Trade is in a sad State

That's what I thought. You have nothing.

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Albinosaurus wrote:

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Tin_Foil_Hat wrote:

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Albinosaurus wrote:

You know, Goetz, all the bullshit aside, you have to be blind to think masters alone makes crafting viable. They had that potential--maybe they still could--but they are not enough.

Also, you're free to provide some of those reasons. You could have already, and I'm not sure why you didn't take the opportunity to if they are so apparent.

Not sure if serious of legitimately doesnt know how to use masters to craft items...

If you truly believe that, you're welcome to expound upon it. Otherwise, this kind of comment boils down to another baseless personal attack. Go ahead, try to explain how to get 6 good affixes on an item of your choice, reliably, that can be used for end-game content or high value trade. I'm all ears.

The masters do make crafting a viable aternative to finding gear that has been dropped. I am not sure what you are asking here. Do you think the only way crafting your own gear can be viable is if you can make a mirror quality item consistently with it? If so, what would be the reason to have anything other than currency drop at all?

There are a lot of videos on youtube that show you how to craft. If you want to spend the currency and time, you can make some pretty good end game equipment starting with just a high ilevel white.

You are entitled to your opinion, but It is difficult to understand why you are still here...is there anything you actually like about this game?

I'm not asking for mirror quality gear with crafting, but when my ilvl 70 ring rolls affixes that are random ilvl between 1 - 70 instead of, say, 50 to 70, and any given roll on each of those affixes can be pretty terrible within its own bracket, it takes much more currency than what it's worth in trade--many magnitudes more. The point is that closing the gap between "Should I try to roll this item?" and "Should I just buy it off poe.trade?" is the key to managing both systems in a way that would allow better trading tools to exist in game without completely trivializing the game--at least not any more than poe.trade already (supposedly) does.

And this...

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You are entitled to your opinion, but It is difficult to understand why you are still here...is there anything you actually like about this game?

This has no place in the discussion. Unless you prefer I just troll all of your posts with irrelevant questions, don't do it to mine. Just keep that to yourself.

Speaking of questions, nobody has provided any concrete answers to mine. I find that odd considering how staunchly that assumption is cited in the defense of the awful trade system we have had to endure for so long.

Well putting aside your assertions about the trade system (which i dont care much about and feel poe's biggest problem is endgame) how do you get a 6 good affix item. Well you can chaos spam a high ilvl item, people certainly get good chests, high es gear etc doing this. You can alt, augment and regal ( i think the odds for this are way to low, i would prob double the chances of getting good rolls) then mastercraft the rest. +3 system with master crafting, and finding good rares and master modding (prefixes/suffixe cannot be changed) scour.
I honestly dont know how much of this has to do with trade though but i do agree crafting is limited particularly for phys weapons.

Here's an example.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNF3aaPBjQU

He uses over 800 orbs. He probably could have just bought one for less than that.

But "crafting is fine." This guy is a professional streamer. All he does is play. People with jobs don't have the time to simply amass that kind of currency to do this, but somehow they should be excluded from enjoying some of the best things the game has to offer? Because of shit RNG? Bullshit.

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Fhark wrote:

Well putting aside your assertions about the trade system (which i dont care much about and feel poe's biggest problem is endgame)...

The game has many problems, and trade is one of them, but you really can't talk about trade without talking about endgame, and without talking about crafting, and drop rates, and RNG, and, and, and... You get the idea.

Here's a concept. Maybe PoE could use it. Maybe it's not right for the game. I'm not going to claim either here, but it's an idea.

Targeted Farming



The idea really deserves its own thread, but the point is that there's always something different they could be doing to try to improve the game. The people here who make it their mission to ensure that the feedback forums are useless are afraid of change, and some things about the game need to change for it to continue to grow. All we can do is say, "Hey, we've got a problem here. Let's see what we can think of to fix it." If enough of those problems get fixed, the game remains healthy. If they are ignored, the game loses players. This isn't only true for PoE. Pretty much every game deals with this.

Albinosaurus wrote

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Here's an example.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNF3aaPBjQU
He uses over 800 orbs. He probably could have just bought one for less than that.
But "crafting is fine." This guy is a professional streamer. All he does is play. People with jobs don't have the time to simply amass that kind of currency to do this, but somehow they should be excluded from enjoying some of the best things the game has to offer? Because of shit RNG? Bullshit.

I look at that and see a bis bow, which you can buy an ilvl 100 chest ev chest for 1ex, you can use snakebite gloves for free poison, so you in essence have a 8l plus all the power of your chosen ascendancy. Power has never been so cheap in poe, which is why i think endgame is the biggest concern.

Also about 6linking its imo a waste of currency, your much better of buying the bow 6s, 5l and selling then going again till you get your 6l.

You think power is too cheap, but I think it's finally accessible to the larger player base. If Perandus showed us anything, it was that players like being able to participate in the content without being slaves to the game. It's meant to be fun--not a job.

If you look at Prophecy vs Perandus, this season isn't doing so well. There are many factors that go into that, and I don't think it's that items aren't accessible, but it's clearly missing something. I personally am just burnt out on the leveling process. Others are sick of Lab. Some give up because of bad crafting RNG. Others feel forced to trade when they don't want to and the devs won't even take responsibility for the trade systems (they rely on 3rd party nonsense).

Many of these issues existed before Prophecy, so the main differences you might look at are what did Perandus offer, and what doesn't Prophecy offer? Or maybe Prophecy is simply doing something wrong. Again, just my personal opinion, but I don't think MMO style quests without guaranteed rewards really belong on this game. I'd be skeptical even if every prophecy did have a guaranteed reward, but at least they could be justified. Prophecies that only exist to "make something different happen" are seen as a waste of time, effort, and currency to any normal player. They are just junk (filler) to make the prophecies we might otherwise care about that much harder to actually get. Maybe people just don't like how shitty that feels.

End game hasn't changed much (other than the exp nerf), so I don't really think that is why people left so early. For that matter, I don't think power is any cheaper now than last season (probably a little less, tbh). It seems to me that while end game is something that needs addressing, it's far from the biggest fish to fry.

I didnt actually say i think power is to cheap, i said its never been so cheap. Your right prophecy is prob cheaper, my problem is that with this much power playing the paltry tiers of maps that drop is boring. I dont think content should be this gated and content is a very different thing to gear purchases.

Fair notice: I quit playing PoE some time ago, just browsing Feedback for kicks, and I speak purely out of game design interest.

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Regulator wrote:

First and foremost the biggest mistake and sign of unprofessionalism, lack of experience and initiative is the existence of a 3rd party site that serves as the true trading medium for the game. <snip> they continue acting like this is the right way and solution to the problem by promising more updates for the 3rd party program.....Let that sink for a while, and realise how atrociously sad this is, so we can continue.

I don't see this as a negative. Who cares who develops the trading system, as long as it's developed? Keeping it third-party is a benefit to GGG (they don't need to work on it themselves) and a neutral as far as player experience goes (what matters is the delivered experience, not who delivers it).

Note that I'm not saying "third party is so much better for players than GGG doing it." There is a big difference between saying something is irrelevant and saying that it's awesome.

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Regulator wrote:

And dont get me wrong, i too believe like GGG that an automated auction house wouldnt be the best course of action, but damn, there are so many sweet and good suggestions around the forum, its a shame nothing has yet been done.

Like for example,

Spoiler

in the past GGG mentioned a system were npcs semi-controlled by the player could act like vendors for specified items, other players could enter the hideout, bronwse said vendor's inventory and buy things without the player controlling the vendor doing anything. Or other cross instance trading features were players could sent trade offers, if the other player pressed accept then a trade-like window would appear were the items and the offer would show and by pressing accept again or decline the deal could be done without players having to be in the same instance. Or a mail system, where offers could be sent even to offline players, if the item has a buyout price then he doesnt even need to be online for this. And so many more options. And GGG can easily implement those and even restrict some features (like limiting the space of the vendor's inventory, trades per day with the mail system etc.)

Solutions exist, a lot of them, but i dont know if there is willingless from GGG's part to improve said aspect of the game.

I think all of those suggestions, except maybe cross-instance trade, are bad ideas.

1. NPC vendors with set buyouts + inevitable indexing (illicit third party if not officially supported) = auction house

2. Mail system with buyouts = auction house. Mail system without buyouts sounds nice but wouldn't be used much... imagine you're a buyer, you could get an item from a confirmed active player using an Online Only search, or send an offer to a mailbox where you have no assurance its owner will ever log in again, much less within the next few days. In short, no form of mail system warrants developer attention.

3. Cross-instance trading is the sort of thing which would require special mechanics to properly implement, as the current system would have issues with inventory cap (you're not supposed to get every single item out of a map with only one portal, etc). However, the core mechanic for item receipt is already there (remove-only tabs) and a more formalized process for listing items could complete the puzzle. I don't think it's worth doing with cross-instance trade as the sole payoff, but it could build towards other improvements (see below).

I am not saying there isn't negative feedback about trading. There is, and a wise game developer would take away from that feedback "we should try to fix, or at least improve, this." But those suggestions all fall somewhere between "ineffective waste of development resources (unless developing past that to a further goal)" and "destroy Path of Exile." Knowing there is a problem is not the same as knowing the solution.

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Regulator wrote:

Spoiler

So let me share the reason i made this post because the point might make GGG more willing to improve the trading exprience.

So...what made me post this were recent events that really showcase how the state of trade at the moment is so sad. It started 2-3 days before the recent State of Exile podcast, when a perm HC player whispered to me about an item. As usually i said, "let me finish some prophecies i procced and ill be right there like 10-15minutes", he said "ok". As soon as i was done i whispered him again only to find out that he was offline. The exact same scenario was repeated a bit after the first one, but this time i added the other player in my friendlist so i can invite him as soon i was finished with the map i was doing in proHC. Not even 5minutes had passed, and the player logged out.

The day after that the podcast was on and people were talking about possibilities and whaat would happen to the game if this or if that. I was searching an item, after whispering like 10-12 people and getting the not logged in/afk messages, i finally found a person who said "ok, but im in a map trial atm, so can you w8 5-10minutes?" Ofcourse i said yes, and then went on mapping. As i was mapping i received a message again from that player who made a comment about the trials, and by actually paying attention to his name i realised it was ItsYoji (streamer/youtuber), who after the trade and some fun discussion we had said "and people in the State of Exile complain how trade is bad atm" only to receive the answer from me "well it is, as i very well know it and you know it and every sensible players knows it, the fact that every once in a while a worthwhile interaction occurs doesnt mean the system is ok" in which he simply agreed and went on talking about the trials again. I continued hearing the podcast, and realised that popular streamers (ziggy, zeno, pohx, lifting) all had some gripe with the current trading system (others bigger than the rest) but all wanted an improvement, and these guys bring GGG traffic and money with their streams, like it or not they influence their viewers/players who talk with their wallets to GGG.

So the last incident was today, when i again got a whisper from a person in perm HC asking for an item (5l white chest), i was in the middle of a montrous treasure map so i said "ill relog in 5-10 minutes", to which he responded "ok, ill w8". Not 3 minutes later he came back to me saying "never mind mate, i found another piece for my needs", me as a gentleman only said "ok, take care and have fun", only to receive a messaage from the same person again asking me for another white 5l chestpiece i had. Realising that i was the same seller he only admited his "mistake" and patiently then waited for me to finish saying ":(, oooh ok then i cant but wait".

"What is the point of those stupid stories man? Like what the fuck, why you do this?" Dont worry everything has its meaning, and those stories are not an exception. What i want to point with those is that the game is bleeding players with this trading system we have, a person that wants to play 30minutes after work and has to wait for 15minutes to buy an item, loses interest, and GGG loses potential customers. When the 3rd party site is down for example it greatly affect the game, and that is a shame, and even bigger one that GGG still refuses to either integrate it or come up with her own better trading system/experience.

What I got from it was sightly different: "When someone whispers me to buy an item in HC, I should immediately portal out to conduct trade or they'll move on to another seller, until they find one without shitty service." I mean, seriously, it's HC - what else are you using the portals for? Flask spam/refill? Extreme packratting? In any case, it should be clear to you that many other HC sellers are willing to do what you are not.

Please stop blaming the game for your own inadequacies. Unless you're trying to advocate automated selling services, aka auction house. In which case: No.

Here's why no automated selling service... Sellers offer quality, buyers offer quantity. The way PoE's trade system works is the seller lists an item and suggests a price, but ultimately the buyer has control over pricing and the seller doesn't, because the buyer can modify the amount of currency offered while the seller cannot modify the item offered. The sellers options with offers are binary: yes or no. This puts pricing responsibility in the hands of both buyer and seller (because list/advertising price is still important), testing both players for valuation skill. Automated buyouts - the systemic kind which put the buyer in a binary yes/no position - erode this skill on the buyer's end to the point that it may as well not exist, because choosing the lowest price from a short list can hardly be called skill, and offline sellers would constitute a vast majority of the market.

(I say "short list" because valuation skill plays a diminishing role as markets flood. Skill matters more in trades for relatively scarce and/or high-demand items. However, such items are really important, so trades involving them are, too.)

So to preserve what little semblance of skill remains in trade, automated buyouts should not be allowed to occur. This means that sellers should always be the ones to both initiate (list) and conclude (binary yes/no) a trade. This means offline sellers will always have a tremendous disadvantage over online sellers, particularly because of buyer doubt that a particular seller is even an active player - what if they don't log in for days or weeks?

A thought excitement: imagine if GGG could provide more ways for offline sellers to remain connected to online buyers in real time, by allowing PoE to follow them outside of the game (optionally, of course). Imagine if trade listings were more formalized, such that seller offers where in a "meaningless" Description text box in a listing, buyers could attach escrowed bids to listings (or retract them at any time, returning the escrowed offer), and sellers had binary approval on bus. Then, imagine a smart phone app which notifies you of bids on your listings and allows you to give that binary yes/no from your phone instead of having to log in to PoE (maybe even a SMS service for those with budget phones). At that point, "offline" sellers could have nearly the same service as online sellers without modifying the core skill dynamic of trade.

(Such a smartphone app could be developed in-house or by third parties. Irrelevant to player experience, as long as that experience is good.)

So yeah, I could think of trade improvements without lowering trade to automated buyouts. But it's worth noting that such a system still wouldn't be for everyone, as not everyone would want PoE to follow them around (even if it's mostly just binary yes/no choices) when not sitting in front of their computer. At the end of the day, selling would be - and should be - about how online one is willing to be, about how quickly a seller responds to buyer offers. There's simply no getting around that, unless one embraces automated buyouts and the one-sided view on valuation skill which inexorably comes with it.