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DEATH TO THE AUCTION HOUSE!!!

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    • 428 posts
    February 6, 2016 7:12 PM PST

    I have played MMO with auction houses only the EC tunnel crap and the Timesink that was EVE.  Nothing like spending a an hour or so just to buy one part and risk losing billion isk ships.  I hated not having options based on the time I have available

    • 999 posts
    February 6, 2016 7:15 PM PST

     

    Krixus said:

    No auction house will give rise to professional buyers and sellers too, people who get rich on the market and equip themselves without doing much adventuring. My daily group in the beginning of EQ would offload our bronze/fine steel/etc to a guy just to be rid of it and he'd turn around and flip it and did very well for himself. There are tons of examples like this that an auction house would not allow to happen. 

    I just disagree here 100% as well.  An AH provides a player who wants to monopolize the market "much" more opportunity to corner the market and buy low/resell high than the EC face to face style.  Could it still happen in the EC system, sure, but it's much less likely than being able to see exactly the price of what everything is listed for at any one time (even if it's locally).  A player in the EC has to literally be on 24/7 to corner the market, where all it takes for the AH is for Trader A to buy all the listed bat wings at 5 PP and resell them at 10 PP.

    AH provides the convenience of automated selling/buying items - there's really no other benefit and only negatives. 

    • 1778 posts
    February 6, 2016 7:16 PM PST

    geatz said:

    Amsai said:

    @Kalgore

    Nice and sensable.

     

    It isn't sensable to completely eliminate an aspect to the game.  I mean I don't like crafting and I know a lot of other people don't, so maybe we can keep the crafting trade alive but for those of us that don't want to craft we can just go and purchase our own NPC crafter, that way I can get the weapons I want without having to actually craft or buy from PC crafters.  Sounds fair and sensible to me, I mean you can still craft and I can get all the benefits of crafting without doing the work.

    Reaching a bit there arent ya?

     

    I can be silly too if ya want?

     

    There has to be some thing that can be done? Do we want to explore that or just say it needs to be such and such way or else? 

    • 105 posts
    February 6, 2016 7:41 PM PST

    Amsai said:

    geatz said:

    Amsai said:

    @Kalgore

    Nice and sensable.

     

    It isn't sensable to completely eliminate an aspect to the game.  I mean I don't like crafting and I know a lot of other people don't, so maybe we can keep the crafting trade alive but for those of us that don't want to craft we can just go and purchase our own NPC crafter, that way I can get the weapons I want without having to actually craft or buy from PC crafters.  Sounds fair and sensible to me, I mean you can still craft and I can get all the benefits of crafting without doing the work.

    Reaching a bit there arent ya?

     

    I can be silly too if ya want?

     

    There has to be some thing that can be done? Do we want to explore that or just say it needs to be such and such way or else? 

     

    I wasn't being silly, that's an exact compliment to what you are trying to do with an auction system.  You're trying to sell me that you aren't eliminating trade by making it completely unnecessary to spend time trading when you can just use an auction system and it does all the work for you.  You don't like trading, I get it, I don't like crafting, but I'm not posting on boards complaining that I don't have the time to reap the benefits of crafting my own gear and then asking that they put a system in place so I can reap the benefits with minimal work.  Why can't selling just be an aspect of the game you don't have time for.  Keep questing or camping or whatever it is you do and either find someone to sell your gear or vendor trash it if you don't like doing it. 

    • 1714 posts
    February 6, 2016 8:11 PM PST

    Raidan said:

     

    Krixus said:

    No auction house will give rise to professional buyers and sellers too, people who get rich on the market and equip themselves without doing much adventuring. My daily group in the beginning of EQ would offload our bronze/fine steel/etc to a guy just to be rid of it and he'd turn around and flip it and did very well for himself. There are tons of examples like this that an auction house would not allow to happen. 

    I just disagree here 100% as well.  An AH provides a player who wants to monopolize the market "much" more opportunity to corner the market and buy low/resell high than the EC face to face style.  Could it still happen in the EC system, sure, but it's much less likely than being able to see exactly the price of what everything is listed for at any one time (even if it's locally).  A player in the EC has to literally be on 24/7 to corner the market, where all it takes for the AH is for Trader A to buy all the listed bat wings at 5 PP and resell them at 10 PP.

    AH provides the convenience of automated selling/buying items - there's really no other benefit and only negatives. 

     

    I didn't do a good job of descrbing what I was after. 

    • 1714 posts
    February 6, 2016 8:11 PM PST

    Raidan said:

     

    Krixus said:

    No auction house will give rise to professional buyers and sellers too, people who get rich on the market and equip themselves without doing much adventuring. My daily group in the beginning of EQ would offload our bronze/fine steel/etc to a guy just to be rid of it and he'd turn around and flip it and did very well for himself. There are tons of examples like this that an auction house would not allow to happen. 

    I just disagree here 100% as well.  An AH provides a player who wants to monopolize the market "much" more opportunity to corner the market and buy low/resell high than the EC face to face style.  Could it still happen in the EC system, sure, but it's much less likely than being able to see exactly the price of what everything is listed for at any one time (even if it's locally).  A player in the EC has to literally be on 24/7 to corner the market, where all it takes for the AH is for Trader A to buy all the listed bat wings at 5 PP and resell them at 10 PP.

    AH provides the convenience of automated selling/buying items - there's really no other benefit and only negatives. 

     

    I didn't do a good job of descrbing what I was after. 

    • 1778 posts
    February 6, 2016 8:17 PM PST

    Wait a second Im not trying to do anything. I dont necessarily say there has to be an AH. This is all Ive wanted:

     

    Convenience of finding every day items and the possibility of a more involved search for less common/important items. And I have agreed with some kind of board that you can check to see who is selling what. Even if that means having to see where they are and physically go there or contact them directly. I think Im being fairly open to ideas?

    I just dont want searching for a pinch of salt to turn into a damned 4 hour quest. I dont really find that unreasonable.

    • 130 posts
    February 6, 2016 8:24 PM PST

    If I could get VR to promise one thing if they do actually go with a auction house -- PLEASE provide charts showing historical price data.  There's a website showing P1999 item pricing history and I thought that was totally slick.  The data would be there for the taking, record it and plot it on a chart that way it would be very easy to see if you're getting gouged or scoring a killer deal.

    I'll go with whatever system gets put in place as long as the game is fun and challenging like the glory days but if you're gonna do an auction house at least have a plethora of useful options, go biggie on the fries or go home.

    • 578 posts
    February 6, 2016 9:33 PM PST

    Mephiles said:

    NoobieDoo said:

    Mephiles said:

    Krixus said:

     

    People CHOOSE where to build their cities. People CHOSE the EC tunnel, because it was a population and travel hub. Freeport and the connection between NRO and EC is the river, not the freakin auction house. Good grief. 

     I didn't say that the tunnel was an auction house, im saying that the tunnel existed where it was for the same reasons why people go to an auction house.People CHOOSE to use the auction house in the place it is located if doing so is convenient. It is the same exact thing, people CHOOSE what makes sense and if it makes sense to use an auction house they will do so and if it does not then they will not, if using the auction house AND having a player market makes sense then it will happen.



    The EC tunnel, where it is, did NOT exist for the same reasons. The EC tunnel came to life organically due to location, population, safety, amnemnities, etc. The auction house are specifically designed and vendors are placed in specific location all across the world. PLAYERS created the EC tunnel where DEVELOPERS create the auction houses. Yes, certain auction houses tend to be more popular than others due to location, population, etc but this has nothing to do with what the EC tunnel is or how it was created.

    "The main reason you seem to have a problem with an auction house is not that it is truly artificial or that it isn't infrastructure for players to organically form around (do not forget that most games offer alternatives to using the auction house for trade and thus it is player choice that drives them to the auction house) but that you want a structure of market that is more controled by players than an auction house is." this is a quote by you from a previous response.

    NO this is NOT the problem. I can't speak for Krixus myself but I'm pretty sure this isn't what his problem is. The problem is that it eliminates the NECCESSITY of that face-to-face transaction. The EC tunnel is a singular trading house (so to say), where ALL the trading is done specifically in that one area. It's immersive. You have to physically be there to sell your items and you have to physically go there to buy any items. It's not a connected web of NPCs who contain all the items of the world to sell to you at the press of a button. Auction houses are all over in many different cities. No matter where you are in the world chances are there is an auction house near by. Chances in EQ were that you could be VERY far from the EC tunnel and if you were in need of some items for you to make use of its 'trading system' you had to physcially go to the EC tunnel.

    I don't want to sound cliche' or whatever but I don't know what other words to use, but there is something magical when stuff like that creates itself organically. And having a global auction house could hurt the chances of organic features and/or immersive gameplay such as the EC tunnel from possibly happening in Pantheon.

     

    Yellow: That IS the same thing, developer design of the world and placed tools/features resulted in it being located where it is.

    Again, your issue is related to the LEVEL of player control of the market NOT that dev introduced elements are artificial (every element of the game directly or indirecty results in player action which would make all aspects of a game artificial causing that to lose meaning).

     

    Red: That is false and I explained how that is so. It CAN do that but there are ways that an auction house can be implimented that does NOT eliminate that.

     



    No offense but this conversation is going nowhere because you don't seem to understand some of these concepts. I honestly don't know if you are trolling us, if you are young and are having troubles comprehending some of this, or if you are just trolling us lol but for whatever the reason you are just not getting this, we are just going to have to disagree and go our separate ways. But I leave you with this...

    The way the EC tunnel was created, the way it functions, its purpose, its result is completely different than what auction houses are. They are not the same. They are absolutely completely without a doubt 100% different. There is nothing you can say that will change this, no matter how many words, big or small, you use. It's legit a fact.

    Lol how are you going to tell me what MY issue is with this feature??? Lol I created this thread, this topic, so I'm pretty sure I know what my issue is. And where does this "Again, your issue is related to the LEVEL of player control of the market NOT that dev introduced elements are artificial" even come from??? my issue is not related to the level blahblahblah nor are you right that my issue is that the devs introduced artificial elements. Among many other reasons I have already explained, I PERSONALLY do not want the auction house because I would love for PLAYER HOUSING to implement trading vendor NPCs. A global auction house would greatly hurt the value of this concept.

    The text you highlighted in red, AGAIN, is a FACT. I said auction houses eliminate the NECCESSITY of face-to-face trades, not that they eliminate face-to-face trading in its entirety. There is a difference. I even put the word in capital letters to emphasize it's importance. Yes, even though a game has an auction house players can still trade face-to-face. But the key factor is that they do not NEED to, they can just go to the closest AH and shop there which in reality is mainly what happens.

    I believe player housing in EQ and VG was poorly implemented and I do not want to see the same happen with Pantheon if and when it is implemented. So I like what Wildstar did a lot and how they made player housing have ALL of these cool little features that made them important to gameplay and not just some side feature that had no tie to the game. VG there was litterally nothing that tied your house to the game and since these little villages were non-instanced and located in the world they became ghost towns because other than fluff and a break from the game, there was really no reason to ever visit your house. If players were able to spawn NPCs at their house to do various things such as sell their items when they are not home or not online then this would give reason for not only the owner to visit the house and area but would give reason to other would-be purchasers to vist. If there were an auction house then there would be NO NEED to visit these player houses

    I leave you with this...

    I think either you are trolling us are you are confusing the concept that AH vendors were designed and designated BEFORE they become popular NOT THE SAME as the EC tunnel was designed and designated AFTER the location became popular with the concept that the EC tunnel was popular because of its location and its usefulness the same way that certain AH vendors are more popular than others due to their location and usefulness.

    I don't have anything else to add to this so good day to you!

    • 1434 posts
    February 6, 2016 10:42 PM PST

    Amsai said:

    Wait a second Im not trying to do anything. I dont necessarily say there has to be an AH. This is all Ive wanted:

     

    Convenience of finding every day items and the possibility of a more involved search for less common/important items. And I have agreed with some kind of board that you can check to see who is selling what. Even if that means having to see where they are and physically go there or contact them directly. I think Im being fairly open to ideas?

    I just dont want searching for a pinch of salt to turn into a damned 4 hour quest. I dont really find that unreasonable.

    And yet you mocked my suggestion which adds convenience for normal items, but with a greater cost for rarer items. What I suggested is a way for convenience to come with a price. Most people wouldn't use a global AH for expensive item, but for crafting materials, reagents or other common items, it would be perfect. Mostly likely a lot of players will want to put a little time in and sacrifice that convenience to go find a consignment shop which will offer more valuable items with less fees involved. Then other people would probably want to use player vendors like DAOC, where they search personal vendors in cities or housing areas and track down the items they want. Finally, those who want to do it the old fashioned way, and make the most money, will advertise buying and selling and track the players down themselves. 

    That system really offers something for everyone and fits into what many of you are saying that you want.

    You know what will shock people more than a high fees or taxes? Having to manually trade every item in 2017.


    This post was edited by Dullahan at February 6, 2016 10:44 PM PST
    • 208 posts
    February 6, 2016 11:01 PM PST

    Krixus said:

    geatz said:

    There should be no bazaar, there should be no Auction System, because the game shouldn’t be catering to those who don't want to spend the effort to sell their goods, to some of us it wasn't a burden but an awesome element to the game that we enjoyed.  If you want to sell stuff, I certainly hope there will be a means to do it, but there is no reason why you need an Auction House, except that you want to make easy money selling your junk without putting in the time to do it.  Personally, I want to put the time into doing it, socializing and bargaining and traveling, an Auction house kills that.  If the server develops an East Commons, joy, good for the community, that's pretty cool, and will make life a little easier for people who want to sell, but there is no reason to insert an Auction House.  The only reason anyone wants it, is because you don't want to put the time into doing it, you want the game to be about getting good deals with little work, by inserting Amazon.com into the game.  This was an awesome sandbox element to EQ, I hope they keep it alive and don't cater to those that want to spend all day camping mobs, questing, or crafting, and still be able to sell anything they want with ease.  Keep the trade aspect of the game alive, some of us enjoy doing that.  I recommended earlier actually making trader a profession I would be cool with a system like that because it doesn't kill the dream.

    No auction house will give rise to professional buyers and sellers too, people who get rich on the market and equip themselves without doing much adventuring. My daily group in the beginning of EQ would offload our bronze/fine steel/etc to a guy just to be rid of it and he'd turn around and flip it and did very well for himself. There are tons of examples like this that an auction house would not allow to happen. 

    Actually this is false. The AH in WoW was monopolized on many servers. You can Google search for proof on that. Plenty of discussion on the subject.

    • 1778 posts
    February 6, 2016 11:04 PM PST

    Well I was just shocked at the high tax percentage. Maybe Ill just butter up a crafting buddy and be done with it. Ill give him mats and he makes me food/pots when I need it.

     

    Too many ideas running around and nothing is coherent or desirable to every other person. And I think this thread has seen crazy at both ends of the argument.

     

    I hate to use this idea because I seems to be a go to answer for **** people dont like. But wouldnt this be a good thing to have alternate server rulesets for? Call it the Hardcore Economy Server or Maybe it would be more appropriate on the RP server, you know ... immersion and such.

    • 610 posts
    February 7, 2016 1:23 AM PST

    Raidan said: To start - I will admit my bias. I'm just flat out against automation. @Dullahan Even with taxes the economy would eventually equalize with the going rate on items and taxes would be a hinderance nothing more. The vast majority would use the AH still and the only real positive effect of the taxes would be curbing inflation by removing gold from the market. Basically you would have items marked up due to taxes, but people would use the AH still due to convenience. Would there be a few outliers such as epic level crafted items sold in person - sure, but you remove most of all the trader gameplay. And, my desire for no automation is not entirely about trade itself, but the other negative ramifications that are impacted as a result which I mentioned in my novel on the first page. The compromise for me would be the trade board/classified ad/craiglist style that would still require the trader to be online and present also mentioned in the same post. And @Aradune - as far as scaring away gamers, in any challenging aspect of life - if I know the expectations, how to do engage in the activity etc. I (players) will adapt. Hardly anyone is going to sign up for the most challenging task, but most everyone feels better after accomplishing one versus a trivial task. And, once they experience the sandbox style, I firmly believe its one or those aspects they'll like it even if they don't think they will before trying it. Worst case scenario, you add an AH later - you can't go back from one.

     

    Couldnt agree more

    • 610 posts
    February 7, 2016 1:55 AM PST

    One thing I would really like to see if there is any kind of home bound npc auto seller...

    The need to have a merchants license to sell so that not just any tom dick or harry can flood the market with every little piece of trash they find.

    To recieve your merchants license you must first be a master in a trade skill...I mean honestly only people with a skill would open a shop. Not only would you be required to pay a tax (nothing as extreme as a consignment shop just a local sales tax) but you would have a monthly fee to maintain your good standing as a merchant. Also you would be restricted to selling wares that were related to your Tradeskill...bakers sell baked goods, Armorers sell armor and repairs etc etc....Now you could open a general merchants shop without being a master TSer....but it would be a pretty hefty fee for a merchants license. As a general merchant you could sell pretty much most items that are not restricted to the specialty shops, such as most TS items (spider silks, pelts and so forth) you could also sell items that are needed but not provided else where....bat wings, bone chips and others. I know this is a rough form idea and would need a bunch of tweaking but I could see something like this working well.

    You could still sell big item drops on the "black market"

    As part of your membership in the trade guild your wares would be posted on a billboard (for lack of  a better word) but would also be local only....but maybe for an extra fee you could take out ads in other cities so your name and wares could start to get an international reputation

    And even with prices being listed on a Billboard you would still need to locate that shop and transact your business there


    This post was edited by Sevens at February 7, 2016 2:02 AM PST
    • 158 posts
    February 7, 2016 2:29 AM PST

    NoobieDoo said:


    No offense but this conversation is going nowhere because you don't seem to understand some of these concepts. I honestly don't know if you are trolling us, if you are young and are having troubles comprehending some of this, or if you are just trolling us lol but for whatever the reason you are just not getting this, we are just going to have to disagree and go our separate ways. But I leave you with this...

    The way the EC tunnel was created, the way it functions, its purpose, its result is completely different than what auction houses are. They are not the same. They are absolutely completely without a doubt 100% different. There is nothing you can say that will change this, no matter how many words, big or small, you use. It's legit a fact.

    Lol how are you going to tell me what MY issue is with this feature??? Lol I created this thread, this topic, so I'm pretty sure I know what my issue is. And where does this "Again, your issue is related to the LEVEL of player control of the market NOT that dev introduced elements are artificial" even come from??? my issue is not related to the level blahblahblah nor are you right that my issue is that the devs introduced artificial elements. Among many other reasons I have already explained, I PERSONALLY do not want the auction house because I would love for PLAYER HOUSING to implement trading vendor NPCs. A global auction house would greatly hurt the value of this concept.

    I am not trolling in the least and find it absolutely hillarious that you don't seem to get this.

    Yellow: You keep saying it is a fact but fail to present a case where I have. It is very, very simple, the EQ tunnel exists because of dev implimented features.  Auction house trade exists because of dev implimented features. BOTH are a product of DEV IMPLIMENTED FEATURES. I guess player trade is artifical too no? I mean players didn't build a trade window or a chat channel for the game. How about the layout of the worlds map, I suppose players made the EQ tunnel the connected spot that it was too? If you can't understand that regardless of if it was a direct system put in the game for that specific purpose or an indirect result of features that made it the place to be then I don't know what to tell you. Why was the EQ tunnel not off in some random corner of the world? I can tell you why, its because of those "artifical" elements that the designers put in the game that makes the spot people picked the logical location for such a market intended or not. The order for how this happens is not important, the net result is the same.

     

    Red: I am mostly responding to the concept of the auction house inherently invalidating player markets and the idea that it is somehow less artificial than any other pixle in the game. That is what I am attempting to draw intent from, not your out there concept of player housing. Why player housing even comes into this discussion when it is probably not even going to be in the game on release and may not be in the game for a very long time makes it a very silly thing to build the market around. As much as I like player housing and making it meaningful, useful and dynamic there are other ways it can and should be utilized but leaning on it as part of the economy design when it could be 2+ years out from launch? I don't know about that.

     

    "The text you highlighted in red, AGAIN, is a FACT. I said auction houses eliminate the NECCESSITY of face-to-face trades, not that they eliminate face-to-face trading in its entirety."

     

    I explained why this is false, because if you use a system where not all items can be traded on the auction house then it is once again NECCESSARY to trade face to face or at least with a player kiosk if allowed there.

     

     


    This post was edited by Mephiles at February 7, 2016 2:30 AM PST
    • 126 posts
    February 7, 2016 2:29 AM PST

    geatz said:

    Amsai said:

    @Kalgore

    Nice and sensable.

     

    It isn't sensable to completely eliminate an aspect to the game.  I mean I don't like crafting and I know a lot of other people don't, so maybe we can keep the crafting trade alive but for those of us that don't want to craft we can just go and purchase our own NPC crafter, that way I can get the weapons I want without having to actually craft or buy from PC crafters.  Sounds fair and sensible to me, I mean you can still craft and I can get all the benefits of crafting without doing the work.

     

    Sure, for some people is crafting a chore. It is also very time consuming and some people don't like it. Do you think that trading should take more time than crafting said item? Should trading be a chore? And note, he did NOT said, he didn't like trading. He didn't like the tunnel because of the "massive amount of time" it needed to even find simple items.

    I guess some of you were teenager back in early EQ, but even if not, do you still have so much time at hand, 16 years later? Really, I envy you and mean it wholeheartedly. Really. A LOT of people don't have that much time at hand to just waste it away selling or buying basic things. If I need three hours to find that crafter who is able to make a really good thing, then great. But let my time be worth the purchase! If I find me logging in and the challenge of the day is trying to find 3 chicken feet for two hours, then i can only imagine how laborious that'd be. Or if I would try to sell 3 chicken feet for two hours.

    I want a game to be fun and challenging. Mindless time consuming for the most basic and ordinary things (as is trading) does not equal challenge, at least not for me. Pure time spent is not challenge. 

    When you pretend that some kind of board/broker/thing would kill the community, kill the all the social aspect of the game, kill all the interaction, then you can't be serious and stretch your argument a bit too far. There are a lot more points were people connect and come together. And convenience in basic things doesn't kill challenge either. Just because EQ was your first love in MMOs doesn't mean it is the non plus ultra in all things. Nostalgia IS a powerful force, but Pantheon needs more people than just you EQ diehards.


    This post was edited by Duffy at February 7, 2016 2:31 AM PST
    • 158 posts
    February 7, 2016 2:43 AM PST

    Amsai said:

    I hate to use this idea because I seems to be a go to answer for **** people dont like. But wouldnt this be a good thing to have alternate server rulesets for? Call it the Hardcore Economy Server or Maybe it would be more appropriate on the RP server, you know ... immersion and such.

    That might actually be a good way to handle it (though with all of the different requests people might have for differeing types of servers it would have to be seen what main categories they can break servers into).

    I think though that many of the people in here are failing to consider this little tent pole for pantheon:

    "Will Pantheon require me to play for hours and hours or all night and all day to advance my character? No. While the world of Terminus will consist of vast landscapes and epic dungeons, there is no reason to require players to play long, contiguous gaming sessions. Players will be able to play a couple of hours, logout, and return later to continue their journey." - from the about page

     

    I think they said they were aiming to make it so you could chunk progress in 2 hour windows?

     

    One thing pantheon is aiming to do is to keep the long term investment and serious nature of the game while at the same time making individual play times more manageable for a busy adult schedule. Does spending all of your time for a game session trying to trade for esscential items make sense in this setting? I don't think so, it sounds like it is incurring a lot of wasted time through use of non-optional inefficient methods of trade.


    This post was edited by Mephiles at February 7, 2016 2:45 AM PST
    • 105 posts
    February 7, 2016 6:14 AM PST

    Duffy said:

     

    Sure, for some people is crafting a chore. It is also very time consuming and some people don't like it. Do you think that trading should take more time than crafting said item? Should trading be a chore? And note, he did NOT said, he didn't like trading. He didn't like the tunnel because of the "massive amount of time" it needed to even find simple items.

    I guess some of you were teenager back in early EQ, but even if not, do you still have so much time at hand, 16 years later? Really, I envy you and mean it wholeheartedly. Really. A LOT of people don't have that much time at hand to just waste it away selling or buying basic things. If I need three hours to find that crafter who is able to make a really good thing, then great. But let my time be worth the purchase! If I find me logging in and the challenge of the day is trying to find 3 chicken feet for two hours, then i can only imagine how laborious that'd be. Or if I would try to sell 3 chicken feet for two hours.

    I want a game to be fun and challenging. Mindless time consuming for the most basic and ordinary things (as is trading) does not equal challenge, at least not for me. Pure time spent is not challenge. 

    When you pretend that some kind of board/broker/thing would kill the community, kill the all the social aspect of the game, kill all the interaction, then you can't be serious and stretch your argument a bit too far. There are a lot more points were people connect and come together. And convenience in basic things doesn't kill challenge either. Just because EQ was your first love in MMOs doesn't mean it is the non plus ultra in all things. Nostalgia IS a powerful force, but Pantheon needs more people than just you EQ diehards.

     

    You don't need to trade just as you don't need to craft, vendors will be setup to sell your gear at a minimal price, I'm sure.  I don't consider trading a chore or mindless, I like the social aspect of it and I hope there is some travel involved so I can find better worth for my items.  I'm fine with increasing the fun factor of trading by making it a trade skill or something, to make it more appealing, but I'm not for making it more convenient just because some of you don't like doing it.  If you want to put a system in place so I that I get a consignment fee for selling your items, I'm okay with it, but it should be player driven.  

    The board/broker/thing won't kill the community, it won't even kill all the social aspects game, neither will killing crafting.  

    I don't think EQ handled it perfectly and I think it can be improved upon, but it doesn't need to be completely blown out of the water by adding NPC's or an Auction House to do the job for us.  It's not nostalgia, I just don't enjoy all these convenience features that draw your attention out of the world and ruin the satisfaction of not being able to accomplish anything grand because everyone is basically capable of doing everything without any sacrifice of other content.  We live in a gaming time where everyone wants to have time to do everything and there is a certain amount of entitlement from the gamers that this is how it should always be.  I hate the direction of the current MMO market this is true and the core tenants of this game from the developers is to break away from the convenience features of the current crap out there, and here you are trying to argue that we should be putting them back in for convenience sake.  Mind is blown...

    I was hoping this topic would go a different direction, maybe discussing way's to improve trade, but instead I hear people whining for the same destruction of the craft that everyother MMO has done and which we aren't playing...I'm not posting on this topic anymore, I've made my point and I think I've made a good case for not including an Auction House or Broker System. 


    This post was edited by geatz at February 7, 2016 6:16 AM PST
    • 157 posts
    February 7, 2016 6:40 AM PST
    A great conversation. With many emergent opinions. Convenience vs economic control, and both sides with strenghts and weaknesses. I really can't see the total disappearance of the AH mechanic, but I can understand the arguments both for and against it. Perhaps an AH with price regulation of some sort? A scalable tax that increases the further away you get from an item's vendor price? Perhaps this puts items into circulation while discouraging gouging?
    • 999 posts
    February 7, 2016 6:54 AM PST

    Mephiles said:

    I think though that many of the people in here are failing to consider this little tent pole for pantheon:

    "Will Pantheon require me to play for hours and hours or all night and all day to advance my character? No. While the world of Terminus will consist of vast landscapes and epic dungeons, there is no reason to require players to play long, contiguous gaming sessions. Players will be able to play a couple of hours, logout, and return later to continue their journey." - from the about page

     

    I think they said they were aiming to make it so you could chunk progress in 2 hour windows?

     

    One thing pantheon is aiming to do is to keep the long term investment and serious nature of the game while at the same time making individual play times more manageable for a busy adult schedule. Does spending all of your time for a game session trying to trade for esscential items make sense in this setting? I don't think so, it sounds like it is incurring a lot of wasted time through use of non-optional inefficient methods of trade.

    I'm sure prior to your edit, your EQ point was aimed at posters such as myself; however, I don't claim for masochist elements because I always "enjoy" them or they are best for my time constraints, but I try to look outside of my wants and whats best for the MMO as a whole.  I fit in the 2-3 play window (I have a wife, kids, jobs, etc.), and have even admitted I would use an AH if it was available, but that doesn't mean that I can't see the value in a player trade system versus fully automated or partially automated.

    As far as EQ goes - once you knew where/how to level in EQ, it really wasn't an inordinate amount of time to obtain max level from 1-50.  Where EQ slowed the progression was by including some of the tasks that you (others) deem as trivial timesinks that should be tweaked/modified/removed.  Player trade, meaningful travel, boats, corpse runs, exp penalties, etc.  However, they didn't feel trivial in EQ, they felt organic and part of the journey.  And it was participating in those activities that kept content more relevant, that allowed developers to keep up with content/expansions and people weren't all max level in 2 weeks (yes, you had the power gamers still)  And, I'll agree, after the added convenience of AH today or similar changes in other mechanics, and reflecting, many of EQ systems seem archaic compartively.  

    But, I'll give a real life example for comparison.  I don't think anyone would give back their cell phones/laptops/social media, etc. etc., but the true face to face interactions and conversations are becoming a dying experience.  People are more "connected" today but they are more distant at the same time.  Just look at couples out to eat - I can't even tell you how many times I see people that don't even talk and are on their cell phones sitting across from each other.  While cell phones/technology have definitely added a ton of convenience and have advanced us, we've also lost some of the social elements.  So back to Pantheon, I'd argue, the more technology/automation etc. that is added the more "social" experiences that are lost.  Whether that is good/bad/indifferent is subjective, but if I'm arguing for creating a social MMO, I'd wager it was bad.

    And, let's be honest, you didn't need to go to the EC or wherever you chose to sell everyday, I went to sell my wares maybe every other week or once a month at best when I had enough money/items, etc. to make it worthwhile.

    But, I'll discuss some of the timesinks that were in EQ that are always argued as not needed or are highly contested as needed and if they will ruin Pantheon if not implemented.

    1.  Will solely adding an AH ruin Pantheon?  No.  

    2.  Will solely adding graveyards in zones and/or removing bind location restrictions ruin Pantheon.  No.  

    3.  Will solely removing corpse runs ruin Pantheon.  No

    4.  Will solely having VG level exp loss from death versus EQ ruin Pantheon.  No

    5.  Will solely having Mounts ruin Pantheon.  No

    6.  Will solely having Campfires/Safe spots/Caravans/Fellowships ruin Pantheon.  No

    7.  Will solely having a fellowship/mentoring system ruin Pantheon.  No

    8.  Will solely having translocators versus boats ruin Pantheon.  No

    Etc. etc.

    The problem is, if you remove all of those (and others) or a combination of them and move the slider towards convenience to make sure Pantheon is accessible - you're removing the very essence of what would make Pantheon different from new age MMOs.  Pantheon becomes nothing more than the rush to end-game with potentially harder content from 1-50.  It's the player mentality that I must have fun at all times (if that's only adventuring) that has to change and recognize/appreciate that you have to have the punishing/boring/monotonous to have and truly appreciate the good/great/excellent.

     


    This post was edited by Raidan at February 7, 2016 6:59 AM PST
    • 671 posts
    February 7, 2016 7:02 AM PST

    Katalyzt said:

    Hieromonk said:

    If this game has an acution house, I won't be playing.

    Acution houses are counter to a living world, counter to travel & counter to a functioning society.

     

     

    Automated trade is not bad, if done on a One on One basis. (Not under one roof).

    ie: One spends his months playing..  deep in the dark woods seeking rare Yew, to (not cut down, but) splice the regrow their own... just to make a special type of Elven bows.. thats takes months to make. Yet yield the best properties, etc. And while also being a grandmaster fletcher & making some of the best arrows and other precision ranged items..  in which you have your warez up fopr sale at a merchant tent outside your local Village. In which you paid a NPC worker to harks your warez for you, for a cost. There is also a village tax to consider.

    Ironically, at any point you can hark your own warez free of tax, ..or locality. (Oldschool).

    With such mechanics in place, One can tweak it so only savvy and direct & active players will be able to maintain a shop head, in a small village..  so remote that you almost missed in passing.

    Bigger Towns, or Cities can have higher costs and taxes associated with it. (this mechanic alone fits ideally to when housing is introdiced (2019?), that nobody wealthy enough will be able to own homes near cities yet.. might takes years. And then you probably won't see homes, but Manses & Guild Halls & Keeps..  will go up near cities. Tents are a different story. Most of the populace will scramble to own homes with the least amount of taxes and cost out in the rural and remote areas... where there is more danger. 

     

    Ideally, One can take those^ suggested mechanics, & use them in many ways. Perhaps ties into that, the only way you can use an /auction channel (in cities), would be that you need a rented store head/merchent tent, etc.

    Understand, in EQ...  equipment (except lockpicks) didn't break, or decay. That will not be so in Pantheon. There will be constant source of money pits... taxes, gear upkeep, rations, etc. Maintaining a large Guild can be expensive. Preperation & planning will cut costs. No master fletcher in guild? You might need to travel an hour to the Yew valley, to your little known player merchant..  to get 5000 arrows for your next guild outing. A trip you've made several times before... from an established fletcher who makes highest quality stuff at nearly half the cost as the cities.

    Easily workable under Pantheon's system.

     

     

     

     

     

    So if one mechanic of how the game will work does not align with your specific list of needs, you're just not going to play? Interesting. So you would forgo the only game being developed that meets the predominate list of your gaming needs, all because they implemented a single part of the game in a way you disagree with?

    From my perspective I hope the developers don’t take these types of arguments into consideration. Either/Or type threats from the subscribership is the very thing that created games like World of Warcraft. Regardless of the fact that your opinion falls on the opposite side of the spectrum from WoW, it still has the same potentially damaging effect if the development team starts to bend to that mentality.

    I for one, would like some type of persistent mechanism in the game world that allows for trade. It does not need to be a global approach to buying and selling, but I don’t want it to consume a predominate amount of my limited game time either. The bulletin board idea seems like a decent one, maybe mixed with vendor NPCs that you have to go to and physically trade with. I don’t mind having to travel and use in-game time to procure an item, but I don’t want to waste hours of my time sitting in a live market hoping someone spams a link containing an item I want. The inverse is true as well. I don’t want to feel like the only time I can sell an item is when I have time to just sit around spamming a link with items listed in it hoping the right buyer is online somewhere reading the chat. There has to be a better solution. Give me the EC tunnel, but place a persistent bulletin board on the cave wall, and depending on where the person listed the item, make me travel to pick the item up from their vendor.

    Regardless of the solution VR comes up with, let it be known, I’m still going to play the game. Because while there may be a handful of mechanics that are contrary to what I would personally implement, this game, as a whole, is the only game coming out that appears to have the type of world in which I wish to play. After all, it’s between this (regardless of the number of my “really want” check boxes are checked upon release) and, well… nothing. I’m sick of having only nothing to choose from at this point.

     

    Correct. Read my post again.. (I offer a few solutions too)

    I do not wish to play children's games anymore, where everything is automated and designed for adolescent newbies. The exact reason I came here and invested in Pantheon, is because Pantheon leaves the hand-holding to the other MMOs. An "auction house" is not a type of argument, it is a type of game...  in which an online living world will be based on, & how the internal economy will work. It illustrates how guilds will essentially function, or how people will react & relate to one another, etc.

     

    Please research and reflect before you speak?

    You've stated you do not have a preference, that is because you have not taken the time to ponder and understand what AH does, or have not deeply thought about & researched and studied online economies over the last 10 years..  and you just happen to have an opinion. In which you have essentially said nothing to say on the subject, because you don't even have a preference. And are just throwing out an ideas while dismissing the fact some people have put in way more effort into their posts, than just blurting out an opinion.

    Auction House MMOs are a style of game...   it is a game mechanic that is the downfall of online activity & travel. Not only did I state my opinion, I gave solutions. There is no reason for an auction house except being lazy.

     

    As for Sign posts and Bulletin boards..?  Most likely they will direct you to commerce, but will not be able to sell anything. It might cost a few coins to write on the boards & signposts which will allow for competing spots, for Player marketing & messages. Basic & easy game mechanic.

     

    • 409 posts
    February 7, 2016 7:53 AM PST

    Aradune said:
    So then, I open this question to all of you:  What is too far?  Do you think we should leave all of this completely to the players?  Do you think we should have some functionality that assists players in doing item transactions, or finding people to group with, etc.?  If so, what would be acceptable, and what would be taking it too far?


    What is too far?

    I think it's too far when the game is altered in such a casual way to support newbies... which then effects the other vetran players.
    I think that's the wrong approach. Read further down for more of an explanation.

    Do you think we should leave all of this completely to the players?

    We should trust the players/community more. I think most of us here recieved some form of help from another player with-in EQ. Even myself.. before EQ I had never played any RPG before; never mind a mmo.. so I was thrown in at the deep end so to speak with Everquest. But the point is I got help from the community/players.

    Suggestion: So I think precisely that.. I think a voluntary guide system would be best with a button to list them. Voluntary guides could put a flag on for instance like /guiding so they only appear in the list then or go wondering to help newbies (if they wished). For me this would be the best way instead of making the game easier or simplified for people who aren't used to that sort of game.. teach/show them in a nice a friendly way using the community. :) - a personal touch is much more than an automated one. You could also add a rating system to the guide system too.. that way he/she is always on his/her best behavior and gets rewarded in-game for a good rating.

    Do you think we should have some functionality that assists players in doing item transactions, or finding people to group with, etc.? 

    Finding people to group with an LFG tool like EQ's would be nice. One thing I would add though.. is a shown/displayed timer on how long you've been lfg. That way people can pick the people who have been waiting the longest.. this would improve the experience slightly. Help with item transactions and the rest I think could be solved via the suggestion above.

    If so, what would be acceptable, and what would be taking it too far?

    Taking it too far would be making everything trival with no/little player interaction. Also LFG Matchmaking (as in no lfg list just a hourglass/waiting icon and then suddenly instantly in a group)... hate this so much.. never ever do this. <--- that's taking it too far.


    This post was edited by Nimryl at February 7, 2016 7:56 AM PST
    • 2138 posts
    February 7, 2016 8:38 AM PST

    I do not see any other way to get around  needing to make space in your inventory and still be able to go out adventuring without having to make a sacrifice for the inventory space in the manner of personally, selling or getting rid of the item.

    The dissonance comes when you want to sell the item but not have the time needed to sell the item interfere with adventuring plans.

    I am all for dealing with it. Do one, or the other, cannot do both. So, throw the 50 sword at the mid level appropriate race character, and walk away, its all really worthless isnt it? and the in game money is not for player marketing (buy low, sell high- do that in real life in the stock market, dont feel acomplished doing it in game, makes no sense at all), but just a means of exchange to add "realism" in towns with merchants.

    If you have tons of bonechips and can save someones time, sure sell them for s pittance but dont be actively getting bonechips for the cash, as it takes away from the game. Just get those chips that come along in your travels and when you move on or are in an area where bone chips do not fall in your travels, so be it.

    Know a friend working on smithing, in which you have no interest and you have a piece of acrylia? Don't sell it to your friend you know is working on smithing for 5p because that is what you can get for it in bazaar- Instead, and  without being told, be the person that gives that piece of acrylia to your friend because you know they are working on smithing and you have no interest in crafting, especially when you pnly have the one piece of acrylia.

     

     *edited for spelling and removed unecessary opinion

     


    This post was edited by Manouk at February 7, 2016 1:23 PM PST
    • 158 posts
    February 7, 2016 9:48 AM PST

    Raidan said:

    *snip this because its quite large*

    No, it was not aimed at anyone in specific just at the idea that the system should be massively time consuming, necessary, etc.

    I have nothing against everquest nor everquest fans and I certainly wouldn't call you a masochist for wanting what you want (I also am not against the many of the same things). It is just that we disagree what is important to the experience. In this case you seem to value the high level of social interaction that can occur in a market that requires a higher level of direct person-to-person action. That is a fair perspective to have and I have not been arguing against having that perspective (my arguments are very specifically about the apparent lack of an open approach to diffrent ways a system can be implimented and that the cost of the system as proposed by many of the EQ vets is potentially a lot of time searching, shouting, whathave you). For me however you will most likely never get me to agree that the face to face only market is important while I think a market, economy and trade are imporant aspects of an mmo I don't feel like it should be an unavoidable hurdle to overcome and is not part of what made mmos special to me. For me I liked how it was done in xi because you had a level of choice in how deep you wanted to be involved in the market, you could do the minimum and buy and sell what you needed to or you could play the market traveling between cities and trading or you could set up a shop and increase your profit potential and sell services. To me that was alive and dynamic and it also let people be what they wanted to be.

     

    Suffice it to say that even if all of the things you listed occured pantheon would still be a very different game from moder mmos. I actually feel like it is really weird to suggest that, I mean none of those are directly core concepts of pantheon no? Some are related but if they were not done the core concepts would still be delivered in other ways. Exp loss for example over corpse runs, this is still vastly different from modern mmos which pretty much don't have you lose anything at all on death except maybe a little bit of armor durability. That isn't to say I am for all those things necessarily but I think that pantheon would still accomplish what it means to with or without them.

    • VR Staff
    • 587 posts
    February 7, 2016 10:03 AM PST

    Mephiles said:

     

    Yellow: You keep saying it is a fact but fail to present a case where I have. It is very, very simple, the EQ tunnel exists because of dev implimented features.  Auction house trade exists because of dev implimented features. BOTH are a product of DEV IMPLIMENTED FEATURES. 

    First, I don't want to completely wade into this debate, but I did have to say this (and I hope I'm not misunderstanding your assertion -- if so, apologies in advance):

    Other than by NOT implementing a interface for trade, we did NOT design or plan or even predict the EQ tunnel trade area.  This was player-driven emergent behavior.  In hindsight, given it's location, I understand WHY it became a popular place to buy/sell/trade, but we didn't put that tunnel there thinking or planning for people to do commerce; rather we put it there so that people wouldn't necessarily have to go through Freeport to get from the commonlands down south.