure older motifs are accessible. (Brand new motifs aren't included, naturally, since ZOS wants players running the content or buying from the Crown Store to get them.)

Mats get periodic double resource nodes during zone events. But like with the previous examples, this helps ZOS control the total mat market, balanced with the giant material sink that is the Crafting Bag. It doesn't do jack diddly for players who won't farm their own items or who want those items at an high price point as opposed to waiting until prices drop.

And sure, ZOS could add more gold sinks. The last major gold sink they added was, IIRC, the Outfit System. Though it's funny that ZOS - the people with the data - just added CP passives and slottables that will actually increase the amount of gold players obtain through gameplay.

Velocious_Curse · April 2021

Jem_Kindheart wrote: »

As many have noticed, upgrade and base materials prices have exploded. In most cases doubled, in Legendary level prices have tripled. In some outlier cases, it's gone 5x. This is all within a timeframe of a few months.

This is all well and good if Gold income or flow was also increasing at similar rates. It has not. For the flippers and exploiters, this is all great and amazing!

For the regular player all the way up through upper level veteran players, even us long timers, this is not good and has set a dangerous precedent. Even with decent weekly sales and income from occasional hours of dedicated farming, it has become unrealistic to upgrade gear.

As a matter of perspective, the prices themselves aren't the problem. The issue is the relative value versus the players' ability to earn that coin to buy it. In this case, the value hasn't gone up, nor has the player's ability to earn that value in gold, but the price has gone up.

Through poor planning or poor game design, as well as controlling the artificial drop rates, ZoS is both allowing and is an accomplice to a rapidly growing inequality. It's getting to where even the advanced player has to sell Crowns just to upgrade gear. If this is the new game design or intention, then ZoS should just go ahead and directly sell us Gold for Crowns or real money so we can eliminate the middleperson.

For several examples, here's some examples that I had been noticing and watching skyrocket.
Dreugh Wax: an absolute game flaw making the gold mat for light and medium the same item.
year ago: 6k, then 7k, then a few months ago 9k, then suddenly 10k, then when the patch dropped 12k, quickly up and up, 14k last week, this week 17k.
So from 6k to 17k.

Tempering Alloy: a year ago 3.5k, then 5k, then when U29 dropped had gone to 8k, last week breached 10k.
So 3.5k to 10k+

Rosin: watched it go from 2.5k to 5k-8k, so not so bad, but still noted.

Alchemy ingredient prices: almost all have undergone a 50% to 100% price increase during that same time.

One outlier case I noticed go insane, and I don't care nor am in the market of nor for, is Aetherial Dust. Obviously it would go up due to the raised cap. Yet it has gone way deep into questionable and greed territory. A year ago or more it was 230k-275k, it had been there for quite some time. I watched the zone sellers since Update 29 go immediately to 350k, then a few days later 400k, then last week 500k then 600k, and a few days ago 750k.

That is just totally nuts and a terrible design that allows for something to go from 230k to 750k within weeks.

This is setting a dangerous precedent ZoS, I'm telling you as a friend for years, this is dangerous and will backfire. If you want only the elites to get richer and everyone else to have to sell Crowns just to make gear or make potions to do content, the just come out and say so. Make a way for us to just buy the Gold.

Or, if you really want to fix it, just increase the drop rates. A Dreugh Wax is not worth 17k if it was 6k last year. Just up the drop rates of the mats and Surveys, we don't mind working for it.

We don't mind working for it, but it has to be realistic. 1.2 Million gold to fully upgrade 1 set of armor for 1 character is not realistic for most players.

Listen, you must not have been playing when temps were 25-30k and Wax and Rosin were 15k+
ZoS doesn't set the prices, the players and demand do. New sets come out every patch and people wanna gold some out, so the price is naturally gonna go up. Eventually they fall again. It's a constant cycle.

ThorianB · April 2021

CrashofLorkhaj wrote: »

ThorianB wrote: »

CrashofLorkhaj wrote: »

The reason for it is simple, price rigging is being actively organised and directed by a number of the biggest trading guilds and alliances on the servers.

Here is the proof [edited to remove names]:

https://imgur.com/a/sKOp9NZ

I am honestly surprised that this is not public knowledge... they did not try to hide it after all.

What they are trying to do won't work. They would need dozens of people at all times of day scouring traders siphoning up the deals in order to control the market. The problem with that is they are sitting on ever increasing inventories that they must then try to offload at higher prices which will take more time. You have limited selling slots and limited inventory space in this game. What happens in this scheme is they run themselves out of gold quickly and end up sitting on a large inventory that they are either going to have to dump back on the market at a low price because they can no longer control it, or they are going to have to slowly feed it back into the market for a small profit over what they paid for it in which they are going to make very little profit for all the hassle when they could have made 10x more doing other trades that don't require market control.

That is only one of a few things i found wrong with their "business model"

I picked up a motif yesterday for 50 gold. I sold it today for 7500 gold and i was on the first page of lowest price on TTC. THAT is how you work the market in ESO.

Sanctum74 wrote: »

CrashofLorkhaj wrote: »

The reason for it is simple, price rigging is being actively organised and directed by a number of the biggest trading guilds and alliances on the servers.

Here is the proof [edited to remove names]:

https://imgur.com/a/sKOp9NZ

I am honestly surprised that this is not public knowledge... they did not try to hide it after all.

You do realize it’s pretty much impossible to do this. You would need dozens of players and billions in gold working around the clock to do this. As soon as you buy up their stock people will list new items so you would have to hit about 200 guild traders on an hourly basis.

Then there are inventory limitations that would also prevent this. The bigger problem would then be they are sitting on all these items and not enough guild slots to sell them, not to mention they wouldn’t have time to sell them because they would have to be constantly buying at traders all over tamriel.

As it stands now with the exception of a small guild I can go to any guild trader and find a wide variety of items. If what you said was true then they would only be available in a few select traders which is clearly not the case.

It is easier to respond to these similar posts in one go:

It is already happening, successfully. These are a group of players for whom trading and markets is their whole endgame, and they actively check as many traders, all large and small ones, as a group, with labor divided between them. They have the numbers to do it, and the billions of gold collectively (and individually in a couple of cases). It is not a new concept, and it is something that you see often in other MMOs.

They have been actively doing it for some time now, successfully. They buy up all the valuable and in-demand materials from everywhere possible, relist as a higher price, buy out all the competition, and control the market price in this manner.

In fact, it was timed to happen in advance of the new patch, so that the large number of returning players would boost demand for upgrade materials and consumables, further increasing the prices and cementing their control of this market.

I started trading in Eve online in 2007 and was quite active in it until last year. I have been trading in ESO since mid/late 2016. Trading is one of my favorite activities and im pretty good at it if one judges by my bank accounts in both games.

I am telling you as a trader with more than 10 years experience of trading as a major activity, what they are doing is not logistically sustainable in this game.

* There are to many traders.
* They are to far apart with to many load screens.
* There are to many people shopping in this game concurrently at traders for them to siphon up the deals.
* The higher you sell for the slower the turnover.
* Non craft bag items require storage space limiting how effective you can be at buying stock.
* Hoarders like me will just start trickling our supply at a reasonable price when the price goes up to high.
* People will farm their own materials once you hit a certain price point. So the higher your price point the more people that will just go farm it.

95% of the stuff you can put on a guild trader is not that difficult to obtain yourself with little to no skill. Mats are the easiest thing in the game to acquire. Spend 30 minutes a day doing crafting dailies and you have a steady supply of every single mat in this game being fed into a infinite craft bag. The only people that are going to pay high prices are filthy rich lazy people and you are not going to have a lot of them in ESO because it takes a bit of work to be filthy rich unless you sell 50k crowns a month. You start doubling and tripling gold mat prices and everyone and their grandmother is going to be grinding crafting wits and picking nodes.

The only reason the prices of things have increased is because of events and changes to the game both of which upset supply and demand not because of some trade mafia. This would simply require to much time invest, constant micromanagement, and to much capital for a very small profit if any. For example:

If you wanted to raise the price of perfect roe on PC NA from about its current 20k to 35k you would need an investment of 50-100 million for about 1850 roe. Lets say you can get the roe for 30k each( its actually going to be closer to 33k from my quick run through TTC) average. That is 55 million. If you offload it for the new low which is 35k your sell price is 64,750,000.

Let's assume you sell all 1850 items in their 30 day window. You will have paid 4,532,000 gold in fees half of which goes to the guilds you sell on and half that goes into the ether. Your total profit before taxes is 9,750,000 less taxes of 4,532,000 which leaves a total profit of 5,217,500 gold.

So you have to collect 1850 roe from somewhere between half to two-thirds of the traders in the game and invest 60 millionish. Storing isn't bad because you have infinite craft bag. Now you have to unload 1850 roe while maintaining the price point at 35k or higher. For all this effort you make a measly 5.2 mil profit. By comparison, i can make about 1.4 mil a month just doing crafting dailies on 9 characters everyday and only selling the ornates and intricates and keeping everything else to myself.

It is not hard to make money in this game, but what those players are trying to do is a lot of work, risk, and investment for very little possible gain. The ROI of volunteering at a soup kitchen is almost better. That SS of a discord post earlier in this topic is nothing but the start of a pyramid scheme.

Viewsfrom6ix · April 2021

ThorianB wrote: »

]
I started trading in Eve online in 2007 and was quite active in it until last year. I have been trading in ESO since mid/late 2016. Trading is one of my favorite activities and im pretty good at it if one judges by my bank accounts in both games.

If you don't mind me asking. How much gold do you have? I'm curious.

ThorianB · April 2021

Viewsfrom6ix wrote: »

ThorianB wrote: »

]
I started trading in Eve online in 2007 and was quite active in it until last year. I have been trading in ESO since mid/late 2016. Trading is one of my favorite activities and im pretty good at it if one judges by my bank accounts in both games.

If you don't mind me asking. How much gold do you have? I'm curious.

I wont say exactly how much i have or how much i make or how i make my gold but i will give you a hint. Summerset chapter drop put me in 9 figures liquid. I really wish there was more stuff to spend gold on in ESO. In Eve i always flew faction/deadspace fitted ( that is high end for a sub capital ship in Eve) t2/t3/faction ships in pvp so i had a pretty good size money sink there.

ESO doesn't have anything like that to blow money on. Just trade it to other players for stuff i normally just acquire myself. Gold seems kind of pointless in ESO, so i have a hoarding issue as well( I have hundreds of motifs for example) as i trickle many things onto the market only when i really like the price i can sell it for and that is slower than the rate i acquire it.

I really wish they would make it so crowns could be bought on traders. I'd blow my gold on the crown store and then at least feel like it was worth making.

remosito · April 2021

xaraan wrote: »

The biggest reason for prices going up is that the value of gold is going down.

if that were the case everything would have gone up. But most stuff hasn't.

It's simply a question of supply and demand.

If ZOS would up the drop rate of purple and gold tempers by a factor of 10. Prices would crash like crazy.

Kwoung · April 2021

remosito wrote: »

xaraan wrote: »

The biggest reason for prices going up is that the value of gold is going down.

if that were the case everything would have gone up. But most stuff hasn't.

It's simply a question of supply and demand.

If ZOS would up the drop rate of purple and gold tempers by a factor of 10. Prices would crash like crazy.

Dude, I have golded out so many sets of gear just from doing daily craft writs and surveys it ridiculous. I have never had to buy tempers, the only mat in this game in serious short supply that everyone wants is Chromium, and only because they put some insane system in for it that makes it 5X slower to get from writs or processing and is basically unobtainable any other way.

As for not everything going up in price, of course not, the meta changes constantly and if something isn't popular anymore, it's value crashes, while the items that became meta skyrocket. Between the sticker book, gear changes, skill changes, CP 2.0 and all the other stuff ZOS has done in the last 6 months, the market is bound to be nuts. Not to mention the effect Covid has had on the game. There are WAY more people spending WAY more time in the game now, they are generating gold, they want the nice things they never had the time to get before and are buying them. This game wasn't balanced for a Covid level event, ZOS never expected the entire country to be stuck at home and playing their game like this, it has messed up everything. As a simple example... Imagine what 100,000 new people trying to get Master Crafter, because they now have the time, does to the Motif market, now carry that across the entire game. Yeah, it's nuts.

remosito · April 2021

Kwoung wrote: »

remosito wrote: »

xaraan wrote: »

The biggest reason for prices going up is that the value of gold is going down.

if that were the case everything would have gone up. But most stuff hasn't.

It's simply a question of supply and demand.

If ZOS would up the drop rate of purple and gold tempers by a factor of 10. Prices would crash like crazy.

Dude, I have golded out so many sets of gear just from doing daily craft writs and surveys it ridiculous. I have never had to buy tempers, the only mat in this game in serious short supply that everyone wants is Chromium, and only because they put some insane system in for it that makes it 5X slower to get from writs or processing and is basically unobtainable any other way.

As for not everything going up in price, of course not, the meta changes constantly and if something isn't popular anymore, it's value crashes, while the items that became meta skyrocket. Between the sticker book, gear changes, skill changes, CP 2.0 and all the other stuff ZOS has done in the last 6 months, the market is bound to be nuts. Not to mention the effect Covid has had on the game. There are WAY more people spending WAY more time in the game now, they are generating gold, they want the nice things they never had the time to get before and are buying them. This game wasn't balanced for a Covid level event, ZOS never expected the entire country to be stuck at home and playing their game like this, it has messed up everything. As a simple example... Imagine what 100,000 new people trying to get Master Crafter, because they now have the time, does to the Motif market, now carry that across the entire game. Yeah, it's nuts.

maybe I am dense but not entirely sure..

so you agree with me? it's mainly supply demand. with a lot of stuff happening that has driven up demand more than supply??

zaria · April 2021

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Vlad9425 wrote: »

I’ve rarely actually had to buy mats in this game because I took the time to level multiple crafters and all my mats were earned by me. Something to consider for those worried about this.

I'm pretty sure writs rewards were adjusted to be self-sustaining. Not sure if that is true if you don't do survey runs. Some people are claiming the event would lead to people grabbing more mats but that should really be a problem. The event actually leads to a significant bump in supply of all mats not used in writs.

The prices go up because people are willing to pay more. When I'm selling something, I'll keep incrementing the price as long as people keep paying more to buy it. Doesn't take anyone manipulating the market.

I will also flip things at times. Easy money. There are a lot of people who sell without understanding the market.

Before crafting writs was not self sustaining, I had to buy platinum, rubrite and ancestor silk.
With 40% more from surveys I suspect it is.
However with the event people do writs on level 1 crafters who hardly use material at all and still get surveys.

Redguards_Revenge · April 2021

Tell me if this sounds familiar. You are going to love this! I posted this a month ago for the reason why transmute crystals should be used to change a weapon type. I'll put a ( MATS) instead of what was there.

So you only do group content for the items?

Not to meet people, not for fun, not to experience the dungeon, not take on a challenge, not for the story, not to achievements.

If you are going to a dungeon only for the items then the game it's on it's decline. Think about it why do games die?

How can I explain this one you are going to love it. I'll put it in fragmented thought because I cant explain it fully right now. I can see it but not explain it well.

1. RNG splits the player base making people with higher RNG success move past the rest.

2. Dungeon groups are segregated in to top tier and the rest. Even if you join a guild. The top tier continue to move past the rest every time new content is released. Being top tier is more desirable in groups. Few want to take the time to train an teach somebody with the day before yesterdays build. (we'll come back to this)

3. New players with the new content won't even be able to play that new dungeon content anytime soon. As they have to wait on RNG to favor them. Some will shoot up to the top fast while others will stay with the rest. There is no true systematic way to move up in the game. So over time you don't truly improve yourself. You are truly waiting for RNG to improve your person. It's an illusion of improvement.

4. More content will come out that nobody who bought the game in the last year will buy (although they've been finding ways to make it accessible to all players like the mythics I think) because they simply can't access it. They are still waiting for RNG to improve them.

5. ZoS changes sets that will make their current grind useless. Top tiers have been raking in the money because they simply get more groups and thus more items to barter with.

6. At some point the rest will leave. Leaving the top tiers and the few people who have high RNG success. However even they will see that they can't jump the gap because they can't ride on the rest anymore. At this point most MMO games are at it's downhill phase. Prices start to inflate As top tiers are targeting top tiers with their prices. Time becomes a hot commodity.

7. This stops EVERY new player from getting into the game. Most people on are only running the newer dungeons. All of the older dungeons are dead because the sets are deemed worthless compared to the new items.

All this because we kept a RNG only system to improve ourselves.

We need a progressive system that improve ourselves so we know that every one is moving up over time. Every time a top tier helps somebody in the guild/random it's not wasted time. It moves towards something tangible. It invests in the games overall playerbase. We know that if we give time here and there, the newer/current players WILL be improved. They WILL be able to contribute into moving the games overall experience positively. We AVOID THAT death when we put a true progression system.

As time is not wasted. It all comes back to time. Even when the top tiers are the last ones playing the game. Those prices inflate because it's a top tier who wasted time on an RNG system to finally make an item drop trying to pull as much gold as possible from another top tier to save him time. This cuts out ANYBODY trying to move up. Following what some other MMO did years ago thinking that it is still relevant today is the wrong way of looking at things.

Exerpt from

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/7137215#Comment_7137215

damn I didn't even have to change it.

VaranisArano · April 2021

Redguards_Revenge wrote: »

Tell me if this sounds familiar. You are going to love this! I posted this a month ago for the reason why transmute crystals should be used to change a weapon type. I'll put a ( MATS) instead of what was there.

So you only do group content for the items?

Not to meet people, not for fun, not to experience the dungeon, not take on a challenge, not for the story, not to achievements.

If you are going to a dungeon only for the items then the game it's on it's decline. Think about it why do games die?

How can I explain this one you are going to love it. I'll put it in fragmented thought because I cant explain it fully right now. I can see it but not explain it well.

1. RNG splits the player base making people with higher RNG success move past the rest.

2. Dungeon groups are segregated in to top tier and the rest. Even if you join a guild. The top tier continue to move past the rest every time new content is released. Being top tier is more desirable in groups. Few want to take the time to train an teach somebody with the day before yesterdays build. (we'll come back to this)

3. New players with the new content won't even be able to play that new dungeon content anytime soon. As they have to wait on RNG to favor them. Some will shoot up to the top fast while others will stay with the rest. There is no true systematic way to move up in the game. So over time you don't truly improve yourself. You are truly waiting for RNG to improve your person. It's an illusion of improvement.

4. More content will come out that nobody who bought the game in the last year will buy (although they've been finding ways to make it accessible to all players like the mythics I think) because they simply can't access it. They are still waiting for RNG to improve them.

5. ZoS changes sets that will make their current grind useless. Top tiers have been raking in the money because they simply get more groups and thus more items to barter with.

6. At some point the rest will leave. Leaving the top tiers and the few people who have high RNG success. However even they will see that they can't jump the gap because they can't ride on the rest anymore. At this point most MMO games are at it's downhill phase. Prices start to inflate As top tiers are targeting top tiers with their prices. Time becomes a hot commodity.

7. This stops EVERY new player from getting into the game. Most people on are only running the newer dungeons. All of the older dungeons are dead because the sets are deemed worthless compared to the new items.

All this because we kept a RNG only system to improve ourselves.

We need a progressive system that improve ourselves so we know that every one is moving up over time. Every time a top tier helps somebody in the guild/random it's not wasted time. It moves towards something tangible. It invests in the games overall playerbase. We know that if we give time here and there, the newer/current players WILL be improved. They WILL be able to contribute into moving the games overall experience positively. We AVOID THAT death when we put a true progression system.

As time is not wasted. It all comes back to time. Even when the top tiers are the last ones playing the game. Those prices inflate because it's a top tier who wasted time on an RNG system to finally make an item drop trying to pull as much gold as possible from another top tier to save him time. This cuts out ANYBODY trying to move up. Following what some other MMO did years ago thinking that it is still relevant today is the wrong way of looking at things.

Exerpt from

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/7137215#Comment_7137215

damn I didn't even have to change it.

I feel like this overlooks that a new player can get relatively easy access to overland and crafted gear with no RNG involved that's easily adequate to a Vet DLC dungeon or a Normal Trial/Arena, at which point you can farm the meta gear. You just don't need meta gear to start out. You DO need to know how to play your role in group content.

Honestly, I'm not sure that "RNG success" is a good descriptor of what causes the separation of players into tiers. I think its "time spent in game."

Players who spend a lot of time in ESO are more likely to be rich than those who don't. That's easily apparent across this whole discussion. I can bear the higher prices because I have extra time to farm. Other people have the time to do writs on mtiple cradters every day. Someone who only has time to PVP or do questing is going to struggle with the current high prices because their time is not spent on gold-making activities.

Players who spend a lot of time in ESO are going to reach higher tiers of content faster. They have more time to farm gear, so in a sense, they can handle bad RNG better than someone who has little time to farm. More time spent farming = better chance to get the item. They have more time to practice their role - parsing practice in from of the training dummy takes time. They have time to dedicate time to their guild - at one point I was raiding six hours and practicing for 1 hour or more with my PVP guild, while players who couldn't commit that time didn't "advance" in skill the way I did.

In short, when I think of "top tier" players, I think of people who spent a lot of time in ESO. That's true of PVE trial guilds, top PVP players, and the very rich. Casual players don't hit the top primarily because they don't have the time to farm, to practice, to make connections, or to sink into activities with their guilds. Gear RNG is only a tiny part of that equation. Time spent in game covers everything.

Is ZOS going to fundamentally change that?
*looks at the CP 2.0 system*
Probably not. I mean, we really can't deny that CP 2.0 is absolutely designed to create a top tier of players who spent tons of time in the game to get peak combat effectiveness AND their QOL bonuses. It makes some things easier for brand new players or players who don't spend much time in game. Other things, it moves further out of reach.

ESO is an MMO. It's designed to get players logging in every day and playing the game, and of course, spending money on the Crown Store,new content, and subscriptions. Every player online helps justify the ongoing cost of the servers. Time = money in an MMO. RNG is only one method that the Devs use to extend our time in game, and even if we change it, it's not going to close the gap between players who spend lots of time in ESO and players who don't.

Redguards_Revenge · April 2021

VaranisArano wrote: »

[quote="Redguards_Revenge;c-7202673".

I feel like this overlooks that a new player can get relatively easy access to overland and crafted gear with no RNG involved that's easily adequate to a Vet DLC dungeon or a Normal Trial/Arena, at which point you can farm the meta gear. You just don't need meta gear to start out. You DO need to know how to play your role in group content.

Honestly, I'm not sure that "RNG success" is a good descriptor of what causes the separation of players into tiers. I think its "time spent in game."

Players who spend a lot of time in ESO are more likely to be rich than those who don't. That's easily apparent across this whole discussion. I can bear the higher prices because I have extra time to farm. Other people have the time to do writs on mtiple cradters every day. Someone who only has time to PVP or do questing is going to struggle with the current high prices because their time is not spent on gold-making activities.

Players who spend a lot of time in ESO are going to reach higher tiers of content faster. They have more time to farm gear, so in a sense, they can handle bad RNG better than someone who has little time to farm. More time spent farming = better chance to get the item. They have more time to practice their role - parsing practice in from of the training dummy takes time. They have time to dedicate time to their guild - at one point I was raiding six hours and practicing for 1 hour or more with my PVP guild, while players who couldn't commit that time didn't "advance" in skill the way I did.

In short, when I think of "top tier" players, I think of people who spent a lot of time in ESO. That's true of PVE trial guilds, top PVP players, and the very rich. Casual players don't hit the top primarily because they don't have the time to farm, to practice, to make connections, or to sink into activities with their guilds. Gear RNG is only a tiny part of that equation. Time spent in game covers everything.

Is ZOS going to fundamentally change that?
*looks at the CP 2.0 system*
Probably not. I mean, we really can't deny that CP 2.0 is absolutely designed to create a top tier of players who spent tons of time in the game to get peak combat effectiveness AND their QOL bonuses. It makes some things easier for brand new players or players who don't spend much time in game. Other things, it moves further out of reach.

ESO is an MMO. It's designed to get players logging in every day and playing the game, and of course, spending money on the Crown Store,new content, and subscriptions. Every player online helps justify the ongoing cost of the servers. Time = money in an MMO. RNG is only one method that the Devs use to extend our time in game, and even if we change it, it's not going to close the gap between players who spend lots of time in ESO and players who don't.[/quote]

VaranisArano wrote: »

Redguards_Revenge wrote: »

Tell me if this sounds familiar. You are going to love this! I posted this a month ago for the reason why transmute crystals should be used to change a weapon type. I'll put a ( MATS) instead of what was there.

So you only do group content for the items?

Not to meet people, not for fun, not to experience the dungeon, not take on a challenge, not for the story, not to achievements.

If you are going to a dungeon only for the items then the game it's on it's decline. Think about it why do games die?

How can I explain this one you are going to love it. I'll put it in fragmented thought because I cant explain it fully right now. I can see it but not explain it well.

1. RNG splits the player base making people with higher RNG success move past the rest.

2. Dungeon groups are segregated in to top tier and the rest. Even if you join a guild. The top tier continue to move past the rest every time new content is released. Being top tier is more desirable in groups. Few want to take the time to train an teach somebody with the day before yesterdays build. (we'll come back to this)

3. New players with the new content won't even be able to play that new dungeon content anytime soon. As they have to wait on RNG to favor them. Some will shoot up to the top fast while others will stay with the rest. There is no true systematic way to move up in the game. So over time you don't truly improve yourself. You are truly waiting for RNG to improve your person. It's an illusion of improvement.

4. More content will come out that nobody who bought the game in the last year will buy (although they've been finding ways to make it accessible to all players like the mythics I think) because they simply can't access it. They are still waiting for RNG to improve them.

5. ZoS changes sets that will make their current grind useless. Top tiers have been raking in the money because they simply get more groups and thus more items to barter with.

6. At some point the rest will leave. Leaving the top tiers and the few people who have high RNG success. However even they will see that they can't jump the gap because they can't ride on the rest anymore. At this point most MMO games are at it's downhill phase. Prices start to inflate As top tiers are targeting top tiers with their prices. Time becomes a hot commodity.

7. This stops EVERY new player from getting into the game. Most people on are only running the newer dungeons. All of the older dungeons are dead because the sets are deemed worthless compared to the new items.

All this because we kept a RNG only system to improve ourselves.

We need a progressive system that improve ourselves so we know that every one is moving up over time. Every time a top tier helps somebody in the guild/random it's not wasted time. It moves towards something tangible. It invests in the games overall playerbase. We know that if we give time here and there, the newer/current players WILL be improved. They WILL be able to contribute into moving the games overall experience positively. We AVOID THAT death when we put a true progression system.

As time is not wasted. It all comes back to time. Even when the top tiers are the last ones playing the game. Those prices inflate because it's a top tier who wasted time on an RNG system to finally make an item drop trying to pull as much gold as possible from another top tier to save him time. This cuts out ANYBODY trying to move up. Following what some other MMO did years ago thinking that it is still relevant today is the wrong way of looking at things.

Exerpt from

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/7137215#Comment_7137215

damn I didn't even have to change it.

I feel like this overlooks that a new player can get relatively easy access to overland and crafted gear with no RNG involved that's easily adequate to a Vet DLC dungeon or a Normal Trial/Arena, at which point you can farm the meta gear. You just don't need meta gear to start out. You DO need to know how to play your role in group content.

Honestly, I'm not sure that "RNG success" is a good descriptor of what causes the separation of players into tiers. I think its "time spent in game."

Players who spend a lot of time in ESO are more likely to be rich than those who don't. That's easily apparent across this whole discussion. I can bear the higher prices because I have extra time to farm. Other people have the time to do writs on mtiple cradters every day. Someone who only has time to PVP or do questing is going to struggle with the current high prices because their time is not spent on gold-making activities.

Players who spend a lot of time in ESO are going to reach higher tiers of content faster. They have more time to farm gear, so in a sense, they can handle bad RNG better than someone who has little time to farm. More time spent farming = better chance to get the item. They have more time to practice their role - parsing practice in from of the training dummy takes time. They have time to dedicate time to their guild - at one point I was raiding six hours and practicing for 1 hour or more with my PVP guild, while players who couldn't commit that time didn't "advance" in skill the way I did.

In short, when I think of "top tier" players, I think of people who spent a lot of time in ESO. That's true of PVE trial guilds, top PVP players, and the very rich. Casual players don't hit the top primarily because they don't have the time to farm, to practice, to make connections, or to sink into activities with their guilds. Gear RNG is only a tiny part of that equation. Time spent in game covers everything.

Is ZOS going to fundamentally change that?
*looks at the CP 2.0 system*
Probably not. I mean, we really can't deny that CP 2.0 is absolutely designed to create a top tier of players who spent tons of time in the game to get peak combat effectiveness AND their QOL bonuses. It makes some things easier for brand new players or players who don't spend much time in game. Other things, it moves further out of reach.

ESO is an MMO. It's designed to get players logging in every day and playing the game, and of course, spending money on the Crown Store,new content, and subscriptions. Every player online helps justify the ongoing cost of the servers. Time = money in an MMO. RNG is only one method that the Devs use to extend our time in game, and even if we change it, it's not going to close the gap between players who spend lots of time in ESO and players who don't.

I feel like this overlooks that a new player can get relatively easy access to overland and crafted gear with no RNG involved that's easily adequate to a Vet DLC dungeon or a Normal Trial/Arena, at which point you can farm the meta gear. You just don't need meta gear to start out. You DO need to know how to play your role in group content.

Go into detail to me for this. Give me a list of sets that are on overland. Now tell me if that is adequate enough for me to get a skin at a DLC/Chapter veteran trial.

ESO is an MMO. It's designed to get players logging in every day and playing the game, and of course, spending money on the Crown Store,new content, and subscriptions. Every player online helps justify the ongoing cost of the servers. Time = money in an MMO. RNG is only one method that the Devs use to extend our time in game, and even if we change it, it's not going to close the gap between players who spend lots of time in ESO and players who don't.

No there is a way to get players to come back into the game. It's not by pushing the next shiny thing in the new chapter. It is by creating a strong community that interacts. Having a system that progresses rather than relies on randomness will ALWAYS be far better because that means EVERYBODY who logs in WILL move someone forward. Time will not be wasted.

I've played MMOs for 20 years I've seen many rise, sustain and fall. I've seen what is NOT the solution. Justifying the same old practices that did not work for 20 years and saying it's the only way they can stay viable is foolish.

I've even seen MMOs that were just DEAD but had the last ...what I call...WHALES playing the game because they don't want to feel all that time invested into a game due to a dumb RNG mechanic was wasted and will continue to throw money in. To feed something in them that I have not understood. I've never sat down and asked them why they do it.

Honestly, I'm not sure that "RNG success" is a good descriptor of what causes the separation of players into tiers. I think its "time spent in game."

This is simply not true. You seem to be fooling yourself to justify and defend the time invested in the game.

So I'll pull another exerpt I wrote in February...

I am less likely to run a dungeon over and over when I know the time invested is 100% wasted. As I realize it would be futile to get what I want in a timely manner. I would rather run a dungeon over and over knowing I am getting points that I can grinding slowly up to a guaranteed item so that I know my time isn't being wasted. Random chance isn't in my opinion a grind. Grinding levels actually move the chains over time. Rolling 7 dices and hoping that they all fall on 1 changes nothing over time.

Did you understand that? Time invested won't change RNG. They are independent from each other. Like I said it only LOOKS like it's not because there are so many people playing at the beginning of a game or chapter release. When those people stop playing that or stop collecting mats, the prices rise.

There will be a point that the prices become so insane due to inflation and price fixing trying to pull the money from the WHALES that only FEW will survive in ESO. You may be one of them but the many will not be and the game WILL die.

Kiralyn2000 · April 2021

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

xilfxlegion wrote: »

Pinoh wrote: »

Sanctum74 wrote: »

You do realize it’s pretty much impossible to do this. You would need dozens of players and billions in gold working around the clock to do this. As soon as you buy up their stock people will list new items so you would have to hit about 200 guild traders on an hourly basis.

I think you're mistaken. After while consumers would be scouring the traders to buy up the cheap deals, not something the original colluders would have to continue to do themselves. After high prices more or less become standard, they will be able to move whatever they bought to flip in large stacks.

Clearly it's not only possible, it's worked multiple times often on the same materials over the last couple of years. ZOS clearly has no interest in even pretending to monitor the game economy.

Needless to say the flippers trolls and w/e are incumbent to trot out endless denials. Just like they've done for the last several years so nothing ever gets fixed.

again, it is a free market --- what is there to fix ?

Stock responses like "Its a free market" or "just supply and demand" are frankly useless. My first thought when I see them is, meh, that dude probably got a C- is in Macro Economics and thinks they are Milton Friedman.

It is ignorant to think that a "free market" exists almost anywhere in the world, whether its in a video game or in real life. Closest thing we have is probably Crypto currency.

ZOS has the ability and the duty to manage the value of their currency, just like literally every government does on a daily basis. They also have the ability and the duty to manage their economy as a whole. They have tools to not only mange the value of their currency via gold sources and gold sinks, but also to manage the supply (and less so) the demand of the commodities that drive said economy. They are actively doing this and have been since launch. OP is not wrong to suggest that some matt prices have sky rocketed recently, and it logically follows that ZOS has a duty to curb that to some degree.

Well, or they think it's a game, not a real economy. No-one is going to starve or be put out of their house if the economy isn't kept 'stable'/etc. So there isn't really a "government responsibility to manage the value of their currency" since nothing actually depends on it maintaining a particular range of values.

As long as currency & raw materials can be poofed up from thin air via the game world producing infinite amounts of it (as opposed to a supply chain that depends on fuel costs, environmental regulations, mining, etc), any thoughts of treating Game World economy by the standards of Real World economy, are just silly.

Blacknight841 · April 2021

.

ThorianB wrote: »

CrashofLorkhaj wrote: »

ThorianB wrote: »

CrashofLorkhaj wrote: »

The reason for it is simple, price rigging is being actively organised and directed by a number of the biggest trading guilds and alliances on the servers.

Here is the proof [edited to remove names]:

https://imgur.com/a/sKOp9NZ

I am honestly surprised that this is not public knowledge... they did not try to hide it after all.

What they are trying to do won't work. They would need dozens of people at all times of day scouring traders siphoning up the deals in order to control the market. The problem with that is they are sitting on ever increasing inventories that they must then try to offload at higher prices which will take more time. You have limited selling slots and limited inventory space in this game. What happens in this scheme is they run themselves out of gold quickly and end up sitting on a large inventory that they are either going to have to dump back on the market at a low price because they can no longer control it, or they are going to have to slowly feed it back into the market for a small profit over what they paid for it in which they are going to make very little profit for all the hassle when they could have made 10x more doing other trades that don't require market control.

That is only one of a few things i found wrong with their "business model"

I picked up a motif yesterday for 50 gold. I sold it today for 7500 gold and i was on the first page of lowest price on TTC. THAT is how you work the market in ESO.

Sanctum74 wrote: »

CrashofLorkhaj wrote: »

The reason for it is simple, price rigging is being actively organised and directed by a number of the biggest trading guilds and alliances on the servers.

Here is the proof [edited to remove names]:

https://imgur.com/a/sKOp9NZ

I am honestly surprised that this is not public knowledge... they did not try to hide it after all.

You do realize it’s pretty much impossible to do this. You would need dozens of players and billions in gold working around the clock to do this. As soon as you buy up their stock people will list new items so you would have to hit about 200 guild traders on an hourly basis.

Then there are inventory limitations that would also prevent this. The bigger problem would then be they are sitting on all these items and not enough guild slots to sell them, not to mention they wouldn’t have time to sell them because they would have to be constantly buying at traders all over tamriel.

As it stands now with the exception of a small guild I can go to any guild trader and find a wide variety of items. If what you said was true then they would only be available in a few select traders which is clearly not the case.

It is easier to respond to these similar posts in one go:

It is already happening, successfully. These are a group of players for whom trading and markets is their whole endgame, and they actively check as many traders, all large and small ones, as a group, with labor divided between them. They have the numbers to do it, and the billions of gold collectively (and individually in a couple of cases). It is not a new concept, and it is something that you see often in other MMOs.

They have been actively doing it for some time now, successfully. They buy up all the valuable and in-demand materials from everywhere possible, relist as a higher price, buy out all the competition, and control the market price in this manner.

In fact, it was timed to happen in advance of the new patch, so that the large number of returning players would boost demand for upgrade materials and consumables, further increasing the prices and cementing their control of this market.

I started trading in Eve online in 2007 and was quite active in it until last year. I have been trading in ESO since mid/late 2016. Trading is one of my favorite activities and im pretty good at it if one judges by my bank accounts in both games.

I am telling you as a trader with more than 10 years experience of trading as a major activity, what they are doing is not logistically sustainable in this game.

* There are to many traders.
* They are to far apart with to many load screens.
* There are to many people shopping in this game concurrently at traders for them to siphon up the deals.
* The higher you sell for the slower the turnover.
* Non craft bag items require storage space limiting how effective you can be at buying stock.
* Hoarders like me will just start trickling our supply at a reasonable price when the price goes up to high.
* People will farm their own materials once you hit a certain price point. So the higher your price point the more people that will just go farm it.

95% of the stuff you can put on a guild trader is not that difficult to obtain yourself with little to no skill. Mats are the easiest thing in the game to acquire. Spend 30 minutes a day doing crafting dailies and you have a steady supply of every single mat in this game being fed into a infinite craft bag. The only people that are going to pay high prices are filthy rich lazy people and you are not going to have a lot of them in ESO because it takes a bit of work to be filthy rich unless you sell 50k crowns a month. You start doubling and tripling gold mat prices and everyone and their grandmother is going to be grinding crafting wits and picking nodes.

The only reason the prices of things have increased is because of events and changes to the game both of which upset supply and demand not because of some trade mafia. This would simply require to much time invest, constant micromanagement, and to much capital for a very small profit if any. For example:

If you wanted to raise the price of perfect roe on PC NA from about its current 20k to 35k you would need an investment of 50-100 million for about 1850 roe. Lets say you can get the roe for 30k each( its actually going to be closer to 33k from my quick run through TTC) average. That is 55 million. If you offload it for the new low which is 35k your sell price is 64,750,000.

Let's assume you sell all 1850 items in their 30 day window. You will have paid 4,532,000 gold in fees half of which goes to the guilds you sell on and half that goes into the ether. Your total profit before taxes is 9,750,000 less taxes of 4,532,000 which leaves a total profit of 5,217,500 gold.

So you have to collect 1850 roe from somewhere between half to two-thirds of the traders in the game and invest 60 millionish. Storing isn't bad because you have infinite craft bag. Now you have to unload 1850 roe while maintaining the price point at 35k or higher. For all this effort you make a measly 5.2 mil profit. By comparison, i can make about 1.4 mil a month just doing crafting dailies on 9 characters everyday and only selling the ornates and intricates and keeping everything else to myself.

It is not hard to make money in this game, but what those players are trying to do is a lot of work, risk, and investment for very little possible gain. The ROI of volunteering at a soup kitchen is almost better. That SS of a discord post earlier in this topic is nothing but the start of a pyramid scheme.

There are a few flaws with your model. No one would attempt this on perfect roe because it can be farmed by bots. Pc and console are vastly different.

On the other hand, buying up all the Atherial dust months ago has turned out to be extremely profitable. Why? Because players knew that the cp change would drive people to use the potions. Atherial dust is very difficult to farm. You could farm all day and never pull a single one. The jester festival was going to drive the prices even higher. Purchase price was 80k-100k, with a fluid peak around 400k. Why would I want to do this for perfect roe when more fish are farmed by botted controllers every day, not to mention there are people holding the in stacks (like myself). Can’t manipulate a market where you can’t buy up all the materials and you don’t know how much can be generated daily. Sure bots will will pull Atherial dust, but you can tell who is buying from the bots based on their listings. Now you just have to strike a deal with the people getting the supply from bots. Of course you have to take note that the jesters festival is prime to sell all of it, and you need to unload most of it by the end of the event.. since the jubilee festival drops it. Then you tank the market, people who think the prices are still at 400k will get stuck holding the ones you are offloading on a different account at 300k, then the market drops to 200k as people undercut from the rewards they get in the crates. Profit margin of this is 300%, better than a measly 5m you get from roe, that will never work.

As an seasoned trader I would expect you to know that you shouldn’t flip markets where you don’t know the rate of generation, and the stagnant supply. You don’t need an army people to drive the price of an item up, you just need to know what item to hit and when.... and a few million to clear the traders. Like i said console and pc are different. We don’t have to fool an add on. On console it’s all “Allegory of the Cave”.

There is no way to check trader remotely on the console. It takes hours to go through the loadscreens if you do want to check them. Manipulating the prices on console has been something players have been doing since the beginning. Why? Because it is easy to do. There are no add ons to tell someone what the real value of an item is. There is no way to see what other traders are pricing something without going to that trader. There are no tool to show trends of an items value. One day Minotaur helmets is 50k like every other Minotaur motif. The next day there are none in the traders and they sell for 400k. Why because after someone goes out and buys 13/14 pages. Paying 400k is still cheaper than buying the whole motif from the crown store. Console is where it is at, and as long as zenimax is unwilling to give the players the tools they need to navigate the market.... the rich become richer.

Matchimus · April 2021

Took a break from game for 6 mths & noticed the inflation however it was across the board. A loaf of bread is not worth more than car.

VaranisArano · April 2021

Redguards_Revenge, you broke the quoting, so I'll reply to your bolded points here.

To repeat: my main contention is that if we say that players are separated into tiers (in terms of content or economically) then time spent in ESO is the primary difference, not their luck with RNG.

1. I'm not going to go into more detail about gear, but rather suggest you reread my point, since you've taken it to mean something I didn't say. Players can easily get the crafted/overland gear they need in order to access the content where they can obtain the gear (dungeon/normal trial/normal arena, then progressing to perfect gear if they need it) they need to get something like a Vet Trial skin. Please note that in accord with my other points, getting a Vet Trial skin requires more than just gear. It depends on you having the time to practice your role, the time to commit to a group, and time to grind to the required amount of CP. If you don't have those things which are independent of RNG, then just handing you a set of meta gear isn't going to launch you into the top tier of players.

2. Sure, MMOs could design themselves differently. If they wanted to. I wish you the best of luck convincing the ESO Devs that ESO should be designed differently to fit your tastes.

3. If you removed RNG entirely from ESO, there would still be tiers of players based on how much time they could commit to playing ESO. The RNG only makes it more apparent.

Time invested doesn't change RNG. Time invested merely gives additional chances at rolling the dice. Compare Player A who only has the time to run Vet Maelstrom 5 times and Player B who has free time to run Vet Maelstrom 20 times. Player B has a much better chance at getting their gear, not because the RNG was any different, but because Player B has time to take 15 more chances to get lucky.

You seem to be arguing that you want to design ESO differently to include some form of token system, which again, fine you can certainly ask ZOS for that! I don't expect ZOS to go for it, since their answer to requests for a token system for Vet Maelstrom was to introduce the Transmutation System.

But if anything, your suggestion of removing RNG and instead grinding points towards a guaranteed item only goes to prove my point: the primary thing holding players back is the time they invest. Player B is going to grind out those points so much faster than Player A, even if they both get the item at the end of the grind. Oh, and as we well know, handing both of those players the guaranteed item is NOT going to automatically confer the skill to use that item well. If Player B wants to get that Vet Trial skin, Player B needs to practice their role and commit time to a progression group. It's just that Player B, having more time to spend on ESO, is going to accomplish those goals so much faster than Player A.

Side note 1: I'm not sure what this gear RNG discussion is doing in a thread primarily about Materials. Base materials are so plentiful and available that it basically works like you want dungeon gear to: just gather enough to sell or refine and you'll get the improvement mats you want. What that does take is time, and so you'll note that the primary difference between the economic "haves and have-nots" in this thread is the time they spend in ESO doing gold-earning activities, not their luck with RNG. I'm rich in ESO compared to the average player not because I'm abnormally lucky with my nirncrux RNG, but because I can spend hours farming Craglorn and selling all the materials, to the point that the nirncrux is only a portion of the profit. Someone who can't spend hours is going to have to get abnormally lucky with their nirncrux RNG to even come close to matching my quantity of materials to sell. They aren't held back from matching me by the nirncrux RNG, but rather that they either don't have as much free time or they'd rather not run loops around Craglorn like I do.

Side note 2: The above talks mainly about PVE group content. Keep in mind that I also play PVP, where it is glaringly apparent that you can suit someone up in the most overpowered meta build and they will still get destroyed by players who actually put in the time and effort to practice their play. That's even more apparent right now in Cyrodiil, where we've got all of 19 sets to use. Gear and gear RNG is only a small portion of what holds players back from being top tier in PVP. It's primarily time invested: time spent practicing with your build and fighting many different players.

ThorianB · April 2021

Blacknight841 wrote: »

There are a few flaws with your model. No one would attempt this on perfect roe because it can be farmed by bots. Pc and console are vastly different.

I pulled a random out of of TTC, don't read into it. I disagree that PC and console are vastly different. If this is about TTC, people put far to much stock into what TTC can do to help you find good deals. Most of the deals i find at traders are not using TTC.

On the other hand, buying up all the Atherial dust months ago has turned out to be extremely profitable. Why? Because players knew that the cp change would drive people to use the potions.

This isn't some genius level insight. It's common sense. Dust is used to make xp pots and people are going to want to grind levels as soon as U29 comes out. Same situation with writs. This is another one of those situations in which traders with some cash anticipate demand, which is 100% normal for any trader that is decent at trading. Not like the trade mafia conspiracies that have been floating around in this thread.

You don’t need an army people to drive the price of an item up, you just need to know what item to hit and when.... and a few million to clear the traders

I disagree especially on consoles.

Console Scenario: You run around buying up a certain item to raise its price. A trader who always sells that item puts the item up soon after you visit his trader. I stop by that trader and buy it for his normal price. You buying up everything you could find did not affect my impression of the price one bit.

PC Scenario: You are buying up all of a certain item to raise its price. I check TTC and visit a couple of kiosk and find the items gone. I will either sort my TTC list by last seen and refresh it while i play until i get a fresh one up in my price range, or i will go farm the item myself.

All Platforms: Most of what is on the guild traders is relatively easy to farm yourself. You don't need special skills to farm a lot of things. Most people have a price point at which they will simply just go get their own stuff. The only people that are going to buy over priced items are lazy rich people and their are not a lot of those in ESO.

All Platforms #2: Someone like me is going to be a real PITA because i sit on a stocks of highly desirable items and when the price starts to go way up i will start trickle feeding the market. There will be thousands of players like me that will have a price point at which they start selling their own stock.

There is no way to check trader remotely on the console. It takes hours to go through the loadscreens if you do want to check them. Manipulating the prices on console has been something players have been doing since the beginning

Nah, they just THINK they are manipulating prices. People will still be selling under them consistently all day long. They are more naive than the people who buy from them because they think they are actually driving the price up when all you do is create the impression that the top spot trade guilds are greatly overpriced because that is where they all try to sell the items they are snagging up from lower traffic areas. All you do is teach people who want deals to not shop at those top tier spots if they want something that is reasonably priced.Oh...wait... that is just like what we already have now.

Minotaur helmets is 50k like every other Minotaur motif. The next day there are none in the traders and they sell for 400k. Why because after someone goes out and buys 13/14 pages. Paying 400k is still cheaper than buying the whole motif from the crown store. Console is where it is at, and as long as zenimax is unwilling to give the players the tools they need to navigate the market.... the rich become richer.

Only people who are really desperate and can't wait to get the helm would pay the 400k for it. Otherwise, they would either farm it or wait for someone to post it for a reasonable price.

On a separate note to console players: you don't need TTC on consoles to see what something is worth. Use the average between PC NA and PC EU to see how rare an item is, how much the general player base farms it and the general prices that people are selling it for. The drop rates on all platforms are the same so in most cases the prices won't be real far off in range. If someone is trying to sell you a mino helm for 400k and PC NA has a stock of 160 and PC EU has a stock of 280 and the average going rate is 100-125k on PC NA and 80-100k on PC EU then its safe to bet that paying over 200k is unreasonable and anything over 150k is probably very high. Whereas if you can find the helm for below 100k that is probably going to be reasonable, and if you find it below 50k then its probably a good deal.

Pinoh · April 2021

Redguards_Revenge wrote: »

Is ZOS going to fundamentally change that?
*looks at the CP 2.0 system*
Probably not. I mean, we really can't deny that CP 2.0 is absolutely designed to create a top tier of players who spent tons of time in the game to get peak combat effectiveness AND their QOL bonuses. It makes some things easier for brand new players or players who don't spend much time in game. Other things, it moves further out of reach.

ESO is an MMO. It's designed to get players logging in every day and playing the game, and of course, spending money on the Crown Store,new content, and subscriptions. Every player online helps justify the ongoing cost of the servers. Time = money in an MMO. RNG is only one method that the Devs use to extend our time in game, and even if we change it, it's not going to close the gap between players who spend lots of time in ESO and players who don't.

Yeah well log in rewards dailies and things to buy for daily merits would seem to address most of the daily attraction. And the game already has plenty of that. As you say Zos seems to be over rewarding existing/heavy players, at the expense of new and or casual players. The rest of this isn't really addressed to you, but the thread in general.

But as some have said this game has anything but a free market. zos determines gold input, zos determines gold sinks, zos creates artificial demand by setting rarity. It's totally absurd to say oh it's a free market, zos should not manage it in any way, let it run wild. It's equally absurd for Zos to have taken a hands off approach for as long as it has, considering it's controlling all the variables to begin with.

A lot of people buy gold with crowns, indirectly in game gold is real money. There needs to be rules against price fixing and market manipulation just like there are in the 'real world'.

If the argument is that its not the real world its just a game and it doesn't matter. Then the flip side of that argument is that its just a game and it's ok to implement rules. One players ability to abuse their fellow players and unfairly take their gold isn't something they are entitled to do. 7 years of the economy running amok is enough, its time for something new.

The game in general will ultimately be better off it it makes the game more enjoyable for new players. Catering to long term players is a losing economic plan for ZOS, or any game maker. New players need to buy everything, old players don't. Zos is making a fundamental mistake when it caters to flippers and trolls rather than promoting a stable economy. This affects all aspects of the game not just trading. pvp trials w/e new or casual players are squeezed out if the game has too steep of a curve for buy in.

Also a lot of the items people flip are from the golden vendor. The cost of upgrade materials has directly affected that market. It's not really market economics at play here. If Zos is going to inject end game items into the economy. It just needs to equalize the economy by having the crafting vendors sell upgrade components as well. Players can sell off their excess for cheaper still if they don't need them or want to farm for money.

As for Roe and furnishing materials, Zos just needs to increase those drop rates.

Mayrael · April 2021

Blacknight841 wrote: »

.
.... There are no tool to show trends of an items value. One day Minotaur helmets is 50k like every other Minotaur motif. The next day there are none in the traders and they sell for 400k. Why because after someone goes out and buys 13/14 pages. Paying 400k is still cheaper than buying the whole motif from the crown store. Console is where it is at, and as long as zenimax is unwilling to give the players the tools they need to navigate the market.... the rich become richer.

And imagine having a global AH. Such a person can do such things in a matter of minutes with dozens of items just by standing in one place, click click click click and you have an artificial shortage of goods which he then fills himself. Create a problem and then sell a solution to it.

Besides, as has already been mentioned, if this were inflation, all prices would go up, but what we have here is a simple increase in demand for certain goods, which makes them more expensive. Take advantage of the situation and farm as many upgrade mats as possible and earn money on it, because the prices are already falling due to the event.

Raegwyr · April 2021

Mats

Pinoh wrote: »

Redguards_Revenge wrote: »

Is ZOS going to fundamentally change that?
*looks at the CP 2.0 system*
Probably not. I mean, we really can't deny that CP 2.0 is absolutely designed to create a top tier of players who spent tons of time in the game to get peak combat effectiveness AND their QOL bonuses. It makes some things easier for brand new players or players who don't spend much time in game. Other things, it moves further out of reach.

ESO is an MMO. It's designed to get players logging in every day and playing the game, and of course, spending money on the Crown Store,new content, and subscriptions. Every player online helps justify the ongoing cost of the servers. Time = money in an MMO. RNG is only one method that the Devs use to extend our time in game, and even if we change it, it's not going to close the gap between players who spend lots of time in ESO and players who don't.

Yeah well log in rewards dailies and things to buy for daily merits would seem to address most of the daily attraction. And the game already has plenty of that. As you say Zos seems to be over rewarding existing/heavy players, at the expense of new and or casual players. The rest of this isn't really addressed to you, but the thread in general.

But as some have said this game has anything but a free market. zos determines gold input, zos determines gold sinks, zos creates artificial demand by setting rarity. It's totally absurd to say oh it's a free market, zos should not manage it in any way, let it run wild. It's equally absurd for Zos to have taken a hands off approach for as long as it has, considering it's controlling all the variables to begin with.

A lot of people buy gold with crowns, indirectly in game gold is real money. There needs to be rules against price fixing and market manipulation just like there are in the 'real world'.

If the argument is that its not the real world its just a game and it doesn't matter. Then the flip side of that argument is that its just a game and it's ok to implement rules. One players ability to abuse their fellow players and unfairly take their gold isn't something they are entitled to do. 7 years of the economy running amok is enough, its time for something new.

The game in general will ultimately be better off it it makes the game more enjoyable for new players. Catering to long term players is a losing economic plan for ZOS, or any game maker. New players need to buy everything, old players don't. Zos is making a fundamental mistake when it caters to flippers and trolls rather than promoting a stable economy. This affects all aspects of the game not just trading. pvp trials w/e new or casual players are squeezed out if the game has too steep of a curve for buy in.

Also a lot of the items people flip are from the golden vendor. The cost of upgrade materials has directly affected that market. It's not really market economics at play here. If Zos is going to inject end game items into the economy. It just needs to equalize the economy by having the crafting vendors sell upgrade components as well. Players can sell off their excess for cheaper still if they don't need them or want to farm for money.

As for Roe and furnishing materials, Zos just needs to increase those drop rates.

I find your statement that zos is catering to old players instead of new baffling.
No, zos is heavily catering to new players and really don't care about vets. Only problem is, vets understand this game better then devs and are able to use the new systems in unexpected way.

ThorianB · April 2021

Raegwyr wrote: »

Mats

Pinoh wrote: »

Redguards_Revenge wrote: »

Is ZOS going to fundamentally change that?
*looks at the CP 2.0 system*
Probably not. I mean, we really can't deny that CP 2.0 is absolutely designed to create a top tier of players who spent tons of time in the game to get peak combat effectiveness AND their QOL bonuses. It makes some things easier for brand new players or players who don't spend much time in game. Other things, it moves further out of reach.

ESO is an MMO. It's designed to get players logging in every day and playing the game, and of course, spending money on the Crown Store,new content, and subscriptions. Every player online helps justify the ongoing cost of the servers. Time = money in an MMO. RNG is only one method that the Devs use to extend our time in game, and even if we change it, it's not going to close the gap between players who spend lots of time in ESO and players who don't.

Yeah well log in rewards dailies and things to buy for daily merits would seem to address most of the daily attraction. And the game already has plenty of that. As you say Zos seems to be over rewarding existing/heavy players, at the expense of new and or casual players. The rest of this isn't really addressed to you, but the thread in general.

But as some have said this game has anything but a free market. zos determines gold input, zos determines gold sinks, zos creates artificial demand by setting rarity. It's totally absurd to say oh it's a free market, zos should not manage it in any way, let it run wild. It's equally absurd for Zos to have taken a hands off approach for as long as it has, considering it's controlling all the variables to begin with.

A lot of people buy gold with crowns, indirectly in game gold is real money. There needs to be rules against price fixing and market manipulation just like there are in the 'real world'.

If the argument is that its not the real world its just a game and it doesn't matter. Then the flip side of that argument is that its just a game and it's ok to implement rules. One players ability to abuse their fellow players and unfairly take their gold isn't something they are entitled to do. 7 years of the economy running amok is enough, its time for something new.

The game in general will ultimately be better off it it makes the game more enjoyable for new players. Catering to long term players is a losing economic plan for ZOS, or any game maker. New players need to buy everything, old players don't. Zos is making a fundamental mistake when it caters to flippers and trolls rather than promoting a stable economy. This affects all aspects of the game not just trading. pvp trials w/e new or casual players are squeezed out if the game has too steep of a curve for buy in.

Also a lot of the items people flip are from the golden vendor. The cost of upgrade materials has directly affected that market. It's not really market economics at play here. If Zos is going to inject end game items into the economy. It just needs to equalize the economy by having the crafting vendors sell upgrade components as well. Players can sell off their excess for cheaper still if they don't need them or want to farm for money.

As for Roe and furnishing materials, Zos just needs to increase those drop rates.

I find your statement that zos is catering to old players instead of new baffling.
No, zos is heavily catering to new players and really don't care about vets. Only problem is, vets understand this game better then devs and are able to use the new systems in unexpected way.

I don't think ZOS is catering to any specific group. They aren't doing anything different than any other developer in the category. As an MMO progresses new players want to know if there are catch up mechanics so they aren't so far behind. Players are always good at finding bugs, exploits, unintended side effects and such. This isn't because the players know the game better than devs its because their are magnitudes more players than devs. So instead of a few hundred people playing through the game finding bugs and issues you have a few million. Its like difference between the computing power of a calculator and a data farm.

The only furnishing material that needs its drop rate increased, imo, is heartwood and that is because heartwood based prints are used far more than the other prints.There are even more woodworking prints than other professions by double to triple depending on the profession.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · April 2021

Kiralyn2000 wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

xilfxlegion wrote: »

Pinoh wrote: »

Sanctum74 wrote: »

You do realize it’s pretty much impossible to do this. You would need dozens of players and billions in gold working around the clock to do this. As soon as you buy up their stock people will list new items so you would have to hit about 200 guild traders on an hourly basis.

I think you're mistaken. After while consumers would be scouring the traders to buy up the cheap deals, not something the original colluders would have to continue to do themselves. After high prices more or less become standard, they will be able to move whatever they bought to flip in large stacks.

Clearly it's not only possible, it's worked multiple times often on the same materials over the last couple of years. ZOS clearly has no interest in even pretending to monitor the game economy.

Needless to say the flippers trolls and w/e are incumbent to trot out endless denials. Just like they've done for the last several years so nothing ever gets fixed.

again, it is a free market --- what is there to fix ?

Stock responses like "Its a free market" or "just supply and demand" are frankly useless. My first thought when I see them is, meh, that dude probably got a C- is in Macro Economics and thinks they are Milton Friedman.

It is ignorant to think that a "free market" exists almost anywhere in the world, whether its in a video game or in real life. Closest thing we have is probably Crypto currency.

ZOS has the ability and the duty to manage the value of their currency, just like literally every government does on a daily basis. They also have the ability and the duty to manage their economy as a whole. They have tools to not only mange the value of their currency via gold sources and gold sinks, but also to manage the supply (and less so) the demand of the commodities that drive said economy. They are actively doing this and have been since launch. OP is not wrong to suggest that some matt prices have sky rocketed recently, and it logically follows that ZOS has a duty to curb that to some degree.

Well, or they think it's a game, not a real economy. No-one is going to starve or be put out of their house if the economy isn't kept 'stable'/etc. So there isn't really a "government responsibility to manage the value of their currency" since nothing actually depends on it maintaining a particular range of values.

As long as currency & raw materials can be poofed up from thin air via the game world producing infinite amounts of it (as opposed to a supply chain that depends on fuel costs, environmental regulations, mining, etc), any thoughts of treating Game World economy by the standards of Real World economy, are just silly.

Could not disagree more. Sure its a game, but it is crazy to think that ZOS doesn't have an interest in managing a healthy economy because it contributes to an overall healthier game. And its naïve to think that they arent actively doing so. They control new currency being introduced to the game and they control how currency is removed from the game, just like any government does with their currency. This is how currency value or inflation is managed. They have likely even more control than any RL example, more so when it comes to how commodities are introduced.

The economy is a vital aspect to any MMO, and ZOS has an interest in managing it to keep both players, and perhaps more importantly to them, shareholders, happy. If the economy is accessible to new players, the game (and shareholder profits) will die. Are they exactly like real world economies? Of course not, but real world economic principles are absolutely applicable.

Kiralyn2000 · April 2021

Mayrael wrote: »

Blacknight841 wrote: »

.
.... There are no tool to show trends of an items value. One day Minotaur helmets is 50k like every other Minotaur motif. The next day there are none in the traders and they sell for 400k. Why because after someone goes out and buys 13/14 pages. Paying 400k is still cheaper than buying the whole motif from the crown store. Console is where it is at, and as long as zenimax is unwilling to give the players the tools they need to navigate the market.... the rich become richer.

And imagine having a global AH. Such a person can do such things in a matter of minutes with dozens of items just by standing in one place, click click click click and you have an artificial shortage of goods which he then fills himself. Create a problem and then sell a solution to it.

Yeah, imagine having a global AH, where - instead of 14 pages to buy & relist, there'd be 140. Because everyone could be listing them, instead of the ~50k players (probably less)* with trade vendors listing them and the other 1mil+ vendoring/deleting them.

Sure, in a global AH high prices aren't "maintained" - since undercutters can keep flooding the market and continuously drive prices down... but that's only a problem for the Big Wheeler Dealer types who want to keep their protected markets & artificially inflated profits. /shrug

* yes, there's something like 98k total slots in guild vendor locations. But so many of the "pro traders" are in 3-5 trade guilds. So there's a lot less actual players trading, than there are available vendor slots.

HumbleThaumaturge · April 2021

I agree with the original poster. Fortunately, I have a large supply of materials from years ago, but I try to imagine how a new player might deal with the current situation. I mean, imagine needing to come up with nearly 1 million gold for your first set of Gold-gear!

Actually, inflation is worse then the original poster states. He remembers when Dreugh Wax was 6k. I bought 800 Dreugh Wax years ago for 2700 gold each (still have them), but now wax is selling for 16k or more! Up by a factor 6. Similar stories for items like Potent Nirncrux and Perfect Roe. And, of course, jewelry mats have always been high, but the blue mat used to be 4k and is now 16k to 20k!

The value of gold-mats is now so high, it makes no sense to do Master Writs most of the time. Some folks do them just to get the XP, but I rarely do them because the value of the resulting Voucher is less than the value of the materials. (Also, the drop-rate of Master Writs and the average Vouchers per Writ are now significantly lower than when the Master Writ system first started.) I don't do any jewelry Master Writs anymore. And I don't do gold-level non-jewelry writs unless the voucher-value makes it worth it.

Some folks have said inflation is all due to "supply and demand." I think not. I mean, that may be a part of it, but not the most important part.

As others have explained, I think much of the inflation is being caused by price manipulation by folks (individuals and guilds) with huge amounts of gold and an understanding of how to manipulate the market and how to manipulate the listings on Tamriel Trade Centre.

I suppose ZOS can (and has) made changes affecting the amount of materials and gold in the game. But what can ZOS do to control price manipulation? They could stop Crown-selling. But that's not going to happen. They could ban Tamriel Trade Center. But that's not going to happen. And how could they stop a rich player or guild from cornering the market on certain items by going to every guild trader and buying that item if it is below their target price? I can't think of a way.

ThorianB · April 2021

HumbleThaumaturge wrote: »

I agree with the original poster. Fortunately, I have a large supply of materials from years ago, but I try to imagine how a new player might deal with the current situation. I mean, imagine needing to come up with nearly 1 million gold for your first set of Gold-gear!

Actually, inflation is worse then the original poster states. He remembers when Dreugh Wax was 6k. I bought 800 Dreugh Wax years ago for 2700 gold each (still have them), but now wax is selling for 16k or more! Up by a factor 6. Similar stories for items like Potent Nirncrux and Perfect Roe. And, of course, jewelry mats have always been high, but the blue mat used to be 4k and is now 16k to 20k!

The value of gold-mats is now so high, it makes no sense to do Master Writs most of the time. Some folks do them just to get the XP, but I rarely do them because the value of the resulting Voucher is less than the value of the materials. (Also, the drop-rate of Master Writs and the average Vouchers per Writ are now significantly lower than when the Master Writ system first started.) I don't do any jewelry Master Writs anymore. And I don't do gold-level non-jewelry writs unless the voucher-value makes it worth it.

Some folks have said inflation is all due to "supply and demand." I think not. I mean, that may be a part of it, but not the most important part.

As others have explained, I think much of the inflation is being caused by price manipulation by folks (individuals and guilds) with huge amounts of gold and an understanding of how to manipulate the market and how to manipulate the listings on Tamriel Trade Centre.

I suppose ZOS can (and has) made changes affecting the amount of materials and gold in the game. But what can ZOS do to control price manipulation? They could stop Crown-selling. But that's not going to happen. They could ban Tamriel Trade Center. But that's not going to happen. And how could they stop a rich player or guild from cornering the market on certain items by going to every guild trader and buying that item if it is below their target price? I can't think of a way.

No it's supply and demand. I know conspiracies about secrete trade organizations controlling prices is more fun, but it really is just basic economics. This was even predicted to happen before it happened. Everyone is burning through master writs and the improvement mats quickly right now and more people are focused on leveling than gathering and resource collection.

JKorr · April 2021

CrashofLorkhaj wrote: »

The reason for it is simple, price rigging is being actively organised and directed by a number of the biggest trading guilds and alliances on the servers.

Here is the proof [edited to remove names]:

https://imgur.com/a/sKOp9NZ

I am honestly surprised that this is not public knowledge... they did not try to hide it after all.

And what exactly is making people follow their dictates? "A number of the biggest trading guilds and alliances", but not all of them. So basically they really can't control the market at all. Especially if players say "No."

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Guild_Traders

The "biggest trading guilds and alliances" are going to exert iron-clad control over all those traders?

Kwoung · April 2021

Prices fluxuate, just look at everything XP potion related right now, the price on Aetherial Dust seemed to have capped at 650K last week, and looks to have plummeted into the 450K range now. The market is volatile and completely based on supply & demand, regardless of what all the conspiracy theorists feel.

As for the gentleman above wondering about overland gear sets you can wear... Mothers Sorrow/Juliannos & Briarheat/Hundings. Both options Overland/Crafted and available to everyone, both setup capable of completing *all* content in ESO. Heck, I have seen 90K parses on MS/Juli!