Are Hero & Villian Market the same?

Quick question as I couldn't find this answer on paragonwiki. Does the Hero market pull from the same inventory as the Villain market?

If not why? Since they all use the same ingredients for their stuff. If so, then good.

PS, I know I've seen the answer here in one of these market guide threads but I didn't have time to peruse before work so thus the quick Q&A.

Sadly, they are not the same.

As has been said, they are not the same.

The consensus opinion* in regulars in this area is that a merge would be a good thing overall for most people who use the market.



*consensus meaning there are dissenters, but they are few. It

For further detail: all hero markets, including the European ones, are linked. All villain markets are linked. Hero and villain are not.

The huge, glaring problem I have with that is that it means in practice that heroes have a pretty good rate while villains have a lower one, or have a more limited selection from which to get a "sorta good" rate, comparatively.

It's that disparity that makes me want a merged market. If the hero and villain markets were equally sluggish and had been from day one, I doubt the "merge the markets" refrain would be sung quite so much.

I am very sure this just adds on the pile of reasons people prefer the hero environment. In addition to whatever else they prefer about it, the market there is better-supplied, meaning it provides the shinies faster and often at a lower absolute price.

Well, I just added this to the Suggestions and Ideas section. I know, I know, it has probably been beatin' to death from others, but I need to find a solid and good concrete reason WHY they cannot be combined? As some have stated in this thread that maybe it would make it easier to move stuff and thus make us TOO rich?...lol. Okay. That gave me a chuckle...

The devs have given reasons in the past. Twice they have said (once on the forums via a community rep and once at Hero Con) that they want the amount of inf on the two sides to be more equal.

That answer makes no sense. Perhaps because something was lost in translation. Perhaps because the devs are being... dense about this. However, that reason, stated in the limited way it has been presented to us, isn't a meaningful reason not to merge the markets. First of all, it doesn't make sense in the general case - what matters in general is per-capita wealth or wealth generation, not total wealth. The villains will never be able to match hero total wealth, because they have a smaller population. However, even if they mean per-capita wealth, the only impact of merging the markets with uneven per-capita wealth is the potential for abrupt revaluation of existing stores of hoarded inf. However, we have already been through radical swings of that on both independant markets without a merger. The AE and its farming for example, and now the sudden, rough doubling of the inf/hour earning abilities of a level 50.

That leaves RP reasons. However, the answer the devs gave doesn't really suggest they're being driven by RP reasoning. I do give them the benefit of the doubt that they wouldn't use a (potentially badly flawed) economy reason to cover for an RP one.

As far as I am concerned, the RP favors a merged market. You just have to keep in mind that the player might know things that the character does not. That shouldn't be a problem for role players.

The player might know that the markets are merged, but the character will believe the Wentworth's spokesperson who says that they are not, except for that one time that some things fell off the back of a truck, and there was that one rogue employee, but he has been fired and that couldn't possibly happen again.

Do roleplayers worry about the fact that the market is cross server? I've never heard anyone complain about it.

While I agree completely, RP reasoning is one that can be particularly thick headed. Asking someone to justify the markets period with RP reasoning leads to all sorts of unpleasantness I consider akin to starting a discussion in mixed company on politics, religious faith, etc. My line of thinking there was to point out that, so far, the devs haven't gone down that road when justifying the split markets, for which I am, so far, thankful.

True. I just wanted to mention it because a lot of people seem to assume that it's RP vs economics, and that's not the case.

AFAIK, the only reason the devs have ever given is economic, and they have never expressed that reasoning in a way that makes any sense.

It's possible that they will merge the markets, but they want to surprise us with it, to cut down on the marketeering. I don't think that makes any sense either, though, and it seems very unlikely given the way they've described GR so far.

Someone, I think it was Ex Libris, seemed to suggest that she thought it was more fun to have two different markets that behaved differently than it would be to have one big market that behaved uniformly. I don't know if that represented an official dev point of view, or just her own feelings as a player. I will point out that most of the people who find the market fun are in favor of a merger.

Just merge them. Please.

To the OP: As somebody who plays the redside more than blueside by far, and has for more accrued in the 'red' than 'blue' side, these would be my observations.

The redside moves slower. As such, it is less prone to fluctuations, or at least the fluctuations are slower to happen. There's also less supply- as such you see some outrageously overpriced things at times, which can be very profitable or draining depending on whether you sit on the supply or demand side. 'Rare' items are lucrative, but if you want them, especially at a decent price, you will have to be patient. (And find ways to acquire them yourself.) Easy to find items, or low demand ones, however, sell for a pittance many times.

Blueside there are just a lot more numbers. As one who only plays there with friends away from my home server, it's a little harder to get into without first finding some lucky/expensive drops. And what's lucky/expensive will change pretty fast, so you must pay more attention to trends. I have noticed the cheaper stuff sells better, so if you you the blue market often, you could get the numbers to pay the bigger numbers that everything goes for. Or be patient and try dredging up stuff posted low...I find I've gotten more 'valuable' deals blueside, as I guess fewer people list low redside than blue for the "good stuff."