Market Wards, enough is enough

[Sorel]

Keep the market wards if you must but please any word on an Auction house is much appreciated.

Rest assured that the team is in the process on stabilizing and improving the current retainer system. Something that I want everyone to keep in mind is that even if we simply changed the current system over to an auction house, that doesn’t mean it would solve all of our problems overnight. There are more things that would still need to be adjusted if that were to happen. As such we aren't currently planning on switching over to an auction house system as of yet.

Consider the word given, sir.

[SuzakuCMX]

I'll post it again.

I want a hybrid.

All wards from each city are linked.
ONE WARD ONLY.
Wards are longer.
Retainers do not sell things.
Each Stall has an NPC auctioneer
Auctioneers each represent what is currently a "ward." So each auctioneer would specifically sell only things from that ward.
Retainers can be accessed from anywhere to put something for sale on that auctioneer (for a surcharge).

[Amineri]

I concur, enough is enough, why waste time, effort and manpower in fixing the buggy market wards, when there is already a proven workable method of auction house?

Let's take the example of the auction house in Aion. Was that really a proven, workable method? Did not the RMT machine come in and completely and utterly destroy that game?

I fail to see how an auction house (that doesn't actually have auctions, but functions primarily as a buying and selling marketplace) is going to fix all the issues in the game?

[ShinChuck]

When the Ala Mhigo zone is released there will be mats attained from there that cannot be found in Gridania so they have to be taken there. See a more dynamic system. Not a magical AH where everything is linked together....and yes I know in XI they were not all linked.

How is that an argument for the wards when you said right there it's about delinking marketplaces, and could be done with an AH? That's not an argument for the wards, it's an argument for separating the marketplaces, which is a separate issue entirely.

[Cairdeas]

A. mostly everyone wants
B. Something that has been in MMOs since the 90s
C.Makes buying and selling crap in this game not take so damn long that is considered a more "casual" game

a. 26% is not "Mostly everyone"
B. Nope. The First MMO Auction house wasn't public til after 2000.
c. This is an opinion and has nothing to do with an Auction house.

Without Timed or Blind Bidding it is NOT an auction house and it doesn't need to be called such, Just implement the features of an auction house (minus the timed and blind bidding) to the market wards. This can be easily done. Those of us who do not want Auction Houses do not want Timed or Blind Bidding. We do want a Convenient market system though.

[Amineri]

You do not get it :P which is ok. no harm no foul.

Even with an Auction house players whom are first to sell something are the first to set a price. And they tend to go for greed vs anything else. Everytime a new item an item was added to the AH it always had a 50K-1mil price tag. Even with an AH system players are setting the price. SE doesn't tell players what price is good.

Ha ha! Either I don't get it, or I do get it, but you don't get that I get it

In either an Auction House (with actual auctions, meaning bidding) or a marketplace of some kind, sellers don't set the price. The may ATTEMPT to set the price, but buyers have just as much power in determining the final sale price as the buyers.

I could try and sell my Darksteel Ore for 1million gil per piece, because no one else is selling. But no one would buy it. That means that I haven't set the price.

When I look at the item search function for the current market wards, I don't think "Item X is selling for price Y", I think "Someone is trying to sell item X for price Y". There is a world of difference.

Sellers always try and maximize the amount that they can sell an item for. Buyers always try and minimize the price they buy something for. Nothing will change that. The goal of a market system or auction system is to quickly and efficiently allow buyers and sellers to reach a compromise price that they will both agree on.

Currently, the system is ineffective and sluggish because sellers can only guess at prices, and if an item doesn't sell, re-list it at a lower price. Buyers are not represented, because the 'item seek' function is broken (in oh-so-many ways).

In the end transactions only happen because the buyer and seller value the item and gil differently. If the seller values 10k gil more than a pinch of bomb ash, and the buyer values the pinch of bomb ash more than the 10k gil, then a transaction occurs. The current market system fails to find these pairings efficiently.

Slapping an menu-interface on the current system, and allowing instant delivery of the item to the player will hardly accomplish anything. More tools to aid buying / selling are needed.

These could include:

• Fixing the 'seek item' system to allow it to be searched, sought items to take only one bazaar slot, purchasing of smaller increments than the total number requested, and not requiring the player to already have the items to be sought. This fix has nothing to do with auction house vs market wards.
  
• Allowing buy orders, where a retainer is given the order to go out and search for items at or under a given price. The retainer seeks through the market wards, looking for the item, returning it if found. If not, the buy order can remain in effect, until someone lists such an item. Again, nothing to do with auction house vs market ward.

This is what Bayohne said. There are deeper issues that are keeping buyer and seller from finding each other to exchange goods. I hope that the dev team is coming up with some good solutions ... but I'm not holding my breath.

[Cairdeas]

I'd rather have buy orders then Auctions. :P

[Amineri]

I'd rather have buy orders then Auctions. :P

I don't get why our retainers are such useless idiots, to be honest. I can ring a bell across the world and they come to me, yet I can't tell them to set up shop in sell in a particular ward in a particular city.

What is truly ridiculous is that I can't ask my retainer to effectively purchase anything. For example, want to buy 100 lightning crystals. You'd think that if someone came along and was willing to sell 7 crystals, my retainer would buy the 7 crystals, and keep trying to buy 93 more. But no, instead someone has to sell ALL 100 CRYSTALS in one lump sum.

In short, the buyer side of the economy is really broken.

[ShinChuck]

It's just semantics to say that people asking for an "AH" want AUCTIONS AUCTIONS AUCTIONS and NOTHING ELSE will suffice. I'd really like to know how many people use "buyout" options verse actual auctions. I personally rarely ever actually auction items or bid on them, and I'd be surprised if most people got most of their purchases that way.

When people ask for an AH, I daresay they're more referring to a general set of features associated with an auction house, not AUCTIONS OR DIE, and a system with every single feature except literal auctions isn't good enough. Like when you're at a restaurant, and someone orders a "Coke". They don't necessarily mean, "I want a Coke, and Pepsi or Faygo or Royal Crown will not suffice," they usually just mean, "I want a dark carbonated cola."

Is it possible they specifically want Coke and nothing else? Sure. But I think we're all intelligent enough to understand what's being said in this given situation.

[SuzakuCMX]

It's just semantics to say that people asking for an "AH" want AUCTIONS AUCTIONS AUCTIONS and NOTHING ELSE will suffice. I'd really like to know how many people use "buyout" options verse actual auctions. I personally rarely ever actually auction items or bid on them, and I'd be surprised if most people got most of their purchases that way.

When people ask for an AH, I daresay they're more referring to a general set of features associated with an auction house, not AUCTIONS OR DIE, and a system with every single feature except literal auctions isn't good enough. Like when you're at a restaurant, and someone orders a "Coke". They don't necessarily mean, "I want a Coke, and Pepsi or Faygo or Royal Crown will not suffice," they usually just mean, "I want a dark carbonated cola."

Is it possible they specifically want Coke and nothing else? Sure. But I think we're all intelligent enough to understand what's being said in this given situation.

The meaning of "Coke" actually changes depending on where you live.

In some places it means soda and in others it refers only to Coca-cola.

Not really relevant but it bugs me