So Auction philosophy thread.

[Johnny Warren]

Both sensible ideas Muolke and Melkor.

The problem Cerrera with what you said, that you actually need nearly infinite copies of the weapon upgrade deeds (X to Y, +20/5 spend points and +10 to a hit). And +c almost never auctions them. They are more rare than totems if you check the history (I personally wish +C would put these items up more frequently, but we see them maybe once every year or 2). What normally happens is someone gets a few, then has to spend a year or 2 reloading gold, and a few other people get their turn at them... and around it goes, everyone has a chance while the others reload gold. But we seem to have entered a new paradigm where someone can reload 1 billion+ in a few days.... So, if there aren't more frequent aucitons as Muolke/Melkor said, or an attitude shift in play to win players, then we actually can't get the items we want, ever. Let alone for a fair price. This might do what is needed for the economy, but it drastically reduces the fun for everyone except the excessive pay-to-win player(s).

EDIT: I am painting my house and thinking while I do it... I had an idea. One solution could be to duplicate all the top items across both days but make the top couple (the ATHs, totems, AWH, ACB and wep deeds I mentioned) account bound and a rule that if you bought the one on saturday you couldn't bid on the sunday one. That way you can't have a friend buy you the sunday one. You can't shill bid yourself to pump it up (you'd have to get a friend to do that). It removes the "one player has all the fun at the cost of everyone else" feeling, without capping donations or creating too many rule changes.

[+Colibri]

Just a quick note, I'm having some computer problems and that's on top of already being behind on RoadmapPart1 coding, so I don't know how much time and focus I can give to the auction problems. At a quick glance I see that this is a constructive thread and I will read it. I was planning on opening up a thread about auctions at the end of the month.
Probably better to spend time focusing on the current regular plan, which will (in the long term) make it easier to make content for newbies and intermediate players, and monitor existing stuff (how much stuff drops) and make changes much easier (not having to edit every spawner manually through painful in-game interfaces).... and not focus too much on the end-game stuff.
I have some ideas that would probably be easy to implement and would solve some age-old problems with auctions and overall these rare and highly-sought-after items. And I'll read the ideas in this thread too.

Btw, try to look at it from a positive side. In away, one could say it's a broken system and the shard is overall broken and just about to die (as has been predicted pretty much every year but we're still here and going strong).
I see it as: the shard has just leveled up, we're now on level 372. And with a new level, there are new challenges to overcome. Excelsior! = "Keep going, ever higher".

[Praise]

Thanks Colibri! Keep leveling!

[Geriatric]

having those big end items on 120 day account bind is actually not that bad of an idea

tying up 300 million gold for a few months, it would give some pause to the uber rich to take a bit more consideration into their investment
however im still a firm believer in a free market, and adding a 120 day bind should be done for the right reasons, not just to spite the rich, their big donations help keep the shard running, i dont know how much the expenses are to keep the shard running but could +C keep the shard running on the christmas time donations he gets?
be careful your not cutting off your nose to spite your face
and consider, mr uber rich buys the ATH at auction for 300 mil and turns around and sells it for 350 mil to person B

that means the bidding could have gone have easily gone up to 350 mill had person B been at the auction, or had the money at that moment in time
and my point is this.. that people are still willing to pay more than auction prices for these items

i saw someone saying they dont have the time to farm for 6+ hours a day (it might have been on the other auction thread that is running in a similar fashion to this)
well tough luck butter cup
some people can, and do
they spend more time working at it, they are entitled to reap the rewards of the extra time and effort they invested

[Muolke]

Btw, try to look at it from a positive side. In away, one could say it's a broken system and the shard is overall broken and just about to die (as has been predicted pretty much every year but we're still here and going strong).
I see it as: the shard has just leveled up, we're now on level 372. And with a new level, there are new challenges to overcome. Excelsior! = "Keep going, ever higher".

I think this right here is the main issue. You can't address a problem if you don't see that there's a problem.

[Yuki]

I mean... seems like people are pretty split on if it's even a problem or not so why put a bunch of work into something that might cause even more problems.

[Alibaster]

After reading the back and forth, my position on this has changed. There is nothing we can or should do about the large amount of donations that influence the auction prices. I do think that the items on the auction that are not vanity related should be obtainable in game through other means. Either by purchasing it for a large flat fee in the ED room or making it available but hard to obtain like a Titan's Hammer (but a little more obtainable ). Let the auction be a way to get something without grinding for it. Right now there are two options to get an Ancient weapon, grind out gold every waking moment or donate crazy amount of money for gold (300mil gold = 5,000 ED = $500 US). Why not a third option of earning it?

[Lach]

After reading the back and forth, my position on this has changed. There is nothing we can or should do about the large amount of donations that influence the auction prices. I do think that the items on the auction that are not vanity related should be obtainable in game through other means. Either by purchasing it for a large flat fee in the ED room or making it available but hard to obtain like a Titan's Hammer (but a little more obtainable ). Let the auction be a way to get something without grinding for it. Right now there are two options to get an Ancient weapon, grind out gold every waking moment or donate crazy amount of money for gold (300mil gold = 5,000 ED = $500 US). Why not a third option of earning it?

Also to his point what people do with their time or there money is none or your businesses

[Turnabout]

Guys... take care, because a "fair" fix of the auction system could ends up with an "unfair" ED room price adjustment. Think carefully, because I don't feel like lowering prices of vanity items and rising the price of essential items is a good bargain. Don't forget that the price of the item bless deed from Trinsic stone was already raised. Also I want to remember you +C already cogitated a 100ED relayer deed price increase.

[Lach]

Both sensible ideas Muolke and Melkor.

The problem Cerrera with what you said, that you actually need nearly infinite copies of the weapon upgrade deeds (X to Y, +20/5 spend points and +10 to a hit). And +c almost never auctions them. They are more rare than totems if you check the history (I personally wish +C would put these items up more frequently, but we see them maybe once every year or 2). What normally happens is someone gets a few, then has to spend a year or 2 reloading gold, and a few other people get their turn at them... and around it goes, everyone has a chance while the others reload gold. But we seem to have entered a new paradigm where someone can reload 1 billion+ in a few days.... So, if there aren't more frequent aucitons as Muolke/Melkor said, or an attitude shift in play to win players, then we actually can't get the items we want, ever. Let alone for a fair price. This might do what is needed for the economy, but it drastically reduces the fun for everyone except the excessive pay-to-win player(s).

EDIT: I am painting my house and thinking while I do it... I had an idea. One solution could be to duplicate all the top items across both days but make the top couple (the ATHs, totems, AWH, ACB and wep deeds I mentioned) account bound and a rule that if you bought the one on saturday you couldn't bid on the sunday one. That way you can't have a friend buy you the sunday one. You can't shill bid yourself to pump it up (you'd have to get a friend to do that). It removes the "one player has all the fun at the cost of everyone else" feeling, without capping donations or creating too many rule changes.

John your idea is great i could not type it was to early yesterday If the high power items where blocked on the second day of bidding that would help give the others a chance of getting them. Now granted you'll always have that one person that simply wants to be the best. I can issuer you that is not me I love helping and playing with others. Or instead at least blocked on reauction and top items being reauctioned.

[Silent]

Guys... take care, because a "fair" fix of the auction system could ends up with an "unfair" ED room price adjustment. Think carefully, because I don't feel like lowering prices of vanity items and rising the price of essential items is a good bargain. Don't forget that the price of the item bless deed from Trinsic stone was already raised. Also I want to remember you +C already cogitated a 100ED relayer deed price increase.

Very important! Things are already not looking good for ED room prices but I will leave that for another discussion.
Apart from more frequent auctions that would inevitably reduce one's ability to generate more capital I do not see anything worth doing. Nonetheless, if a player is able to donate to replenish his gold while sinking ED prices I can only be thankful to him for helping +C and by helping anyone in need of a relayer deed. If you look at what happened in this auction a new player had a shot on getting a relayer deed for 17mil instead of 30mil. For what its worth it helped the shard a lot. While people are concerned about this auction for other reasons I think we should all explore the benefits of it and of players competing so viciously for those "vanity items" or somewhat "overpriced augments". For a normal player who lives in excelsior the only thing he really needs is relayer deeds and the more accessible the premium currencies are the more attractive this shard will be.

I think this right here is the main issue. You can't address a problem if you don't see that there's a problem.

I don't want to derail the thread, but perhaps some introspection regarding this statement would be useful. We can't fix a bubble by looking into it from within and specially if we don't see it. Reading what others talk about our bubble would surely help building a better shard. (and they don't talk about auctions prices hehe)

Back to the thread:

What is the true benefit of prohibiting bids on a item? or making it account bound?

Are we really trying to fix something? Will the shard benefit from our daydreams? or is this discussion to one's favour only?

[Wil]

One solution could be to duplicate all the top items across both days but make the top couple (the ATHs, totems, AWH, ACB and wep deeds I mentioned) account bound

That would require some potentially tricky coding. Account bound is currently one of the triggers that prevents an item from being used in the relayering process. The code would have to be updated to make specific items an exception to the rule or else the rule would have to be changed and its replacement thoroughly tested for unintended consequences. Either one could be a substantial time sink for +C's already oversubscribed manpower.

Also, making things aggressively account bound was, IMHO, one of +Nix's failings.

[Yuki]

The whole discussion around account binding it is so people can't go to auctions to buy items for resale or at least deter them from buying it for resale but I don't see the issue here. It's been mentioned before but if they're able to sell it for a profit, that means someone was willing to buy it. The price will ultimately be capped by how much someone is willing to pay to use the item. It really just seems like people are proposing rules so they can get items at below market value at auctions.

[Alibaster]

The whole discussion around account binding it is so people can't go to auctions to buy items for resale or at least deter them from buying it for resale but I don't see the issue here. It's been mentioned before but if they're able to sell it for a profit, that means someone was willing to buy it. The price will ultimately be capped by how much someone is willing to pay to use the item. It really just seems like people are proposing rules so they can get items at below market value at auctions.

I think I may have started this conversation and, at the time, that is the main reason why I posted it. I was frustrated that I could not get the cool weapon.

Since the back and forth, I have reconsidered and simply propose making some high level weapons accessible through other means such as a rare drop on a boss or something. Let the market play out however it will but let those that would like to do something other then farm gold have a way to achieve the "prize".

[Geriatric]

maybe add a couple of those items to the veteran reward options?
after 7-8 years of play for a certain amount of vet points something like that

so that even though you havent farmed like a maniac for ages
you have atleast shown a good dedication to the shard