Curse

Drakron · Aug 04, 2005, 04:59 PM // 16:59

Guild Wars economical model is screwed up.

The reason there are no fixed prices was to promote player-to-player trading but that turns out bad since without any price reference players simply asked the highest price they could get away and it that was driving prices up, it turn out so bad that they were forced to introduce the traders (the dye, rune and rare materials traders did not existed) to force prices down.

Price fixed numbers would be a solution but would kill trading but as it stands I simply cannot imagine any other solution that does not involve in a major overhaul of the economy.

Of course killing trading would not be so bad, a lot of us are tired of the trade and all channel spam with WTS messages.

raven214 · Aug 04, 2005, 05:01 PM // 17:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by asdar

Quit complaining so much. It's perfect the way it is.

Were you being sarcastic or are you actually serious? When I checked this morning, black dye was up to 23k! That is just absurd... especially when the other dyes are around 200-400 (not counting silver which has been all over the place as of late). How could one little vial of food coloring cost 23K?

MSecorsky · Aug 04, 2005, 05:17 PM // 17:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rulke

Solution to the pricing chaos: Allow them to be made by crafters. Hidden ones. For a price of a few hundred for most, five hundred for silver and a few k for black, plus ingredients. Make the crafters fairly hard to find, and with slightly randomized locations (always be present in the area, but in one of 5 or 6 places, so it's hard to find). Limit the buy prices at the dye traders to go to a minimum of what it is required to craft them, plus about half that value, so people will still sell to them.

Now, people will sell these for a reasonable amount of mark-up, or to the trader for the enforced miunimum level of mark-up. There will be a lot of these things going around, so the price will drop to somewhere between the minimum buy price of the trader, and the corresponding minimum sell price of the trader. The craft price and enforced minimum buy prices keeps the amount people will sell them for high enough for people to turn a profit, but low enough for people to buy them.

Or they can explore and find the crafters themselves.

Possibly remove the crafters from an area (or all areas) for a person, if they run into the area, found the crafter, left the area, then goes to a materials person, then runs into the area and to the crafter again lots of times, to stop people farming these guys too much. Reinstate them every few hours/days/when they have stopped running round the areas long enough.

Hey, that reminds me.. I found a crafter for the golden scrolls (XP adders). Thought that was neat.

Zaklex · Aug 04, 2005, 05:51 PM // 17:51

If everyone wasn't so damn hot and bothered about dyeing their armor black then demand would go down and prices would follow. It really is a supply and demand market economy, pure and simple, that which is in greatest demand costs the most, and vice versa. Econ 100

P.S. - They Dye Trader has been in since the first BWE, the Rune and Rare Material Traders were added in after release.

SantaClause · Aug 04, 2005, 06:03 PM // 18:03

Has anyone else been paying attention to the cost over time?

If you log on at 10:00am the prices are always much lower than 11:00pm-2:00am for all the traders. I think they programed demand function to be related to how many people have request to buy/trade in some mean time say in the last hour. What they sould do to be fair is make the cost a function of how many unused there are in the market (storeage/inventory & trader). This would eliminate the price flux and hording that occurs.

Red Sonya · Aug 04, 2005, 06:23 PM // 18:23

I like the fluctuating economy and I think the prices are fine. Once again I just see whinners who didn't get on the band wagon and buy up a bunch of stock of certain materials (dyes included) and make a killing off the market when the prices go high. It's just like playing the stock market to me and I love stock market games as much as I enjoy RPG games. I'm certainly glad there are "NO FIXED" prices for many items in the game. Just makes it that much more enjoyable for me "and my pocket book". heee

raven214 · Aug 04, 2005, 07:03 PM // 19:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by SantaClause

Has anyone else been paying attention to the cost over time?

If you log on at 10:00am the prices are always much lower than 11:00pm-2:00am for all the traders. I think they programed demand function to be related to how many people have request to buy/trade in some mean time say in the last hour.

I used to think it was something like that, but I was on around 9am today when black dye was at 23k -- by far the highest I've seen it. Of course I haven't checked in a couple hours, so who knows, maybe it will hit 30k by this evening.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Red Sonya

I like the fluctuating economy and I think the prices are fine. Once again I just see whinners who didn't get on the band wagon and buy up a bunch of stock of certain materials (dyes included) and make a killing off the market when the prices go high. It's just like playing the stock market to me and I love stock market games as much as I enjoy RPG games. I'm certainly glad there are "NO FIXED" prices for many items in the game. Just makes it that much more enjoyable for me "and my pocket book". heee

I thought this game was called Guild Wars, not Stock Market Wars...... and what do you mean about "get on the band wagon and buy up a bunch of stock of certain materials (dyes included) and make a killing off the market when the prices go high"? This may work for people who have been playing for months (myself included, though I don't do it) and have nothing else to do, but what about new players? They come into GW and see incredibly high prices for certain materials/dyes. For them, there was no time when the price was low so they could stock up and then sell high. I can see this as being a part of the game, but I think it's too exaggerated in its current state.

Moltov joss · Aug 04, 2005, 07:10 PM // 19:10

black is down to 11k now. However superior monk runers are hovering around 30k. So I thought this game wasn't about grind? How would one get superior runes??? I have over 700 gaming hours and have only unlocked/salvaged 5 superior runes. So you grind a different way. Even then they nerf that. Bleh.

Rulke · Aug 04, 2005, 07:51 PM // 19:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by MSecorsky

Hey, that reminds me.. I found a crafter for the golden scrolls (XP adders). Thought that was neat.

Yeah, me too. Where'd you think I got the idea from? :P

Pity the craft cost for the scrolls was around 10 times the sell price last time I checked, but that's life.

Martina · Aug 04, 2005, 08:15 PM // 20:15

I've seen that crafter many times..she's*gotta* have cold feet by now, eh? =p

Mr. Matt · Aug 05, 2005, 09:25 AM // 09:25

Hey, maybe life isn't so bad after all. I went home from work yesterday and took my character back to Surmia. I realised that because of all the Grawl and Charr there, I never really explored the area around there. So I went solo with my main Ranger character and started looking around, pleased with the fact that Grawl were dying from single hits.

And I found two black dyes in a row! FROM THE SAME MOB! Pretty darned good if you ask me, especially as the prices were still high at the time. Made a killing. The high prices might be a pain if you're looking to buy the stuff, but it suddenly dawned on me -- if and when newbies find a vial or two, they can get a boost of cash that would be very important to them. Which is a good thing, right?

coolsti · Aug 05, 2005, 01:01 PM // 13:01

I'm still relatively new to this game, and am finding things out every day. A few days ago during a mission I acquired from a creature drop what turned out to be a rune of superior vigor. I thought, well, thats cool, I'll use that for myself. But then one of my party mates pointed out that I am now very weathy. Then I discovered how much I could sell it for at the nearest trader.

My character is level 16 and I only managed to acquire 7000 gold so far. So this sale just increased my fortune by almost a factor of 5!

But this is really absurd, that the prices shoot so high. I'm not the kind of player that will spend hours farming or hours trying to sell stuff I found, so I will not be able to buy anything like black dyes and superior runes.

Akilles · Aug 05, 2005, 01:09 PM // 13:09

it will drop, anywho, you NEVER buy that stuff from trader, subtract 50% and you have the actual price.

DarkiSadist · Aug 05, 2005, 03:33 PM // 15:33

Any one mind fiiling me in on whats happening with rune prices? A minor strength rune is going for 6k right now, even beastmastery, one of the cheapest there is going for 1.5k... the new economy blows for non hardcore players like me....

Aug 05, 2005, 04:32 PM // 16:32

And last time I checked, yellow dyes were going for 800 gold...silvers for 1.3k.
And I remember when yellow was the color no one wanted, and was almost always at 150-160 gold. Funny how that was just a few weeks ago.
Minor absorptions used to be 1.2k, then dropped back down to 120 gold. Now they are back up to 1.2k, so what is most likely going to happen next is everything will get back to 'normal' within the next few weeks, or sooner.

kleps · Aug 05, 2005, 05:41 PM // 17:41

rolls of velium were 2k+ last night as well!

kvndoom · Aug 05, 2005, 06:45 PM // 18:45

When I logged in this morning, there were NO steel ingots in circulation, everyone was pleading for them, and the trader wanted 7900 for lots of 10.

I had 140 in storage. I don't anymore.

Before I get called a hoarder, let me say that I salvaged that many in less than 2 weeks. I have no magic "spot" that gives super drops. Anybody can do it who puts the time in. You can get that much from killing Charr or skeletons. How? Simple, you use only expert salvage kits, and you salvage everything and leave nothing behind. That 7-9 damage sword you left on the ground? By sheer dumb luck, it could salvage into a Steel Ingot, which would have been worth 800 gold this morning. At the very least you'll get one or two iron ingots, which still would have been worth more than the sword. And stackables are priceless. Run through a couple undead areas, and you'll wind up with 50 decayed orr emblems, 600 gold in one inventory space.

I've been playing a whopping 3 1/2 hours since I sold all my steel, and I already have salvaged 10 more steel. You can solo weak monsters and make a fortune. Money is terribly easy to make in this game. Explore areas and try to do missions with as few party members as possible. Don't go paying runners to play the game for you (there was actually someone level 2 at Droknar's yesterday), and fight monsters instead of ducking them. You learn what can kill you and what can't. Kill what you can and take their loot.

I truly don't think Arena is doing much to inflate the economy. They might be by not glutting certain items, but I don't think they're just programming the traders to sell ridiculously high. It's simple economics that a rare item with high demand will carry a high price. If diamonds were just lying about in everybody's garden, they wouldn't cost what they do. Black dye is the same way. Since the last time I sold off all my dyes, I've had about 60 dye drops. Only one has been black. Now I could be below the statistical mean, but it doesn't sound like I am. So, by that math, black dye accounts for less than 2% of all dye drops. Black dye is also the most popular color in the game. If it's being sold and consumed faster than Arena puts more into circulation, then yes, the price will rise greatly until either demand weakens or supply increases. The same with the Superior Monk runes. When the 105HP build got out, how many people do you think rushed and bought all the superior monks as fast as they could? Arena might purposely keep supply on those low for a while because too many people are doing this.

I also think a lot of botters got waxed recently too. Take away the bots, and precious items get infused into the economy at a slower rate. That's the equivalent of a major oil pipeline getting shut down. You know what'll happen to gas prices. But it's necessary because the botters were imbalancing the economy. Things will level out soon enough.

Sagius Truthbarron · Aug 05, 2005, 09:12 PM // 21:12

Blue dye... 1.3k! Red is 900 at the moment, black is 15k and silver is at the usual 1.5k