Markets: Display Best Bid/Offer prices for WW/BM items

That wouldn't happen. That's ludicrous. Players aren't going to frequently get better deals off the market. Every exchange needs a buyer and a seller. If you are a seller who wants to sell his item for more than on the market then you need to find a buyer who wants to pay more than the item goes for on the market. Why wouldn't the buyer simply buy from the market?

If you are a buyer who wants to pay less than what an item goes for on the market you need to find a seller who will sell for less than an item goes for on the market. Why doesn't that seller sell on the market?

WRONG! This is currently going on with the PvP purple IO's.

Players that "have to have it now" are currently buying those purple IO's outside the market from individual players for up to 3 times the market price.

You really have no idea how supply and demand works do you.

The seller knows how rare his drops are. He can see that there are 200 people bidding on his drop and he can see that there are none up for sale. The seller merely tells the buyers outside the market that if they want it now they can meet his price or they can wait in the market queue indefinitely. The "Gotta have it now's" aren't willing to wait patiently 6 or 7 months to get the item. Especially since they know at any time after he places his bid on the market someone else can place a higher bid then he did and knock him down lower on the market queue.

The market does not function when items sell for more than 2 billion due to player limitations of only being able to hold 2 billion Inf. Are you suggesting that all items will sell for 2 billion?

A seller can do the same thing in the market system by listing his item for a price that is higher than the current highest bid.

A player who wants to purchase his item immediately simply needs to view the current lowest list price and bid that amount.

I will use my knowledge of Supply and Demand to now explain to you what will happen in a situation where items sell quickly and there are currently no items listed for sale. This situations demonstrates that at the current price Demand is higher than Supply. In such a situation price will rise. Price will rise because some sellers will see that Demand is greater than supply at this price. These sellers understand the Equilibrium Price is higher than the current price. These sellers will list their item higher than the current price.

This example has occurred in City of Heroes. Luck of the Gamblers used to be virtually be unavailable for sale for instant purchase. Some savvy players listed their Luck of the Gamblers for higher prices. These players continued raising their list price until a balance occurred where LotGs sold at this price consistently while still have some available for sale for immediate purchase.

The concept I have demonstrated here is "Equilibrium Price." By displaying current outstanding bid prices and current list prices Equilibrium Price is more likely to be reflected in current market prices.

*EDIT*
Here's a link to a website of economics for kids that may be more effective at explaining Supply and Demand to you.

No, I'm trying to give a counterexample to the absolute statement "more information = better market". It may not be the best analogy, I admit, but the gas wars had a similar effect to what would happen with everything visible in our market.

Gas wars: one gas station lowers its prices to undercut nearby competitors. Nearby competitor undercuts the first station to attract more business. Repeat.

CoH/V consignment house with all information visible: Seller lists price just under an existing sale price in order to get the sale first, at a similar price. Repeat. Buyer puts bit just over an existing buy order in order to get the purchase first, at a similar price. Repeat.

This occurs in the City of Heroes market now to a certain degree. A player can see the last 5 price. He can then bid slightly higher or list slightly lower than the last 5 price.

The concept you described is called "competition". Increased competition causes more stable prices. That may or not be something players and developers wish to have.

Larger buyer/seller populations and consistent supply/demand ratios make stable prices. (This is also why merging the markets would create a more stable economy and would reduce [but not eliminate] the profits of the marketeers)

What game have you been playing where you think players are limited to only holding 2 billion inf? When you place a bid on the market that money is removed from your character. Each slot in the market can hold a bid for 2 billion inf. And everyone knows there are more than one item that is listed in the market that has been removed from play in the game. Players use those items to "bank" inf over 2 billion.

Thus using the trade feature players can easily sell things for more than 2 billion by making multiple trade transactions. Once 2 billion is reached a player only has to bid 2 billion on something like a Wentworths Teleporter Inspiration and his character can hold another 2 billion.

A level 1 character with only 3 market slots can hold 8 billion inf. 2 billion on the character itself and 6 billion in bids on nonexistant items.

I am playing City of Heroes. A player can only hold 2 billion. Thank you for elaborating how players can get around this limitation. I'm sure your explanation will help some other player who was unaware that they could get around this limitation.

I am not sure to how this is relevant to the discussion of displaying market bids and list prices. Perhaps you could explain that to me. You have already stated that some items trade for more than 2 billion off market. Thank you for pointing that out. I also explained the obvious when I said that this occurs because players cannot bid more than 2 billion on the market because they cannot hold more than 2 billion. Thus, the market ceases to function when prices are above 2 billion.

I'm not sure how or why these facts are relevant to the discussion. The ability to trade items that can sell for more than 2 billion does not change whether bid amounts and list amounts are displayed. In the current system, when they are not displayed, the market does not function when items would regularly sell for over 2 billion. If the system is changed to display list amounts and bid amounts the market would still not function.

I think, Chriffer meant that you can't perform single transaction in excess of 2 Billions using market. That was said in the referrence to PvPIOs.

Real black market transactions are happening now and will happen whether BBO presented or not. And my guess, it is more likely seller will put very rare item on market if he sees reasonable bid as opposite to he doesn't know what bids are out there.

If you read Chriffer's post he doesn't want to see just the bids, he wants to see the sellers asking prices so people can screw the poorer players that can't afford to list their drops for what they are actually worth.

If your going to list the sellers asking price then you'll have to get rid of the listing fees so poorer sellers can then price their drops competitively with the richer players. If buyers can see the list prices then the poorer players will stop selling their drops on the market because they will know they can't get the full value of the item on the market. Instead they'll sell them outside the market. That means less items will be available on the market and the prices will then get more expensive because the supply dropped.

Wake up and read the Market forums. Everyone but you has known about that since Issue 9 went live.


That's because you've been ignoring the explanations that people have given previously in this thread. I'm not going to repeat again what has already been said.

It was the part of my suggestion and it is in the name of the thread "Markets: Display Best Bid/Offer prices for WW/BM items".

Offer = Ask = Seller's Listing price

As for dropping listing price, I put suggestion, in one of my responces, to fold listing fees into transaction fees, and Adeon Hawkwood countered that such measure would greatly benefit EBIL marketeers

And BTW, as it was pointed before, poor player with insufficient listing funds can be very easily screwed in the existent "blind" market: "Snags for 1 inf" thread in The Market and Inventions forum is great example of that.

I will treasure being told this for a very long time.

Apparently Castle didn't get the memo either:
We now have a developer on record saying that something is horribly broken.

Check and mate.

Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters

If only there was a way for a player who finds a valuable item who has low Inf to ensure that he doesn't get screwed over.

Let's say, for example, that you have found a Respec Recipe that regularly sells for 200,000,000 Inf. Sadly, you only have enough Inf to list it for 1 million. If there was a system in place that showed you the current highest bid you would know when there is a current outstanding bid for 200,000,000 or something close and acceptable to you. Then, when you saw there was such a bid, you'd be able to post your item with a reserve price of 1 and know you'd still receive 200M or whatever that "something close and acceptable to you" amount was.

Someone should make a suggestion so that people who found valuable items but don't have the Inf for listing fees wouldn't have to gamble and pray that a current outstanding bid was high. **EDIT** THIS COMMENT MAY CONTAIN DRY WIT**

Obvious solution: merge the markets *thumbs up*

This would be a good start.

While I'm not opposed to merging the markets, I don't see how that will do anything about players storing inf above the personal wealth cap.

Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters

why would someone be stupid and put it up for 1? and how can someone not have listing fees to list it for at least 10-100,00? this is not a good idea at all for the market as has been explained several times to you that it will kill the market by driving almost all sales outside of the market.

who really cares? there are tons of other ways to store it.

I have explained several times that it would not drive players to conduct sales outside the market and explained why it wouldn't. I will use this moment to repeat myself once again.

So when you say "why would someone be stupid and put it up for 1?" The answer is a glaringly obvious "because he knows it will sell for the amount he wants." It doesn't that the seller lists his item for a low amount because the best bid amount is displayed, he will get the best bid amount, and the "lowest list price goes to highest bid amount" still functions.

So my question remains, why would this drive players to use off market transactions? Please show me an example that lists current best bid amounts and best list amounts and why it is beneficial to both parties.

for the seller-buyer transacation: seller goes to market. knows what said drop is worth and doesn't see any best bids anywhere near that. player goes off market with goods.

for buyer-seller transaction: buyer goes to market to get that special 2b+ io/recipe. buyer sees 1,000 bids at 2b. buyer goes off market to purchase without waiting in a line that won't fill until the yr 2269(this number is an obvious exageration).

does that make it easier for you to understand now?

No. It does not. In the first example why isn't the purchaser who buys the item off market placing his bids on the market? Let's add some #s to the example and consider the effects of competition.

Let's say the item in question is a Respec Recipe. Let's say the seller consider the value of the item between 150M and 200M. He is going to try for 200M but he would accept 150M. The seller goes to the market and sees that the highest current offer is 100M. The seller attempts to coordinate an off market transaction for 200M.

A buyer has a choice. He can be the first person in line for the item by bidding 101 million, or he can buy the item now for 200 million. Some buyers will bid more than 100 million for the item. A buyer has incentive to use the market instead of purchasing off market. Thus, the "best bid" amount will rise. Transactions will be lured back to the market. Players will not be pushed away from using the market due to displaying the best list and best bid amount.

The second example does not discriminate between the current system and a system that displays the highest bid amount. It is irrelevant. Displaying or not displaying best bid and best list amounts has no bearing on the players choices.