Guild Wars 2

The economy, as I see it, has a major downfall. The basic mats cost more than the items you can make. Why??? Because,for example, all of the major armor based crafts – Leatherworking, Armorsmithing, Tailoring can all make their own version of a basic accessory. The backpack. Why spend the mats on making a bag …. no one will appreciate the effort and give you a profit for your time.

Everyone can insert a grubby ol’ sliver of a gemstone into their gear and suddenly gain stats. Why bother investing time crafting accessories when its that easy to use a found item. Again you will spend more in mats than you will get for the completed item.

Here is what I am getting at. Every crafting skill needs its own item of demand. Something that every player would appreciate having possession of in order to make their experience more fulfilling. It needs to happen early and often …. say at the first level up of a craft skill. For instance Leathercrafters and Tailors can both make basic 8 slot bags, but after the first skill up the leathercrafter can make a 12 slot and that is his limit. The tailor can make a 14 slot at his first skillup and at each additional skillup he goes to 18 … then 22 … then 30. No other craft skill can match him… so he has an item of demand.

You say but I can just switch crafts at will .A thought on that . After you lock in your 2 craft skills and level to the 2nd tier, you certainly can switch your craft skill ….. for 5 gold. Kind of a high price for switching? Darn right it is

There is no reason the basic mats should cost more in total than the product that results from the use of those mats. Fixing this by giving a “sweetheart item” to each craft skill at a reasonably low level will make crafting valid for more than just exp. That in turn will bump the TP economy in the right direction as well.

As I just posted in the crafting forum, if an item became profitable, the characters who can make it (which is 25% or so for most items, even without switching, with 8 crafts and 2 per character) would do so. This would drive up the demand for relevant materials, and drive up supply of finished items. Materials would therefore become more expensive, and the finished items would become cheaper, until eventually there’d be no more profit to be had.

(And really, while 25% of characters can craft a given thing, much closer to 100% of players can do the same, since presumably anyone who’s learned crafting on an alt learned a different one than their main has.)

25% is far too high an estimate, because it assumes that most characters have 2 maxed crafting disciplines and I don’t expect that this would be the case.

It only assumes that when we’re talking about max level items. Which only level 80 characters can use. And probably most level 80 characters do have both crafts maxed or close to it.

And VendettaDFA, who I was responding to, suggested adding profitable crafting items at low levels, anyway.

I actually agree with both statements made by Hippocampus.8470 and lackofcheese.5617 in respect to how crafting currently works in relation to the TP. It’s the lack of the sweetheart item that holds finished item value down. Crafting alts have existed on that “other” MMO for years and been just fine. Thats because a basic item that all professions need is made by one craft. Yes …also making the sweetheart item profitable to lower level players will kickstart a true crafting community and a proper TP market that rewards even lower level crafter/sellers.

Attaching a player level to crafting the item could be helpful as even though you gain exp from crafting, its not as much as you gain from the rest of the game and takes an investment of either time or money for mats as well. In that case it is a benefit. You get more use out of your game as if you do choose to alt, you invest more time playing the game your way for your enjoyment. Also if only one crafting profession can make a “bag” for example, yet everyone can gather and sell the mats for it … the mats should always be in supply and by volume be cheaper than the finished product. I would like to see a point where a jute bag could sell for the price of the 2 times the material needed to make it.

To make crafting profitable you have to have some kind of specialization or effort required to make in demand items.

I think all you guys missed the REAL problem of crafting.
IT GIVES XP!!

This is why it is not profitable.
In other MMOs you level your craft which takes time and money and as a reward you get a small profit.

This is impossible in GW2 because there is no reason NOT to take a crafting discipline.
It is just some easy XP.
I prefer the GW2 variant because this prevents that some people make unlimited money from their crafting discipline.

Chillmastor.9234:

I think all you guys missed the REAL problem of crafting.
IT GIVES XP!!

This is why it is not profitable.
In other MMOs you level your craft which takes time and money and as a reward you get a small profit.

This is impossible in GW2 because there is no reason NOT to take a crafting discipline.
It is just some easy XP.
I prefer the GW2 variant because this prevents that some people make unlimited money from their crafting discipline.

Ya there is an easy reason why ….. as it is now I can sell all my mats …NEVER craft a thing and just buy whatever I want for cheap as I gain more exp in the field than in crafting while anyone who crafts makes less exp and loses profitablility. Satisfied? In addition since the mats sell for more than the finished product….guess who benefits….. goldfarmers … tada !!!

I’ve mastered 4 different crafting disciplines so far and I agree with the OP that the cost of materials versus the value of a finished item is out of sync.

Other than experience gain, a player is better off buying all of the gear from the Trading Post than trying to make it themselves. There’s a fundamental problem with the system when a player must be forced to spend more money to make something than just buying the finished product out-right.

Even when you consider Exotic gear at level 80, the cost to reach that point plus only buying SOME of the materials exceeds the cost to just buy it directly on the Trading Post.

You have to ask yourself WHY is it out of the sync, and the reason is down to the fact the trading post is cross server. You have 2 million players all trying to sell their items at once.

Let’s say 2,000 people all decide they want to craft and sell the same item.

2,000 people try buy the same craft materials but, there’s a snag there’s only materials for 1,000 items in a reasonable price range. So, people start bidding up to ensure they are the one who gets the materials. A small portion of those players might not have even done the maths properly and pay too much and they won’t even get a profit.

So, we now have 1,000 players who made their items, some are doomed to make a loss already due to paying too much (Usually because they forgot to factor in the sales tax). There might well be demand for 1,000 items… but players get impatient, they want their money NOW, not TOMMOROW – so they under-cut their opponents by 1 copper. let’s say 1/4 of the players engage in under-cutting starting off with an item worth 20 silver (2000 copper).

First bid is 20
Next bid is 19,99
Next is 19,98

After 250 bid-downs, we’re now looking at a sale value of 17,50 and is hovering pretty close to break even possibly even BELOW break-even due to improper understanding of taxes. And this is the problem; now scale this up to a game with 2,000,000 players – there’s far more than just 2,000 players trying to make and sell any given items. It only takes a few impatient players to hike prices and collapse markets for the majority.

Still… not my problem, I’m a trader not a crafter, you guys keep collapsing your markets, I’ll find my arbitrage

You all make good points, and I agree with most everything you have said. The thing is, that the problems with the game economy can’t be chalked up to any one thing. It’s all a cumulative effect. The biggest problem that I see is that you have a TON of folks all trying to level up their crafting at the same time. The overall effect is a HUGE shortage of mats and a HUGE glut of people trying to sell their stuff so they can keep leveling up their crafting. The drop rates on the mats needs to increase significantly for a few months and then taper back off to where they are now. Also I hate to even suggest such a thing because it’s gamer anathema to ever complain about too much of a good thing, but it has to be said that right now this game simply drops way too much good gear seemingly randomly. Rare items should be just that, RARE, I get dropped at least 2 rares every time I play for an hour or so, and a ton of masterwork items as well. Player made items can’t compete with rares that drop with major or better sigils already in them! Heck players can’t even increase the uniqueness and desirability of their crafted items by putting sigils or runes into them. Trust me I learned this one the hard way! Players should be able to put runes and sigils into items without them becoming soulbound. I learned by trying to make a set of armor for my wife and being a nice guy and putting the runes into each item. OOOPS! That one costed me a few silvers at a time when each and every silver was precious!

Anyway, my point is that several things need to be addressed at once in order to turn the situation around. (Which I desperately hope that they do!) I just completed armorsmith and weaponsmith to 400, and I really wanted to train all of the crafting skills because I actually find building and marketing to be a very enjoyable part of MMO’s, but I am not going to train anything else until the economy is fixed. I’ll just buy stuff off the market if I want it.

My 2 coppers….

Deag

There’s nothing to fix in the economy.
The pay is XP not money, so XP is what you get and not money.

Then once you sit down and find the subset of recipes that make money. Guess what, it’s not the recipes every dog use to level up and dump thousands of the same widget on the market. Only those who walk the extra mile in market research can profit, and that’s how it should be.

@ Vaerah.4907

Chillmastor.9234:

I think all you guys missed the REAL problem of crafting.
IT GIVES XP!!

This is why it is not profitable.
In other MMOs you level your craft which takes time and money and as a reward you get a small profit.

This is impossible in GW2 because there is no reason NOT to take a crafting discipline.
It is just some easy XP.
I prefer the GW2 variant because this prevents that some people make unlimited money from their crafting discipline.

MY REPLY (thx forum for the malfunctioning quote system)

Ya there is an easy reason why ….. as it is now I can sell all my mats …NEVER craft a thing and just buy whatever I want for cheap as I gain more exp in the field than in crafting while anyone who crafts makes less exp and loses profitablility. Satisfied? In addition since the mats sell for more than the finished product….guess who benefits….. goldfarmers … tada !!!

(my reply to you)
The XP you speak of does not even BEGIN to compensate for the loss of operating funds from having no lower level sweetheart items to get a living from. Your final sentence is SOOOOOO elitist I want to vomit AND its completely misleading. I will NOT spend a copper in crafting when my basic mats generate a living and build my cash up to easily afford everything you walked the extra mile to make. You try to spin it as the 1 percenters who craft the top recipes make the profit. Its actually you who are toiling for the 99% who have figured out the futility of crafting. Thanks for the baubles I can easily buy with all the low level garbage mats I sell.

Very well said Vend! That’s exactly why I won’t be crafting anything, probably not even for myself. I can buy it much cheaper than I can make it and it takes zero effort and zero time. Anyone who thinks the system as it currently stands is A OK has either not crafted anything at all, or they are just woefully misguided. I’d much prefer to give up the exp and have my effort be rewarded in at least a small profit.

For those talking about proper market research being the key here and my lack of profitability being a product of my laziness…

I’ve crafted top teir exotic lvl 80 gear of both weapons and armor. I made a very small profit on one set of armor I crafted, only because someone had put up a very generous buy order that I happened to stumble into. The second set of the same armor that I made lost me those profits because noone was willing to pay enough to even cover my expense. I lost my you know what on every weapon that I sold. I’m talking about lvl 80 exotic weapons here not cookie cutter run of the mill junk. I don’t even want to mention my expense in karma points to get those exotic recipes. That was another waste of a different kind of currency.

With all the people who actually craft complaining about the problems. I don’t see how anyone can sit there and say we’re all crazy or lazy or whatever else. At the rate things are going there will very soon be market shortages as people figure out that crafting is a waste of their time, effort, and money.

The economy needs some work. It’s not difficult problem to solve, it just requires a few minor modifications. The problem is that in a complex system like this it’s very difficult to know exactly what needs to be adjusted. EVE online had some similar issues back when that game was in it’s first few iterations, they ended up hiring a full time economist to sort it all out, and if there is one MMO I can point to for it’s stellar (no pun intended) economy, it’s EVE.

My 2 isk (cough, cough) I mean coppers…

Deag

VendettaDFA.9368

The XP you speak of does not even BEGIN to compensate for the loss of operating funds from having no lower level sweetheart items to get a living from. Your final sentence is SOOOOOO elitist I want to vomit AND its completely misleading

Apparently it does. Markets don’t lie (traders do, but individually). Markets decided that your pointless zillionth widget is… well… pointless and valued it as such.

I am sorry to sound harsh but in real life I am a trader and to not be in the loser 95% you need to think different, sometimes even be an elitist bastage.
Thinking different is what made me quote you correctly despite the forum quote is broken. Because I thought different and dealt with it.

You too should start dealing with what is thrown at you, be it a buggy forum or an harsh market.

Deagon Droga.1637

I’ve crafted top teir exotic lvl 80 gear of both weapons and armor

.. and felt somehow entitled to a profit right?

Guess, I have a guild mate who has all the craft schools trained to 400 and even then he won’t craft what he knows everybody are going to craft.
It’s obvious you and everybody else expect to “ding” 400 and then start printing money, but exactly the very mental process that drove you to think that you would make money at skill 400 is exactly the same that drove everybody else to jump on the same lemmings bandwagon.

As my RL trading mentor teached to my team, “if you will think like everybody else, you’ll also perform like everybody else: that is you will lose”.

Think about Steve Jobs, or Zuckenberg: they did not think like everybody else and they won.
All the others who think on the same wave length are not appreciated exactly because they don’t shine, they don’t “bubble up” and they are doomed to spend their life doing mediocre and unimaginative jobs.

Deagon Droga.1637

EVE online had some similar issues back when that game was in it’s first few iterations, they ended up hiring a full time economist to sort it all out, and if there is one MMO I can point to for it’s stellar (no pun intended) economy, it’s EVE.

ANET also hired a full time economist, he even posts on this forum (unlike Dr. Ejyo in EvE).

GW2 economy cannot be “fixed” to be like EvE’s, in GW2 there’s no heavy destruction of items to grant a massive demand vs supply based economy.
That’s why they have to charge so much for trading fees, for teleports etc, GW2 economy is constantly in risk of mudflation due to the fact that goods don’t get destroyed as often as they should to insure a “truly perfect” economy.

Vaerah.4907:

VendettaDFA.9368

The XP you speak of does not even BEGIN to compensate for the loss of operating funds from having no lower level sweetheart items to get a living from. Your final sentence is SOOOOOO elitist I want to vomit AND its completely misleading

Apparently it does. Markets don’t lie (traders do, but individually). Markets decided that your pointless zillionth widget is… well… pointless and valued it as such.

I am sorry to sound harsh but in real life I am a trader and to not be in the loser 95% you need to think different, sometimes even be an elitist bastage.
Thinking different is what made me quote you correctly despite the forum quote is broken. Because I thought different and dealt with it.

You too should start dealing with what is thrown at you, be it a buggy forum or an harsh market.

Deagon Droga.1637

I’ve crafted top teir exotic lvl 80 gear of both weapons and armor

.. and felt somehow entitled to a profit right?

Guess, I have a guild mate who has all the craft schools trained to 400 and even then he won’t craft what he knows everybody are going to craft.
It’s obvious you and everybody else expect to “ding” 400 and then start printing money, but exactly the very mental process that drove you to think that you would make money at skill 400 is exactly the same that drove everybody else to jump on the same lemmings bandwagon.

As my RL trading mentor teached to my team, “if you will think like everybody else, you’ll also perform like everybody else: that is you will lose”.

Think about Steve Jobs, or Zuckenberg: they did not think like everybody else and they won.
All the others who think on the same wave length are not appreciated exactly because they don’t shine, they don’t “bubble up” and they are doomed to spend their life doing mediocre and unimaginative jobs.

Deagon Droga.1637

EVE online had some similar issues back when that game was in it’s first few iterations, they ended up hiring a full time economist to sort it all out, and if there is one MMO I can point to for it’s stellar (no pun intended) economy, it’s EVE.

ANET also hired a full time economist, he even posts on this forum (unlike Dr. Ejyo in EvE).

GW2 economy cannot be “fixed” to be like EvE’s, in GW2 there’s no heavy destruction of items to grant a massive demand vs supply based economy.
That’s why they have to charge so much for trading fees, for teleports etc, GW2 economy is constantly in risk of mudflation due to the fact that goods don’t get destroyed as often as they should to insure a “truly perfect” economy.

I did deal with the buggy forum and with this as well – https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Short-guide-to-generating-cash-flow

Deagon Droga.1637:

At the rate things are going there will very soon be market shortages as people figure out that crafting is a waste of their time, effort, and money.

This will never happen, because if items start becoming scarcer, without a simultaneous drop in demand, prices will go up. In fact, that is probably exactly what will start to happen once people have mostly leveled up their crafts and begin making things for profit instead of for XP. They will look at what’s selling for more than cost, and they will make a few more of those things to sell for profit.

But as things currently stand, people seem to expect profit from whatever they craft, and so they craft without thinking, and tend not to make money on average. Guess what: if you try to sell something without first checking whether it’ll make you a profit, chances are you won’t make a profit.

I see the problem as there being simply too many crafters. If someone levels up their weaponsmithing as they level, they will make enough weapons to meet the needs of themselves and maybe 3 other characters. If 1 in 8 characters take weaponsmithing, and 1 half of players need those weapons, this will generate as much equipment as all players need. Between crafting and reselling non-soulbound gear, you could meet the global demand for weapons without drops.

The more fundamental reason why crafting isn’t profitable is that it’s so easy, everyone does it. If you play the game as intended, you’re going to end up with a huge pile of crafting materials. Crafting them into items earns you xp, and a little money from selling the items (less than if you just sold the mats, but still some). There’s virtually no barriers to crafting, it’s very easy, and everyone can do it.

In short, you’re not adding any value when you craft. If 1 in 8 people could fix a car for little to no effort, being a mechanic wouldn’t be considered a job. You couldn’t make money doing it, because your skill is worthless. If you want it to be worth something, you either need few people to be able to do it, or add some difficulty to the task itself.

One problem is that crafters are forced to either deliberately farm for materials or buy them on TP — this is part of the problem … there is an artificial demand and the bots/farmers the ones profiting from it.

I leveled up two characters to 40+ and I still didn’t have enough Fine materials to get Weaponsmithing past the first tier — that’s a big problem with drop rates on Fine materials.

Caelib.2497:

One problem is that crafters are forced to either deliberately farm for materials or buy them on TP — this is part of the problem … there is an artificial demand and the bots/farmers the ones profiting from it.

I leveled up two characters to 40+ and I still didn’t have enough Fine materials to get Weaponsmithing past the first tier — that’s a big problem with drop rates on Fine materials.

or you could spend a couple silver and buy them? Or better yet buy the low level inscriptions that are being sold for less than the cost to make.

In order to make money people are going to have to part with Globs of Ecto. You either sell them or use them in a weapon that will make you money. Or armor for that matter. Thats where the money is. I was on cursed shore for about 2 hours and got 11 globs with my MF set on. That would have gotten me about 1.5g if I sold it. If I use it to craft a armor or weapon then I can possibly double or triple it.

@Vaereh: Very well said! – Kudos

I swear the trade forum reeks of sour lemons and spilt milk xD – I started coming by here lately to see what advice if floating about now I’ve taken up GW2 trading big time and it’s just a place for the bottom 95% to complain about the top 5% and how the system is “broken” (Yet apparently works for us few)

@oZii: Exotic items under best case scenario don’t usually see than about 30% markup on their material value, far from 200% or 300%

@ Ryuujin
I am generating about 20 silver an hour from farming a starting area and selling the basic mats off at TP. I can afford whatever I need for gear at that pace straight off the TP and still have shots at rare drops. Thank you Mr. 5 percent for being my concierge … you work for me enjoy

I don’t know about top level crafting, but crafting lower level stuff has NEVER generated a money profit in any MMO I’ve ever seen. My roomate, for whom the action house in WOW pretty much was the game for him (“I adventure just to get materials to sell.”) came up with a statement that, while technically inaccurate, was funny and nevertheless said something true: price equals materials minus labor. Finished products ALWAYS sell for less than the costs of the materials.

Of course, the correct formula does not defy economic law, but rather should be stated thusly:

price = materials + labor – crafting XP

Until you hit the cap, you’re basically in “apprentice” mode, technically losing money for every item you craft, but gaining in skills. Because people haven’t figured this out yet, probably you lose money even at the cap… though I’ll bet there are opportunities for those who are careful to research the market before deciding what to craft.

At any rate, don’t say the market doesn’t work right… since I’ll bet it works GREAT for those people who prefer adventuring to crafting. Personally, I’m leveling my tailoring and jeweling, but I understand perfectly well I’m probably not going to make any money at it. As soon as people who are in it for the money, not the fun, get out of the selling market, profits will rise back to zero. Right now, they’re well below.

@ Tarvok.4206
Exhibit A : http://hatchery.powerwordgold.net/2012/08/crafting-and-selling-netherweave-bags.html

Max tailoring is 600 in WoW … that was my sweetspot item available at 315 skill. I guess you’ve never seen WoW.

No no no, the fact that mats cost the same or more than an item crafted from the same mats has nothing whatsoever to do with who can craft what. Not at all. And it would not be fixed by having one profession craft unique, demanded things. In fact it would not change the situation by 1 copper.

The reason why a crafted item costs about the same or less than the mats used to craft it, is a direct result of a global market, the lack of soulbound mats, and the Mystic Forge

In the global market of GW2, ANYONE can buy ANY MATERIAL INSTANTLY and INSTANTLY craft ANY ITEM. It is enough if two crafters start selling and underbidding each other in this system, to have the price drop very fast to the level we see now. It does not matter what they craft, and how demanded it is, and if other crafting professions can’t craft it. And we have tens of thousands of crafters doing this.

In other MMO’s where you can make profit by crafting, you have rare mats, and by rare I mean mats you can rarely buy on the market (mainly because the market is server based and not global). This can be further improved by having one-shot rare recipes. Another layer is adding critical chance to craft items of even higher quality. Combine the rarity of mats, with one shot rare recipes and critical chance, and you will have a system where crafting brings in money (assuming the crafted items are equally good as items obtainable in other ways, like dungeons).

Another issue with the GW2 crafting system and another reason why we see crafted item prices way under the mat cost is perhaps less known. I was surprised to find out about this but here is the “secret”:

By combining items in the Mystic Forge you can obtain crafted items!

Throw in some greens, and you may get a crafted rare item. Of course since you did not spend any mats on it, you may sell it for a significantly lower price. This combined with people matching prices without checking, results in a huge price drop in some cases.

The solution to all the above is simple. Add rare soulbound mats for best recipes, add rare soulbound recipes, add free roaming random spawning mobs that drop necessary soulbound ingredients, and can’t be farmed because they can spawn anywhere at any time. Notice the “soulbound” word popping up often. It is crucial to have soulbound materials in a global market of millions. No other way to have rare mats, any rare mat that is not soulbound will appear in bulk on the TP in no time due to the tens of thousands of farmers. Once you do all that, crafting will bring in money for the crafters.

Well, yeah, and today, while leveling my tailoring, I was finding all kinds of materials that were cheaper to craft than to buy. I wasn’t paying close enough attention to see if it was more than 15% cheaper (there’s more money in arbitrage, anyway), but the opportunities are there. You just have to look for them.

It is because when you craft something you are adding nothing to it other than a very small amount of time. Click a button and post on TP. The ingredients before you used them were wanted by almost everyone so the could level their craft and gain xp. Now those same ingredients are contained within an item that only a few people want.

This isnt the case for lvl 80 items though right? I mean once people have lvl 400 crafting if you cant make a profit why bother making anything at all? Eventually all the crafters will stop making stuff, prices on the TP get more expensive, and crafters start making more stuff again.

Having said that, I have made a small amount of money by crafting green jewelry in the trading post

There is an easy way to fix crafting. Make the gifts needed for legendaries tradeable, so people crafting can pony up the 10g for the recipe and make money back on selling it.