Top Reasons I Like Trading, an Economy, and am Sick of Economy Hate Threads

I agree with OP, and like any game, you make your own fun. I enjoy both the trading metagame and playing.

I play self-found but sell things i find, as buying my way to victory isn't really what i want out of a game like this. If you play differently, that's fine.

I am strongly opposed to any kind of automatic auction house however, for the economy to stay interesting there must be a barrier of entry, otherwise inflation will catch up in a matter of weeks and normalise everything, thus leaving sellers at a huge disadvantage.

A solution i'd propose is a stash for trading in-game where you set buyout prices on the items. (Of course, microtransactions for trading stash tabs). The catch is, you can only see the loot for sale from your current instance of the town, so if you want to find that perfect deal, you'll have to hop instances and towns regularily and actively seek out what you need/want.

No search-functionality, both players must be online and in the same instance for the trade. A way to track players without adding them to friends list could be added though.

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Yohanu wrote:

I agree with OP, and like any game, you make your own fun. I enjoy both the trading metagame and playing.

I play self-found but sell things i find, as buying my way to victory isn't really what i want out of a game like this. If you play differently, that's fine.

I am strongly opposed to any kind of automatic auction house however, for the economy to stay interesting there must be a barrier of entry, otherwise inflation will catch up in a matter of weeks and normalise everything, thus leaving sellers at a huge disadvantage.

A solution i'd propose is a stash for trading in-game where you set buyout prices on the items. (Of course, microtransactions for trading stash tabs). The catch is, you can only see the loot for sale from your current instance of the town, so if you want to find that perfect deal, you'll have to hop instances and towns regularily and actively seek out what you need/want.

No search-functionality, both players must be online and in the same instance for the trade. A way to track players without adding them to friends list could be added though.

I'm curious,do you give the currency/orbs away to the poor ?

Being self found implies that those orbs gained from trade won't be used for crafting any of your gear as they aren't self found.

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Twister0258 wrote:

Here is my top list of what is GOOD about trading and the economy. I am tired of all these SFL troll threads and economy hates posts. The simple truth is there are some very sophisticated factors most of these posters overlook.

1. The RNG needs to be tight. Period. People complain about self found and demand an ultra loose RNG. The issue is lifespan. The looser the RNG, the faster the game melts down, becomes stale/easy, and fails. Using D3 as an example, remember when they buffed legendary drops combined with difficulty nerfs? The economy became terminal, maxed in a month. Untouchably nice items in any form (i.e., merely having a GFG leg) became commonplace. Players got bored...fast. The no lifers were finding dozens of BIS bae leg types a day- top items lost all their distinction.

2. Trading adds a high layer of complexity to an otherwise mindless, skillless game. The simple truth is that while the game is highly complex relative to its peers, an economy is key for adding depth and skill. Because the game is big, understanding the economy and keeping current is tough! It lets those who are sophisticated gain an edge through knowledge. A binded SFL game becomes ideal for mindless, easy play. But that's the d3 market, not POE crowd. In fact, a SFL POE is less complex than a non bind D3

3. Trading mitigates the luck factor of a bad RNG streak. Although related to pts #1 and 2, , it's key to remember that trading gives you the flexibility to have what you want, even if drops don't fall your way. The normal counter to this is a request to juice the RNG, a very short sighted demand indeed

1. No it doesn't. The RNG can be loose as fuck. Look at Diablo 2, arguably the greatest aRPG of all time, and the game the designers of PoE based a lot of this game on. Diablo 2 had usable items dropping left and right, and the game was reborn again when runes were duped to shit and everyone got to play around with godly gear. Diablo 3 failed because it was more beneficial to play the auction house than it was to play the game, just like trading in PoE is far superior to actually playing, not to mention a crafting system that is a tard bait carrot on a stick.

2. Sure, it's less complex without sifting through the spammers, lowballers, and shit flipping scalpers. If you add too much complexity to trading then you get D3, the same turd of a game you keep shitting on. Too much emphasis and reliability on trading and wealth building turns this into Sim City for used car salesman, and not a game based around self character growth and crushing the skulls of many monsters. If you want to build an economics empire then go hit up one of those popular Zynga Facebook games. If you want to crush your enemies and see them driven before you then give me a game that doesn't have me going backwards every day after level 85.

3. Trading only mitigates bad RNG if you choose to grind trade chat as opposed to grinding fruitless maps for assy loots or any area for that matter. "Buy low! Sell high!" belongs in a boiler room and not in video games. Myself and many like me play games to unwind and get away from the hustling, nickel and diming WORK that we deal with all day. I don't need a second job when I get home from my first one. Not only are we teased with endgame crafting that could be so much fun if realistically accessible and drop rates that leave people feeling like they're playing the California Lottery for items that are "just okay", but on top of that we are forced into playing stock broker to an economy that is a complete fucking mess to begin with. I don't what makes me more tired, 8 hours of seeing a constant blur of trash on the ground or 15 minutes of reading trade spam.

We have different game genres for a reason. If I want a challenge that requires strategizing, I will play SC2 or LoL. I say unload the duped runes, quark bows, and Diablo Clones so that I can have fun playing the builds that I want and have a friends list that hasn't read "0" for 3 weeks straight.

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Sickness wrote:

I played self found for hundreds of hours, got 3 characters to above level 80, then I started trading. I increased my "wealth" ten fold in under two weeks just from trading. I could finally get all those uniques, high DPS weapons and 6 links that cost exalts and never drops for me. The problem now is that I have a decked out character that took almost no effort, that feels lame. And playing the game started to feel like a waste of time since I could just play the trade chat instead. I can't even bother to start the game anymore.

Exactly what I've been saying in other threads but some people just dont get it :(

Once you trade, it becomes mandatory.

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Zanixx wrote:

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Sickness wrote:

I played self found for hundreds of hours, got 3 characters to above level 80, then I started trading. I increased my "wealth" ten fold in under two weeks just from trading. I could finally get all those uniques, high DPS weapons and 6 links that cost exalts and never drops for me. The problem now is that I have a decked out character that took almost no effort, that feels lame. And playing the game started to feel like a waste of time since I could just play the trade chat instead. I can't even bother to start the game anymore.

Exactly what I've been saying in other threads but some people just dont get it :(

Once you trade, it becomes mandatory.

This x1000 times. People fail to understand the real problem. You DONT get enough orbs to try to craft your own gear or high level maps. Well, I'm not considering farming piety for the next year to be able to do so. But trading 3 days, flipping items and so, allow you to buy best items and faceroll all the content. So, tell me, mister-trading-fantastic-player, how trade make the game last longer if I can get the best items in 1 week of gameplay?

I dont defend SFL because I want a fucking kaoms hearts pinnata everytime I kill a white mob. I want a game that don't balance ALL drops with economy in mind, an economy a lot of people dont want to participate in, but have to to progress at the endgame. That way, maybe we can get enought orbs to craft and roll maps without spending time doing something boring for a lot of us. Would love a bartering system, this item that I wont use in exchange of another one that I would use. But when you add gold (orbs), the system just break. Inflaction, greedy people, buy low - sell high. Sorry, but I'm not playing to participate in a supermarket simulator. Is obvious that we are divided, there are people that like that way of gameplay. And, like loot allocation, we would like to have options.

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iamstryker wrote:

You think the game is mindless but trading takes skill....

ok.....

That was awesome, good job XD.

Gotta love the "trading is more effective than playing" mentality.

As though items that you sell materialize from thin air by virtue of trading alone.

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JahIthBer89 wrote:

Gotta love the "trading is more effective than playing" mentality.

As though items that you sell materialize from thin air by virtue of trading alone.

If you only flip, they do.

EDIT: Eh, let me temper this.

There's a point to be made that you can make currency significantly faster than actually playing the game by spamming a ton, flipping currency, and flipping items at ripoff rates.

You don't have to do this at all -- but, you can, it is fast, and you're exploiting the ignorance of new players.

I found trading easier in D2 not sure why but anyway more or less given up on trading.

trading makes the game super easy (once you are familiar with game mechanics) and its a big shortcut in game´s progression

It's not that people hate trading, it's that people hate how trading works in this game. It's fucking unreasonably time consuming and requires opening browsers to search for items in a 3rd party program to track someone down to then return in game and whisper them and hope you are both free at the same moment to go meet in an instance and make your tiny trade.

Or, it is sitting there for hours spamming your shit through 25+ trade channels while everyone uses macros and hoping that the guy who is interested in your item is watching at that particular moment and is about to read it in between the constant spam of that asshole who keeps linking an entire paragraph of vendor trash shit for multiple chaos 3 times a second.

Do those sentences annoy you? Because they run on and on? That's how trade channel is. Forever.


That's why people hate trading.