Real Money Auction House RMAH for poe

Hard to stop this from happening one way or the other.

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CharanJaydemyr wrote:

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tpapp157 wrote:

It's a bit of a moot topic. GGG has no intention of adding a RMAH to the game. Though I do believe they have plans to add a normal auction house.

So why isn't in in the off-topic board yet?

I can't believe this reached 9 pages. No intention of reading all nine, and for a forum junkie like me, that's a miracle.

lol

i last post on page 2, can't believe either when i login today to see it jump to 12 pages. And thats just 1day ago.

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tacitus wrote:

Perhaps this has been mentioned earlier ... but my simple search did not reveal it and I haven't read the entire thread.

One reason GGG probably would not want a RMAH is that it will take a substantial amount of resources to support it; including perhaps international legal resources. Some (South Korea?! I think) at one point (and maybe still) did not want Blizzard's RMAH because it was potentially too close to online gambling. At a certain point this is no longer going to be an isolated case and its going to become a significant issue. Its not just a simple set it up and expect money to start flowing in.

And Tax issue too. ^ ^"

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Tagek wrote:

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zeto wrote:

Interesting reasons.

Anyway, my stance is summed up as this:

Big Daddy John works at a good job, he gets paid a boat load...

Middle Guy Tony works a regular job, makes ends meet...

Tiny Kid Suzie cannot have a job and spends her leisure time playing...

Item Z is awesome, and everyone wants it. Middle Guy Tony simply has no chance. He cannot afford it, and he cannot devote the time to get items to trade. Tiny Kid Suzie however has all the time in the world, as is very common, and grinds hardcore for 30 hours to get enough resources to offer. Big Daddy John works his normal job, and comes back home to see Suzie offering great loot for Item Z. Big Daddy John offers $200 instead that took him 2-4 hours to obtain... Big Daddy John gets Item Z and a bunch of other great items that require 30 hours of play to obtain... he spent a total of 5 hours, and is now able to obliterate others who have played for 10x longer than him, including poor Suzie.

I do not consider that within the spirit of this type of game, and I feel that this is the case regardless of if it's commonplace or not.

It's simply wrong and Tiny Kid Suzie deserves those items... not Big Daddy John.

I think what you are forgetting is that the person playing the game is actually 'playing' the game.
He's having fun, potentially even partying up with friends having a great time.
The guy with the money is working his potentially stressful and boring job, albeit for less time.
And what if big daddy john has to work almost every day for a very long time, and has very little time to actually play the game? Does that mean he is not entitled to having good items? Does he need to play the game for 5 years to finally get endgame gear? I don't think so.

And the thing is: You say tiny suzan deserves the item.
Well, if she truly 'deserves' it through in-game standards then she could have gotten some cash on the RMAH through in-game means and bought the item that way.
It's really not hard to buy an item off the AH, then sell it for a reasonable price on the RMAH, and voila you have money to spend on the RMAH.

You could always buy an account.

Or "pay" someone to play your account.

That's not my point at all.
My point is when you're playing you're having fun, when you are working you are probably not having fun, quite the opposite for most people.

fuckmedead, what is the computerverse coming to?
The joy of a game like this is fighting endless hoards and then suddenly 'item of excruciating delight' drops in your path...
People who have lost sight of that concept need to fuck off and play the stock market!

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zeto wrote:

Interesting reasons.

Anyway, my stance is summed up as this:

Big Daddy John works at a good job, he gets paid a boat load...

Middle Guy Tony works a regular job, makes ends meet...

Tiny Kid Suzie cannot have a job and spends her leisure time playing...

Item Z is awesome, and everyone wants it. Middle Guy Tony simply has no chance. He cannot afford it, and he cannot devote the time to get items to trade. Tiny Kid Suzie however has all the time in the world, as is very common, and grinds hardcore for 30 hours to get enough resources to offer. Big Daddy John works his normal job, and comes back home to see Suzie offering great loot for Item Z. Big Daddy John offers $200 instead that took him 2-4 hours to obtain... Big Daddy John gets Item Z and a bunch of other great items that require 30 hours of play to obtain... he spent a total of 5 hours, and is now able to obliterate others who have played for 10x longer than him, including poor Suzie.

I do not consider that within the spirit of this type of game, and I feel that this is the case regardless of if it's commonplace or not.

It's simply wrong and Tiny Kid Suzie deserves those items... not Big Daddy John.

For your scenario to be at all meaningful, there has to be a certain thresh-hold of items, or we have to go to fringe cases.

If a "Good" item is worth $1, and a "perfect" item is worth $10, Big Daddy John and Middle Guy Tony can both afford it if they really want it. Sure, if Uber Sword of Level 99 Perfect Itemization and 6 Linked Slots costs $10,000, there is an option which is only available to John.

But, that brings us back to the point that there are lots of options - Even if that *particular* route doesn't work out to be "fair", there are other routes - Tony could use his lunch break at work ("Time outside the game") to to start and maintain a PoE fansite, make it popular, and then leverage it to trade or receive donations (of in game items. Or money, which he can then use to buy the same items as John. Or a playgroup who will share loots. Etc.).

Unless Tony is working 3 jobs to feed his 6 kids, because their momma died in that horrible plane crash - this is the fringe case I referred to earlier - in which case... Meh? Life isn't fair. Get over it, again why are we trying to single out one specific perceived "unfairness" over another?

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Nemesis5858 wrote:

fuckmedead, what is the computerverse coming to?
The joy of a game like this is fighting endless hoards and then suddenly 'item of excruciating delight' drops in your path...
People who have lost sight of that concept need to fuck off and play the stock market!

People have been trading items instead of using only the ones that drop in their path for an awfully long time now. You'd only just noticed?

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Faerie_Storm wrote:

No, just NO!. I don't want to see a RMAH here, I like that no one can pay to buy power thank you very much.

Yes but the issue is not whether you or anyone else in the beta wants it or not. The issue is that it all happens on its own when the inevitable 3rd party vendors open shop. Then whether you like it or not, power will be bought regardless of your opinion about it.

That's what happened with every game from Diablo 2 to wow. Now companies can try to fight it and do bans and police bots but it is a losing fight. Or they can embrace it and use the power of their own user base to force competition on the 3rd party vendors and drive their profit margins to nil via an integrated RM Auction House. At the same time they get a portion of everybody's (user base + 3rd party bots/vendors) profit driving down margins even more. Thats what Blizz is trying to do with their RMAH in D3. Whether it works or not, nobody knows for sure. Time will tell (ie come back a year after D3 release) but at least they are trying something outside the box instead of the losing fight of enforcement.

It is much like the debate between enforcement or legalization of drugs. Do you continue the losing fight of enforcement of prohibitive laws or do you legalize it and let natural market forces drive out the criminals from the market with the added benefit of being able to tax it.

This thread is actually a benefit to the game long term because these issues can be dealt with much better if the company recognizes that they exist rather than hiding their heads in the sand and live in lala land believing that it will never happen.

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zeto wrote:

The thing is, the RMAH is a statistical enabler. Because the access is now a trusted party and fully integrated, the percentage of users will go up. Theoretically demand will go up, and farming activities will go up.

That is the ONLY thing the RMAH does.

Conversely, the lack of a RMAH is a statistical disabler... it will reduce the amount of people using a RM trade system, because it's not integrated and there is a trust issue. Theoretically, demand will be lower, and farming activities will be lower.

For the company, it's all about the money gained... it does nothing else for the company. They absolutely do not care if it's safer or whatever... that is simply lip-service to foster usage.

I agree on your concept of "statistical enabler" in as far as an AH main purpose is to enable/promote trading activities (ie it is much simpler and efficient to buy/sell via auctions than spamming a trade channel)

What I dont agree is the assumption that "farming" activities are somehow bad or outside of normal play. When you reach the high levels, the main PVE activity in this game is actually clearing areas for the purpose of loot. That is pretty much what I call "farming" but it is what everybody do as part of the normal game once they reach a high enough level. That is what everybody do
in Chaos.

So yes an AH enables more efficient trading activities and will increase the level of trading which is basically what you want an AH to do. With efficient and rewarding trades happening, people will increase their PVE activities in chaos or other future high level areas which is basically more playing of the game.

Companies actually should care about efficient and "safe" (ie free of scam) trading because one of the main element of the game is loot and trading of loot. If that process is efficient, more people will be playing the game and they will play it longer before switching to another game. Looking for that new better loot or some loot that you can trade (now made easy with an AH) for that new better loot is what makes people come back to the game after going through the content multiple times.