Guild Wars 2

I don’t know how to make a poll (or even if it is possible with this board), but I’d like Anet to know the opinion that some of their users have when it comes to trading.

The trading post is ok (definitely NOT great)… but I’d like the option for player to player trading (aka GW1 style) to come back as well.

I’d rather trade directly with my seller… we could haggle over the price, trade for items and even buy random items “in bulk”… options that are either limited or non existant on TP… not to mention that sneaky 15% (list & trade) tax…

On a more personal note, I remember standing around in Kamadan like an eagle for “that trade” to be exciting and fun (and later on the only reason to play GW1 at all). Some people hated the place, some loved it… for me, it enriched my experience.

+1000000000 for Player to Player trading. Saying that mail system prevents from gold sellers is just a lie. Anet won’t ban all gold sellers. Removal of direct trading is huge step back instead of forward in MMOs

Janson Smalling.1850:

While we understand the want for P2P trading, we feel that the Trading Post works well for accomplishing fair deals and keeping individual users protected from those with less-than-pure-intentions.

Again, while we know that the majority of players would use a P2P system within its intended design, creating they system may place the global economy at risk, as well as some players.

The TP is ok… It is a nice feature for those who choose to use it… but it limits our experience as long as it is the only option… I am not advocating to go back to only Player to Player… I am advocating having both systems and let the user freely decide which one suits his or her needs best. There will be instances where TP will work better than P2P and vice versa.

As far as risk is concerned, I’d like to reference this thread: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/BUG-Box-of-Berserker-s-Draconic-Armor-Berserker-s-Gladiator-Armor-Sad-Charr

In short, this is a bugged and hugely misleading item that can be bought from the TP. Most of the people (myself included) that have been affected by this feel ripped off… and yet who do we have to report? who ripped us off? the TP? or another player? at least in P2P I know who scammed me… The truth is, TP does not give me any extra security over P2P.

Janson Smalling.1850:

While we understand the want for P2P trading, we feel that the Trading Post works well for accomplishing fair deals and keeping individual users protected from those with less-than-pure-intentions.

Again, while we know that the majority of players would use a P2P system within its intended design, creating they system may place the global economy at risk, as well as some players.

While I now understand your reasoning behind not including a P2P trade system, let me offer this in return. If I find a buyer from chat or the forums or whatever, I AM going to sell that item to that person. It would be rude of me not too. Right now, my only option is to mail that item to them with no guarantee they will send money to me, or viceversa for them. This is super exploitable, with little security. (do you want your support team looking into chat and mail logs all day every day to determine legitimate trades?)

Cash on Delivery mail is the perfect system for Guild Wars 2. It lets me put a price on my item that the other person can review, no way for me to flip flop it or anything last second to try and scam, if they decline then the item is sent back to me. No possible way to scam with this system. 100% fool proof (not idiot proof mind you, but prettykittensecure). And its SIMPLE to implement, next to no man hours.

We really need this, you are leaving us at risk to scammers without the option of a P2P trade system. I expect until something is implemented, if I am scammed, that any and all support requests including item recovery are answered swiftly.

Please reconsider.

EDIT: One last note. Having only a trading post instead of P2P trading lessens the socialness of the MMO. I don’t have to talk to anyone to play this game, I can just throw my junk at a faceless trading company and they do everything for me. This is the opposite of what you want.

imho there is no need to p2p trading because the economy is supposed to be global in gw2. why would i want to spent 15 minutes or more looking for people in the same map who wanna buy my stuff, when i can have a fair, instant trade?

i think many people only want p2p trading because it’s what they’re used to, and they don’t really understand the idea of a global, unified and fair trading in gw2 yet.

WHAT?! I get not having for the feature by launch, delaying it, etcetc but refusing to add something as simple as player trading is out of my ability to understand.

All I know is there are many players that want to trade ore for skins or cloth and can’t. There are players who want to trade dyes for other dyes. There are players who want to trade one piece of equipment for another. You are denying these people a basic function. It’s absurd.

And in the name of what?! Protecting a bunch of newbies from their precious in-game silver. If they like it so much, they should learn not to squander it. In every other game out there that has trading the learning curve also includes learning the market. If that’s too much of a bother for someone, they can just refuse to trade directly.

Right now, if I’m out in the world and want to trade my rare dye for another and I do find someone to trade with I have to either trust that person and send the item first via mail(or the other way around) or put up my item on the trading post for whatever it’s value currently is, buy the other item and go to the trading post representative to pick it up.

Is that where this is going, “if you want the item now buy some Black Lion Trading NPC from the gem store” ?

For example one player advertising an item on shout, and made a deal with another player through chat. He sent the item through mail, but the second player did not pay back.

Is it considered officially as a scam?
Is it an official offence that might have consequences?

All the things that can be accomplished from P2P trading can also be acomplished with TP, in a more efficient way. Think about this, having both P2P and TP. You won’t magically be able to sell higher (I’ll bet that’s what some thinks) because if the TP is cheaper, buyers will go there. Also, why waste time haggling when you know the price in TP is the cheapest? If you want to sell cheaper, just drop it in TP and it’ll sell. You don’t have to spam WTS or WTB. In the end, P2P will have very limited usage because it is so inefficient. I do agree on 1 point though, that purely relying on TP removes the social aspect of trading. There is also an advantage with P2P, which is seller can sell to avoid transaction cost. I feel that this advantage has only very situational usefulness considering the effort it involves in trying to manually sell something. Say if only 1% of the transaction happens in P2P, why would dev want to spend time and effort to implement that? Plus, you’ll have to deal with the complaints on scams and such.

TP is also another mechanism to siphon money out of the system, controlling inflation, but I don’t think putting in P2P will change much of that given that little people will use it.

Given all these factor, it’s better to just rely in TP. You fail to provide sufficient justification to put in 2 system and obviously only considered that from a personal standpoint.

The trading post is great for selling items that I don’t have a specific buyer for, but when it comes to trading with specific individuals (and that doesn’t have to mean spamming it on map chat to sell it, that may be something as simple as selling a drop you pick up to someone you’re running a dungeon with, bartering items for items with another player, or someone commissioning you to craft them a specific item)…well, it’s a failure, and it’s forcing people that want to do these simple things to use an insecure trade method…which, when a trade goes wrong, ultimately increases the workload on the support staff, increases the wait time for people with tickets that can’t be solved by a simple in-game feature, and is a waste of money for the company in the long run. These simple types of trade happen all the time in MMOs, especially MMOs with a crafting system. In the end, the lack of a trade window of -some- sort hurts the players, hurts the support staff’s workload, and hurts the company’s bottom line.

TP is great to sell stuff with the least amount of attention on your part… and when you are not online, that is pretty sweet.

But on the not so great side of things, TP costs extra, it’s a hassle to receive items if you are in an explorable zone, completely anonymous, gives no one to complain to if something is amiss, has hugely reduced flexibility… and if you are the first to own an item you can forever spoil it by setting whatever price comes to mind. TP will simply instruct everyone else to match it.

I still fail to see how the TP is more secure than regular person to person trading. It certainly is more secure than mail, but mail is a poor trading method to begin with.

Also, it is absolutely useless if you want to sell an item to someone specific.

I honestly do NOT know why you wouldn’t entitle us to a Player-to-Player trading experience. As said, What if I want to trade my Iron ore for Silver, knowing I will receive the silver ore? The mail system is great, don’t get me wrong, I think it’s a great idea but it is a very un-safe way to trade with other players.

I understand you would like to keep every player safe but allowing players to “Mail trade” leaves scammers a brilliant system to go about their dirty deeds.

If a P2P trading system was implemented people will still most likely still use the trading post but I definitely want a Player-to-Player trading system in place so I can swap un-needed items for wanted items.

After getting scammed via mail and reporting the other player as a scammer do the scammed items get retrieved to their previous owners?

C.O.D mail cant go wrong. what you doing now is giving TOO MUCH chance for people to get scamed, and it happens here more than in any other game i have ever seen in my life.

1) because people DONT want to lose 15% tax, thats higher than EBAYkitten
2) TP Does go down,
3) Item to Item Trade.

THERE WILL ALWAYS be reasons to have a trade, for now its happening ANYWAY whether you like it or not, the only difference is (because you guys at Anet are very stubborn and think you know it all) Its easier here for scammers than any other MMO ever made.

Here is a somewhat more detailed answer we were given during the beta (not that there’s anything wrong with the answers here!):

Hey guys,

The no face-to-face trade is a real decision and it’s primarily a question of trust (as many of you have noted). But it’s also a decision to protect players from scamming and protect the economy from black-markets. Let’s run through some quick examples.

1) Give something to my friend. – As several of you noted, target your friend, right click the item and select ‘mail-to…’. Done, this works in contact list, guild list, or in world anywhere without having to ‘meet’ them or ‘catch’ them.

2) Get a fair price for an item (anti-scam). – Because ALL trading goes through the trading post we can guarantee that highest bidder meets lowest seller and we can give every player the benefit of current market information.

3) Barter item-for-item. This is the grey area and also the most risky kind of trade because even with UI many items look alike in icon and many social engineering scams take place in this kind of system. It’s a risky trade environment which is why when you support it you have to have these multi-stage UI’s where everyone double-checks everything, and then eventually get’s lazy and stops double-checking and gets scammed anyways.

In the end we decided with super easy access to mail for trusted trades and trading post for untrusted trades that such a system wasn’t worth the risk, complication, and fragmenting the player market off of the trading post..

In testing we’ve found that mail is easier 90% of the time we’d want trade and the other 10% trading post is far safer and avoids drama and thing like random trade windows being thrown at you and lots of other unsavory hawking in game.

Hope that all makes sense.

I think the main reason is in a P2P trading system it would be hard to have a tax implemented due to the infinite combinations of barters/transactions folks could make.

The TP acts as a gold sink for ANET with its taxes …

What about adding a Layaway for items, created at the TP in the recipient’s Account Name; you can “promise” an item to a player even as you put it up to the Trading Post in a private listing. The duration could either be agreed-upon or a standard 24-hours.

If the receiving Player fails to complete the Trade (fork over the cash) before the Layaway ends, that item would then be revealed to the broad public and the spice would flow.

I also may have missed it, were there specific worries over the risks of adding a Cash On Deliver to the Mail system for non-barter transactions?

Janson Smalling.1850:

Kazim.2043:

For example one player advertising an item on shout, and made a deal with another player through chat. He sent the item through mail, but the second player did not pay back.

Is it considered officially as a scam?
Is it an official offence that might have consequences?

Yes, you can report that player as Scamming.

Thank you for clarifying that, good to know!

Janson Smalling.1850:

While we understand the want for P2P trading, we feel that the Trading Post works well for accomplishing fair deals and keeping individual users protected from those with less-than-pure-intentions.

Again, while we know that the majority of players would use a P2P system within its intended design, creating they system may place the global economy at risk, as well as some players.

what if you wanted to trade with someone specifically though and without risk of getting ripped off. you can’t. also the TP is completely anonymous so you cant even use it asa roundabout way to trade.

Janson Smalling.1850:

Kazim.2043:

For example one player advertising an item on shout, and made a deal with another player through chat. He sent the item through mail, but the second player did not pay back.

Is it considered officially as a scam?
Is it an official offence that might have consequences?

Yes, you can report that player as Scamming.

prepare yourself for a lot of reports

I think the main reason is in a P2P trading system it would be hard to have a tax implemented due to the infinite combinations of barters/transactions folks could make.

The TP acts as a gold sink for ANET with its taxes …

you can impose a tax on a trade the same as in the TP.
mmo’s do it all of the time o.o

I wouldn’t mind seeing a dam Cash on delivery option would fall in more handy then a Trade in most points…

this thread is pretty insightful about the TP and P2P:
http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/62780-how-to-fix-the-trading-post/

Trading Post – I know everyone is all jazzed about the TP and how it currently is but I personally think it lacks character or fore thought.
Socialization – In other TP’s we are able to see who is selling an item and who purchased your items. As a crafter, this is very valuable because over time you can build up both a supply chain for raw materials and a customer base which translates into some really great relationships that can even transcend the game.
Supply vs Demand – Before people accuse me of wanting to “play the market” lets be frank. With the TP global, its near impossible for demand to exceed supply on basic materials which in turn keeps the cost of mid-tier items artificially low as well. As a result many items even some rares are available for 1cp more than vendor prices and likely will never come off that cost. That may sound good to the buyers but the sellers are eventually going to get tired of putting effort into crafting items for little to no profit and stop making them all together. Once that happens the TP will no longer be the Trading Post it will just be the Trash post.
Load Distribution – I’ve been a datacenter manager for over 16 years now. Lets face it whatever is running behind the global TP isnt cutting it. Whether its some fancy GRID DB, an Oracle RAC cluster or a giant monolithic DB, its puking daily. Here we are 3 weeks after release and I cant buy Iron Ore because the listings wont populate again. Thats silly. If we cant get it under control then make the TP world based and distribute the load
Item Expiration – I have items that have been up on the TP for over a week now. If we simply expired the items after 7 days the TP would be able to free up what is clearly needed resources to deal with more recent trades that have infinitely more potential to actually contribute to the economy.
PS. The TP went “down for maintenance” while I was drafting this. EXPIRE STUFF

I second this. the TP is ridiculous.
It is literally idiot proof, and this is actually a problem. as a buyer, yay good for you, but there would be no incentive to sell anything. this is mainly due to undercutters who people who don’t care what they sell for what price so long as they get rid of it. combined with the fact that items don’t expire on the TP it’s going to drive prices down dramatically. so low, you mind as well npc it instead. the prices would not fluctuate at all due to items not expiring and cluttering up the TP and driving prices to an all time low. if an item were to expire say 1-3 days after being posted, it would clear up the TP tremendously, and prevent prices from being artificially lower than they should be. this is because the TP would actually take a little bit of effort, and it would make people actually think about the prices instead of passively selling/buying. yes, theoretically everyone is supposed to think on the margin, but realistically no.

the second part is me replying to the first guy.

here’s another thread on the debate:
http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/56322-trading-inspecting-dueling-and-cod-mail/#entry1837941

Player to player trading would make the TP obsolete and it would make it impossible to regulate prices, there would be no price history and anyone can ask for an item whatever they fee like it, no the only players that want this are the ones that feel that their items are worth a lot more and wish to circumvent the TP.

GW2 Trading Post is almost perfect, the game does NOT need direct trading between players, case dismissed.

The TP only needs, armor sub catagories by armor type and the ability to preview before you buy.

Janson Smalling.1850:

While we understand the want for P2P trading, we feel that the Trading Post works well for accomplishing fair deals and keeping individual users protected from those with less-than-pure-intentions.

Again, while we know that the majority of players would use a P2P system within its intended design, creating they system may place the global economy at risk, as well as some players.

So players interacting with each other is going to put the global economy at risk?

No makey sense.

Latinkuro.9420:

Player to player trading would make the TP obsolete and it would make it impossible to regulate prices

Wow. Just wow. You have no concept of economy.

Interesting, what about a middle ground solution. Keep the 5% listing fee but if you are online when your item sells then the 10% fee isn’t taken out. Along with integrate a player to player direct trading into the trading post. Say another section that you can input player name and it opens a trade with them if they accept and trade through that.

It’s all about gold-sink system – this is one and only reason, why there won’t be any direct p2p transactions.
Ok… I can understand that – but ANET, please dont feed us with those silly stories about our safet / anti-scam protection.

Janson Smalling.1850:

Kazim.2043:

For example one player advertising an item on shout, and made a deal with another player through chat. He sent the item through mail, but the second player did not pay back.

Is it considered officially as a scam?
Is it an official offence that might have consequences?

Yes, you can report that player as Scamming.

And this… this is just pathetic…
(have no fear… you dont have to think – anet will do that for you.)

Latinkuro.9420:

Player to player trading would make the TP obsolete and it would make it impossible to regulate prices

LOL

Janson Smalling.1850:

While we understand the want for P2P trading, we feel that the Trading Post works well for accomplishing fair deals and keeping individual users protected from those with less-than-pure-intentions.

Again, while we know that the majority of players would use a P2P system within its intended design, creating they system may place the global economy at risk, as well as some players.

Cheap excuse is cheap. Or maybe it lacks elaboration. Whatever.

The P2P is needed for something so simple, and so basic, even the NPCs tell you to do it: “More people should learn to barter”.

Again, barter.

So, you could make P2P commerce be items-only, without gold or any other currency involved. Those who want to use their gold should use the TP, but two players that want to switch their drop should be able to do so without being forced to use the mail.

Seriously, is the time lost on mail-trading scamming reports worth the lack of P2P?

If you fear people being swindled, add some “X valued on trading post” next to each item in the P2P commerce window. You could even charge a small commission, for economical purposes, if you’re really that worried about the gold sink getting too unstable.

Or you could even make bartering easier through the TP, letting two players that want to barter work out their bartering through it. Call it “Black Lion bartering consultant”, a nice guy that makes sure the transactions go well, and charges a fee equal to that item being sold through the TP.

The point of this is simple: People should be able to buy using items as “currency”. Requiring it to happen through the TP could help you guys control the taxes are applied properly.

Come on, I’m sure you’ll be able to make this work without destabilizing your system. I’ve faith on you ;D.

Janson Smalling.1850:

While we understand the want for P2P trading, we feel that the Trading Post works well for accomplishing fair deals and keeping individual users protected from those with less-than-pure-intentions.

Again, while we know that the majority of players would use a P2P system within its intended design, creating they system may place the global economy at risk, as well as some players.

Um. Yes. The problem is, TP is not working 85% of the time TP is not working at all. At least add a CoD option for mail please.

while I was puzzled by a lack of P2P trading at first I like how the new system will force people to use the TP. This makes it’s sales tax gold sync really count and will keep the economy really stable!

Agree with guys that suggested to add Cash on Delivery option to mail system. But on the other hand – I don’t want to see WTS spam in the game chat, and don’t want to lose the oportunity to buy something that I need because seller sells it with chat that i never check, instead of Trading Post.

Oof. I’ve been trying to sort my thoughts out on this.

You are right, between mail and trading post 90% of the need has been covered. The problem happens when one of those methods fail.

You are dealing with trusted and untrusted trades. That’s very black and white. There’s also a scale of grey here. I might charge a complete stranger the going rate on copper and give it to guildies for free. What about a friend of a friend? I’d like to give it to them at discount, but I can’t.

For those who say that selling outside the Trading Post will destroy the trading post, I can assure you it won’t. I can’t count the number of MMOs that have both public trading and auction houses that have shown time and time again both will prosper.

Hell, I come from EQ2 and we sell raid loot in public channel. You heard that right. Raid loot. The Broker system (auction house, trading post, whatever you wish to call it) is going strong there as well.

Now to address the real point here.
You want me to report any time I get scammed through the nonsecure, non-checking method of sending a mail in hopes I won’t get scammed, but putting a secured “every one checks yes” trading box encourages scamming?
That’s asinine. I can’t imagine how many reports you’re going to get per day on this.

Vexrm.6134:

For those who say that selling outside the Trading Post will destroy the trading post, I can assure you it won’t. I can’t count the number of MMOs that have both public trading and auction houses that have shown time and time again both will prosper.

Now to address the real point here.
You want me to report any time I get scammed through the nonsecure, non-checking method of sending a mail in hopes I won’t get scammed, but putting a secured “every one checks yes” trading box encourages scamming?
That’s asinine. I can’t imagine how many reports you’re going to get per day on this.

I agree with key parts of your comment. It also makes me wonder if the purpose of the TP is simply to exist as a tool that reduces the amount of complaints and support tickets. If so, I think it will fail.

There are already complaints about misleading items… and if people believe that one of the objectives of the TP is being fair then invariably they will see tickets due to valuation/devaluation of items.

Still, I stick to my original premise, which is that having both options (P2P and TP) is better than just having the TP. Some people hated all the shopping and buying going around in trade channels, some people loved it. The option of turning chat channels off existed in GW1 and exists in GW2.

John Smith.4610:

Using the trading post is a safer method of trading and simultaneously makes the game more robust. We believe that between mail and the trading post the game is much safer and still contains all the functionality needed.

Using the trading post is safe yes, but The checks you guys had in place in Guild Wars were safe as well. I will admit I fell prey to a scam once during my 6 years of playing guild wars. You know what happened? I learned to be more attentive to what I was trading and it didn’t happen again in any mmo I played after that.

Janson Smalling.1850:

Kazim.2043:

For example one player advertising an item on shout, and made a deal with another player through chat. He sent the item through mail, but the second player did not pay back.

Is it considered officially as a scam?
Is it an official offence that might have consequences?

Yes, you can report that player as Scamming.

Really? I have to ask what exactly is the difference between reporting someone as scamming this way and reporting them as scamming with the same system that was in place in Guild Wars? Either way somebody gets reported as scamming and somebody else has to deal with.

Regular trade is a good part of pretty much every other MMO out there. Some people enjoy it so much they actually form entire guilds around the concept. As it stands right now there is no way to safely trade with one other particular person in the game unless you know that person.

Also there is just NO WAY AT ALL to barter & trade items directly with another person. Not even Cash on Delivery would fix this problem as somebody would still have to pay something.

You have plenty of options for putting checks in place to allow for player to player trading.

• You could charge a transaction fee for the trade. that would be your money sink
• You can make sure that the details of the transaction (including trading partners name) are put out in text as part of the game message so users can get screenshots if scams take place.
• Some people have bad eyes so you could print out the amount of cash or the items being offered in the game message text as the trade is taking place.
• Asking are you sure before completing the transaction
• Notifying that the items have changed in the trade window before completing the transaction helps avoid scams.

The trading post is great for keeping me from being in town spamming WTS or WTB but you’re still missing a HUGE part of the fun of trading, buying & selling in game.

Lonewolf.5869:

C.O.D mail cant go wrong. what you doing now is giving TOO MUCH chance for people to get scamed, and it happens here more than in any other game i have ever seen in my life.

1) because people DONT want to lose 15% tax, thats higher than EBAYkitten
2) TP Does go down,
3) Item to Item Trade.

THERE WILL ALWAYS be reasons to have a trade, for now its happening ANYWAY whether you like it or not, the only difference is (because you guys at Anet are very stubborn and think you know it all) Its easier here for scammers than any other MMO ever made.

This. Absolutely this. A Net, please pay attention. It’s great that you had a plan to reduce scamming and as a community (aside from the scammers) no doubt we are all grateful that you are attempting to find ways to keep our gold safe and our experience enjoyable, but the lack of P2P trading really is detrimental both socially and functionally.

Add a Cash On Delivery function, then it’s still safe, right? Scam free. Permit swaps of equipment.

Please!

Another point is that with all sales forced through the TP, I have no expression of pride in my work as a crafter. I can’t make a sales pitch (and no, I wouldn’t spam) or refer people to look at my other lovely goods for sale if they enjoyed the orange coconut cakes.

It’s the MMO equivalent of working in a cubicle, with no recognition, producing goods that you never see sold for a company you never meet but which stings you for a terrible fee nonetheless.

I love the crafting mechanics and would invest a lot of time playing the game to raise crafts and enjoy doing this, were it not for this badly implemented system for trading. Serious crafters are great for game retention figures, but they need to be social doing what they do – and I don’t just mean chatting at the craft stations.

I am against player to player trading screen.

I dont want chat screen to fill with “WTS [Vital Dagger]” “WTB [Shiny Gem]” messages.
Just list it on auction house.

I’d like to see a P2P trading system. I think it’skitten that you can’t flat out open a trade window with someone for an exchange of goods. Instead if you want to trade with someone you have to mail them the item and HOPE they don’t just run off with your stuff.

I agree with A.Net on this one. I love not seeing the constant spamming of WTS WTB. If you make a deal with somebody you can either trust the mail system, or post it in the TP and they can buy from you in there. TP will be more stable and has been improving and the 15% tax, well that is the cost of business imo.

Yay for A.Net for this system, they have a fan in me for not giving in on this subject. You can gift, trade with a trusted person, or trade through the TP system. If you trust them, use mail, if you don’t then use TP. The 15% tax on that is the cost of ensuring they don’t run off with your stuff. All is good in the world of A.Net and you get much less in the way of spamming and scamming.

Invictus.1503:

I agree with A.Net on this one. I love not seeing the constant spamming of WTS WTB. If you make a deal with somebody you can either trust the mail system, or post it in the TP and they can buy from you in there. TP will be more stable and has been improving and the 15% tax, well that is the cost of business imo.

Yay for A.Net for this system, they have a fan in me for not giving in on this subject. You can gift, trade with a trusted person, or trade through the TP system. If you trust them, use mail, if you don’t then use TP. The 15% tax on that is the cost of ensuring they don’t run off with your stuff. All is good in the world of A.Net and you get much less in the way of spamming and scamming.

So most of the supporters essentially resent a visual inconvenience they can simply turn off…

Aesir.7519:

Invictus.1503:

I agree with A.Net on this one. I love not seeing the constant spamming of WTS WTB. If you make a deal with somebody you can either trust the mail system, or post it in the TP and they can buy from you in there. TP will be more stable and has been improving and the 15% tax, well that is the cost of business imo.

Yay for A.Net for this system, they have a fan in me for not giving in on this subject. You can gift, trade with a trusted person, or trade through the TP system. If you trust them, use mail, if you don’t then use TP. The 15% tax on that is the cost of ensuring they don’t run off with your stuff. All is good in the world of A.Net and you get much less in the way of spamming and scamming.

So most of the supporters essentially resent a visual inconvenience they can simply turn off…

That’s what it sounds like to me

The problem is, their is a trading post. You can put up what you want for an item. But player are still using “WTS XXXX Item” and there is no system for it, so why do it? If you feel you can get a better price by best offer then you should be suggesting an auction added to the TP. But currently if you want to WTS an item, you can Sell it, just post it on trading post. Peopl who want to buy gems, can by placing buy orders. All your needs are fulfilled.

Lesson learned, don’t trade using the mail system, use the trade post. I make tons of money off it, setting my own prices. I do agree that we need an auction system though.

Janson Smalling.1850:

While we understand the want for P2P trading, we feel that the Trading Post works well for accomplishing fair deals and keeping individual users protected from those with less-than-pure-intentions.

Again, while we know that the majority of players would use a P2P system within its intended design, creating they system may place the global economy at risk, as well as some players.

And as can be plainly seen by another post here, your idea not only failed, it took an important feature away from all players in the process and to top it off placed then at greater risk.

I continually see people selling items in chat, through mail, thus your removal of P2P trading actually took AWAY the only means a player has to protect himself, by actually LOOKING at the item/money in the trade window before hitting accept to the trade.

Now, people who dont want to run to a trader are 100% at risk of being ripped off. Much like your idea of limiting the amount of money that can be sent/deposited into the Guild Bank to the amount of time a person has played….all you did was punish all players, and you didnt even put a crimp in gold sellers business because now they just bot the account until its past the time limits and THEN use that account for gold transfers.

I continually see people selling items in chat, through mail, thus your removal of P2P trading actually took AWAY the only means a player has to protect himself, by actually LOOKING at the item/money in the trade window before hitting accept to the trade.

I think this is their logic though. There is zero common sense in using trade in this sense, why is it so hard for that person to use the trading post? Especially since most items on the trading post are cheaper for the buyer. Is it that hard to stop shouting in map all the time? Is it that hard of a transition that you feel it’s such a needed option even though the trading post fills this need?

First off let me clear some common misconceptions for those against trading:

1) “It will be impossible to regulate the prices”.

This is wrong since supply and demand still exist. it’s not like the TP will be going away, the trading post will still be the king of trading to and for the masses and will determine an item’s equilibrium price. in most cases the TP will be used, trading is for cases where you’ll want to trade to a specific individual, that item will still be of the same value.

2) “there’s the TP and mail so it’s easier to track hackers”

Again false, hackers can be tracked just as easily through trade transactions.

3) “there won’t be any taxes on trades like the TP does”

Well, why not add taxes to trading? I’ve seen tons of mmo’s impose a tax on player to player trades.

4) “you can just use the mail or TP anyways”

The mail requires putting a lot of trust into other people, good luck with that. Maybe there was at the very least, a cash on delivery system then trading may not be needed, but it would still be very nice and there really are no negative effects at all for implementing it. As for the TP, everything is bunched up anonymously so you can’t trade to a specific individual, and even if you could, it could be bought from some random other player when you post it that wasn’t intended to be the buyer in your roundabout transaction.

5) “but there is a negative side effect, the WTS and WTB spam”

Again, false. The trading post existing by itself will get rid of most of this, since if a player wants something or to sell something they can go there so long if they don’t care who buys their items or vice versa. even without a trading system, you still see people doing this right now, and people always will.

Latinkuro.9420:

Player to player trading would make the TP obsolete and it would make it impossible to regulate prices, there would be no price history and anyone can ask for an item whatever they fee like it, no the only players that want this are the ones that feel that their items are worth a lot more and wish to circumvent the TP.

GW2 Trading Post is almost perfect, the game does NOT need direct trading between players, case dismissed.

The TP only needs, armor sub catagories by armor type and the ability to preview before you buy.

No it would not. the value of item x would still be the same compared to the global economy due to supply and demand.
Since the TP is already dumbed down for most people, the trade window can even show how much an item is going for in the TP for all I care.

The problem is that if you want to trade to a specific individual for any reason, you reasonably can’t unless you have the complete and utmost trust in them to not scam you from the mail.

My biggest problem with the trading post is that items stay up indifinetly. There should be a max limit of 1-3 days. Otherwise the TP is going to become clogged, and the economy very very stale, to the point that you won’t be able to sell anything at all, and if you do, only for a few copper. it will also allow the market to competitive and it will find a natural equilibrium price for items. otherwise it’ll be clogged with undercutters who don’t care about prices at all and just want to get rid of stuff. As such, everyone in the economy will have every reason to buy, but no reason to sell.

The only reason for me to use P2P is to avoid transaction cost. But now that I need to spend time to advertise my stuffs, I’ll rather just pay the cost and let the TP sort it out. It an item sells for 1g in TP, the max profit difference I can make from P2P is the savings of 15s…which I don’t really care. It tax applies for P2P, even less reason to go through the hassle.

I think some people actually thinks this will allow them to sell at a higher price…. or are just blaming the TP for not being able to make money.

John Smith.4610:

Using the trading post is a safer method of trading and simultaneously makes the game more robust. We believe that between mail and the trading post the game is much safer and still contains all the functionality needed.

Sorry if I sound ungrateful or anything, as I very much appreciate how much work you guys have put into the game, as well as the fact that you are actively replying to forum posts, but I could not DISAGREE MORE.

What exactly do you mean by, “makes the game more robust”. Player to player trading (or person to person trading) has been going on since forever, in fact, since the beginning of time – and has worked quite well. Being able to barter for items, and reach a fair deal is much better than all these capitalist trading systems nowadays (though we won’t get into this now).

All I’m trying to say is, player to player trading is an important part of every MMO. I could think of a few MMOs where it works very well, and has not resulted in gold selling or anything of the like.

In fact, the mail system, IS THE BEST WAY TO SELL GOLD. Why? Because you DO NOT need to be online to receive it! All I have to do is pay for gold via a website, enter my ingame name, and check back a week later to find my gold is delivered!

Player to player trading then, obviously will not affect gold selling in anyway. In fact, it will only result in positive things. 1) Not flooding the trading post 2) increase trading post performance (less people using it) and 3) fairer pricing and exchange of items.

To not recognise these three benefits, you would have to be severely ignorant.

The only reason for me to use P2P is to avoid transaction cost. But now that I need to spend time to advertise my stuffs, I’ll rather just pay the cost and let the TP sort it out. It an item sells for 1g in TP, the max profit difference I can make from P2P is the savings of 15s…which I don’t really care. It tax applies for P2P, even less reason to go through the hassle.

I think some people actually thinks this will allow them to sell at a higher price…. or are just blaming the TP for not being able to make money.

then else do you suggest we be able to transfer items between “individuals” instead of anonymous people without the risk of one sided mail?