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Auction House
AUCTION HOUSE!
Alright now that I have your attention.
Unfortunately in a lot of MMOs Auction Houses are conflated with Marketplaces, but they are in fact two different mechanisms for commerce.
Marketplace would be dealing with items that are considered low, medium, and (low) high tiered items. Things like timber, and potions, and ores, ect...
Auction houses are meant to be more for luxury and high tiered items. Items that wouldn’t normally be on a marketplace. Things like legendary gear, Dragon Eggs, Super rare minerals, ect…
Now I’ve always envisioned an Auction House being almost like an event.
It happens every 2-4 weeks.
Players must be physically present at a location/node to be able to participate.
Players have to purchase a ticket to participate (money sink).
The item’s list will be announced 5 days prior (to give players in other ZOI enough time to get to the there).
Items come from player base of course (though 1-2 randomly generated high tiered raw materials might come from the game/auction house itself).
Items can be sold for 2x-4x the maximum marketplace minimum (to incentives players to participate by selling their items). (Also 1x-2x of it could be used as a money sink (ala tax)).
Bids will start at minimum (or maximum) market value and each bid must be at least 10% higher than the last.
Players can buyout an item for maximum price only after the item has reached 50% of its maximum buyout potential.
Thoughts on such a building being implemented in Ashes.
Comments
Keep it all in the same place, I don't want to be forced to stand still for any length of time.
I want to be able to buy stuff at any time.
Gamers think they want all this realism stuff but a couple of years from now it will be huge boring chore and you will hate it.
MMOs need to be as fun as they are challenging.
Standing around selling shit or having to go to two separate markets for items is neither.
I would definitly want auctions as a concept to be present, in whatever form that may be, preferably something more common than your event based idea.
You've also placed restrains on things (what things can be sold for, what minimum bids, etc) and that violates a player driven economy.
And this:
Would be a horrible idea. The purpose of raw materials is for them to be rare. Doing this doesn't help gatherers, it hurts them.
That's a fair point. For players like yourself such game mechanics in commerce would seem boring, though I'd like to state that it wouldn't be so for everyone else. Under my particular idea of an Auction House one isn't forced to participate in buying, nor is one forced to sell their items in the Auction House. The Auction House is just another viable way of buying/selling high end gear.
I also think this would be quite fun, and challenging. For high end players (those pushing the curve) money might not be necessarily an issue for them but items/materials/ect.. might be. This sort of event is almost like a mini holiday where those with a bit of gambling and bid warring tendencies can duke it out with each other. Playing the market and being a finance mogul to some players is fun. To dismiss the fun players have in commerce/finance is to ignore one of the 4 core node types and cornerstones of AoC. Commerce nodes themselves at Metro will give ZOI marketplace, to the developers they thought that such a finance driven benefit would be an enticing enough reason for players to live/work/play in such a node. (Not even including the fact that there will be a stock exchange where there will be different companies/guilds/nodes all up for buying and selling stocks). I have no doubt that there will be players who's whole gaming experience will be mainly focused on becoming their nodes biggest finance mogul.
One of the main reasons for having such an Auction House was due to me finding out that item pricing wont truly be up to the players (in order to combat money funneling). That there will be a min/max on items. If players think that their legendary item is worth more than the current marketplace max then then can try their luck by throwing it onto the Auction House (for a fee).
That was a good read and I think it's an interesting topic (your link). Locking down items for 5 days of course is just a theory. It could be locked instead for 2 days. Or even 24 hours. Just enough that players from other ZOI and nodes can make it to the city that is holding the Auction. I'm currently unaware how long it would take to get from one end of the map to the other (including roving bandits, monsters, terrain dangers, ect....). So I just used 5 days.
I'm also basing the fact that I was under the impression (i may be incorrect) that there will be a min/max on items (based on market value) due to combating money funneling & and other mechanics like it.
I also think that 1-2 rare items of node specific (or ZOI) could be enticing enough that players would come from near and far in order to snipe such things.
Bring back names.
I agree.
Let me choose what items I buy.
I agree.
Bring back the Auction…
I agree (as you already can tell).
Let people bid on items to put down interest/scare off...
I agree (this is an essential part of auctions)
There should be interface that allow participation in several auctions
I agree (though it’s one auction with several items in my iteration).
List of names that participate...
Logistically this might be annoying why not the top 5 bidders (and/or those in the bidding war).
@pooka Alteration/Expansion
It’s an interesting alternative to the original Auction House. I’m more of a fan of a physical location (space denotes function kind of theory).
There is no "time crunch" at least not that I see (please elaborate in case i'm missing something). One can still participate in the usual marketplace to sell their items. There is also no need to rush to the Auction that week when you could potentially just wait for the next one.
The benefit is the potential increase in net gain for the seller.
Roving traders is definitely an interesting idea. The caravan system might be fleshed out enough that player can select any node in their ZOI of influence and be roving traders from one node to another.
While I don't disagree that it does place restraints. Those restraints are in response to something I was told earlier (that there will be a min/max on items in the marketplace). Since there is already a restraint on a free market economy, in order to counter act that the Auction House was created. It allows players to exceed the market max on rare/legendary items but with any benefits comes some cons (happens only 2-4 weeks, items that can be placed, ect...).
Again all of this is placed under the assumption of a min/max being in the marketplace. Otherwise you'd have to scrape most of the idea except for the rare items from the node (the next part you disagree with).
This is probably an impasse point but, I don't believe 1-2 randomly generated node specific/ZOI materials are enough to hurt a majority of gatherers. If there is a rare ore in a mining node, that has like .001% of procccing but is a key component to making some gear/weapon/item. Then the ones being hurt by never having the chance to acquire such an items are the artisan crafters/processors. With it only happening once ever 2-4 weeks, and it only being 1-2 RANDOM items/materials. The the effects it would have on the gatherers as a whole would be minimum, while still providing an avenue for the other artisans classes. (honestly the same argument could be flipped and be used for an item for crafters, or processed item for processors...the sheer number of items that could potentially be listed and the randomization of it and the limited amount per 2-4 weeks makes this argument in my view moot.)
But please feel free to elaborate in case I'm not understanding something.
Do you expect to be able to just click a tab and open a traveling auction house?
Now THAT would be boring. Oh and you can keep your "shit".
I feel on the safe side when I say that won't be the case.
As stated player to player trading as well as anti bot precautions as well as gms will be in place for Ashes. It feels like it would extend to such things as bidding/buying from marketstalls, markets, auctions making min max values obsolet.
I certainly would like them to not be the case. The market should stabilize itself regionally through players, presenting even more opportunities for trading crossregions.
And even in GW2 it didn't feel like anything I was selling, or buying for that matter, was part of the community. Just opening the menu and searching or selling, I might as well just have been trading with NPCs.
And before you respond with nobody wants that -
Its common knowledge nobody wanted the old runescape in wake of rs3... But its somehow popular enough to have a dedicated dev team? Hmmst. Now OSRS does have the grand exchange (rs global market) but as I mention there's no reason for me to actively participate in the community when I just offer money or goods to the game instead of another player directly.
Now you may want an MMO with instant gratification everywhere and everything is within arms reach at all times, but personally I want one that'll be a slow burner.
On the topic of actual auction houses, I've never played a game with proper auctions. Sounds interesting at the very least.
No issue with that, each nodes AH should sell different items.
"Keep it all in the same place" I was referring to one market for some goods and an auction for other goods.
Every comment I make, imagine its 10 years in the future, there's no hype, it's not new and more people each day don't care about the game.
That's how my mind works and that's the problems I try and solve today.
As far as the 1-2 randomly generated items on a 0.001% proc that means I'd have to harvest no less than 100,000 of an item to ensure I got one.
[Yes I know that 1% chance means that you could get one your first hit or your 100th hit and it doesn't exclude getting 2 inside 100 hits, but if you consistently got 2 per 100 then it would be a 2% proc)
So you take said item that has a 0.001% proc. If I have had to harvest 100,000 Iron Ore to get the 1 Durable Iron Ore, that means Iron Ore would have almost no value because it would have to be mined non-stop to get that 1 Durable Iron Ore.
So, I decide to sell my 1 Durable Iron Ore for 1,000,000 Gold because the proc rate is so low, the time required to find is so high, and all the other materials I've gathered to get that 1 item are of now a very low value due to the quantity I'm injecting into the system.
If the random item proc by the market was sold for 20,000 it has artificially set the max price on my Durable Iron Ore to 20,000. Worse still, if if it produces 2 of them, then there is no need for the one I found, I have flooded the market with the common gather, my time has been wasted, and the "system" has hurt me.
Sure there will be some bad at first if they are player held but this is not something that can be completely avoided.
Players having to physcially be present at the Auction House's location is self explanatory if you ask me.
I see no reason why it cannot be listed 2 weeks in advance, at the end of the previous auction. This will give players even more time as well as be a good marketing strategy to announce at the end of an Auction. This also means that you will have to deposit said items to the Auction House 2 weeks or more in advance however.
I also disagree with the maximum price. People who deposit items to the Auction House should be able to set a Minimum price, this minumum price will be the starting bid, with no upper limit to the final price. If someone wants to spend several times the normal sum to buy something , why should they not be able to?
And finally the tax, any AH that takes 25-50% of the final sale price will never be used.
I envision that 15% would be max, and this would still be distasteful.
5-10% is what I think would be the good number on this. Who would want to sell things on an AH if they cannot earn well on it?
And a 10% increase on previous bid is bad practice.
a 10% increase based on Starting bid would make much more sense. That way it is standardized without changing too much.
Buyout.. At an auction house... Ruins the point of the word "Auction"
So no. No buyout.
Also generating items to be bid on gives me Black Market Auction House (World of Warcraft) vibes. That would only work on unobtainable items and if you need a gold sink in the game.
This requires setting alarms and waiting around doing little as the deadline approaches.
Placing a bid prior to the last moment only inflates the price of the item.
I'd also like the option to be able to be a traveling merchant being able to sell from my "cart".
Personal opinion-> Don't make finding and buying items anymore complicated or time consuming than is really necessary for the average merchant/shopper. Make all the detailed, player run and player operated systems you want as a player. Have a non overly complicated(read frustrating) system for players to buy and sell built into the game.
An economy should be a fluid thing, at base, and will only really work well if it isn't overly difficult to find/buy/sell what you want to, when you want to.
But this would just be an event, and regular sales and commerce would be unaffected. Anyone should be able to sell anything whenever they like. Low grade basic resources or epic endgame mythic gear. All sell-able whenever, but only locally.
So why an AH event? Maybe it could have longer ranges, or multiple AH events in multiple cities are linked. So for a brief moment people could shop from afar. Maybe AH events just draw a large crowd which facilitates more trades and participation. Less standing around waiting for someone to want your mid-low level bread crafting results or whatever.
But it would have to be a moderate in impact, an event, a fun change of pace. Not a game changer. We need our commerce to run through supply lines and caravans. That is a huge facet of the games underlying functionality. So local markets and economies partitioned by distance and capacity and willingness to travel. But maybe every once in a while the AH crew rolls in with another functioning commodities portal, and holds an event? That could be fun.
I think regional market places, and an AH as the top-tier Economic Node benefit is the way to go, and I would like to see what Ashes is going to implement before I claim that this particular AH idea is good or bad. As it might be worse or better than what IS does.
I would also be against any NPC or Random object being submitted to the AH. AH's should sell things that players make, farm, or gather. It should not be a place everyone feels they have to go to so they too can get a chance at a rare material they would otherwise not have easy access too. This disrupts player agency control of the Economy.
I don't mind the idea, and in 10 years people will be complaining about how boring Ashes is because of all the new games/tech that comes out between now and then. Regardless of what Ashes is that will be true. Might be some peeps that claims Ashes was/is still the best, but they would be like all the WOW fans at that point.
Having to travel to a market or AH might get boring, so don't do it.