Retainer Reference System to replace the Market Wards.

[Roaran]

@Fannar

While those are all good suggestions, I think they mostly fall into the last category of changes that Viridiana mentioned; and, I'm more interested in talking about the foundation of the market system.

I think the most pressing problems the market system are the overcrowding and crashing of the wards. Even as the game population is considerably low, the market wards are already being taxed to their limit. As the population grows, this problem will only worsen. While linking the market wards would be a temporary fix, at the very best, the markets would be evenly divided among the 3 city-states (maybe 4 whenever Ishguard is finally released). Should the game gain in popularity, these markets would then be taxed again bringing us back to square one.

So, essentially, the only way to fix the crashing & overcrowding involves dealing with the retainers themselves. The only visible steps SE has taken so far involve merely hotfixing the current system. Although one of the letters did point to some fundamental changes, I'd wait to see what they are first. If SE does not work on serious changes, one popular patch (1.8 for example) and all those players who have been waiting for content will jump on and be using the wards which are already at their limit.

Edit:

From Bayhone:

In Patch 1.18, we will be increasing the max number of retainers that can be set up within each area. However, by simply increasing the number of allowable retainers, the fact remains that it could again reach the capacity limit. Therefore, as a precursor to that we will be planning some type of system of checks and balances in order to reset the retainers that have been setup.

I think SE clearly sees the problem. No mention of direct work on the retainer system outside of hotfixes though.