DiabloFans

Cool video.

Quote from Morbus

The problem is, people look at the auction house and they think they can get a "job" there. But if you want to look at it in a pseudo-philosophical way, think like this: every "job" (as in something that gets you money) comes from something that needs to be done (as in something that people are asking for). Money comes only as a reward. If people aren't willing to give you money every month to sustain your lifestyle, then you aren't doing something they want. I my guess is they won't want your items every month.

If you want to look at it in a mathematical way, try to see it in numbers. Let's start off with the values they put forth in the video. 300 million, wasn't it? 300 million yearly that is SPENT by the PLAYERS on the auction house. If Blizzard takes 5% of that (and they won't, because they said already they'll take a fixed margin for every transaction, which I'm guessing is gonna be 1$, which means, in the end, as an average, it'll average out as way more than 5% of the whole, since most transactions will probably come out on the cheap side, but who knows). Anyway, if Blizzard takes 10% of that, let's go with that, it's 270 million yearly that is earned by the players. That means 22.500k monthly. NOW. If you are familiar with the concept of "long tail", you'll know that the vast majority of that money will probably go to the vast majority of the players, and that the vast majority of the players will earn very little. In fact, they'll be at a loss since we're thinking that the minority (who is hoping to make money) will turn out a profit in the end, so the 300 million that were spent will be spent by 90% of the player base (just a guss percentage), and those same 90% will earn, say 75% of the 22,5 million a month, so that means only 5625k, monthly, will feed the 10% that is hoping to make money. Now of course those 10% will have a long tail within themselves, let's forget that for a moment. What I mean is, say 1 million people will use the real money auction house. That's a pretty low number, I believe, but I could be wrong, so let's go with that. 10% of 1 million is 10 thousand. 10 thousand people actively trying to make a living out of playing Diablo 3. With 5625k a month. That means an average of little more than 500$ a month.

while i agree that itll be difficult to make a living off of D3 i think your underestimating it by a lot sir.

in WoW most players made a decent amount from the gold auction house, some would farm and sell an ok amount, then there was the AH guru's. the average player had around 10-20k gold or less(pre cata). while these players had HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS on EACH character and had to have bank alts just to hold it all (money cap was around ~234k gold per char). they played the AH and made a killing. they would buy and sell hot items like a stock market. obviously in this sense you have to intitially have money to make money, but you can start out very small and within a few months be at that point as well.

and with that those players dont even have to PLAY the game to make a killing. and that 300M you used as an example was ONLY china and it was ILLEGAL. so make it legal then make it worldwide and times that by A LOT more. its more like its going to be 30 billion worldwide, or even more.

RMAH's will be sepparated by regions but any one region can have hundreds of thousands of trafficers going through it since the average player now has super easy, no hassle/non illegal access to it. there will be 1000x more kids buying items with their mommies credit card and people who farm for months for a certain axe and finally say "f*ck it!" and buy it from the RMAH cuz no one puts it on the gold AH and its right there.

i would bet everything i own that within a year or two of diablo 3's release there will be an article on yahoo or somewhere about some guy who literally made millions (or at LEAST a 6 figure income) off of the D3 RMAH from buying/selling items.

and while im almost posative this will happen i also think the above average player can make an ok living by just farming. if you spend a couple months n get an ultimate MFing build with awesome MF gear and you can farm inferno fairly quickly you can take all your inferno loot/crafted items/crafting materials and sell them all on the RMAH daily for a decent income. or a group of 4 veteran players to rampage through it and collectively sell everything. i'd bet a lot of people form small farming business's all over the globe and rotate shifts farming or farm together on certain days and split the profits. they say the average player wont be able to get through inferno those average players may really feel like they need to buy the gear from you before they even attempt it.

PS. your calculations are off. 10% of 1 million is 100k not 10k. lol

I keep hearing people talk about making a living off of the RMAH. Like, everyone. Everyone plans on getting something out of it. But they forget that for every 95 cents they make, someone else had to have put in a dollar. You're only making money if someone is buying. Someone's got to be losing more money than you're making. If everyone is trying to make money, no one will be buying and the system will fail very fast. I'm sticking to the gold-based one.

Quote from Shisou

I keep hearing people talk about making a living off of the RMAH. Like, everyone. Everyone plans on getting something out of it. But they forget that for every 95 cents they make, someone else had to have put in a dollar. You're only making money if someone is buying. Someone's got to be losing more money than you're making. If everyone is trying to make money, no one will be buying and the system will fail very fast. I'm sticking to the gold-based one.

did you watch the video? 300 MILLION in just china gold farming. and thats illegal usage. make that worldwide and legal (D3 RMAH) and you'll have more like 30+ BILLION.

Quote from WishedHeHadBeta

Quote from Shisou

I keep hearing people talk about making a living off of the RMAH. Like, everyone. Everyone plans on getting something out of it. But they forget that for every 95 cents they make, someone else had to have put in a dollar. You're only making money if someone is buying. Someone's got to be losing more money than you're making. If everyone is trying to make money, no one will be buying and the system will fail very fast. I'm sticking to the gold-based one.

did you watch the video? 300 MILLION in just china gold farming. and thats illegal usage. make that worldwide and legal (D3 RMAH) and you'll have more like 30+ BILLION.

30 billion.. Thats like $3000/costumer, if 10 million people play Diablo 3

U MAD?

While I do understand what you are saying, and the inherent problem reaching the penicle of gear, one thing that really helps protect Diablo 3 from the problem of power creeping is the fact that the best gear is going to be randomized. What this means is that there is going to be a certain level of grey area in terms of what is "best" that simply doesn't exist as much in most MMO's since those games are usually designed around a set tier of equipment. Even when expansions for Diablo 3 are released, it wont be like WoW in that suddenly all gear is worthless compared to the new stuff. In fact, it really might take quite a bit of time before a true upgrade is found. And really, the problem can also be sort of avoided by adding lateral improvements to the game (i.e. new items to fit in sockets, or perhaps a return of the talisman idea).

I am not going to say that Diablo 3 is immune to this problem. No game that expands on its content can be 100% safe. But the way that the systems in Diablo work naturally provide protection from these specific problems. And even if you truly do have all of the best items in the game and a new expansion opens a new tier, it isn't like your current gear is suddenly worthless. You can still sell it for quite a hefty price as all the randomly rolled stats will still make it highly desirable. If anything the new top-tier stuff will just be that much harder to obtain, and thus cost just that much more.

Not really, no. Diablo 3's 'end-game' is struggling through difficult content for elite items to do better at the difficult content. This will be not be invalidated, because this gear will be the same as the gear you'll need to farm Hell to get into Inferno. So technically, you'll need this gear to do the expansion content.

And you can't compare Diablo 3 to an MMO, you need to compare it to D2. In D2 each boss and each act is only one step above what came before. You take small steps to improve, so just like LoD, Act 5 isn't miles away from Act 4 and Baal isn't ten times harder than Diablo.
In WoW, you can use Lich King gear to solo Illidan (or just ask a healer friend to tag along). This is not a fair comparison. Moreover, in WoW you could skip expansions, but in D2 you'll still need to clear each act and kill each boss to progress, and you WILL NEED the gear from a previous difficulty to progress to the next one.

Instead of being at the wrong end of the tunnel like the other person...you're just in the middle of it.

END GAME. End-game is AFTER Inferno where you've beat the full game (all difficulties) once but grind in some fashion to get better and better gear. When the next expansion comes out, everything from AFTER Inferno has been beaten the first time becomes invalidated because then level 60 just becomes any other level that isn't max level...something you aren't in very long, and something you don't spend a ton of time working on perfect gear for because...well there's better gear when you level.

You're also looking at WoW completely wrong. They are basically taking AWAY content (while not actually removing most of it from the game...just most of the compelling reasons to complete them after newer content is released) and replacing it with other content. Until end-game, WoW's content is simply levelling. Sans the odd concept of DKs starting at 55 (a great example of a new, absurd concept poking around at fundemental design). You can't buy Cataclysm and skip leveling from 1-80. So just like Diablo...you have to go through old content to get to the latest stuff. Raids and dungeons when they were max level (60, 70, 80) are not levelling content.

Diablo 3.1 (or whatever you want to call the expansion) is not going to require gear that you farmed post-beating Inferno in the first version. Everything you've done post-beating Inferno then becomes invalidated thanks to power creeping. Like I said before, I don't think it's going to have quite the impact power creeping has on traditional MMOs, I certainly agree with PA that this just simply happens everywhere, and no one (including Blizzard) has figured out how to avoid it (and again, like PA said, I agree money is the main motivator).

While I do understand what you are saying, and the inherent problem reaching the penicle of gear, one thing that really helps protect Diablo 3 from the problem of power creeping is the fact that the best gear is going to be randomized. What this means is that there is going to be a certain level of grey area in terms of what is "best" that simply doesn't exist as much in most MMO's since those games are usually designed around a set tier of equipment. Even when expansions for Diablo 3 are released, it wont be like WoW in that suddenly all gear is worthless compared to the new stuff. In fact, it really might take quite a bit of time before a true upgrade is found. And really, the problem can also be sort of avoided by adding lateral improvements to the game (i.e. new items to fit in sockets, or perhaps a return of the talisman idea).

I am not going to say that Diablo 3 is immune to this problem. No game that expands on its content can be 100% safe. But the way that the systems in Diablo work naturally provide protection from these specific problems. And even if you truly do have all of the best items in the game and a new expansion opens a new tier, it isn't like your current gear is suddenly worthless. You can still sell it for quite a hefty price as all the randomly rolled stats will still make it highly desirable. If anything the new top-tier stuff will just be that much harder to obtain, and thus cost just that much more.

Quote from Astion

Quote from WishedHeHadBeta

Quote from Shisou

I keep hearing people talk about making a living off of the RMAH. Like, everyone. Everyone plans on getting something out of it. But they forget that for every 95 cents they make, someone else had to have put in a dollar. You're only making money if someone is buying. Someone's got to be losing more money than you're making. If everyone is trying to make money, no one will be buying and the system will fail very fast. I'm sticking to the gold-based one.

did you watch the video? 300 MILLION in just china gold farming. and thats illegal usage. make that worldwide and legal (D3 RMAH) and you'll have more like 30+ BILLION.

30 billion.. Thats like $3000/costumer, if 10 million people play Diablo 3

U MAD?

that 30b is YEARLY and obviously not divided evenly. and 3k a year is complete crap income, 3k monthly is even crap. so if a few people are making 300k a year off of it then that number is insanely lower.

U TROLL?

I like how people assume all variables are constant and it will be easy to make money and control the markets... WoW variables cannot even be compared to this as WoW has defined gear at certain places on certain mobs within a high % drop rate. Diablo is random gear, with random monsters, with random drop %'s that are a fraction of a %.

Mods should look into this post, please refer to the hundreds of RMAH posts, it has been theory crafted to death and its very unlikely anyone will make large amounts of money.

Quote from Slayerviper

I like how people assume all variables are constant and it will be easy to make money and control the markets... WoW variables cannot even be compared to this as WoW has defined gear at certain places on certain mobs within a high % drop rate. Diablo is random gear, with random monsters, with random drop %'s that are a fraction of a %.

Mods should look into this post, please refer to the hundreds of RMAH posts, it has been theory crafted to death and its very unlikely anyone will make large amounts of money.

your speculation with zero back up is just as bad. also in wow the AH guru's (being one myself) would make actually 90-95% of my profits off of mats/crafting material, not super powered items/wpns. think of the insanely rare items in Diablo as the highest ilvl gear in the game that drops in raids and that are on the AH for like 50k gold. and the mats/not insanely rare but decent items as the mats/crafting material in wow.

the market in wow constantly fluctuates as well depending on supply/demand. it will virtually have the same outcome. people WILL make a killing if you play it right, just like ANY auction house in ANY game.

Quote from WishedHeHadBeta

your speculation with zero back up is just as bad. also in wow the AH guru's (being one myself) would make actually 90-95% of my profits off of mats/crafting material, not super powered items/wpns. think of the insanely rare items in Diablo as the highest ilvl gear in the game that drops in raids and that are on the AH for like 50k gold. and the mats/not insanely rare but decent items as the mats/crafting material in wow.

the market in wow constantly fluctuates as well depending on supply/demand. it will virtually have the same outcome. people WILL make a killing if you play it right, just like ANY auction house in ANY game.

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A couple of months ago (before your time) you will find a large discussion on the topic. I don't feel the need to discuss all the material, please go ahead and read your self.

Secondly I see those 50K items on AH and guess what nobody ever bought them I saw them there for weeks.

Any body who played the game long enough new that materials were a good way to make money, I did it, everyone did but farming that crap all day was boring and if I sold all the gold I made from that it isn't even worth an hour what I make from a regular job.

Your right that there is always opportunity to make money on a market, until mods are made (if they can even be implemented into the game) to record materials and trends in the market it will be highly difficult. Everyone will be trying to make a buck and until people spend money nobody will earn anything and nobody will pay high prices for gear... well reasonable people anyways. Essentially prices will be driven down and yah... apply economics I don't need to discuss that further.

Oh and BTW how about you trying linking something for a change, your sources in many of your posts are "I'm King shit and I'm know what I'm talking about"

Quote from Slayerviper

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A couple of months ago (before your time) you will find a large discussion on the topic. I don't feel the need to discuss all the material, please go ahead and read your self.

Secondly I see those 50K items on AH and guess what nobody ever bought them I saw them there for weeks.

Any body who played the game long enough new that materials were a good way to make money, I did it, everyone did but farming that crap all day was boring and if I sold all the gold I made from that it isn't even worth an hour what I make from a regular job.

Your right that there is always opportunity to make money on a market, until mods are made (if they can even be implemented into the game) to record materials and trends in the market it will be highly difficult. Everyone will be trying to make a buck and until people spend money nobody will earn anything and nobody will pay high prices for gear... well reasonable people anyways. Essentially prices will be driven down and yah... apply economics I don't need to discuss that further.

the fact that people bought $300m in gold yearly illegally just from china alone, id say that speaks for itself in how your so very very wrong about whats going to happen.

Quote from WishedHeHadBeta

the fact that people bought $300m in gold yearly illegally just from china alone, id say that speaks for itself in how your so very very wrong about whats going to happen.

In a game that has been established for over 6 years and will have a larger player makeup.

Quote from Slayerviper

Quote from WishedHeHadBeta

the fact that people bought $300m in gold yearly illegally just from china alone, id say that speaks for itself in how your so very very wrong about whats going to happen.

In a game that has been established for over 6 years and will have a larger player makeup.

you miss the "illegal" part, and the "just china" part? or the fact that millions wont buy gold simply for the fact that there scared of getting scammed. china is huge yes but changing it to GLOBALLY and LEGAL and easy/secure will increase the amount of people actually spending real money on it ten fold. so even with a ton less players they will still get more people spending.

My loins ache for the footage...

Quote from WishedHeHadBeta

Quote from Slayerviper

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A couple of months ago (before your time) you will find a large discussion on the topic. I don't feel the need to discuss all the material, please go ahead and read your self.

Secondly I see those 50K items on AH and guess what nobody ever bought them I saw them there for weeks.

Any body who played the game long enough new that materials were a good way to make money, I did it, everyone did but farming that crap all day was boring and if I sold all the gold I made from that it isn't even worth an hour what I make from a regular job.

Your right that there is always opportunity to make money on a market, until mods are made (if they can even be implemented into the game) to record materials and trends in the market it will be highly difficult. Everyone will be trying to make a buck and until people spend money nobody will earn anything and nobody will pay high prices for gear... well reasonable people anyways. Essentially prices will be driven down and yah... apply economics I don't need to discuss that further.

the fact that people bought $300m in gold yearly illegally just from china alone, id say that speaks for itself in how your so very very wrong about whats going to happen.

What facts are you referring to? The $300 million number is nothing more than an uneducated guess by some random guy who made a video. It's completely fabricated, as I doubt anyone has a clue what kind of sales are seen in China, let alone the world. As far as we know, the number could be $5 million, $25 million, or an even billion in China.

The reason people can make good money in WoW is because their competition is extremely small. We're talking 3500 to 5000 people per server MAX. That's not per faction, that's the entire server. Then take into account that the people selling the exact same thing as you (your direct competition) may hit 50-100. So really, you are only competing against 100 people in any one market. That number is almost always much smaller, but it varies per server. If you have half a clue you can make good money. Diablo 3 is a completely different beast, something we've never seen before. We'll have a couple servers for the entire North American player base. We could see anywhere from 1.5 million to 3 million on each server (wild guesses). With that many people playing, there is going to be a metric ton of raw mats, crappy items, decent items, legendary items, etc being posted every second. With that many people and that many items, prices will plummet and will stay extremely low. In order to make ANY kind of income, you are going to have to sell a significant amount of items. We certainly won't see everyone take part in the RMAH, but if even a small percentage does, that's still so many more people than any WoW realm has seen.

Logically, the worldwide D3 gold/items market will be large, but no individuals will have a chance to make decent money. "Gold farming" companies, perhaps. It's a different business model than they are used to with WoW and the margins will be a lot slimmer, but labor costs are low.

Quote from superfula

Quote from WishedHeHadBeta

Quote from Slayerviper

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A couple of months ago (before your time) you will find a large discussion on the topic. I don't feel the need to discuss all the material, please go ahead and read your self.

Secondly I see those 50K items on AH and guess what nobody ever bought them I saw them there for weeks.

Any body who played the game long enough new that materials were a good way to make money, I did it, everyone did but farming that crap all day was boring and if I sold all the gold I made from that it isn't even worth an hour what I make from a regular job.

Your right that there is always opportunity to make money on a market, until mods are made (if they can even be implemented into the game) to record materials and trends in the market it will be highly difficult. Everyone will be trying to make a buck and until people spend money nobody will earn anything and nobody will pay high prices for gear... well reasonable people anyways. Essentially prices will be driven down and yah... apply economics I don't need to discuss that further.

the fact that people bought $300m in gold yearly illegally just from china alone, id say that speaks for itself in how your so very very wrong about whats going to happen.

What facts are you referring to? The $300 million number is nothing more than an uneducated guess by some random guy who made a video. It's completely fabricated, as I doubt anyone has a clue what kind of sales are seen in China, let alone the world. As far as we know, the number could be $5 million, $25 million, or an even billion in China.

The reason people can make good money in WoW is because their competition is extremely small. We're talking 3500 to 5000 people per server MAX. That's not per faction, that's the entire server. Then take into account that the people selling the exact same thing as you (your direct competition) may hit 50-100. So really, you are only competing against 100 people in any one market. That number is almost always much smaller, but it varies per server. If you have half a clue you can make good money. Diablo 3 is a completely different beast, something we've never seen before. We'll have a couple servers for the entire North American player base. We could see anywhere from 1.5 million to 3 million on each server (wild guesses). With that many people playing, there is going to be a metric ton of raw mats, crappy items, decent items, legendary items, etc being posted every second. With that many people and that many items, prices will plummet and will stay extremely low. In order to make ANY kind of income, you are going to have to sell a significant amount of items. We certainly won't see everyone take part in the RMAH, but if even a small percentage does, that's still so many more people than any WoW realm has seen.

Logically, the worldwide D3 gold/items market will be large, but no individuals will have a chance to make decent money. "Gold farming" companies, perhaps. It's a different business model than they are used to with WoW and the margins will be a lot slimmer, but labor costs are low.

you dont know that 300m is a guess anymore then we know its true. so were both just as "right" or just as wrong in that case.

<_< the amount of people buying also increases with the amount of people total using the RMAH so your competition vs. consumers rate is going to be virtually the same as any AH is. or the stock market in real life. if you know what your doing and do it well you can make a substantial profit, period. none of this "neener neener you dont know" crap when clearly in ANY market ANYONE thats good enough can make money. rant mindless about variables that make no difference but not long after release people will be making a ton.

i never said it was easy nor did i say tons of people would make it rich. just thats its obviously very possible for SOME people to.

1. To the people here saying they are worried about there being more buyers than sellers: Look up the stats on the 2 in game mounts blizzard realeased for 25 dollars each. They sold 100's of thousands instantly. I would say a large majority of players will spend 15 - 30 a month on diablo, if pets and mounts can make people cave, just imagine what the most powerful items with perfectly rolled stats will go for.

2. Me, along with alot of other people, would NOT buy this game if it weren't online only. You haters realize that by making an end game difficulty that requires critical thinking to survive they have basically eliminted BOTS in inferno? This, along with being online only is going to create an awesome stable environment where unskilled "farmers" from places like china will have to actually PLAY the game and BEAT inferno to farm, this isn't right click on flowers till ur bags are full... They ACTUALLY HAVE TO PLAY. Imagine how many farmers would lose there left hand after a couple inferno deaths?

3. When the game drops if I'm wrong, call me out. Perfect slotted gear will be worth well over 50 dollars. I don't think anyone realizes how rare the randomized stats and stat "ranges" that certain classes really want will make this stuff worth. If I had to guess I would say the first few perfect ledgendaries will be in the hundreds. (500) Just hop on over to a wow site that sells gear and look at the prices, regardless of whether or not YOU will spend money on the ah, the 3million or so ppl who bought sparkle ponies for 25.00 are probably getting that year of wow, and I'm sure they will be more than willing to dish out ;).

4. To the people saying they won't use the real money auction house.... You do realize if u found something in inferno I'm the first month that was extremely rare, sold it on the ah for 100.00, and then just waited a while till prices dropped, you would now have 100 to spend on purchases you need to make... It would be a fool that wouldn't take advantage of that.

5. Gear... Obsolete .... In diablo? People roll new characters like underwear in diablo. The faster I get thru nightmare, the faster I get to hell. Gear does that. New expansions will drop the prices of gear... Kind of like... TIME. lol. But that gear won't ever be obsolete. Get out of the wow mindset, good gear is going to be alot harder to come across, your not guaranteed anything from a boss, and a kick ass level 30 chest peice is just that, a kick ass level 30 chest peice. Buyer beware.

Quote from WishedHeHadBeta

you dont know that 300m is a guess anymore then we know its true. so were both just as "right" or just as wrong in that case.

We know it's a guess because the guy said it was a guess. At the same time, there are no facts to back it up. Seems fairly obvious. I don't know what it is about you needing to be right all the time.

<_< the amount of people buying also increases with the amount of people total using the RMAH so your competition vs. consumers rate is going to be virtually the same as any AH is. or the stock market in real life. if you know what your doing and do it well you can make a substantial profit, period. none of this "neener neener you dont know" crap when clearly in ANY market ANYONE thats good enough can make money.

The competition vs consumers rate is NEVER the same in any AH, including the stock market. If they were the same, prices would never fluctuate. As far as WoW is concerned, you could make a ton of gold and not have a clue how to do it. It's so very easy because gold's value has dropped considerably since wotlk. There is a ton of gold out there so everyone is spending. Prior to wotlk, the number of people making a ton of gold on the AH were far and few. In vanilla wow, NO ONE made a ton of gold. No one had gold to spend. Which WoW market will D3 mimic? No one knows yet so you cannot claim people will make "a substantial profit, period". Doing so without knowing if gold will be plentiful or not is silly. If gold is a rarity, you may have a few people make a small amount via the ah, but nothing to write home about. Not even Gevlon could make much in an economy like that.

rant mindless about variables that make no difference but not long after release people will be making a ton.

A nice little ad hominem thrown in there for good measure. Those variables do matter. Do you dismiss them because you don't understand?

i never said it was easy nor did i say tons of people would make it rich. just thats its obviously very possible for SOME people to.

It's equally possible that no one will do well. I'm not sure why you cannot admit it, as right now there are no black and white outcomes. Everything is grey until it opens.