Trade system is TERRIBLE - and not just that

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MortalKombat3 wrote:

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Unquietheart wrote:

What MarcusMaximus was saying is that you're over using the existing trade system, which is why you think it sucks. And if there was an AH, then everyone would over use the trade system. Every single piece of junk would be up there for an Alchemy, or a Chrome, or an Alt.

You already can buy any "piece of junk" for 1 alch or 1 chaos with current trading system. Be it 5-10% gem, or leveling item like Victario's Flight, etc. AH wont make it any worse. It will only save your time buying "junk", that's all.

An AH would make it infinitely worse. No one would ever expect to find any upgrades while out in the world, everyone would be geared completely from the AH. Drops would cease to have any value at all as drops. For 99% of the player base, the game would simply become a currency grind.

And no, it is not currently that way, regardless of your personal experience or that of your friends. In point of fact, most players NEVER trade.

But don't take my word for it, here's Chris Wilson saying the same thing: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2025870

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Chris wrote:

Most players who play Path of Exile never trade.

Additionally, you focused on the most minor aspect of what I said, and choose to ignore the main point: MortalKombat3 was over using the system, which is why he had a negative experience of it. He was also accusing Hellshout of saying the existing system was "good" when in fact, Hellshout said nothing of the kind. Hellshout is clearly aware that the existing trade system is consider the lesser of two evils by the GGG devs. It's not "good" they freely admit it's awful, but it's still better than the alternative. Because (like most of us opposed to an AH) the GGG devs actually did get to see the AH in operation in D3 (and I'm talking about the Gold AH in addition to the RMT AH).

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MortalKombat3 wrote:

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Unquietheart wrote:

Guildwars 2 is an MMO. AH's have a place there.

PoE is an ARPG, AH's are erosive to basic game play.

And what's the core difference between ARPG and MMO regarding AH? In MMO, you MUST group with other players to beat endgame content (and it's balanced around that), and in ARPG, you can do it solo (and it balanced around that), that's the core difference. How AH "has a place" in one, and is "erosive" to second???

Was it really necessary to make two separate posts?

MMO's and ARPGs have a lot of fundamental differences.

MMO's have a shared over world (where players compete for crafting resources). MMOs have an easy leveling curve and put most of their effort on end game content. Said end game content is specifically geared for large groups. Large groups have multiple, distinct roles: Tanks, DPS, Healers/Support.

Gear is usually Bind-on-Equip. And the best gear in each tier is Bind-on-Pickup. Only a handful of slots are allowed to be filled with crafted and/or endgame level BoE gear.

Gear has only a limited amount of randomization. There is usually SOME, but not to the extent of an ARPG. Gear represents a substantial upgrade, and is often "tiered".

ARPGs do not have a shared overworld. Players do not compete for crafting resources.

All content is designed and built with the understanding that at least a substantial portion of the player base will run it solo. Encounters are not designed for specialized player roles, and are built with the base assumption that everyone is DPS.

Encounters in an ARPG are intended intended to provide a standing wave of challenge throughout out the game's horizon of activity. (You're welcome to argue that they're not very successful at it, but that's besides the point. The point is that standing wave of challenge is the design goal).

Each challenge is intended to provide highly randomized, incremental rewards, offering just enough of an upgrade to allow you to attempt the next challenge in line. Gear is (almost never) character bound in an ARPG.

MMOs are intended as large-scale, teamwork exercises.
ARPGs are moment-to-moment combat, with almost constant, small scale rewards.

An AH CAN work in an MMO. (Although most MMOs have plenty of problems with abuses). Probably the best example I've personally ever seen was the AH set up in EVE-Online.

AH's are erosive to basic gameplay in an ARPG (the key example being D3).

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Kurnis wrote:

You're thinking too small, or maybe just not being creative. There are ways to implement an AH that would be IDENTICAL to poe.trade, except fixing issues that poe.trade has, such as price fixing, fake listings, and items showing up for hours after being sold.

You say AH ruin ARPGs, but poe.trade IS an auction house. What are you trying to say, that we should remove poe.trade? And as for drops, they wouldn't have to adjust anything, since trading is already occurring on a massive scale. You aren't making any sense and only contradicting your own "points".

It comes down to: We already HAVE an auction house. Let's just make it official to fix the glaring problems that plague this shitty system.

POE.trade is not an AH. When we say AH we mean the ability to sell even when offline and usually with buyouts. ARPGs should not have that unless they've tested it extensively and add some sort of soul binding mechanism

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FrodoFraggins wrote:

decent MMO auction Houses leave out best in slot items from the AH.

But PoE doesnt, even with current trading system. So, maybe you'll actually ask for THAT - make the most powerful items non-tradeable? Because for trading expensive items, current trading system in PoE is almost as good as AH with instant buyout.
Making the best items non-tradeable essentially will make an SSF game. I've played WoW, where almost all best items were non-tradeable, and i'd rather consider it self-found game, even though it had AH for consumables and few tradeable items (though "used" items couldnt be sold again anyway).

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FrodoFraggins wrote:

and did you even see how the AH ruined D3?

I played D3 since launch, and until they removed AH. But i didnt saw how AH ruined it. D3 was ruined because it had shallow itemization/gameplay/character buildup, no currency sinks and RMAH, and no fresh leagues/economy every 3 months. And do you think D3 suddenly became a super-interesting and popular game after they remove AH? Hell, NO! It still kept all its "weak points" except RMAH.

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FrodoFraggins wrote:

If they add an AH here, they have to massively nerf the drop rates to compensate. It also makes it very easy for people to flip items and corner the market.

Actually, it will make it much harder to flip items. With properly implemented AH, it will be much easier and faster to evaluate an item for ordinary player. Flipper wont be able to use "price fixing", and checking prices could be made in few clicks. Even though flipping might seem "easier", profits from each "flip" will decrease drastically, and dont forget about possible AH fee, that could make flipping most items simply not worth it. Total market control will also be harder, cause more players will use trade. Also, i never seen "fair flipping" (without abusing price fixing, or total market control) as something detrimental for game, or ordinary players.

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FrodoFraggins wrote:

David Brevik, Chris Wilson and Blizzard(now) understand exactly how toxic an AH for items is to an ARPG. Chris and David have also explained in detail what the tradeoffs are.

Please stop suggesting things that will hurt the game

Why dont make a game, balanced around SSF, then? Why bother with trading at all, if they dont want it? Turning PoE into SSF game will help it even more, following you logic. Why stop the half-way?

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Unquietheart wrote:

But don't take my word for it, here's Chris Wilson saying the same thing: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/2025870

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Chris wrote:

Most players who play Path of Exile never trade.

It's the same as say "Most players in World of Warcraft play solo".
PoE is balanced so you HAVE TO TRADE, Chris himself stated that. If you dont trade in game, balanced around trading, you just an idiot and choosen wrong game. Same as you play only solo in WoW - you're playing a game in wrong way.

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Unquietheart wrote:

MMO's have a shared over world (where players compete for crafting resources). MMOs have an easy leveling curve and put most of their effort on end game content. Said end game content is specifically geared for large groups. Large groups have multiple, distinct roles: Tanks, DPS, Healers/Support.

MMO's have instances, where players DONT compete with each other. Most endgame content in hidden within instances in MMO like WoW.
It's NATURAL, that early game is easier, than endgame. I know, in most ARPGs, the hardest part of gameplay is playing at early levels, while playing a fully-leveled and gear character might be a cakewalk, but it's just a poor design. How is it related to MMO?
Distinctive roles in MMO just reflect a deeper gameplay mechanics. Why it shouldnt be possible to play a tanky character, or healer in ARPG? For example, in Dark Souls series you can play as tanky character, or character with heals, or glass cannon caster, or nimble melee DPS, and all those playstyles are viable solo.

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Unquietheart wrote:

Gear is usually Bind-on-Equip. And the best gear in each tier is Bind-on-Pickup. Only a handful of slots are allowed to be filled with crafted and/or endgame level BoE gear.

It's just to make MMO mostly self-found, and prohibit trading between players.
Why we cant make the same in ARPG? Most of them dont bother with that because they're offline and solo-play in nature, so why bother with BoP and BoE?

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Unquietheart wrote:

Gear has only a limited amount of randomization. There is usually SOME, but not to the extent of an ARPG. Gear represents a substantial upgrade, and is often "tiered".

I bet, Grim Dawn ARPG has exactly what you described, yet, it's one of the best ARPGs ATM.

Trading still sucks as hell after x years lul.

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Trading still sucks as hell after x years lul.

And will continue to suck. Only idiots think otherwise.GGG clearly stated that they want trading to suck. Some players just cant accept reality.

Then don't trade. No excuse for it but lazy and incompetent. Steelmage was first to 100 in all 4 leagues playing in SSFHC so it's not like you need to trade/party or other things to make game easier.

I used to be a big trader even had pages of currency flip scripts but i like SSFHC more. More challenging more fun than being trade house boy. Who knows you might like it better too.

Of course I suck compared to Steelmage and died @89 but really fun compared to trade house.

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Aim_Deep wrote:

I used to be a big trader even had pages of currency flip scripts but i like SSFHC more. More challenging more fun than being trade house boy. Who knows you might like it better too.

Sadly, not everyone can afford to spend so much time and patience on PoE to play SSF. Progression really sucks in SSF, and many builds are out of question just because you wont have required unique. You cant even afford making mistakes with your build, because farming regret orbs is incredibly hard in SSF, so if you suddenly need 30-40 of them to change build, it's easier to level up a new character (lol). Also, it doesnt remove the fact, that you cant run endgame content without boring repetive farming of lower-level content. Nor that you keep all disadvantages of online game (latency, server lags, etc) while actually playing OFFLINE MODE.
But if you have enough time and patience, it's still a good option. Until you drop some FOTM uniques, OFC.

Most uniques you will find. Like I have 10 tabs of them only going to 89. Then you can farm many others with cards. This is not 4 years ago where nothing dropped and you had to trade. Game is practically moved to SSF like D3 did. Unique drop rates were increased 4 fold, you got masters to shore up deficienct gear, Essenses, cards for hard to get 6L and uniques, etc. Uber elder is killed by 2 week in SSFs so end game is there too.

The online experience is lame though game should offer offline version in SSF but I'm sure it has to do with compitition and keeping drops on server. All the big streamer have moved to SSF to compete. Raiz, Ziz, havoc etc all played SSFHC and couldnt compete if you could make your own items like local hosting would do.

Simple fix play the xbox version...... It has a half ass working AH