Suggestion: add a 'Trading Fee' for using the /ah command

I've passed through on my way to somewhere else, which is all most players do.

Travel lobby & in-season mission hub, the only time you'll see it populated (outside Virtue, anyway).

This seems to support my point of view that useful spaces attract population, whatever the design intent.

Your hangup on spaces being defined by their intent is really weird.
They *designed* it as a social hub, and yet it is mostly abandoned.

Well, except for the periods when it transforms into a mission hub and becomes generally useful, whereupon it magically fills with players.

This suggests to me that your "social hub" should deliver a service of general utility if you want players to use it.

Like, say, a market.

And you keep making my points for me, it really takes a load off!

Not on Virtue, it isn't. Is that really what this is about? Is this just another one of those "My server doesn't have enough people on it, merge the servers" threads with twist? When you aren't around enough people, go to where the -people- are. Don't force them to come to you.

As I mentioned.

No, that isn't what this is about.

If you're literally not sure, I'm referring to heroes and villains, the two factions that exist in City of Heroes. There are different market interfaces on the zones originally designed for villain content and the zones originally designed for hero content, and a co-op zone would likely merge them into a singular interface that was faction neutral.


I'm much more puzzled by your confusion here, since I specified this in the original post you apparently replied to.

And I am perplexed that you are puzzled by his confusion!

OK, I'm assuming you're looking at the physical design (round building vs open truck.) There would be no reason to "merge" anything with those designs in Pocket D. You could make it look like an ATM for all that matters. It really has absolutely nothing to do with putting something in Pocket D, which is why bringing that up - plus the fact the market *itself* is a merged one - is rather baffling.
And I expanded on the "nto sure what it's meant to prove." That some people will use such a kiosk when others won't because it happens to be there? Don't need to worry about any coding or any real thought being put into it, as the answer is "sure," for much the same reason that people will buy a candy bar they didn't plan on because it's shown in the checkout line. "it's there, what the heck why not."

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And so you want to force people into a space to do something YOU want them to do, despite the fact that in all the time said space HAS existed, it has *never* taken on that use.

Keep tilting at that windmill.
Your definition of a "made point" really needs work. And the way you try to twist things that fairly solidly prove your idea just isn't going to work? It didn't take me long to find an illustration of the logic you have to use to do so:

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I only brought it up because you seemed unsure what factions exist in the game. My original statement was:

Why is this significant at all? Because there are faction limitations in Pocket D in some cases (for example, the vault), and because in the general case there is no faction-neutral marketplace where the different factions can gather simultaneously that already exists. So when I specify adding a market area, it is ambiguous whether I mean two different segregated areas or one merged one unless I specify such.


The best response to that is to simply repeat what I said originally:

See, you've gotten me (or kept me) confused as to why any of this is relevant in the slightest. There *is* no faction limitation for the vault. I can run a hero down there, stick something in the vault, switch to a villain and... stick something in the same vault. It doesn't say "You're a villain, you must go to the villain vault. Oh, hello hero! Praetorian? What are you doing here?" Obviously the location the items are stored are different, as they're tied to the character.

As far as no faction-neutral marketplace... you're incorrect, unless I'm completely misunderstanding you.

Yes, no hero can go to a Black market truck and click on the NPC there to access the market system. (By market system I mean access the UI elements which allow bids and other market activities.) Why? Because they are not allowed in those zones, *not* due to any limitation of the in-game-world NPC. Similarly, no villain can enter Wentworths.

HOWEVER.

You can take any hero or villain, go to Pocket D, enter Praetoria and enter the trading houses there, interact with the NPCs - who just don't care who you are - and perform your market activities. They can indeed have simultaneous hero and villain interactions. And yes, I *did* just run a hero there and a villain there to make sure.

Now, no, being in Praetoria does not mean they're in pocket D, but the faction-neutral market does already exist.

As for the last, requote your original statement all you want, but the point itself is still irrelevant, given Nethergoat's stated purpose is to forcibly drive people into using specific areas for HIS desires, NOT to argue convenience - if anything, he's pushing INconvenience by means of adding a transaction fee. The statement is basically a pointless statement to make. Someone will socialize, then go use the market placed in Pocket D *or* use /AH, depending on their own preference (during which it's highly doubtful they'll be, for instance, engaged in intensive RP,) then they'll leave that interface and go back to concentrating on socializing. Stating they would be "unused" - which is not something I ever suggested, by the way - is, frankly, a ridiculous position to take. SOMEONE will be standing near one at some point and say "Hmm, wonder if that luck charm sold" and decide to use it because it's there.

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Perhaps you should respond to him instead. I have no better means of passing on your message than you do. I'm under no obligation, and make no effort, to interpret your response to my post as serving a higher goal of responding to someone else. If you don't understand my post, I can explain it to you. If you understand my post but you think its not relevant to any reply you might make to another poster about a completely different topic, its probably because its not.

I'm just responding to your part of the discussion. As for the goat, well, his ... *unique* way of viewing responses, well....

Though I am wondering why you state there are factional limitations to the vault. (I'm assuming vault reserve vault, as that'st he only "vault" I can think of there.)

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My post speculated on the difference between Pocket D and the normal market areas' appropriateness for socialization by proposing an experiment to see if market activity is sufficiently incompatible that people would actively avoid mixing the two activities even in the face of a convenient pre-designed area that comingles the two. That's neither an endosement nor a repudiation of Nethergoat's suggestion. It is directly relevant to the question I asked earlier, which was whether there was in fact a specific difference between the two areas that is something other than coincidental.

The question is the degree to which people actually care, and that's measurable by seeing how many people use those terminals. If more people care, some fraction of the total will avoid using them even if they are otherwise convenient to use. The normalizing factor is the number of people that pass through Pocket D relative to the numbers that pass through the other zones that have markets.

See, that's - to me at least - entirely the wrong question to ask. People use the trainer there because it's there and they happen to want to use it. People that would avoid using the market would avoid using any of them, quite likely, not because of placement but because it's the market. In a way, part of that experiment already exists as far as the arena terminals in Pocket D. If someone's not interested in PVP, they're not going to touch it - admittedly that's a larger part of the population not interested - even if they had a terminal on each corner of DJ Zero's pedestal.

Of course, the market also doesn't physically remove you from Pocket D (or wherever else you may be.)

People will change their point of focus, basically, which is why I say it's the wrong question to ask (and potentially the wrong place to ask it.) And that's primarily because of the attention the activity takes - you don't want to accidentally bid 100,000,000 inf on something you planned to pay 100,000 on. So people will go from socializing as a primary activity and switch - I'm likely misusing the term but it's the only way I can think of it, "States" - to marketeering, finish what they're doing whether it's from a terminal or the /ah command, and then switch back to socializing.

As far as the difference between the areas? It's one that's evolved socially - and one that's in the Goat's prior statements. He claims these "were" social hotspots, and that the use of /ah has made them less so. I don't believe he's convinced anyone that they were ever "social hotspots" in a commonly accepted (and illustrated) definition - such as the "hotspot" under the Atlas statue is. If anything, /ah is a "portable hotspot," since you take the service with you *without* having to make a major change in your current activity (waiting for a TF to form or what have you) - much like your theoretical market kiosk in Pocket D, you'd go on chatting, having a costume contest, whatever, turn and use the kiosk, finish and be right where you were, as opposed to going out of your way (in NG's suggestion, to avoid a fee) and *breaking* your current social activity to do so. His suggestion would, essentially, create a "social chill." Going to the market would then be something done (assuming you care about the fee enough to go out of your way to use it) at the beginning or end of a play session or event or activity, something done in a lull. Which would pretty well *still* not serve the purpose he envisions for it.

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Originally Posted by Paladiamors I love you, I Burnt the Toast!

I think what would happen is that the area where you place the terminals would become the "market area" of Pocket D, and socializers/RP'ers would steer clear of it by a small radius, much like they do around the tailor--people back away from that contact by at least 20 feet or so in order to chat or RP, because the people right -at- the tailor are typically busy and won't respond, in my personal experience.

Since Pocket D is relatively large, this wouldn't present a problem, unless you -deliberately- put a market terminal in a highly concentrated area, like in one of the bars, or on top of the dance floor. In that case, you'd start to see angry posts on the forums about the change from people who go to the D to chat/RP, but in the end, that highly concentrated hotspot would gradually dissolve, and people would socialize in other parts of the D in order to avoid blocking the terminals and trying to chat with people who don't respond because they're busy marketeering. Essentially, putting a terminal in the D wouldn't tell you that much about convenience over socialization--instead, it would just subtly alter the makeup of the D, which is large enough to easily compensate for such a change.

Size is not an issue because the issue is not socializers outside the market areas intruding on the markets, but the social interaction intrinsic in high density within the market area itself. That's why I specifically noted merged market areas; to increase the theoretical density in that area as high as possible. If its not a problem to have lots of people crowded into a single market area in Pocket D, the same would likely hold true anywhere else, because the surrounding environment is only significant insofar as it pertains to the convenience of arriving at that market area in the first place.

Actually, size -is- an issue, because it affects population density. The D is large enough that the people in it an any given time aren't packed together--there are hotspots where people congregate, and those spots are highly concentrated, but that isn't true of the entire -zone-. That's why I said that where you placed that terminal in the D would make all the difference.

This is all I need to hear. The rest was superfluous.

The only population density my thought experiment cares about is the density within the market trading area itself. The size of the rest of Pocket D surrounding it is as relevant as the size of Talos surrounding the Wentworths there.

Exactly--which is why I suggested that simply by adding that terminal you would be -changing- the density of that market trading area. I believe that if you put that terminal in a highly dense area of Pocket D, you'd come back a month later and discover that the area where you put the terminal was no longer high-density. People will have migrated to other parts of the D to do their socializing, leaving the market area relatively clear. People would -use- the terminal, but much like WWs, they'd use it, then head off to different parts of the zone to socialize.

Which would be an interesting secondary data point if it occurred, but it would not be relevant to the thought experiment's purpose. The market area's impact on Pocket D is a secondary issue, but not the issue I was thinking about. The question was whether a market embedded in Pocket D has different properties from one in a stand alone structure, not whether a market embedded in Pocket D would in some way alter the environment of Pocket D itself.

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@Starflier

It would, as people would be in PD for other things (they congregate there *now* for other things) and the market kiosk would have convenience going for it, as opposed to the rather solitary, dedicated nature of WW buildings.

Putting it another way...

Who goes out of their way (I mean really out of their way) for McDonald's? It's not exactly high quality food. If there were a McDonald's you had to drive 20-30 miles out of the way for, you probably wouldn't have it as your first choice in most instances.

However, a McDonald's that's in the middle of other things - a shopping mall, business "strip" with gas stations, grocery store, etc. is going to get the "Eh, I'm a little hungry and they're usually fast and cheap, so sure" business - even from people who wouldn't normally consider McDonald's as a place to go for food. Someone will stop by and go through the drive through in a few minutes and drive off munching a quarter pounder or drinking a soda/coffee/whatever.

Similarly, a Pocket D Market terminal is going to get "business" from people RPing, people showing up for events (like the cape radio's little get together tonight,) people moving from Paragon/Rogue into the other zone or into Praetoria, people gathered for iTrials, people gathered for holiday events, etc. They don't have to move far from where they're goign and what they're doing. At most, it's a quick detour. Few people are going to go to Pocket D *specifically* for the market kiosk. They'll go there as part of an overall trip.

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I think you're thinking of the AE Studio B. Pocket D disables teleport, not toggles.

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