Detailed Proposal for an Auction House System - Guild Wars Guru archive powered by Guild Wars Legacy

Emerikol

Academy Page

Join Date: Jan 2007

Undead Army

E/Me

16 Feb 2007 at 22:14 - 401

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aeon_Xin

4. Bandwidth. You get what you pay for, and a 1 time minimum of 50$(or less now I hear for earlier chapters) isn't enough to impliment something that will end up straining the servers. People do die from lag(anet side) occasionally and this would only increase.

There are seperate servers for every district/instance that you are in, and your character data is transfered to a new server every time you switch zones. Putting an auction house in its own instance on an island somewhere would not be able to cause any kind of lag death whatsoever.

You also do not have to concern yourself with any of the other worries you have about an auction house being in existance, since nobody is forcing you to use it. It is coming anyways, so no point in complaining about it now

Same goes for more storage. It is all just a matter of time...

The Herbalizer

<3 Ecto

Join Date: Jul 2005

16 Feb 2007 at 22:46 - 402

Quote:

Originally Posted by Emerikol

There are seperate servers for every district/instance that you are in, and your character data is transfered to a new server every time you switch zones. Putting an auction house in its own instance on an island somewhere would not be able to cause any kind of lag death whatsoever.

You also do not have to concern yourself with any of the other worries you have about an auction house being in existance, since nobody is forcing you to use it. It is coming anyways, so no point in complaining about it now

Same goes for more storage. It is all just a matter of time...

The longer it is left the less likely it will happen. Why spend alot of $$$ to design and add new hardware (no comp expert) for the auction house if Guild Wars is only going to be around for 2 chapters.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ruby Lightheart

Well..instead of an auction house (cost fansites do a good job with auctions), why not install a market where players can put their goods up for sale for whomever wishes to pay that price. To help limit people from pricing stuff outrageously just so they can use the market as storage...limit the number of transactions PER ACCOUNT to 5 and have a time limit of 7-10 days. This way after 7-10 days the item is auto returned to the inventory of the toon that placed it up for sale. Gold could be deposited directly into the player's bank (not their on hand cash).

anyhow just me 3 1/2 cents

Alot of the rich players I know have multiple accounts. Some I know have up to 10

Anyway, the auction house WOULD be used by rich people to sell their stuff and some may consider it highly unfair if they get around the item limit by using all their other accounts

bilateralrope

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Nov 2005

New Zealand

Xen Of Onslaught (Xen of the Pacific division)

16 Feb 2007 at 23:45 - 403

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aeon_Xin

1. An auction house wouldn't really fit into GW. You're an adventurer on the move, not a merchant. When they add Industrious Merchant to the class options at character creation, I'll sign. I'm already pushing the limits of my tolerance with some guy who can store our 100k + ecto's worth of golds and greens, and not get robbed/killed.

I'll take the auction house despite the fact that it won't fit into the GW lore. Though since the Xunlai somehow manage to be everywhere, if they run the auction house, I don't see how it would be any worse.

Quote:

2. Amount of total and utter crap people save to sell would rise signifigantly, it's already bad enough. Scurvey Schiester Bastards. If you sold worthwhile stuff it'd take you 5 minutes per item, max in LA(or comparable city), providing you ask a decent price.

The auction house would require some sort of search system just to filter through the good items. So it would also filter out the worthless stuff.

Quote:

3. An open market induces prices to go up. It makes it so easy for everyone to know the going rate, so all prices will level out, no more extreme high and extreme low prices. With that noted, there will always be the guy asking for just a bit more and he'll get it, then since he got it, lots of other people will try to get it, and eventually will. Rinse and repeat. Over time prices rise.

Except that if the price is too high, the item won't sell. What I'll do is put items up for sale with their starting price way below what I feel the market value is. This means that if the market price drops, I'll still sell what I'm selling but those trying to push the price up won't sell.

Besides with an auction house, how can you push for a higher price except by putting a high starting price, which will push people away from your auction to the cheaper ones ?

If anything I feel the prices will go down as its easier to sell things meaning supply will go up and its harder for people to inflate the prices. Also since the auction house means people spend less time trading, people will spend more time farming, meaning higher supply, meaning lower prices.

So why do you say that an open market will make prices rise ?

Quote:

4. Bandwidth. You get what you pay for, and a 1 time minimum of 50$(or less now I hear for earlier chapters) isn't enough to impliment something that will end up straining the servers. People do die from lag(anet side) occasionally and this would only increase.

Bandwidth might be an issue here, though unless ANET comes out and actually states that this is why they aren't making an auction house, we can't really be sure. So unless someone has evidence that the bandwidth/CPU use of the auction house will be an issue its better to assume that it isn't.

Quote:

5. The way it is, it's up to the player to balance farming/XPing/StoryProgression/PvP/Farming/Trades to their taste.(Similar to managing attacks/healing/speed, etc in battle) It's currently possible, and fairly easy, to make vast amounts of money, with a minimum time spent in LA.

With the auction house, you spend less time trading, so you have more time to do everything else. So unless you actually enjoy trading I don't see how this is a problem as you will have more time to do whatever you enjoy doing.

Quote:

I guess, all in all, the only reason for people to really want an auction house is total greed, possibly combined with lack of skill at time management and research.

So wanting a system that is proven (in any other game with a working auction house) to reduce the time spent doing something we don't like doing is bad time management ? Especially since guild wars is meant to be fun.

As for research into prices, what exactly does that involve other than checking the price lists and then asking for a price check when the item isn't listed on them ?
Or should we spend more time doing stuff we don't enjoy ?

Quote:

And I think it would encourage people to save every piece of non max +12% while hexed crap they see and try to sell it.

Until they see that the non-max items simply don't sell, then they stop wasting their time with them. Though I'd suggest that, with the exception of some rarer skins, that the auction house simply refuses to take non-max items simply to reduce strain on the auction server. It should also refuse any items that have NPC traders or are sold by merchants for the same reason.

TABellis

Academy Page

Join Date: Sep 2006

Honors Glory

A/

18 Feb 2007 at 21:28 - 404

/signed

Much needed. Spamming WTS/WTB is so Old school.

Dark_Lord_Chris

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: Feb 2007

Canada. Eh?

Fury of the Storm

P/W

19 Feb 2007 at 02:56 - 405

/Signed

I love this idea, I hate standing around LA for an hour trying to sell something. This idea, if implemented, will offer more actual time that you play the game and less standing around hitting CTRL-V every 15 seconds.

Swift Thief

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Feb 2007

Aatxe Pirates [YaRR]

A/

19 Feb 2007 at 03:26 - 406

Dang it, I can't believe ArenaNet hasn't implemented this, even though they have 140 workers.

ikpt

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Feb 2007

19 Feb 2007 at 05:16 - 407

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aeon_Xin

I guess, all in all, the only reason for people to really want an auction house is total greed, possibly combined with lack of skill at time management and research.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aeon_Xin

Go play the game.

How can I play the game when to get any amount remotely close to the market price of an item, I have to sit in some central city and spam Trade and Local chat forever for someone to see it?

You see, THAT != playing the damn game. You think greed motivates the auction house? No. Wanting to use Local Chat, wanting time to play while also being able to get fair $ for valuble drops, and general standards for MMO's motivate the desire for an Auction House. You can still sit and spam in town like an idiot if you want.

Emerikol

Academy Page

Join Date: Jan 2007

Undead Army

E/Me

19 Feb 2007 at 06:41 - 408

Quote:

Originally Posted by ikpt

How can I play the game when to get any amount remotely close to the market price of an item, I have to sit in some central city and spam Trade and Local chat forever for someone to see it?

You see, THAT != playing the damn game. You think greed motivates the auction house? No. Wanting to use Local Chat, wanting time to play while also being able to get fair $ for valuble drops, and general standards for MMO's motivate the desire for an Auction House. You can still sit and spam in town like an idiot if you want.

Amen to that! An auction house, combined with a better spam filter and more storage will make this game more on par with other games out there. To me, they are the 3 major things that hold this game back as being one of the greatest MMO's in existance.

Alaris

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Nov 2006

Montreal, Quebec, Canada

R/N

19 Feb 2007 at 16:54 - 409

/signed

I think auction house should be reserved for those things traders can't handle very well. Traders can do simple items with low attribute variability, e.g. inks, runes, minipets (*hint hint*), crafting materials, seasonal items (drinks, candy canes, candy weapons, etc *hint hint*), etc. Because every item is the same, it is easy to assign a single price to it, which varies with supply and demand. The algorithm is already in place, we only need to traders for all of these new item types that are not currently implemented (*hint hint*).

Auction then is best for weapons, off-hand items, shields, and upgrade components. Because each item is unique, you actually want to look at your options, and consider the price differences. You also want to be able to sort through it efficiently, not only by item type, but perhaps also if you're looking for certain attributes...

Angra

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Nov 2006

19 Feb 2007 at 19:58 - 410

Quote:

Originally Posted by ikpt

How can I play the game when to get any amount remotely close to the market price of an item, I have to sit in some central city and spam Trade and Local chat forever for someone to see it?

You see, THAT != playing the damn game. You think greed motivates the auction house? No. Wanting to use Local Chat, wanting time to play while also being able to get fair $ for valuble drops, and general standards for MMO's motivate the desire for an Auction House. You can still sit and spam in town like an idiot if you want.

QFT and /signed

I have to sit and spam for an hour to sell greens, and he thinks its "enjoyable"? Enjoyable is not watching your spam get mixed in with other peoples spam while you sit in one spot hoping someone sees your line and pm's you for potentially HOURS on end. An auction house would be a better way, or some sort of store system. It isn't "total greed", its tired of spamming wts/wtb when almost every online rpg out there has a better sell system.

They could potentially do a store listing system, where you list the item in the store at a price you choose, and wait to see if someone buys it. store places a "hold" on the item, and if a person buys it, its taken out of your storage and instantly gets transfered to them, bar any customized items.

And, Come to think of it, It also solves swap scamming, as the item is listed in the auction/store by its own name, so you can't switch Ice for Sapphire or something like it. As for "lagfest" you have a district tacked on whenever one gets full (points to kamadan's 140 districts during the pig event), Anet clearly has enough server resources to handle this implement.

I'm still failing to see a downside to this.

clawofcrimson

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Sep 2006

Crimson Claw

W/

19 Feb 2007 at 23:29 - 411

its been a while since this first was posted....and still nothing?? the party search menu is no fix to the problem...

Tarun

Technician's Corner Moderator

Join Date: Jan 2006

The TARDIS

http://www.lunarsoft.net/ http://forums.lunarsoft.net/

22 Feb 2007 at 18:30 - 412

Are they ever going to add this?

/signed

Absolute Eminence

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: May 2006

24 Feb 2007 at 09:16 - 413

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alaris

/signed

I think auction house should be reserved for those things traders can't handle very well. Traders can do simple items with low attribute variability, e.g. inks, runes, minipets (*hint hint*), crafting materials, seasonal items (drinks, candy canes, candy weapons, etc *hint hint*), etc. Because every item is the same, it is easy to assign a single price to it, which varies with supply and demand. The algorithm is already in place, we only need to traders for all of these new item types that are not currently implemented (*hint hint*).

Auction then is best for weapons, off-hand items, shields, and upgrade components. Because each item is unique, you actually want to look at your options, and consider the price differences. You also want to be able to sort through it efficiently, not only by item type, but perhaps also if you're looking for certain attributes...

I think it opposite of your position. It would be best to start of with static items such as greens and combine the dye, mat, rare mat, and rune into it. Also mods and inscriptions. The items with variations would be harder to implement. I say ANet start off with this and then add other ideas.

I would love to get some advanced news from anet about this "upcoming AH update" they keep avoiding...

Lokomotiv

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Aug 2005

26 Feb 2007 at 03:27 - 414

/signed

Auction house FTW

Absolute Eminence

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: May 2006

27 Feb 2007 at 22:22 - 415

I can't believe more people won't erspond to this post. Many people give up yet on the AH?

bilateralrope

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Nov 2005

New Zealand

Xen Of Onslaught (Xen of the Pacific division)

28 Feb 2007 at 02:39 - 416

Quote:

Originally Posted by Absolute Eminence

I can't believe more people won't erspond to this post. Many people give up yet on the AH?

Currently, is there is there anything more that can be said about an auction house other than another person going /signed ?

Shmanka

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Oct 2006

In Your Head

The Brave Will Fall [Nion]

Me/

28 Feb 2007 at 07:48 - 417

Quote:

Originally Posted by bilateralrope

Currently, is there is there anything more that can be said about an auction house other than another person going /signed ?

Nope.

/signed

cutaholeinabox

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: Feb 2007

28 Feb 2007 at 22:30 - 418

/signed

we need to get a bunch of people to let guild wars know that virtually everyone wants an auction house, and there is little to no downsides to it. Right about now it's basically necessary to have an auction house, it takes forever to sell items, even maxed stuff. (which is what people only buy anyway)

TabascoSauce

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Jan 2007

Virginia, US

TFgt

W/Me

28 Feb 2007 at 23:45 - 419

/signed

Thx!
TabascoSauce

luqius

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: Aug 2006

Me/N

03 Mar 2007 at 17:25 - 420

/signed
this would make the long winded forum auctions unnessesary.

Aeon_Xin

Banned

Join Date: Nov 2005

E/Me

03 Mar 2007 at 18:03 - 421

Quote:

Originally Posted by Emerikol

There are seperate servers for every district/instance that you are in, and your character data is transfered to a new server every time you switch zones.

Lol, really, I think I just peed a lil'.
I'm fairly sure, even at 50$ per game and max character slots, that anet can't afford servers for each person that chooses to solo(or solo /hench/hero) a map, each party in an instance, each arena battle in existance, and all districts of each city, which during events, can even reach 200 districts.
That would be thousands of computers, the building would have to be huge, and have one helluva high power bill and fire insurance policy.

(replies to others below):
"With the auction house, you spend less time trading, so you have more time to do everything else. So unless you actually enjoy trading I don't see how this is a problem as you will have more time to do whatever you enjoy doing."

The point I was making is that I already spend next to no time doing the wts/wtb thing now, and I've got vast amounts of money just sitting around.
I get the feeling people waste time by doing that because they get the feeling making money that way is easier...or they just flat out enjoy "playing the market"

"Bandwidth might be an issue here, though unless ANET comes out and actually states that this is why they aren't making an auction house, we can't really be sure. So unless someone has evidence that the bandwidth/CPU use of the auction house will be an issue its better to assume that it isn't."

No, it's not better in my opinion, because people that don't think about lag(or even know about it, yes they exist..), will end up regretting their former support for the cause of it.
I think it's much better to assume there will be lag, and if people /unsign because of only lag, then they can disregard those from the ..."vote"?/petition or whatever you want to call it. I'm not posting to let Anet know about the lag, it's to remind people to use it when they weigh their coming /sign, or lack thereof.

Atleast you're admitting that lag could become a problem, there's other people around these forums guaranteeing there will be no lag, even though they don't work for GW/Anet. Props there.
(don't care how much education someone claims they have, you can't guarantee no lag unless you know the game code(for somethign like this) and the anet hardware+software in great detail, in addition to their ISP/package capacity)

RazorEdge

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2005

Norway

Soul of Destruction

W/

03 Mar 2007 at 18:24 - 422

/Signed. An auction house would be a blessing. Also I get the feeling that GW is one of the only few mmorpgs that doesn't have an auction house. Sure, there's traders and merchants, but that's not really the same, is it..

Holy

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Jan 2006

Closest Dumpster.

Liars, Cheats and Thieves [Liar]

Mo/

03 Mar 2007 at 18:39 - 423

/signed
great idea!! Ive been wishing for an AH for a reely long time!!

Liberations

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Nov 2006

Azeroth (shhh)

Ryders of the Sword [FrNd]

E/

03 Mar 2007 at 19:25 - 424

This is an incredibly old thread!!!
/signed.
Those ideas from the first poster are awesome!!! I'd like an auction house, but there should be some limits, because then there would be a million different auctions and most wouldn't even get noticed. ALong with this there needs to be a lot more ultra rare things introduced, and some things should have their rarity increased.

Liberations

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Nov 2006

Azeroth (shhh)

Ryders of the Sword [FrNd]

E/

03 Mar 2007 at 19:27 - 425

Hey for all we know an Auction House is well in the works, ArenaNet has stated that they have tons of new features (maybe not tons but you get the point) that they havent even hnted at yet.

Deadly SiNs

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Mar 2007

England

Farmers Union [CASH]

W/Mo

05 Mar 2007 at 01:09 - 426

/signed
I think this is a great idea ^^
It can be hard to sell stuff and to find stuff that you want to buy so making an auction house would make things easier, maybe you could get a message when you've received a higher offer, or someone else has bidded higher than you etc

Connor87

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: Oct 2005

E/Mo

05 Mar 2007 at 03:39 - 427

/SIGNED /SIGNED /SIGNED /SIGNED.

guildwars NEEDS an auction house. it will reduce the amount of useless spam in main towns and people will finally be able to sell gold items without spamming for hours. there should be no reason why guildwars doesnt have a auction house.

Edmund Elrick

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: Mar 2007

Guild of Dragon Wright

W/

05 Mar 2007 at 11:25 - 428

/signed
CHAT SPAM FTL

wacked_1

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Jul 2006

Your Going Home In An Ambulance

11 Mar 2007 at 16:18 - 429

i remember reading a thread somewhere about a one of those conferences guild wars hosts for guild wars fan sites. (sorry cant remember which thread) but it stated that one of the usual questions asked was "is an auction house ever giong t be added to guild wars?" and i think it was jeff strain or someone simply nodded and said "its on the way"
so dont worry hopefully we will be seing an auction house soon! probably some time when the next game is released.

Xeones The Great

Banned

Join Date: Nov 2006

American District 1

NDR|||We are recruiting|||PM me

11 Mar 2007 at 16:57 - 430

finally lol!!!

/signed (x100)

i hate how i post something like WTS Axe, and within 2-3 hours, its already on the 2nd page, where no one will notice it. pisses me off. Love the idea!

Ilithis Mithilander

Academy Page

Join Date: Jul 2006

Testing Eternity

E/

13 Mar 2007 at 02:10 - 431

/signed

This would clear up the lower districts a lot so someone might actually be able to read what people are saying. Also with the use of the AH guild wars activity would go up because all those people spamming WTB/WTS would put their item in the AH instead. Thus giving more activity in places that could really use the activity, like the less populated missions.

Goreman

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Mar 2007

Brother Blood

W/Mo

13 Mar 2007 at 20:52 - 432

Well, i was gonna ask the same question, i get tired of the meaning-less hours of trade and gettin nothin... i feel i could do somthin better while in trade...

/signed
this is a good idea (along with 2 handed swords for warriors)

have a nice day

MithranArkanere

Underworld Spelunker

Join Date: Nov 2006

wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigo

Heraldos de la Llama Oscura [HLO]

E/

13 Mar 2007 at 21:01 - 433

Any auction system would be fine for me as long as:

- It won't allow to offer items available at traders. They are there for something, and if prices are high, is because people do not use them.

- The maximum price is set to 100k. It's the maximum ammount of gold you can carry, and it¡s there for something. It's the price nothing should cost more than.

bilateralrope

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Nov 2005

New Zealand

Xen Of Onslaught (Xen of the Pacific division)

14 Mar 2007 at 02:06 - 434

Quote:

Originally Posted by MithranArkanere

- The maximum price is set to 100k. It's the maximum ammount of gold you can carry, and it¡s there for something. It's the price nothing should cost more than.

However items will still be worth over 100k, as an items worth is what someone is willing to pay for it, and if you scroll down the main page of guru auction you will see that there are items going for well over 100k. So no matter what you feel about what the max value of a GW item should be, the fact is that some are worth well over 100k.

If the max price is limited to 100k people who don't know its worth more than 100k will put the item up for auction, and it will be scooped up by someone who does know its real market value so they can resell it for a higher price. And the people doing the reselling, since they can't use the auction house, will have to either use various 3rd party websites (like gurus trade forums) or trade spam to sell them.

So by limiting the max price at auctions to below what items are worse you will be both causing people to lose out on gold because they don't know what an item is worth (like the pre-searing dye scams, except with much more gold involved), and forcing people to either use 3rd party trading systems (which are a symptom that the trading systems ANET offers are insufficient) or to use trade spam. And if the 3rd party trading systems are closed, that means the resellers only have the option of trade spam.

And considering that the vast majority of price checks posted here are items valued at under 100k, meaning a response of "stick it in the auction house with a low min-bid and long duration, see what price you get" will be valid for them, I don't see the price check forum retaining much traffic if its even kept open. This means that players might not have any way to actually check the value of an item.

In conclusion having a max price at the auction house is a bad idea, unless that max price is well above what any item is worth.

MithranArkanere

Underworld Spelunker

Join Date: Nov 2006

wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigo

Heraldos de la Llama Oscura [HLO]

E/

14 Mar 2007 at 15:10 - 435

The max price for anythong is 100k. People may want to pay more. But the max value for any itme in GW is 100k no matter waht people say.

And.. how would yu pay in the auction house meny more than 100k if it won't acces the Xunlai storage (and it WON'T access it) and the 100k limit in the characters will NEVER be increased?

It's not what I'd like it to be.
It's what would be if it where.

Tarun

Technician's Corner Moderator

Join Date: Jan 2006

The TARDIS

http://www.lunarsoft.net/ http://forums.lunarsoft.net/

14 Mar 2007 at 15:44 - 436

Two years later (practically) and not even a hint of this. Anyone else think this is pretty pathetic?

frickett

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Jan 2006

Shinigami Keys [SHIN]

R/Mo

14 Mar 2007 at 15:51 - 437

/signed once for each of my characters...

I wonder if we are gonna see anything like this, we have been promised trade improvements for months, but nothing is forthcoming.
I wonder what their ideas are.

funguito

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Sep 2006

14 Mar 2007 at 16:30 - 438

Quote:

Originally Posted by frickett

I wonder what their ideas are.

Yeah, I also wonder why the delay on this matter...

Tarun

Technician's Corner Moderator

Join Date: Jan 2006

The TARDIS

http://www.lunarsoft.net/ http://forums.lunarsoft.net/

14 Mar 2007 at 16:33 - 439

Quote:

Originally Posted by frickett

we have been promised trade improvements for months

How much do you wanna bet that the new "Search" feature was a "Trade Improvement"? Sorry to say but it's like they're going backwards.

mazey vorstagg

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Aug 2006

Nodnol

Meeting of Lost Minds

E/Mo

14 Mar 2007 at 16:47 - 440

/signed, I mean, what's stopping them. All it needs a direct copy of the AH used in WOW. Only 4 tabs, browsw, sell, search and auction log.

Come on devs!