Guild Wars 2

Mystic.5934:

Dench.5968:

There are 3 theories right now about this:

- It’s an anti bot measure that fails at life.
- It’s an intentional feature that protects 1990’s era server technology
-It’s a legitmate error that has been ignored by Arena Net.

Things that don’t set it off:
-Buying items as fast as possible with a mouse/keyboard
-Bidding on items as fast as possible with a mouse/keyboard

I love every and all things you said. well put!

Behellagh.1468:

Pfft, 1990s technology. Show me a transactional database that can do multiple thousands of insertions and deletions a second on moderately priced servers then you have a point. It’s the insertion into the TP DB and the removal from your character’s DB that is the costly part. Bidding is merely a subtraction of coin and creation of a bid and queries can be deferred slightly without a player noticing but making sure an item is properly moved between the two, preventing “dupes”, keeping a record to allow rollbacks and restoration.

As someone who owns a website with a database, I can confirm that my $6/month server takes about 6 seconds to do 10,000 database updates. I’ll test insertions and deletions for you later tonight.
If bandwidth was the issue, why can I buy things as fast as I can click? and I can buy things like 3 times faster than I could sell things if this error wasn’t there. selling should be insert-delete, buying should be delete-insert. (or maybe insert-update vs. delete-update). I see no reason buying and selling would have different bandwidth requirements.

thanks

ran some tests. it’s a MySQL database, using PHP. I made a new table to test this. each record has an auto-incrementing ‘id’ and an int field ‘i’.
inserting 10,000 records took 3.545154 seconds
individually updating 10,000 records to add 1 to ‘i’ took 3.703984 seconds
individually deleting 10,000 records took 5.285522 seconds

the code:
$i=1;
$start_time=explode(" ",microtime());

while($i<=10000) {
//mysql_query(“INSERT INTO temp (i) VALUES ($i)”);
//mysql_query(“UPDATE temp SET i=i+1 WHERE id=$i”);
mysql_query(“DELETE FROM temp WHERE id=$i”);
$i++;
}

$end_time=explode(" ",microtime());
$time=round($end_time⁰+$end_time¹-$start_time⁰-$start_time¹,6);
echo “<br>testing: $time seconds”;

I’m sure it could be done quicker and more conclusively than this as I would consider myself only an amateur/hobbyist programmer, but I’m just showing that database queries are FAST. keep in mind that this is on a non-dedicated $6/month server, so if you didn’t have a hundred other people on your server, and you had multiple servers, you could do a lot more in the same time.

I have the same problem with Trading Post. After made an istance, i had put items to TP to empty my inventory, but a few minutes later i was unable to sell items. The message that displayed is “Error Attempting to sell”. Now i can’t sell anything since 2 hours and then i can’t play dungeon or do anything cause my inventory is always full.
How can i do? It’s impossible to play. I want sell my items T_T

There’s a thread about this in the bug forum > here < but no official answer…

This would be the first time it’s happened to me since day 1, I can’t sell any items but am allowed to buy anything I want without a problem. I have lots of buy orders that I would love to cancel but can’t because tp shows that I have no items I’m buying but I keep receiving items to pick up anyway. What do I do? Just wait for a fix? Also this is crippling my money making ways as I need money to craft my eternity. I post this in hopes of anet addressing the issue with the tp.

Thanks

P.S. This is also my very first post in the forums… EVER!

UPDATE:

Patch came in and fixed my problem, I can now see my listings and sell again, I also forgot to mention that I was getting an error on selling my items. For some strange reason, I was able to sell an inscription this morning, the item disappeared from my inventory and the tp gave me the Error attempting to sell message, so I guess my inscription is gone forever. Seems that when they roll out patches, it fixes tp issues for awhile until it happens again. Good Luck everyone else.

Despair.2374:

This would be the first time it’s happened to me since day 1, I can’t sell any items but am allowed to buy anything I want without a problem. I have lots of buy orders that I would love to cancel but can’t because tp shows that I have no items I’m buying but I keep receiving items to pick up anyway. What do I do? Just wait for a fix? Also this is crippling my money making ways as I need money to craft my eternity. I post this in hopes of anet addressing the issue with the tp.

Thanks

P.S. This is also my very first post in the forums… EVER!

I think your problem is a temporary bug and not related to the problems this post outlines.

Temporary bug?? I read a lot of threads 1 year old! I wrote to support and they simply answer me with this: “We are sorry that at the moment we are unable to offer you an immediate solution to this problem, however, we’ll do our best to release a fix as soon as possible.
Please let us know if you have any other questions or concerns.”

…………. -__________-‘’ It’s not a reply!!

I MAY have found a solution to this problem, how many of you press “OK” after a sale, I stopped doing that because it was just a waste of time, if there was an “OK” button and a “Cancel” button you would have to press one or the other, but with just an “OK” button there’s no point in pressing it as the item is already sold.

Now I just sold a load of stuff, making sure I pressed the “OK” button after each sale, and didn’t get the “Error attempting to sell” once.

Second post here (and just copy & paste), got this error today, wasn’t even playing so much, just did some Boars in Queensdale, since I started playing the game just a few weeks ago, sold few things and this happened. Can’t sell anything, tried to LOG OFF, restart, completely LOG OUT from the game, nothing helped. I even went out, met friends and stuff, returned after 3 hours home, wanted to play GW2 hoping the problem will disappear, and NO, it didn’t. I was not selling anything in a bulk, I was not buying anything, I don’t think I behaved like a bot in any case, but I ran out of my space in inventory and chest, and I can’t play it more. kitten it, wanted to finish my Daily and do good portion of Monthly :(

Neochrome.5039:

Second post here (and just copy & paste), got this error today, wasn’t even playing so much, just did some Boars in Queensdale, since I started playing the game just a few weeks ago, sold few things and this happened. Can’t sell anything, tried to LOG OFF, restart, completely LOG OUT from the game, nothing helped. I even went out, met friends and stuff, returned after 3 hours home, wanted to play GW2 hoping the problem will disappear, and NO, it didn’t. I was not selling anything in a bulk, I was not buying anything, I don’t think I behaved like a bot in any case, but I ran out of my space in inventory and chest, and I can’t play it more. kitten it, wanted to finish my Daily and do good portion of Monthly

Actually I still think that’s a different error than the one described in the first post in this thread.

Some others have been getting you error as well, and it may be a temporary bug.

Solid Gold.9310:

I MAY have found a solution to this problem, how many of you press “OK” after a sale, I stopped doing that because it was just a waste of time, if there was an “OK” button and a “Cancel” button you would have to press one or the other, but with just an “OK” button there’s no point in pressing it as the item is already sold.

Now I just sold a load of stuff, making sure I pressed the “OK” button after each sale, and didn’t get the “Error attempting to sell” once.

I’ve always pressed the OK and I still get this error. I truly think it just has to do with the speed at which you sell items. Pressing the OK button maybe slows things down a bit so you don’t encounter the error? I usually just have a browser window open up on my other screen and do other things while I wait for it to allow me to sell more items.

Alyssa.7254:

Solid Gold.9310:

I MAY have found a solution to this problem, how many of you press “OK” after a sale, I stopped doing that because it was just a waste of time, if there was an “OK” button and a “Cancel” button you would have to press one or the other, but with just an “OK” button there’s no point in pressing it as the item is already sold.

Now I just sold a load of stuff, making sure I pressed the “OK” button after each sale, and didn’t get the “Error attempting to sell” once.

I’ve always pressed the OK and I still get this error. I truly think it just has to do with the speed at which you sell items. Pressing the OK button maybe slows things down a bit so you don’t encounter the error? I usually just have a browser window open up on my other screen and do other things while I wait for it to allow me to sell more items.

Yeah you could be right, just by slowing me down by 1/4 a second is enough to stop the error for me.

I don’t know why they put the OK button there, it does absolutely nothing, once you press sell it’s sold, why do I need to say ok>

Solid Gold.9310:

Yeah you could be right, just by slowing me down by 1/4 a second is enough to stop the error for me.

I don’t know why they put the OK button there, it does absolutely nothing, once you press sell it’s sold, why do I need to say ok>

To slow you down enough that you don’t get the error.

tolunart.2095:

Solid Gold.9310:

Yeah you could be right, just by slowing me down by 1/4 a second is enough to stop the error for me.

I don’t know why they put the OK button there, it does absolutely nothing, once you press sell it’s sold, why do I need to say ok>

To slow you down enough that you don’t get the error.

Just no, I’m sure it didn’t go like this…………

Bloke A “We need to slow them down, they are selling stuff too fast”
Bloke B " Ok put an OK button there" Points to BLT open window
Bloke A " So what will that button actually do"
Bloke B " Nothing at all, they don’t need to press it, but if they sell 10 items without pressing it they will get an error attempting to sell"
Bloke A Grumbles under his breath “Darned stupid idea, blah I just get paid to do as I’m told”.

I’m serious, it serves no other purpose than to make you pause between items.

Not sure if I have seen it confirmed, but 99% sure that “error attempting to sell” is in there by design, not a bug. And in that context, slowing you down a little when listing multiple items makes sense.

tolunart.2095:

I’m serious, it serves no other purpose than to make you pause between items.

Not sure if I have seen it confirmed, but 99% sure that “error attempting to sell” is in there by design, not a bug. And in that context, slowing you down a little when listing multiple items makes sense.

I think most people who use the trading post a lot think it’s not a bug and something intentionally done by Arena Net. Some here think it’s to protect limited hardware, others think it’s an anti bot measure.

I personally lean towards a poorly thought out and failed anti bot system. I think ANets silence gives this theory credit as most dev teams refuse to talk about anti bot measures or systems, as they are doing with this “error.”

If this was a legit error or a throttle system i see no reason to keep it quiet. A simple “yes it is a bug and it is very low priority” or “we do this to throttle sell listings” would clear up most of the mystery if those were the cases.

I personally think it’s a major speed bump for heavy trading post users with no clear explanation of its existence which is very frustrating to people who hit it 20+ times per day like I do. I’m at the point now where I watch a youtube video on one screen and list items on another. Thats how bored I am when I list my items due to the slow pace.

Despair & Neochrome: there are two TP bugs I get all the time.
this error is one of them – where you sell too fast and it won’t let you sell anymore.
the other happens randomly, where you go to the TP and everything is blank. TP, transactions, sell, it all shows nothing. I believe this is totally unrelated to the error attempting to sell. There are a couple ways I’ve fixed this one: logout/login works like 90% of the time. change your text language to french then back to english also works like 90% of the time.

as to the ‘ok’ button: I’m kinda glad it’s there. sometimes when you hit ‘sell’, it takes several seconds for the transaction to go through, then ‘ok’ comes up. I think it’s just a confirmation that it worked. it also refreshes the screen to show your updated inventory (selecting to sell another item also refreshes it). I believe there’s no reason to press ‘ok’, but it’s good that they have that confirmation that it worked so I know when I can go on and sell the next thing. If only I could go on and sell the next thing…

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Can-t-sell-anything-on-trading-post/first
they’re getting multiple responses over in bugs forum. not the responses we are looking for, but at least they know it’s being read. maybe devs just don’t look here?

Mystic.5934:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Can-t-sell-anything-on-trading-post/first
they’re getting multiple responses over in bugs forum. not the responses we are looking for, but at least they know it’s being read. maybe devs just don’t look here?

they read this forum. the replies are just selective.

Mykittenic.5934:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Can-t-sell-anything-on-trading-pokitten/firkitten
they’re getting multiple responses over in bugs forum. not the responses we are looking for, but at leakitten they know it’s being read. maybe devs jukitten don’t look here?

They’re talking about something different. The “speedbump” error I’m talking about happens after I likitten a dozen or two items in quick succession, the next item won’t go through. So I wait five seconds and try again and it works. It’s jukitten a reminder to slow down a little, whatever the original reason for putting it there, it’s not going away. AFAIK it’s been there since the game launched, or soon after.

If you can’t likitten anything on the TP, no matter how long you wait, then it’s a bug. The bug thread (and dev response) is not about how the error message normally works.

Dench.5968:

tolunart.2095:

I’m serious, it serves no other purpose than to make you pause between items.

Not sure if I have seen it confirmed, but 99% sure that “error attempting to sell” is in there by design, not a bug. And in that context, slowing you down a little when listing multiple items makes sense.

I think most people who use the trading post a lot think it’s not a bug and something intentionally done by Arena Net. Some here think it’s to protect limited hardware, others think it’s an anti bot measure.

I personally lean towards a poorly thought out and failed anti bot system. I think ANets silence gives this theory credit as most dev teams refuse to talk about anti bot measures or systems, as they are doing with this “error.”

If this was a legit error or a throttle system i see no reason to keep it quiet. A simple “yes it is a bug and it is very low priority” or “we do this to throttle sell listings” would clear up most of the mystery if those were the cases.

I personally think it’s a major speed bump for heavy trading post users with no clear explanation of its existence which is very frustrating to people who hit it 20+ times per day like I do. I’m at the point now where I watch a youtube video on one screen and list items on another. Thats how bored I am when I list my items due to the slow pace.

Anyway it’s back for me, and I hate it.

I’m with this guy on the reasons why, a poorly implemented bot deterrent (As if bots wouldn’t get around it in less than 4 hours).

Otherwise of course they would have no problem saying it’s a minor bug.

Alyssa.7254:

I’ve always pressed the OK and I still get this error.

Same. Not only that, but I also take the time to price check every item to make sure it’s even worth listing. So between mousing over the item to see its vendor price, checking the projected profit (& mentally subtracting the listing fee), clicking on ‘add to lowest listing’ (a lot of times it defaults to buy orders), clicking sell, clicking OK, etc. we’re not talking about lightning speed listings here.

I’ve even tried counting to 5 between each item (in addition to all of the above) and I still get the error roughly every ~6 items. At this point I either try to sell 6 things during breaks in gameplay (between pulls in dungeons, during lulls in WvW) or just end up alt tabbing for the 30 seconds or so it seems to require for the error to disappear.

I’ve seriously considered just starting to vendor everything because with a full inventory it just doesn’t seem worth the hassle. I have all 20 slot bags, so with this error every 6 items + roughly 30 seconds needed between them to re-list we’re talking somewhere around 10 minutes to clear inventory. It’s ridiculous.

Still hate it, STILL not fixed.

This prevents me from spending real money on the game because of BLTP errors. If they can’t get this fixed in over a year I don’t trust them to fix the other stuff.

Solid Gold.9310:

Still hate it, STILL not fixed.

Either ANet does not consider this to be a bug or not possible to fix or of low enough priority to fix that nobody has been assigned to it. Did you submit a bug report or just complained here about it? If everyone who hates this reports it just maybe it’s status will be elevated.

Lite Ning Strike.5203:

This prevents me from spending real money on the game because of BLTP errors. If they can’t get this fixed in over a year I don’t trust them to fix the other stuff.

Pray tell how does selling multiple items rapidly on the TP and having it put the brakes on has anything to do with buying Gems? Yes their credit/debit/paypal purchasing gem transaction section of the TP can be stubborn about letting you buy gems but frankly I’ve seen this before with NCSOFT run cash shops. Their anti-fraud methods can be draconian at times and sometimes it’s the result of the bank your CC is issued from. Everytime a charge is reversed due to a stolen CC used is a black mark against ANet/NCSOFT and it’s been known to reach a point where CC companies simply refuse to let you buy from them.

Anyways if you are having a problem buying gems for cash open a ticket and let support work with you to resolve it.