Diablo 3 Auction House?

[Luke]

Bashiok has replied to a thread with some info on Diablo 3 Trading possibilities.

I'm not sure I understood all of what you said, sorry, it sort of read like stereo instructions written by the guy that scares people away from using the pay phone at the 7-11 down the street.

Just a couple of my own cents on the system. First off we really don't have a solid plan for any sort of external trading system, that is anything beyond being in the same game with the person. We know we'd like something like that though if at all possible.

Foremost - spamming is bad. I think trade channels usually suck because of the requirement to spam. The amount of time and effort spent just to get your items noticed borders on brain-explosiony. Throw in the lack of easily gauged economy and you're usually left out in the dark, laughed at, ripped off, etc. Your suggestion seems to mix the idea of an auction house and trade channel, in that you can use a channel in-game to spam, and then have some sort of UI to trade the item. That definitely solves one issue, which is needing to leave the game and just sit in a chat channel. What it doesn't solve is needing to sit in a chat channel and spam. Sure, you could probably play and spam the channel every once in a while but it's really not the cleanest approach. You're still spamming a chat channel, you're still limited to the people that want to see that spam (ie not many).

Since you brought it up let's move on to the World of Warcraft's auction house. World of Warcraft did not invent the auction house trading system. It may have certainly refined it, but an irrational hatred of the game that some of you seem to have really shouldn't translate to game systems that aren't original to it. There are some major advantages to an auction house similar to WoW's. You don't have to be present being the biggest and best. You can be playing with friends, PvPing, asleep, at school or work, and someone has the ability to see your items, and you have a greater chance to sell/trade them. You don't have to spam a channel, you don't have to even be online and playing. That's HUGE, and really the main reason so many people use trading systems such as websites and forums for Diablo II. You want to focus on playing the game or not playing the game, not sitting around hoping someone wants your item.

It also helps form a visible and easily identified economy. I'm a new player, I got a sword I think it's probably pretty nice, I can go on an auction house and search for it or similar swords and get an idea of how much it should sell for. In this case being in a trade channel is no better whether it's in-game or out of game. What you'd probably end up with is people still going to forums and more static styles of trading found on websites, but even then any unified sense of economy is spread thin. Maybe that's not such a bad system in itself, and an official trading site could work. Of course what you lose either way though, auction house or website, is in-game player interaction. Which is what I assume you're striving to keep.

When it comes down to it, any change or addition or removal of any systems have to be weighed. Do the positives outweigh the negatives?

I'll go back to what I said at the beginning and state we don't know what if any types of trading systems will be in the final game. Maybe there won't be, it may be that eventually we settle on leaving it Diablo II style. We have some ideas of what would be cool, but at the end of the day we're not going to do anything that isn't far and away a more positive change for the game.

Source...

[Aka Gambit]

I think that the Auction house is a good idea, I hated seeing spam all over the place "buy my items", "best price" etc, the auctions are simple, easy and let you focus on playing the game with friends and not trying to sell, but if they wanna keep that player trading interaction then why not add a kind of rate your seller tool so that people can see how other people are rated and then have a better seance of who they can trust. Or something similar to that.

[Juke]

When is comes to Auction house you need Currency, and depending on how they make gold use able in the game then it would be hard to replace. Changing this part in the game of Diablo then you might as well play wow. Multi player made diablo for what it is not the story line so I do not think they will ever put a AH in Diablo.


But a Open in game trade channel were u can link with anyone in it and trade without changing a game. Well that would be nice...

[FrogMan]

Kinda liked the trade spam in D2 although it would make sense for a WoW type AH but that would change the whole concept of whats valuble from the old D2 that game mechanics would change to make something like "gold" the strogest form of trading.

[Tap]

I perfer they dont change anything so i can just use Forum gold

[Pamela]

D2 doesn't have an auction house? Explain the games economy to me and what is considered of value.
Gold,certainly,is of value...but are there items that are in demand as well?

[Mathalamus]

D2 doesn't have an auction house? Explain the games economy to me and what is considered of value.
Gold,certainly,is of value...but are there items that are in demand as well?

the currency standard is the Stone of Jordan Unique Ring. the games economy is based on the SOJ.

[Ragnarhox]

D2 doesn't have an auction house? Explain the games economy to me and what is considered of value.
Gold,certainly,is of value...but are there items that are in demand as well?

Game gold doesn't actually have value in d2; everyone trades thro d2jsp fg.

[Pamela]

What is the stone of Jordan and why is it valuable?

[skidude]

ss1..jpg
that is a soj

[Pamela]

It has hot stats! I see the value now.

[The Mob]

well.. there are some things way more valuable than the soj.. and i quite frankly dont see why it is considered the standard. but as with any currency, there must be a standard. making gold extremely hard to come by would kinda work... but then that would turn everything on its head. either way, i would like to see gold be actually worth something

[Grave]

You guys are getting way off topic here, but i think auction is the way it should of been in d2.

[Pamela]

I do not see why auction would not work.It is almost as old of a concept as trade and barter.

[Ragnarhox]

I would much rather use an AH in d2 than use d2jsp. I just don't want D3 to end up being diablo2 + world of warcraft.

[Blue]

The soj while certainly a currency, isnt the main currency in my opinion, its the HR (high level rune) thats mostly traded for items.

[ItsMee]

Paul wouldn't be liking this idea much heehee