Store Fronts are Awful

Rockyfour

Just your standard auction house please. No need to reinvent the wheel!!

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Sathrago

Rockyfour wrote: »

Just your standard auction house please. No need to reinvent the wheel!!

You are mistaken. This is the wheel.

Ludullu

Sathrago wrote: »

You are mistaken. This is the wheel.

And I want THIS wheel.

So yeah, no auction houses.

Noaani

Store fronts are a log roller.

Auction Houses are a refined, manufactured wheel.

A store front system is actually fine for a game with a basic economy like Ashes currently has. Trading a few basic materials and some finished products is actually fine with a store front system. It is asking players to spend more time on tedium instead of having fun playing the game, but some developers know their games aren't actually all that fun.

However, store fronts will not be able to support the kind of economy Intrepid has planned for Ashes. You can't build a castle or node using store front mechanics. The idea of a game with Archeages economy working with a store front system is kind of amusing to think about - the auction house was moving millions of items a week, you can't do that with store fronts.

Sathrago

Noaani wrote: »

Store fronts are a log roller.

Auction Houses are a refined, manufactured wheel.

A store front system is actually fine for a game with a basic economy like Ashes currently has. Trading a few basic materials and some finished products is actually fine with a store front system. It is asking players to spend more time on tedium instead of having fun playing the game, but some developers know their games aren't actually all that fun.

However, store fronts will not be able to support the kind of economy Intrepid has planned for Ashes. You can't build a castle or node using store front mechanics. The idea of a game with Archeages economy working with a store front system is kind of amusing to think about - the auction house was moving millions of items a week, you can't do that with store fronts.

Memes aside I agree. Games like this need to be careful with the little annoyances that stack up. Having to run around the city to each players stall and manually searching their vendors is absurdly tedious and can really ruin player experience in a game.

Having a central trade market in each town should be the minimum, and these trader stalls should be connected to this market (as long as they are in that node''s Zone of Influence) for ease of search and price comparison. Players can manually go to a player stall or they can go to the market and purchase from there.

There is a system on the private server Everquest: The Heroes' Journey (maybe its in their retail version IDK) that is basically this and it works quite well.

Ludullu

I haven't properly played P2 yet, so I haven't seen how player stores look like, but I think we need item-based filters (player-side, not store side) that let you see which stores have the item you want.

So, instead of running up to each store, you can just run through the market and see if anyone has the item you want.

This would still let people try to scam buyers, which would require people to be careful with their purchases instead of just going "duhhhh, this item in the auction house is the cheapest so I just buy it".

Item availability of node stores should be a tradable good, just as commodities are.

if you wanna go full hardcore they could require a caravan run
but I think just having them as a piece of paper that you gotta carry to another node should be fine
you get them from an npc that overlooks the node market
you bring them to the same npc at another node
the reward for doing this is similar to how caravan rewards are calculated
the item itself is unreadable
the info you get from the npc is simply presented as a list of items in a node market w/o prices or seller names
economic nodes distribute this info within their node relation system automatically, and also pay more for any market info that you bring them, which makes them the info hubs for local trading

I'd love a system like that

Noaani

Ludullu wrote: »

I haven't properly played P2 yet, so I haven't seen how player stores look like, but I think we need item-based filters (player-side, not store side) that let you see which stores have the item you want.

So, instead of running up to each store, you can just run through the market and see if anyone has the item you want.

Looking at this from an Archeage perspective (and assuming raw material consumption may be similar in Ashes), this would still result in players having to run around dozens of player stalls to get the quantity they are after.

With Ashes storage system, this would work even worse here than in Archeage.

Sellers being able to transport materials to a central location and buyers being able to buy it all from that one location is a basic function that Ashes needs to function on a basic level - personal preferences aside.

Ludullu

Noaani wrote: »

Sellers being able to transport materials to a central location and buyers being able to buy it all from that one location is a basic function that Ashes needs to function on a basic level - personal preferences aside.

I'd be totally fine if bought items went directly to your storage instead of inventory. Hell, we already had the damn UI window for that, it was just not working.

And imo markets should be limited in size (depending on the node buildings of course), so you would only "run around a ton" if you were in something like an economic Metro.

I fully expect pvp to be turned off in nodes by the end of testing, so I see no damn reason not to let people send their stuff directly to storage. Hell, give us ability to pack crates right there on the spot, if not directly from the purchase. And those crates could go to the caravancery immediately as well.

I agree that there should be qol additions to the system. I simply disagree that they should come in the form of a centralized point of purchase/sale. I want to see market scammers in the game. I want people to pay attention to what they're buying and how much they're paying.

Taleof2Cities

Ludullu wrote: »

I agree that there should be qol additions to the system. I simply disagree that they should come in the form of a centralized point of purchase/sale.

Noaani wrote: »

Sellers being able to transport materials to a central location and buyers being able to buy it all from that one location is a basic function that Ashes needs to function on a basic level - personal preferences aside.

Lucky for both of you that Ashes will eventually have both player stalls and an auction house.

If you are a citizen of an Economic node, an Auction House will be a unique feature of the node … for the convenience of scanning all commodities across the node itself.

However, if you prefer capitalism, the player stalls are where you will find the best deals.

Maybe the OP isn’t aware the Economic node Auction House feature isn’t in Alpha 2 yet?

Nerror

I believe Steven said the players stalls will be searchable by specific item as well? It's just not in yet.

Noaani

Ludullu wrote: »

Noaani wrote: »

Sellers being able to transport materials to a central location and buyers being able to buy it all from that one location is a basic function that Ashes needs to function on a basic level - personal preferences aside.

I'd be totally fine if bought items went directly to your storage instead of inventory. Hell, we already had the damn UI window for that, it was just not working.

And imo markets should be limited in size (depending on the node buildings of course), so you would only "run around a ton" if you were in something like an economic Metro.

I fully expect pvp to be turned off in nodes by the end of testing, so I see no damn reason not to let people send their stuff directly to storage. Hell, give us ability to pack crates right there on the spot, if not directly from the purchase. And those crates could go to the caravancery immediately as well.

I agree that there should be qol additions to the system. I simply disagree that they should come in the form of a centralized point of purchase/sale. I want to see market scammers in the game. I want people to pay attention to what they're buying and how much they're paying.

To me, in node storage should mean the resources in question can be in general storage, on the market, in the caravansary, or ready to be used for crafting within the node.

I don't see having to move materials between these things as being valuable gameplay.

However, I also don't see having to run between a few dozen different stalls to get those materials to be valuable gameplay, even if you don't need to transport the materials. That makes playing the economic game a series of self directed fetch quests, and thst really isn't compelling gameplay.

So, even without the need to transport materials within a node, an auction or market is still required, imo.

Voeltz

Haven't seen them yet but I could see it being annoying needing to check dozens of stalls compared to one NPC. They should have signs giving you an idea of what they're selling. I would like the types of items available to be displayed in the stall too. So if the stall sells weapons or ore the you can see it visually. Should also be a dialog option or initial dialog where the npc tells you whats for sale that can be set by the owner. I also think it would be cool if they occassionally talk advertising what's for sale. Another option may be a map icon that gives you basic info

Laetitian

Noaani wrote: »

Store fronts are a log roller.

Auction Houses are a refined, manufactured wheel.

A store front system is actually fine for a game with a basic economy like Ashes currently has. Trading a few basic materials and some finished products is actually fine with a store front system. It is asking players to spend more time on tedium instead of having fun playing the game, but some developers know their games aren't actually all that fun.

However, store fronts will not be able to support the kind of economy Intrepid has planned for Ashes. You can't build a castle or node using store front mechanics. The idea of a game with Archeages economy working with a store front system is kind of amusing to think about - the auction house was moving millions of items a week, you can't do that with store fronts.

You're not encouraged to engage in tedium. You're discouraged to engage in it. You've said yourself that it's off-putting. You're just giving in to your reward-addicted brain telling you to do it anyway because you're entitled to infinite profits; enjoyment be damned. Developers can't create systems that value your time if YOU don't value your time.

A big part of "playing the economy game" is realising when you've done what's an efficient use of your time, and choosing to be done with it for the day, instead of continuing to chase profits any way you can. 80-20-rule. Don't spend 80% of your time doing things that only contribute to 20% of your satisfaction; you're playing the system wrong.
If the prospect of someone else doing the boring stuff you don't want to do making more profits than you is intolerable to you, that's not something the devs can fix.

You're encouraged to engage in alternatives.

Trade in wholesale person-to-person or guild-to-guild contracts if you want to avoid the associated tedium and inefficiencies to your time and resources.
Don't craft when you don't enjoy it. Do something else. Play the game. Make money through warfare, quests, grinding new characters. While you passively wait for your economic endeavours to take shape.
If you need gear, trade for your items with gold or other services. This is what an economy is supposed to do. Make you weigh where to use your time and resources, where to employ your skills and interests best.

The only reason this isn't obvious to you is that you're too used to games that reward you for wanting to do it all just so you can say you did it all, so you treat Ashes the same way in spite of the obvious intentional roadblocks.

Themepark auctionhouse economies are for ADHD kids. Storefronts are for grown-up ADHD kids with properly adjusted medication.

Lucascp92

They are planning as well to introduce AH.
Independent from each other, It will be node-vassal based.

Electronn

I personally hope AoC evolves to implement a global AH.

The idea of running around to storefronts to acquire what you want is incredibly annoying and inefficient. It is also a significant impediment to people who see trading items and materials as a gameplay loop in itself.

IRL do you like to run around to a bunch of different physical stores to try and buy stuff, or do you like to use a single, virtual portal (the internet) to remotely shop all available options?

Please implement a global AH. If your purchased items are in the node where you're located, you can take possession immediately (in-store pick-up, so to speak). If your purchased items are in a different node, perhaps the AH can offer a menu of choices for delivery services that are listed by player caravan operators.

This would be far more enjoyable for players. It would also enable a better buy/sell trading gameplay loop, as well as enable a more robust player-driven caravan delivery service pvp gameplay loop.

Taleof2Cities

Electronn wrote: »

I personally hope AoC evolves to implement a global AH.

Global auction houses carry their own set of hazards, Electronn … one those hazards being price fixing.

If you’re really into the economy as a gameplay loop, then it’s baffling why you even support the idea.

Unless you weren’t aware that convenience and optimizing your sales revenue are two different things?

Regardless, if the Auction House is important to you, then simply choose an Economic node for your citizenship when the game launches. Economic nodes will each have their own AH.

GrilledCheeseMojito

I hope that Ashes bucks the trend and doesn't do a global AH. I feel like they might choose to eventually, but I miss the arbitrage opportunities I had in Final Fantasy XI before they merged the Auction Houses, and something that would be dirt cheap in Windurst would be big money if you hoofed it all the way to Bastok (especially goods related to quests...)

QoL on top of player stalls sounds like something both realistic and interesting. No current MMO really goes in on simulating the actual bazaar experience of having to really check carefully and find a truly good deal from what's available, and I think that's a shame.

After all, isn't this the risk versus reward game?

Noaani

Laetitian wrote: »

Noaani wrote: »

Store fronts are a log roller.

Auction Houses are a refined, manufactured wheel.

A store front system is actually fine for a game with a basic economy like Ashes currently has. Trading a few basic materials and some finished products is actually fine with a store front system. It is asking players to spend more time on tedium instead of having fun playing the game, but some developers know their games aren't actually all that fun.

However, store fronts will not be able to support the kind of economy Intrepid has planned for Ashes. You can't build a castle or node using store front mechanics. The idea of a game with Archeages economy working with a store front system is kind of amusing to think about - the auction house was moving millions of items a week, you can't do that with store fronts.

You're not encouraged to engage in tedium. You're discouraged to engage in it. You've said yourself that it's off-putting. You're just giving in to your reward-addicted brain telling you to do it anyway because you're entitled to infinite profits; enjoyment be damned. Developers can't create systems that value your time if YOU don't value your time.

A big part of "playing the economy game" is realising when you've done what's an efficient use of your time, and choosing to be done with it for the day, instead of continuing to chase profits any way you can. 80-20-rule. Don't spend 80% of your time doing things that only contribute to 20% of your satisfaction; you're playing the system wrong.
If the prospect of someone else doing the boring stuff you don't want to do making more profits than you is intolerable to you, that's not something the devs can fix.

You're encouraged to engage in alternatives.
Trade in wholesale person-to-person or guild-to-guild contracts if you want to avoid the associated tedium and inefficiencies to your time and resources.

Don't craft when you don't enjoy it. Do something else. Play the game. Make money through warfare, quests, grinding new characters. While you passively wait for your economic endeavours to take shape.
If you need gear, trade for your items with gold or other services. This is what an economy is supposed to do. Make you weigh where to use your time and resources, where to employ your skills and interests best.

The only reason this isn't obvious to you is that you're too used to games that reward you for wanting to do it all just so you can say you did it all, so you treat Ashes the same way in spite of the obvious intentional roadblocks.

Themepark auctionhouse economies are for ADHD kids. Storefronts are for grown-up ADHD kids with properly adjusted medication.

No.

In every way. Every word of this is incorrect.

Storefronts are (arguably) for people that want to engage in the economy as a major part of their gameplay. Even then, they force people in to running around performing menial tasks more than actually engaging in the economy. They are, when actually dissected, literally nothing more than a time sink for players wanting to participate in the economy as a major part of their gameplay.

Marketplace/auction systems are for people that do not want to engage in the economy as a major part of their gameplay. They exist to simply provide a function - one that is key to MMORPG function. That is the key point here, storefronts simply do not fulfil the function we are talking about as well as a market or auction house.

For these people, storefronts are literally a barrier to achieving what they want to get out of the economy.

Intrepid know this, which is why the game will have a proper marketplace in the future. This fact isn't up for debate, it is happening.

Laetitian

Noaani wrote: »

Laetitian wrote: »

Noaani wrote: »

Store fronts are a log roller.

Auction Houses are a refined, manufactured wheel.

A store front system is actually fine for a game with a basic economy like Ashes currently has. Trading a few basic materials and some finished products is actually fine with a store front system. It is asking players to spend more time on tedium instead of having fun playing the game, but some developers know their games aren't actually all that fun.

However, store fronts will not be able to support the kind of economy Intrepid has planned for Ashes. You can't build a castle or node using store front mechanics. The idea of a game with Archeages economy working with a store front system is kind of amusing to think about - the auction house was moving millions of items a week, you can't do that with store fronts.

You're not encouraged to engage in tedium. You're discouraged to engage in it. You've said yourself that it's off-putting. You're just giving in to your reward-addicted brain telling you to do it anyway because you're entitled to infinite profits; enjoyment be damned. Developers can't create systems that value your time if YOU don't value your time.

A big part of "playing the economy game" is realising when you've done what's an efficient use of your time, and choosing to be done with it for the day, instead of continuing to chase profits any way you can. 80-20-rule. Don't spend 80% of your time doing things that only contribute to 20% of your satisfaction; you're playing the system wrong.
If the prospect of someone else doing the boring stuff you don't want to do making more profits than you is intolerable to you, that's not something the devs can fix.

You're encouraged to engage in alternatives.
Trade in wholesale person-to-person or guild-to-guild contracts if you want to avoid the associated tedium and inefficiencies to your time and resources.

Don't craft when you don't enjoy it. Do something else. Play the game. Make money through warfare, quests, grinding new characters. While you passively wait for your economic endeavours to take shape.
If you need gear, trade for your items with gold or other services. This is what an economy is supposed to do. Make you weigh where to use your time and resources, where to employ your skills and interests best.

The only reason this isn't obvious to you is that you're too used to games that reward you for wanting to do it all just so you can say you did it all, so you treat Ashes the same way in spite of the obvious intentional roadblocks.

Themepark auctionhouse economies are for ADHD kids. Storefronts are for grown-up ADHD kids with properly adjusted medication.

No.
In every way. Every word of this is incorrect.

Way not to think about what I said and just repeat what you said before. My entire comment was about not having to spend your time doing it; everything you commented was still treating it as something you feel forced to do.

Entitled convenience goblin demanding perfect rewards. It's like an infection among MMO players.

And then in games where you get your perfect convenience, you spend 10 hours a day anyway, just to keep up with all the other degens' status quo for wealth and xp progression anyway. You're asking the devs to reduce the resistance of the treadmill, instead of making your own choice about when you've exercised enough.
So what did the convenience do for you?
I'll tell you what it destroys for players with a personality further down.

(Just to be 100% clear, I'm not necessarily talking about you in particular, just about how these changes affect the average player who's worried about time potentially spent storefront shopping.)

Storefronts are (arguably) for people that want to engage in the economy as a major part of their gameplay.

No, they're not. They exist to create regional supply differences.
Supply differences that give people something to think about and pay attention to in order to figure out how they want to use their time efficiently. Where to sell your products, how to package them in order to meet buyers where they are. Which other merchants to talk to, which products to focus on in order to benefit from your location.
They also exist to make you think twice about spending your time on market manipulation and middle-man trading, because it requires that much more time and effort, so you're encouraged only to do it when it really feels worth the time for you.
If you choose to chase perfect prices anyway despite it not feeling worth your time, because you're so addicted to profits that you have to find them where they don't exist, that's not the game's problem. That doesn't make market stall hunting the purpose of storefronts.
A player can wind up spending their whole day doing the same thing in the marketplace as they would in storefronts, there's just less walking - yet another way in which marketplaces only make you interact with the world less than storefronts.
If you want a game that makes you interact with the game less, have you tried "no game"?

[Marketplaces/auctionhouses] exist to simply provide a function - one that is key to MMORPG function.

If you need to trade really badly, you'll find a way to do it without a marketplace. If it feels tedious to do it, you don't need to trade that badly, and you'd only be doing it in other games because it's convenient or you're trying to hypermaximise profit on every little spec of dust you've collected.

Reminds me of people like PirateSoftwareThor who spend their time in Eve bumping their head into the keyboard to trigger 90,000 pre-configured API prompts that the devs provide, then telling their guild slaves which products to generate for them, and thinking they did something.
Marketplaces are the same thing, except the API is hidden as a native game function.

Economies in games with marketplaces/auctionhouses are functionally indistinct from games with NPC buyers that pay the going player-market rate for everything.
The outcome is exactly the same. You dump all your reasonably valuable loot into it, you get currency out. Any thought put into figuring out a supply chain, how to buy wholesale, which players or regions or guilds to sell to would be completely pointless and therefore should not happen except maybe as a political tool - never for any economic merit.
Zero interaction. Why do you want players to be discouraged from treating each other as anything but NPCs?

Even then, they force people in to running around performing menial tasks more than actually engaging in the economy.

Define "actually engaging in the economy."
Apparently in your mind trading with specific players/guilds person-to-person, and thinking about which regions to sell your valuables in (and, yes, travelling to make it happen) doesn't qualify. So what is it?

Is it farming items to dump into the economy until you're white in the face? So you want the game to make you spend less time chasing opportunities to sell your stuff at 110% market rate, so you can go back to farming more stuff to dump into the world? Have you considered just accepting the price you're given? Or maybe not continuing to farm stuff and expecting perfect prices for it, **if you don't even care enough to find the right place to sell it?**

Or is it sitting at the marketplace and hitting refresh in order to adjust your prices?
(Or, in a slightly more mentally well-adjusted form: Checking back with the marketplace a few times a day to adjust your prices? You might think that's a lot better, but both of them are equally soul-less non-interactive player-as-NPC transactions.)
Is that "engaging in the economy"? Where is this economy engagement found, what does it look like, and why does it need to be instant - whose gameplay benefits, and how?

Intrepid know this, which is why the game will have a proper marketplace in the future. This fact isn't up for debate, it is happening.

I have no issue with expensive-to-build marketplaces/auctionhouses at node centres that demand expensive base transaction costs and expensive percental transaction costs (the mandatory costs could go to the node, so it wouldn't sting too much.)
Such marketplaces exist mainly to sell rare valuable and specialised items you can't find a buyer for in person.
I have hopes that the transaction costs will be high.
My hope is founded on the fact that resources are inconvenient to stack and difficult to transport in Ashes. Stacking resources in the marketplace would limit the effectiveness of that system, so I hope Steven understands that high base cost and high scaling transaction fees are important to make the existence of storefronts continue to be meaningful.

For these people, storefronts are literally a barrier to achieving what they want to get out of the economy.

If "what you want" out of the economy is maximal reward for minimal effort compared to other players:
- In a marketplace system you can get maximal reward for minimal time&effort compared to other players.
- In a storefront system, you can get maximal reward for minimal time&effort compared to other players. You just have to accept that there might be some players who choose to dump in a lot more time and get slightly higher reward per time spent than you. If you can't tolerate that, get your control disorder treated; at least now you know.

Everyone can thrive in a regional economy MMO. You just have to use your time and resources in a way that aligns with your values.
A marketplace economy MMO takes that decision out of your hands and in return gives you soulless buttons to click without ever thinking about another player. You wanting that isn't because it's better, it's because it rubs your instant gratification sensors the right way. You're stuck in expectations formed from 20 years of systems optimising for hyperconvenience; break the cycle.

TL;DR: If players don't feel entitled to perfect prices, regional market stalls aren't very different from a market place, and they introduce more incentive for market-makers to engage in real player interaction (with guilds and individuals) to get their products sold in wholesale deals and guarantee stable prices for both sides.
If players do feel entitled to perfect prices, marketplaces won't save them from wasting all day chasing profits either.
And if you're convinced that you *like* chasing profits, storefronts are a more engaging way to do it than marketplaces. If you don't like it, it's up to you to prioritise your enjoyment with your entitlement to perfect prices.

Noaani

Laetitian wrote: »

No, they're not. They exist to create regional supply differences.

Again, blatantly incorrect.

The regional supply difference Intrepid want will be maintained via regional markets/auction houses. There is no need at all to have store fronts as a mechanic in order to maintain regional supply differences.

The rest of your post is equally incorrect, and doesn't warrant any more time than what I have put in to this post.

You are, in every respect, factually incorrect here - and that has led you to maintain an opinion that makes no sense when viewed from a perspective with at least some of the facts correctly understood.

CROW3

Meh, stalls seem fine. They basically operate like a node-based AH as is, just need to make sure that search index is accurate.

Could be worse - like the player stalls in ESO that require you to check each one in each city. Not sure if that’s changed but it was a pita.

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