Quote Originally Posted by ErnieKeebler View Post
Wow. Absolutely no moderation to clean up the trolling and +1'ing, but yet the thread was moved. Bravo, moderation team.
Yeah... no kidding. I don't mind people voicing their opinion (like I am), but the trolling is just... sad and pathetic.

Quote Originally Posted by grandm View Post
well this is not strictly true. in a real economy our money does kinda disappear, we pay taxes which goes into the treasury. (true the government uses this to invest in schools, roads, etc) but this is money we never see as physical money again. so it does mirror a gil sink. however this is a game not real life. and gil sinks are needed all MMOs have gil sinks "i wonder if there is a reason for that?"
Yes, but that money goes TOWARDS something tangible. Even casinos go towards something tangible - the gamble of possibly winning more than you started with. These surcharges don't make any sort of "real world" kind of sense. You should 'get' something for spending money. And no, saving ~30 seconds isn't "getting" something.

And yes, this is a game and not real life, but that's a pretty irrelevant argument. I might as well say, "Why are there humans in this game? This isn't real life!" or any number of similar, but pointless arguements.

There's been research on in-game markets with the goal of explaining real-world economics through analysis of closed systems (in-game markets). They're more similar than you might think, even considering it's not "real world"

Far as people saying they like the market wards... what about how some wards get full and you can't put your retainer there? What about how it doesn't tell you which of your items sold (or when), and the only way to figure it out is to keep a list of what you've put in your bazaar? What about the fact that it's just a huge mob of NPCs standing there, looking completely out of place, when it doesn't serve any real purpose beyond being a time sink?

Flea markets have their place in the real world. But the market wards looks like Batallia Downs did in FFXI - tons of bazaars open. The difference here is that we can now make a giant star appear over what we're looking for... but its every bit as much of an eyesore, at the very least.