well thats just you, it takes me 3 seconds to find an item i need. and i see you just started playing the game :\
Same. Type in item name, check "online", check "buyout", hit search, whisper person. Doesn't answer? Press "arrow up" key, try next name. It's only time consuming if you haggle.
this is aimed at Real_Wolf as well because he thinks it's relevant that there is interaction in this scenario.
it isn't relevant. reason being:
players are being trained pavlovian style to not haggle at all 1on1 unless it's a super expensive item or a very short process why? because it wastes time. the players who sell the most items are the ones who list only for cheap, aggressive buyouts with no haggling at all.
and likewise, when you're buying an item and the seller starts excessively haggling it's easier to just skip him and go to the guy who just has a buyout shop.
The part on maps makes very little sense. Maps already have implicit difficulty scaling with level--the monster life and damage is very different from 66 to 78. And these jumps are further intensified by the point at which it becomes mandatory to alch maps in order to get sustainable returns. Increasing the map drop rates makes the game easier, because it enables you to sustain on worse rolls. If you forced the value on 66-69 maps down, people would run them white instead of blue and still move up in tiers. The kinds of rolls your build can do is how PoE allows you to choose difficulty potentially beyond what you can handle.
It is true that low maps tend to accumulate, but this is part of what is already forcing map values down and letting new-to-endgame players get away with worse map management. And GGG has implemented two different recipes that serve to sink low maps in favor of higher ones.
This was a really good read. I especially liked what you said about challenging content being more accessible, very true. Also I like your assessment of uniques and when they should drop. I hope someone from GGG takes the time to read this.
this problem is the same exact problem diablo 3 had with the auction house.
poe.xyz IS THE POE AUCTION HOUSE
there is no difference in functionality between these things besides the fact that in poe you have to alt tab to access the auction house and theres no official middleman where the item sits in escrow (you have to finalize the trade 1on1)
With overlays that is not even needed, a browser windows pops up in game just like it was a always accessible auction house.... and that was something steam added to the game with its in game overlay.
Last edited by Jiero#2499 on Mar 28, 2014, 10:49:21 PM
Path of Exile's economy is currently slowly become a bloated lumbering beast. Trampling on those who don't participate in it and choking those who do.
Trade chat is flooded with spam because everything and anything is incentivized to become a part of this bloated beast. Even poe.xyz and the trade forums are becoming filled with unsold items at unrealistic prices, further choking healthy trade. Increasingly you hear reports on how it's becoming more difficult to sell, how it's becoming more difficult to find the items you need to buy at reasonable prices if you can find them at all.
This amidst endless cries and complaints that PoE is by now a trade simulator and not an action RPG.
Path of Exile's economy is bloated.
The Solution
But I'd say it can become healthier. I believe there's room for the developers vision of an engaging economy that brings power to those who participate in it while at the same time remaining a true action RPG. And, more importantly, I think this can be done without resorting to a dedicated self-found league or features such as account-bound items. So that the game can stay in line with it's original concept of a hardcore action RPG with a negotiation-based economy.
To do this Path of Exile's economy needs to be trimmed down. It needs to lose weight and become a leaner healthier beast that does not cause flooded chats, that does not bury indexers and trade forums in unsold items and that does not leave both buyers and sellers unable to find one another to make their deals. What we need is a luxury economy, an economy that's not about quantity of items traded but about quality. An economy that's all about high-end gear.
Path of Exile needs a smaller and more focused economy that centers around high-end gear.
How to slim down the economy
Currently almost every single item in the game is implemented in such a way as to incentivize it's inclusion in the economy. There's a system-wide scarcity on just about everything characters use to ensure that everything that can possibly be traded has market-value.
Yet this is in the end a self-defeating setup. Because everything is scarce and nothing comes in abundance players are deprived of the very means they would need to turn that scarcity into a healthier economy where intelligent use of abundant resources allows them to take advantage of that scarcity to turn a profit. Instead the only means to abundance come in the form of extreme time investment, astronomical luck and RMT. Ending up in a situation that leaves the majority of players without the means of healthy participation, or even voluntary separation, of the economy.
To trim down the economy to a healthier size we need to introduce limited abundance into the system, effectively removing certain items from the economy entirely with the exception of casual trading between friends and guild-members whilst providing a means accessible to all players to have the resources they need to start building wealth and take advantage of the scarcity that remains in the rest of the system.
To achieve that there are three areas I believe need to be changed. I'll offer several potential solutions that will also touch on other aspects besides the economy including self-found, map-sustainability, hardcore-gameplay, rerolling and others. The main point of my post ends here though, that the core game of Path of Exile needs a trimmed-down economy. Not the current iteration where every item is scarce to enforce a market-value but neither a forced absence of economy through a self-found league or bound items.
Scarcity should not be enforced on everything in the game, a healthy economy also requires abundance.
Three areas of improvement
Gems
Gems need to be removed from the economy. Specifically non-quality gems. Non-quality gems are, in the most literal way, the resource players use to begin building wealth and to participate in the economy. Intelligent use of this resource will allow you to take advantage of the scarcity that exists in the game both by killing enemies quicker and acquiring more loot and by allowing you to effectively get by with less.
For this very reason it's vital that skill gems themselves are not subject to such scarcity. A non-quality skill gem should not have any market-value at all beyond casual trades between friends and guildies. Non-quality skill gems should be abundantly available and should be the first thing players look at when they wonder how they're going to acquire the means to buy a specific peace of high-end gear. There should not be a single skill or support gem in the game that can not be easily acquired, without any real cost, by a poor person with a plan to get rich (or die trying).
In addition easier access to gems would inspire exactly the sort of market behavior we desire. A defining quality of high-end gear is links and sockets. Things prized much higher by those with an abundance of gems than those who are already short. Easier access to gems I believe would cause an increase in demand for items with good links and sockets, high-quality gear whose trade would be the singular focus of what I believe to be a healthier economy.
On the subject of skill gems I offer three potential solutions: 1. A new vendor recipe. 3 skill gems of the same color can be traded for a single random level 1 skill gem of the same color whose minimum required level is equal or below the lowest minimum required level of all gems offered. For example, you have a plan for a build that needs Reduced Mana. Except your class isn't getting that support, ever. You could level 3 Heavy Strike gems to level 9 and have a single chance at being able to vendor these for that support. You could level 4 Heavy Strike gems to level 9 and have 4 chances. Level 5 Heavy Strikes and you can vendor them in 10 combinations etc. 2. A new vendor. After beating Dominus for that difficulty Lady Dialla, the Gemling Queen, becomes available as a vendor selling skill gems and supports. She will have a small selection of level 1 gems available each level, never of quality, that can be purchased for an Orb of Chance. At normal difficulty she'll only ever have gems with a minimum level requirement of 10. At cruel she'll have gems up to and including level 24 and in Merciless she will potentially offer every single gem. 3. Extended Quest Rewards. Normal difficulty rewards stay exactly the same. At cruel difficulty every class can also pick from the rewards of adjacent classes, meaning the Marauder also gets his pick from Templar and Duelist gems. The Scion would gain a balanced subset of every single class. At merciless difficulty every class can pick every single gem given to any class as a reward for that particular quest. Rangers could pick from Templar rewards and Witches could pick gems normally offered to Marauders.
The point of these changes is to effectively remove non-quality gems from the greater market, both to slim down the economy as to facilitate easier participation in the economy by removing roadblocks to making a fun farming build.
Maps
Maps should be removed from the economy.
There's a single quality that I believe that all challenging games possess. They give you the option to access content that's tougher than you can handle. This exists in Dark Souls where you have to option to not head to the Undead Burg but instead head straight for the Tomb of Giants. In XCOM: Enemy Unknown you can choose to start on Impossible Ironman difficulty right off the bat. Even Path of Exile has the option to, in normal, skip straight through areas and past side-areas to get access to content that's potentially much higher than your level. In later difficulties there's the option to do higher side-areas right away when you're several levels below or to wait and do them later.
This is good, this adds challenge and choice to the game. However PoE's mapping system goes the exact opposite direction. Instead of giving you access to content that you can't handle it denies you access to content that you can handle. This is bad, both from a gameplay perspective as from an economic perspective.
The lack of this access causes players to flood the market with low-quality items making trade chat, indexers and trade forums a mess full of items that are barely worth the effort of either selling or buying them to get the currency they need to keep on accessing content appropriate for their character. Directly working against what I believe would be a much healthier state of PoE's economy, a smaller luxury economy with a focus on high-end gear.
Instead what I believe would be a much better situation would be if the maps stockpiling in a player's stash were not the type too easy and boring to run but instead maps that are much too hard to run. Giving the player access to content harder than they can handle. In turn this would inspire exactly the market behavior we wish to see, providing a focus instead on the high-end gear required to run these maps as opposed to a constant stream of smaller amounts currency to keep rolling maps.
To achieve this I have two variants of essentially the same solution which, admittedly, is rather extreme. I would suggest a boost in map drop-rates sufficient to effectively destroy any market-value they may have had. With one of these possible simple cave-eats. 1. 66-70 maps would remain the same. 71-75 maps would gain an implicit mod of moderate difficulty, different and appropriate to the type of map. 75+ maps would get an implicit mod of high difficulty, again different and appropriate to the type of map. These implicit mods would give no bonus to the quantity of items dropped. 2. Maps 66-70 will continue to drop in all rarities as they do now. 71-75 maps will only drop as magic or rare, with a bias towards more dangerous mods. Maps 75+ will only drop as rares with a strong bias towards more dangerous mods. The quantity bonus of mods would likely have to be reduced somewhat.
The goal is to provide much easier access to higher maps but at the same time increase the probability that those maps will be harder, this to create an environment where players have continual access to content harder than they can handle. At the same time inspiring demand for high-end items needed to deal with those maps.
Uniques
You're probably expecting an 'uniques need to be removed from the market'. Not quite. Instead how uniques drop needs to be diversified.
Right now we're in the awkward situation where uniques are losing a lot of glamour because the quantity bonuses present in maps, along with whatever rarity players have acquired by that time, causes many uniques to drop at the times players need them least. At the same time this means those uniques are often dumped on the market for prices barely worth the effort of the veterans selling them but still out of rich for new players, the sole audience likely to buy them. More market bloat that we need to get rid off.
Uniques in this game come in several flavors. We've got high-end extremely powerful uniques the likes of Kaom's Heart, Shavronne's Wrappings and Soultaker. We've got general purpose uniques the likes of Goldrim, The Searing Touch and Bright Beak. We've got build-enabling uniques like Facebreakers, Solaris Lorica and Voll's Protector. And we've got leveling uniques the likes of Crown of Thorns, Briskwrap and Ondar's Clasp. These should be split up in separate categories each with their own level and area related drop chances.
Right now, with all uniques being in essentially the same category I believe we're in an unhealthy position when it comes to the market for uniques. The high-end stuff is suitably high-priced and traded for, I'm not looking for changes there. But everything else is in a bad spot that benefits neither trades nor self-found players. Again, the sheer size of the market makes it a pain in the ass to find the items you need without an automated auction house (which would destroy the game in other aspects).
At the same time I believe the current system, which seems designed around the idea that dropping low-level uniques in the end-game will inspire rerolls, is countering itself. I do not believe that the vast majority of low level uniques dropped in maps inspire any thoughts of rerolling. Rerolling I believe is driven by two things. Firstly the idea of a new playstyle, for most builds this does not require any uniques and where it does this applies only to a very small selection of build-enabling uniques, general uniques dropping in the end-game serve no purpose in this. Secondly it's fond memories of the levelling process, uniques dropped in the end-game have no purpose at all in this, on the contrary it's uniques dropped during the levelling process that serve a role here. To inspire rerolls these low level uniques need to be attained during leveling, at a point where the player doesn't have the wealth to effectively participate in the economy. As such they need to drop.
On the matter of uniques I would suggest these changes: 1. High-end uniques should stay as they are. Extremely rare and primarily obtained through trade or the most difficult content. These are exactly the uniques we want to see present on the market. Should only drop in high-level content, mostly through maps with lower chances in high-level Merciless zones. 2. General purpose uniques are useful at most levels but will be replaced by stronger gear without too much difficulty. This category should be available at all levels and should be relatively common too find. These don't flood the market but they do not push it in the direction we wish either, as such I believe their drop chance should be significantly increased but with a heavy bias towards lower rolls. High rolled items will be rare and take the market more in the direction we want. Low rolled items will be more abundant and less likely to appear on the market. 3. Build-enabling uniques need to drop primarily mid-game. The end of cruel and the entirety of Merciless. This is the time where obsessive rerollers need them to start a new character. They should be rarer in maps and early-game. As with general purpose uniques I believe their drop chances should be increased noticeably but with again a strong bias towards lower rolls to enable a market for highly rolled items whilst providing lower rolled variants to inspire players to keep rerolling. 4. Levelling uniques, the type of unique that's only useful in early-game and serves little to no purpose in gearing beyond that need the most change. These uniques are the type that only inspire awe in new players still unfamiliar with the scope of PoE and are, at best, only decent to more experienced players. We don't want to see these on the market much at all but we do want them in the hands of newer players to inspire them to play on. Drop chances for these should be significantly increased in the early game, to the point early act bosses will drop one very often. On the other side they should be very rare mid-game, allowing variants with more sockets and links, and not drop at all in maps, ever.
The purpose here is to end up with less uniques on the market overall but those that are present should be in demand and highly contested. In addition it's to provide a richer levelling experience and easier rerolls giving more options and power to players to build wealth through playing the game.
Final Words
Well... If you've come this far that must've been one heck of a long read. Thank you for reading my rambling and even if you disagree vehemently, I've been wrong before, I do hope it provided some food for thought about the state of the game and the role that the economy should play there.
The main point I wish to make is that I do believe that the economy has a real and significant role to play in Path of Exile but that currently that role has become much too broad. The economy needs to be refocused, specifically on high-end gear, providing clear aspirations and goals to those who do trade, which fits in much better with PoE's chosen format without an auction house but with trade through simple chatting. At the same time it would relieve other areas of the game of the economy's constant influence and allow those to stand on their own.
The part on maps makes very little sense. Maps already have implicit difficulty scaling with level--the monster life and damage is very different from 66 to 78. And these jumps are further intensified by the point at which it becomes mandatory to alch maps in order to get sustainable returns. Increasing the map drop rates makes the game easier, because it enables you to sustain on worse rolls. If you forced the value on 66-69 maps down, people would run them white instead of blue and still move up in tiers. The kinds of rolls your build can do is how PoE allows you to choose difficulty potentially beyond what you can handle.
It is true that low maps tend to accumulate, but this is part of what is already forcing map values down and letting new-to-endgame players get away with worse map management. And GGG has implemented two different recipes that serve to sink low maps in favor of higher ones.
1. Dropping down to 66s because you can't sustain maps isn't difficulty. It's tedium. For a sufficiently high leveled character there's no difficulty in 66s. In a challenging game a player should always have access to content more difficult than he can handle unless he's already at the highest difficulty the game can offer.
2. I want them to move up in tiers. I want players to constantly be stretching their characters and running maps just above what they can realistically handle. And yes, rolls are how PoE allows the choice of difficulty which is exactly why I suggested either a minimum rarity on dropped maps or an implicit extra roll to strengthen this system and provide constant access to more difficult content. The goal isn't to maintain the current mapping system of constantly dropping down to less challenging content. The goal is for a new mapping system where you're constantly moving up tiers, sometimes even before you're ready.
3. Your method of acquiring low maps involves trade. I want to remove map-trading entirely. It's more spam in the economy driving the need for indexers and potentially an auction house. I don't want to move in that direction. I want to keep to the original idea of a haggling-based economy, this requires a smaller economy with less things being traded. Map management should be in selecting just the right map for your character's power, not in working against the odds to keep doing content appropriate for your character's power.
My vision for a better PoE: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/863780
Section on maps is very good. Wish more people would read it.
I would like to have increased difficulty and better rewards as an option that is encouraged, not gated away. Let High level end game gear items be what the market centers around.
It's not right that I can't freely challenge myself and instead have to farm easy zones. This game was meant to be challenging, so why can't I fight an enemy I'm not prepared for? Why not let me try a 78 map, get my ass kicked, then try to build better without spending a ton of currency?
It just makes very little sense from a game play perspective. Makes me feel like, what's the point? Even if my character got good enough for the content, how long can i keep playing it? Probably not enough to really feel worth it. imo
1. Dropping down to 66s because you can't sustain maps isn't difficulty. It's tedium. For a sufficiently high leveled character there's no difficulty in 66s. In a challenging game a player should always have access to content more difficult than he can handle unless he's already at the highest difficulty the game can offer.
2. I want them to move up in tiers. I want players to constantly be stretching their characters and running maps just above what they can realistically handle. And yes, rolls are how PoE allows the choice of difficulty which is exactly why I suggested either a minimum rarity on dropped maps or an implicit extra roll to strengthen this system and provide constant access to more difficult content. The goal isn't to maintain the current mapping system of constantly dropping down to less challenging content. The goal is for a new mapping system where you're constantly moving up tiers, sometimes even before you're ready.
3. Your method of acquiring low maps involves trade. I want to remove map-trading entirely. It's more spam in the economy driving the need for indexers and potentially an auction house. I don't want to move in that direction. I want to keep to the original idea of a haggling-based economy, this requires a smaller economy with less things being traded. Map management should be in selecting just the right map for your character's power, not in working against the odds to keep doing content appropriate for your character's power.
Who is dropping down to 66s, realistically? After the massive buffs to map size, it's all too easy to sprint straight to 74+ and stay there. I was able to do exactly this in Nemesis, and while my interest/playtime isn't as high for Invasion, my map pool has stayed ahead of my character level/power by a decent margin. If you aren't sustaining maps well above 70, then you probably aren't rolling them with enough quantity. This is what "sustaining" is supposed to achieve--it puts pressure on you to do harder content via better rolls, because if you don't you risk slipping down. Again, the system you're advocating alleviates that pressure because further buffs to map drop rates would make the already easy sustain possible with blue maps. That makes the game easier, not harder.
As for the haggling-based economy, perhaps that might have been the goal in the distant past, but it's completely out the window now with the existence of indexers.
Its hard to get high quantity maps due to buffing invaders to 1 shot mode. I don't alch maps on invasion. I chisel and alt spam til i get pack size or magic monsters then a non damage mod and then I regal it.
Example: 20% quality with pack size, reflect, immune to curse is only 56% quantity.
