So we have all seen how frustrating it gets for rexxus when someone decides to … “bump” the market place. But this was just too funny, and I did feel bad for laughing at first.
But it leads to a few questions about said market.
1: What happened to the market design where we could walk straight into trading rooms from outside landing pads? those were nice.
2: Why do we not just do one very large shell market, then small bases inside for each market. This would allow the coordinates to not change for the individual NPC rooms if someone bumps the outer hull… lets say accidentally.
I know it took a lot of work to design the current one, and it is beautiful, dont get me wrong. But there has to be a way to prevent a single goober from completely disabling NPC traders.
Finally, a thought on NPC traders: If people used them more (which they are starting to do) they will put real traders out of business. There was mention of adjusting package prices to reflect market costs, but I do not see that being the case when you can get a stack of iron ore for less than 2k, and the lowest an iron ingot has ever been on the market for an extended period is 2 cr per ingot. That is double the npc trader cost. That cost goes mostly directly to someone who donated (which is great, dont get me wrong), but it breaks the economy in the game. I suggest an ammendment: NPC trader owners may sell whatever they want for as little as they want. But Only as long as the trader is supplied. The supplying must come from the owner (or another faction), we will call them noob X, selling to the npc package for about 60% of what the cost of the package would sell that same material. Then noob Y comes along, sees things are in stock, and can buy the package for the marked cost. 30% of THIS cost then goes back to owner of NPC package. It sounds complicated I know, but hear me out. The idea here is that currently, npc traders are just pulling infinite resources out of their pocket, and selling it with zero effort for the trader owner, but all the effort of Rexxus. If those supplies had to COME from somewhere first, it does two things: Brings back supply and demand, which has been brutally murdered by the current setup; and is gives gatherers who have lots of mats but can only post 20 orders at a time an opportunity to sell more. This also means that traders must be a little more careful about what they charge for the package in order to balance both the number of people supplying the package, and those buying.
As I am typing this out, I do see a flaw, in that the person could just post up npc trader sell for one iron ore for one million credits, and sell to himself all day. Ok it needs some tweaking and limits. But the idea is there.
[quote=“mcprouty, post:1, topic:3645”]
1: What happened to the market design where we could walk straight into trading rooms from outside landing pads? those were nice.
[/quote]Was my first complaint on the first 5 seconds after visiting the market on day 1. Current market is disorienting and annoying to navigate through. Also PKA had a station like that in 4.0. We ended up blowing out the windows because we got totally annoyed by the elevator. Then in 5.0 we get: elevators!
[quote=“mcprouty, post:1, topic:3645”]
Finally, a thought on NPC traders: If people used them more (which they are starting to do) they will put real traders out of business
[/quote]Market is set to private and my NPC traders aren’t even listed on the LCD’s WEEKS after 5.0… So there is literally ZERO business (at least for me). I asked Rex several times now to fix this because it’s unfair that some people are on the LCD’s and some are not. I get no sales + my loyal customers are now probably gone to others…
The rest was already discussed near the end of 4.0. Our conclusion was: We have no proper solution…
Maybe an admin can just login and record while going to work and when he get’s back fast-forwards the recording to check if someone bumped the marketplace. But I guess that 5.1 will fix this.
First of all sorry to all NPC Trader owner and the long wait till everything is back online. I explained it multiple times why this is the case and that the fix is coming with 5.1.
I didn’t know that this would happen otherwise I wouldn’t have done it like this. But only this way the devs fixed a bad bug.
Regarding the shop design I updated it at least on EU already to not need Elevator usage anymore. With 5.1 we can freely build stuff with admin cores so this will help also a lot.
About the NPC Trader balance we need Jaschas time for it. I already have some concepts which keeps it even more in balance.
About your idea mcprouty I will think about it it too.
What you need to keep in mind is that the packages can’t be bought infinite (see the guide slide 47).
Fact is that Jascha is very busy with refactoring the tool so we need to have patience and don’t moan all the time. This won’t help in speed terms. After the refactoring changes can be made faster and better.
[quote=“RexXxuS, post:3, topic:3645”]
(see the guide slide 47).
[/quote]It it’s virtually unlimited. You just ask some trader friends to buy them for you. If they have some RP it won’t be hard to buy a 100+ a day. That’s how we did it in 4.0. This also opens up a certain serious imbalance that I probably mentioned already in some PM.
So if I understand correctly, NPC traders are completely disabled right now? Because the shop-areas did trigger properly for me today but I didn’t buy anything. In that case I misunderstood and then it doesn’t matter if the LCD are up or down if nobody can buy anyway.
Oh I am aware of this, its like the biggest way that traders get a bonus in trading. Unfortunately all you need is a warp sled full of faction mates smurfing for you to warp out there for 20 minutes every day to completely invalidate the limits as set. Not that I am saying thats an issue, just a counter point. Plus the limits have wildly different meanings between the half million dollar package, and the ludricously low priced one stack of iron package (Which btw, why would anyone ever complain of lack of iron. There is literally infinite there for the buying, with no need for anyone to have mined it)
Just to be clear, I am not being critical, I love the thought that went into the system, and have no specific complaints, just ideas how it might become more versatile and balanced. But I do not want to tear y’all away from the work you are already doing for 5.1
More importantly, tax us on selling instead of placing. 10% is ludicrous, but stupid really if we get taxed even if it doesnt sell. You want product on the market? Change it to this system and encourage ppl to sell. So much i could put on there if i didnt have to worry about putting something up, then seeing 10 others undercut me and know instantly ive lost 10%.
Tax was added to prevent people from using it as a safe storage place. However with the 5.0 changes to the market the tax no longer makes sense. At least not 10%, maybe 2-3% to prevent reselling and other such forms.
Or maybe a dynamic tax that starts at 10% and then a way to am:buy:taxreduction levels xD lol…would at least then give the people that specialize in trading an edge.
[quote=“TinyDewDrop, post:4, topic:3645”]
So if I understand correctly, NPC traders are completely disabled right now? Because the shop-areas did trigger properly for me today but I didn’t buy anything. In that case I misunderstood and then it doesn’t matter if the LCD are up or down if nobody can buy anyway.
[/quote]I just confirmed that the NPC traders DO WORK… I just get no customers because no LCD…
But when they do work, only the players with LCD’s make sales.
Nobody navigates on coordinates, a few on colors perhaps. Plus I lose all my regular customers to others. Also setting the LCD text is not a lot of work compared to the rest. I probably spend 20 minutes writing those PM’s and posts alone just to get my LCD text… I still believe that it is unfair that some can have LCD text and some not, even when the station does not work most of the time… And it is less time than even reading these posts I guess…
But okay your server your rules, c’est la vie. How fair or unfair they may be.
(I know you have worse problems with 5.0 but this would take only a few minutes to set it for everybody)
I think it would be better just to have the trader NPCs inside the ti command, and have it check whether you are standing on the Elemental Market. This way it wouldn’t matter if someone rammed their ship into the station.
I think the rooms could still be decorated and have LCD panels with info on what command to type to buy from that person’s trader. It has to be done via command anyway.
