Curse

Moltov joss · Jul 17, 2005, 12:13 AM // 00:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zorrander

This goes on in every game... just because it offends you doesn't mean that they will suddenly stop auctioning off things they got through bugs and exploits. People are greedy by nature. If it bothers you that much don't play MMO style games.

Good advice (I mean that). I'm actually thinking of not playing MMO style games because of crap like this. I just want to play a damn video game, I dont want to be caught in the polotics of it or get caught between the war of the exploiters and the nerf bat. I find myself enjoying GW less and less because all these nerfs. I'm having a harder time finging gold (I don't farm btw).

Red Locust · Jul 17, 2005, 12:17 AM // 00:17

The only thing wrong with the new system (if it really does work the way Gaile said it would) is the difference between buy and sell prices of merchants. It's a gold sink, sure, but it's very annoying to be forced to sell to players to make any decent profit.

Other than that, nothing's wrong. It's basic supply and demand; if there is too much wood in the economy, obviously you shouldn't get too much gold for selling it to the merchant. If everybody wants linen, then obviously it should cost you a lot of gold to buy it.

Zorrander · Jul 17, 2005, 12:44 AM // 00:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Moltov joss

Good advice (I mean that). I'm actually thinking of not playing MMO style games because of crap like this. I just want to play a damn video game, I dont want to be caught in the polotics of it or get caught between the war of the exploiters and the nerf bat. I find myself enjoying GW less and less because all these nerfs. I'm having a harder time finging gold (I don't farm btw).

EverQuest was a lot like this too. All the super guilds would go in and get ridiculous items with little effort.. then by the time most of the other people were up to this point the nerfing had made it nearly impossible for anyone else to do. After Planes of Power I put EQ in its grave and never touched it again.

PhineasToke · Jul 17, 2005, 03:48 PM // 15:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Red Locust

The only thing wrong with the new system (if it really does work the way Gaile said it would) is the difference between buy and sell prices of merchants. It's a gold sink, sure, but it's very annoying to be forced to sell to players to make any decent profit.

Other than that, nothing's wrong. It's basic supply and demand; if there is too much wood in the economy, obviously you shouldn't get too much gold for selling it to the merchant. If everybody wants linen, then obviously it should cost you a lot of gold to buy it.

It ISN'T supply and demand any longer. Take a look again. The trader pays 5 for an iron ingot, and charges you 21 to buy it? Same with tanned hides. I needed both last night to complete an armor purchase, and couldn't believe how wacked the prices are.

This sucks, and whosever idea it was to do this doesn't understand player mentality. We lost a guild officer last night because he realized pharming just got more difficult by a factor of 4.

Shagsbeard · Jul 17, 2005, 05:06 PM // 17:06

A brief lesson in fixed-point theory:

Any dynamical system with a stable long term solution will approach a fixed point. If a system has no fixed point, it will have no stable solution.

0 buy - 0 sell is a fixed point since if this is the case, no one would sell, and no one would buy.

10 buy - 40 sell is not going to be a fixed point for any commodity since someone is going to want the 10 gold for his drops rather than simply deleting them. That sale would lower the price, approaching the 0-0 fixed point. People won't pay the 40 for the item since there's people out there selling them for 10. So 0-0 is an attractor.

All prices in the game, once sufficiently low, even for what is currently in demand, will be attracted to this 0-0 situation.

Now... can there be a fixed point at some positive number? Let's say X-4X is this fixed point. This means that some people are willing to part with their item for X and others are willing to buy the same item for 4X. The person selling is paying a commission of 3X to the merchant to not have to deal with selling the items dirrectly to another person. So for large values of X, the chance of someone being willing to contibute to the merchant decreases... thus it's not a fixed point. So there cannot be this "equilibrium" that Gaile refers to other than the 0-0 fixed point.

The designers need to fix this, else players will not be rewarded for playing.

Other games get rid of the stuff that is sold. It's doesn't pile up on the traders losing value. They don't explain what happens to it, but it's gone from the economy.

Master Of Disharmony · Jul 17, 2005, 05:54 PM // 17:54

First of all :

I guess its FORBIDEN --> EBAY Shit...

And the Problem is, it was always so ; but since those updates the prices went down ( higher "Down RATE" ).

Iron Ingots : Sell for 115 Gold 2 Weeks ago, now 54. If more people sell Ingots, or same Mater. so the Prize goes down. or Up like Black Dye ( 7 k ), 2 Weeks ago max was 4 or 5k.

Young_Anakin · Jul 17, 2005, 06:31 PM // 18:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhineasToke

It ISN'T supply and demand any longer. Take a look again. The trader pays 5 for an iron ingot, and charges you 21 to buy it? Same with tanned hides. I needed both last night to complete an armor purchase, and couldn't believe how wacked the prices are.

This sucks, and whosever idea it was to do this doesn't understand player mentality. We lost a guild officer last night because he realized pharming just got more difficult by a factor of 4.

Anet is going to lose a lot more if they keep it up. They better pray that their update and expansion are worth while.

PhineasToke · Jul 17, 2005, 07:06 PM // 19:06

The entire point to being competitive in any game is aquiring resources to purchase better equipment to survive the harder areas designed into the game. Now that pharmable resource prices are in the tank, rare items are trading much higher to offset the gold losses. Early this week, basic 20-24 fortitude sword pommels were 500-1K. Today they're 1.5-5K.

Watching prices today, everything has gone beserk. Fur selling by individuals now 500, silver dye 1.5K and on and on. AN better pay attention real quick because all there are in the trade channels are sellers, not buyers, and this game was designed for PLAYING not trading.

I get more pissed at this situation by the minute.

KuTeBaka · Jul 17, 2005, 07:28 PM // 19:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by Young_Anakin

Anet is going to lose a lot more if they keep it up. They better pray that their update and expansion are worth while.

how will they lose money if the buyers have already payed?

Edge Martinez · Jul 17, 2005, 07:47 PM // 19:47

Aside from thinking Phineas has the best Avatar ever, I also agree with just about everything he is typing. Materials trading was a hassle free way of earning cash while exploring new areas. To make a profit now I need to zone and district for awhile announcing that I'm selling. What option is there for me now that I've finished the game a few times, done UW and FoW to death, and have almost all the bonuses?

PvP? Great... been there and done that, and I like it, but it gets old fast. When I started playing GW, I figured... finally a game that will break me away from Mechwarrior since MS decided not to do any more games for that series. But if all GW is going to be for long periods of time is PvP? There are alot better team vs. team games out there.

Avantos · Jul 17, 2005, 08:29 PM // 20:29

If the economy crashes (prices too high, by my meaning, for anyone to really buy anything) then, as I've been saying, there will only be WTS, and WTB out there as players don't even bother with merchants.

The process won't happen instantly though. What I hope is happening with ArenaNet is they are planning to fix the system--though do so more carefully and more thought than the last "fix".

PieXags · Jul 17, 2005, 08:48 PM // 20:48

The problem is there are LOADS of gold sinks, but...hardly any people have the money to...you know, use up. The gold sinks were put there to stop rich people from having too much money, well they do. It's just that, the rich people are so insanely rich they don't need to sell any materials to the merchants or anything like that, they only buy the stuff.

Gold sinks are fine, so long as there's money going around well so people can spend it on the gold sinks...right now it's just...alright...poor...people...who can't buy hardly anything because...everything is a gold sink.

Nasenbluten · Jul 17, 2005, 08:51 PM // 20:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Algren Cole

I made 6 plat in about two hours...guess what I was doing.

holy mother of crap....I WAS PLAYING THE GAME!!!

and where are you ascended? rofl, Gl trying to play the game through and not farming and get some decent armor.

generik · Jul 17, 2005, 10:10 PM // 22:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by KuTeBaka

how will they lose money if the buyers have already payed?

How do you foresee they will *stay* in business if nobody buys their expansions? Afterall people "have already paid".

Willow · Jul 17, 2005, 11:56 PM // 23:56

EVERYONE should read Shagsbeard's post.

Now that you've done that,

Shagsbeard- I don't agree that 0/0 is a fixed point. A-net must have a price floor set in. Assuming the market were to bottom out, people would still buy runes at the low low price, which will raise the values of items.

So the question is, what's the equilibrium price level?

I have found that I get armor with runes where it's better just to sell the armor to merchants. So I would say that the equilibrium sell level is equal to average armor gold piece value of runes. If it drops below that, people will buy but not sell and the price will go up. If it is above that, people will sell, and it will go down.

Kishin · Jul 18, 2005, 12:07 AM // 00:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhineasToke

The entire point to being competitive in any game is aquiring resources to purchase better equipment to survive the harder areas designed into the game. Now that pharmable resource prices are in the tank, rare items are trading much higher to offset the gold losses. Early this week, basic 20-24 fortitude sword pommels were 500-1K. Today they're 1.5-5K.

Watching prices today, everything has gone beserk. Fur selling by individuals now 500, silver dye 1.5K and on and on. AN better pay attention real quick because all there are in the trade channels are sellers, not buyers, and this game was designed for PLAYING not trading.

I get more pissed at this situation by the minute.

I don't see any problem with acquiring better (statisticlaly) equipment once you reach the Desert. There, you can pick up enough mob item drops (most of which even sell for about 100gp a pop) trade it to the right collector, and walk away with the best armor (well, best AL armor. Not all the armor is the best armor, as the bonuses might not be suitable), best focus, or best weapon available to you. My Ascalon Short bow is worth about 500-700gp in Hydras claws and has the stats of a 300K Yellow Short Bow. if having the equipment you need to finish the PvE is your worry, just use the collectors.

The only things hard to afford under this current economy are vanity items, and honestly, thats all yellow and purple items are to me when I can get the upgrade components and items I need to max out one out to my heart's content. 15K Armor? You're never going to have it before you finish the PvE, and its not in any way necessary.

PieXags · Jul 18, 2005, 12:14 AM // 00:14

For the record, most desert drops (weapons/focus/shields) sell for around 50gp each, not 100. In fact most sell for less than 50gp, and the collectors items sell for about 20gp.

Drakron · Jul 18, 2005, 12:32 AM // 00:32

The problem with collectors items its not optimized, sure we get max damage swords +15% when enchanted but were is my +1 to swordmanship and my +30 health mods on it?

And you cannot salvage it.

Besides since drops have been nerfed good luck on finding 5 of some required items since in some cases (like sand wurms) its hard to get then to drop anything since henchies take a cut and few players are willing to go item hunting.

Also collectors dont offer subsets, you get stuck with the basic set.

Kishin · Jul 18, 2005, 01:13 AM // 01:13

There are multiple types of collector weapons, which cover pretty much all the bonuses. Also, you can simply buy the upgrade components and slap them on the weapon.

P.S. A maximum defense upgrade (+5 armor) yields better results than +30 HP.

As for 5 of the required items? I never had any problems, even with the bleached shells. I got three of them on my own (One of the wurm that always spawns near Hero's Audience and 2 in Dunes of Despair), and I bought the rest in town. Losaru manes, hydra claws, mandibles, carapaces and minotaur horns are all almost no trouble to get at all. I seriously don't think I ever devoted more than 30 minutes to actively finding some of this stuff. The rest I just picked up wandering the desert.

Jczech · Jul 18, 2005, 01:56 AM // 01:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Drakron

The problem with collectors items its not optimized, sure we get max damage swords +15% when enchanted but were is my +1 to swordmanship and my +30 health mods on it?

Collector items are optimized.. base items. You get the best possible stats for an item with no modifiers on it. If you want +30 hp, go out and find or buy one.

As for the reason prices are insane.. I feel it's because of greed. Take black dye as an example.

As of the time of this post, it's going for 6 platinum. Now, if people were to sell black dye to the trader, the prices would eventually go back down. However, since selling black dye this way will probably only get you 4.5 plat, most people opt to selling to players for 5.5 platinum. The seller gets a deal, the buyer gets a deal, and everyone is happy. The downside being since either the dye trader either has very slow or no natural increase of how many dyes he has left, players will continue to buy, but not sell, which only further drives the prices up. A good example of this, is the globs of ectoplasm.

When people first started selling them to the trader, the trader had no experience with the product, and probably didn't sell very high. Many players, however, didn't see the demand (I don't think there was much demand at the time) and so, a good many ectoplasms were sold to the trader, giving it a healthy base. When demand first skyrocketed, ectos were 5 plat to buy and probably around 3 plat to sell, and, since demand was high, why sell for 3 what you can sell for 4, or 4.5?

And again, since greed took over and nobody sold back to the trader, prices continued to increase, and at 10 plat an ecto, why sell for 7 when you can get 9 or 10 from a player? And now, because nobody sold ecto to the trader, both it and shards are now out of stock, never to be sold by the trader again. I have no idea what players are buying for it now, but even if the trader offered 10 plat for an ecto, players would still pay more.

This same things goes for every other trader as well. Since everyone wants that extra bit of money, traders are eventually all going out of stock, and *then* the economy will be in a mess, as just about everything will be player controlled.. and well, that's not going to work.

And for a suggestion. Perhaps if the game monitored trades somewhat (people selling 1 ecto for 10 plat and such) then took the averages of those recent trades and set that as the base price that traders would buy for, maybe then the economy would start to fix itself. Sure, there would be a few free trades between guild members, but those could either be ignored or might not even show much decrease at all in the overall picture. Maybe then people would start selling back to the merchants instead of spamming towns (since prices would be what most people would get anyway).

Sure, there would have to be safeguards (to prevent people from just taking an ecto and selling it back and forth between two people for 100k, perhaps only look at the first trade between players, not any others between the same two people for an hour or even a day), and still factor in the merchant's natural supply and demand scripting. But if the merchant isn't going to pay what people are willing to pay, it's just going to be skipped completely and it won't matter how good your code is if it's not keeping up with the economy.