Guild Wars 2

Why do people not like the new TP? It’s ergonomically unfriendly.

Let’s examine why!

Selling Issues!

The first reason is that all the tabs of the first TP have been reduced down to one tab. At first glance, this shouldn’t seem like an issue.

http://i.imgur.com/I01nej7.jpg

What one fails to realize is that the previous TP had a separate tab for selling all your goods. Selling goods on the TP in the past took a single click. Now it takes at least two clicks. If you do this multiple times during a dungeon run, this literally doubles your clicking.

The next issue is the number of items on the sell list. Previously, about 20 items were shown per screen, without any need to scroll. Now, we only get 9 items shown per screen, and we need to scroll down to see the 10th and beyond.

http://i.imgur.com/5a3RB7P.jpg

On the buy list, we get 8 items before we need to scroll.

http://i.imgur.com/LJ8itxl.jpg

The other additional factor in buying is that the “pages” no longer exist. While in theory this is good (it does reduce overall clicks), it makes it more difficult to keep track of your place when looking through a large list of items.

Moving on, let’s see how the actual buying and selling of items has been… unimproved.

Let’s say I want to sell an item instantly. In the past, you clicked a single button and poof! Everything sold instantly to the the person paying the most money, until the order was fulfilled. Do it again until items are gone or orders are filled.

What happens now is you have to first click on a buy order in order to sell instantly. (+1) click.

http://i.imgur.com/58w9Vo4.jpg

Afterwards, a screen pops up saying to pick up your coin. Hitting “Ok” or “Close” do the same thing, functionally, which is confusing. Additionally, hitting these buttons is another click, and although that was in the previous TP, it was almost exactly next to the sell button, which made it very quick.

http://imgur.com/58w9Vo4,G1E5XBA#1

Then when you click the button, it automatically puts you at the next sell instantly order. This is good! Automatic is good. What isn’t good is that the system by default doesn’t put the slider on sell all instantly — this is generally what people want, and what the system did by default previously. This adds another click (+1 click).

http://i.imgur.com/E0Snw7E.jpg

The issue of automatically including all items also pops up when listing the item, instead of using the buy order system. Listing the item makes the slider, by default, only sell 1 of the item. Most people don’t want to list just 1 item. Most people will, by default, want to list all items and reduce from there. This requires an extra click and drag to correct (+1 click).

http://i.imgur.com/AMHcxDN.jpg

Now imagine doing this after a dungeon run. If we assume the new patch made it take 6 clicks to sell items, instead of the previous 3 clicks it took, then you have effectively doubled the amount of clicking it takes to sell all your loot. This starts to wear on people’s patience.

Buying Problems

Let’s say I want to buy 250 Ancient Bones instantly, instead of placing a buy order.

On the old TP, I would simply enter 250 into the quantity slot, and the TP would automatically go through all available listings until my desired quantity was fulfilled. I can’t do that any more. Entering 250 on an item without 250 available in the first listing will only fill until the first listing is nullified.

http://i.imgur.com/khqda0B.jpg

I have to first check multiple boxes for available listings and make sure that at least 250 Ancient Bones are available in those listings. I then have to enter the quantity (250) and hit buy. As before, I also have to pray that somebody doesn’t buy at the same moment I do and cause the listings to change. As you can see from the image below, I actually have to start scrolling through listings and checking to reach the required 250 Ancient Bones. This is INCREDIBLY tedious, especially when considering the number of buys some people need to make.

http://imgur.com/khqda0B,CpQOnbA#1

Now let’s say I say “Screw that!” and want to place a buy order. This has been simplified over the previous iteration of the TP, but it’s confusing to newcomers. Now I have to click on the left side of the screen, enter my quantity and desired price, and list the item. This part is done fairly well, but not very clearly to newcomers.

http://i.imgur.com/nR4mpj1.jpg

However, I ran into a snag while doing this. I tried to place a buy order at the same price as a listing. The system automatically shifted me over into the instant buy section. This was not my desired goal — I wanted to place a buy order at a specific price and quantity, not buy instantly at variable prices and variable quantities. Now we’re back to the aforementioned issue of instant buys!

http://i.imgur.com/woE7Tnm.jpg

See more in Part 2!

Part 2

Shifting Gears

In the previous iteration of the TP, filtering items and searching was front and center in the TP. You couldn’t miss it — it was right at the top. Now searching is off to the top left corner, as is filtering. Additionally, while there are new filtering categories (thank you for that ANet!), the filtering system is only accessed through a tiny little gear icon, which most newcomers may not see.

http://i.imgur.com/FERnIo9.jpg

The filtering and search system is VITAL to making the TP experience pleasant. Don’t relegate these items off to the side!

Misc. Issues

While I personally don’t spend a lot of effort speculating in the market, some people do. Having a statistics page like in the original TP post was useful for people who wanted to know what was happening in the market.

The Good News — AKA What Was Done Right

This isn’t to say all the changes are bad. Some of the changes are wonderful.

The most important beneficial to the TP, in my opinion, was being able to sort by class restrictions. My fiancee and I have had this gripe about the TP since beta, and I’m glad to finally see it fixed.

Secondly, I have seen the TP speeds greatly improve. This is wonderful. The TP before was sluggish and unstable, and the new version seems to be much faster and more stable.

Thirdly, the transaction log (currently buying, currently selling, bought and sold items) is easier to navigate than before. This is a good ergonomic change.

Fourth, and perhaps least importantly, the dang thing looks prettier. It was an eyesore before. However, this new form needs to be functional too.

Which is why we should talk about…..

Suggestions!

1. Fix the aforementioned ergonomics issues — if I want to instantly buy 250 items, make it so I go through all necessary listings to reach that 250 items. If I want instantly sell a large number of items, it shouldn’t take twice the clicking!
2. Make entering quantities manually easier. Right now we have to click on the tiny quantity box, delete the number that’s currently present, and then enter our desired number. What should happen is that clicking the quantity box should instantly remove whatever quantity is currently in there already and allow us to instantly enter our desired quantity. The click and drag thing takes more time and effort than should be necessary.
3. Allow players to customize how many items they see per viewing pane.
4. Provide an additional statistics page for people who like to play the market.
5. In future feature packs, allow players to playtest changes first in order to discover these issues before they become available to the general public.

Now imagine doing this after a dungeon run. If we assume the new patch made it take 6 clicks to sell items, instead of the previous 3 clicks it took, then you have effectively doubled the amount of clicking it takes to sell all your loot. This starts to wear on people’s patience.

So many clicks, so many tears!

Thanks for the great summary, Vagrant.

Vagrant.7206:

Why do people not like the new TP? It’s ergonomically unfriendly.

Let’s examine why!

The next issue is the number of items on the sell list. Previously, about 20 items were shown per screen, without any need to scroll. Now, we only get 9 items shown per screen, and we need to scroll down to see the 10th and beyond.

http://i.imgur.com/5a3RB7P.jpg

On the buy list, we get 8 items before we need to scroll.

http://i.imgur.com/LJ8itxl.jpg

Klick on Buy Items enter or copy/paste “I am Evon Gnashblade” into the Search field. You will now see a list of all items rather than the big Icons. To disable it just enter the same phrase again.
Note the input has to be case sensitiv!

have fun with it ^^

.::edit: becareful the TP gets kinda laggy in Gnashblade-Mode ::.

Yes. Selling is horrible now. If I go to the “sell” page, it should automatically assume that I want to actually, you know, SELL the things that I click on.

Great observation from the opp: I concur. This is inflicting RSI, and testing my patience. Selling items this way is a pain in the donkey…

The new TP interface leaves much to be desired, please Arenanet take this serious and make it more user-friendly instead of making it less user-friendly.

Soon.5240:

Yes. Selling is horrible now. If I go to the “sell” page, it should automatically assume that I want to actually, you know, SELL the things that I click on.

How is it not doing that? You can’t buy from the sell page. It brings up you inventory. The two differences I see is defaulting to low sell order price rather than high bid. And of course the missing match your lowest price.

Vagrant.7206:

Now let’s say I say “Screw that!” and want to place a buy order. This has been simplified over the previous iteration of the TP, but it’s confusing to newcomers. Now I have to click on the left side of the screen, enter my quantity and desired price, and list the item. This part is done fairly well, but not very clearly to newcomers.

http://i.imgur.com/nR4mpj1.jpg

However, I ran into a snag while doing this. I tried to place a buy order at the same price as a listing. The system automatically shifted me over into the instant buy section. This was not my desired goal — I wanted to place a buy order at a specific price and quantity, not buy instantly at variable prices and variable quantities. Now we’re back to the aforementioned issue of instant buys!

http://i.imgur.com/woE7Tnm.jpg

I’m glad somebody brought this up so I didn’t have to start a whole new thread on it. The first time I wanted to put a whole stack of something on buy order, it gave me an error because I was asking for more than were currently being offered on sell orders, even though the current sell listings should be irrelevant when I’m making my own buy order. Eventually I realized I had to click in the buy order listings window first before doing anything else, but this is far from obvious. And, since the upper part of the interface doesn’t seem to change one whit, there is no feedback to the user telling them that the UI thinks they are in `buy order` mode vs. `buy now` mode.