Quote from itirnitii
^Agreed.
I think this is where my disdain for trading for the most part comes from. Forget the economy aspect people. It's not what the game should be about. It should be about finding items and determining how useful is that item to you, not what value does it offer in an economy so you can trade for what you really want.
I say this as someone who jumps through hoops and plays the economy game myself to somewhat of an extreme because I hate the feeling of being left in the dust by people who do. I am competitive by nature too much for my own good.
I recognize though that people like to find items and share with their friends, so it is difficult to reconcile that aspect of the game as I do agree that should be something that doesn't disappear from the game; but I also really hate the economy aspect and wish it would just vanish. Items should have no more value than how they can be utilized by you or possibly to your friends if you shared or traded with them.
I've been feeling this same disdain since joining the community shortly after launch. Again, no disrespect to the OP, because I don't know what his or her buying and selling behavior is like...but watching other people only care about gold, wealth, currency, etc., is just saddening. Used to be that people were excited to go out farming, they were excited to the play the game, and instead, since launch, many of those people have only become concerned with maximizing gold, because it will mean the fastest path to godly items.
In a formal "trading" economy, the value of some items were extremely high for just about everyone...however, depending on what kind of particular character or build a player was working on, they could place incredibly high value on a piece of gear that was worth far less in terms of a comparable "value" trade. Thus, you'd have someone who desperately wanted, for example, a certain shield or bow that was just somewhat hard to find, not insanely rare, but still desirable by that one person...who was willing to trade something worth WAY more to others, simply because they wanted that item soooooooooooo badly.
In the D3 economy right now, "market research" takes about 10 seconds...we've all seen it. Someone in General Chat posts an item they want to sell for 100m gold...seconds later, you have about 5-10 people going, "seriously? those things go for 4m max." How do they know this? Because all they have to do is plunk an item name and a few stats into the AH search engine, change the filter so it shows the most common min and max buyouts, and presto. Everyone playing D3 is a bloody economist that can track prices at a few clicks, ensuring that "what the market will bear" stays HIGH for the rich, and the poor ultimately get left in the dust.
Thus, in a formal P2P trading economy, there's going to be a lot more community interaction. People looking to trade up from their items will be more likely to do so, because P2P trading is far less frowned upon than simply clicking a few buttons, flipping a few items, and being godly. Items being harder to acquire with the AH shutdown, though, Loot 2.0 boosting item quality, and skills being retuned to have more comptent synergies, people will definitely be encouraged to do what they can with they get. And depending on how easy it is to respec Paragon Points, people might be changing builds per run if they have enough gold or materials.
I think a better overall question is...will the growing self-found community embrace P2P trading, as it does innately take far more time and interaction and effort than AH camping, and partake themselves...or will they stay self-found and not partake in trading? Self-found has become something of a movement, however it's become that because while some have refused to take the hard road to what they feel is "mediocrity," self-found players specifically like taking the hard road and comparing their progress with another's.
So will trading be seen as that same "easy path" like the AH has been seen, or will it be once-again accepted as part of the journey to a godly character?
Supplemental question...any chance some folks are going to use the Crusader as a measuring stick, to see if and/or how fast they can outgear their AH-geared characters with just drops and runs and farming? That'd be interesting to see.
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