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    Your Elvenar Team

Trades

Delves

New Member
I play all US servers, and I am noticing that there are several trading issues. For example in one of my worlds there is no one trading crystals at all , at all hours if the day . I do not know if this is a strategic decision by the developers to force poor people out of the game , or force people to buy diamonds. What say you ?
 

Nerwa

Well-Known Member
Are you posting trades, asking for crystal? If so, how long does it take for them to get picked up. When you don't see trades for something in the trader, it doesn't necessarily mean that there's no one selling. It could be (and often is) a matter of those trades being snapped up a few minutes after being posted.

I'm a free-to-play player*. I spent maybe $10-15 US early on to get my Magic Academy fully upgraded. Beyond that it's all been in-game, non-farming play. I don't finish Gold in events but I've hit Silver a couple times. Spire, Tourney, FAs - no problem. It's doable. A solid FS with diverse boosts helps a LOT.

*ETA: My fun budget is limited. Chocolate & books & toys for my cats, mostly.
 

Delves

New Member
Are you posting trades, asking for crystal? If so, how long does it take for them to get picked up. When you don't see trades for something in the trader, it doesn't necessarily mean that there's no one selling. It could be (and often is) a matter of those trades being snapped up a few minutes after being posted.

I'm a free-to-play player*. I spent maybe $10-15 US early on to get my Magic Academy fully upgraded. Beyond that it's all been in-game, non-farming play. I don't finish Gold in events but I've hit Silver a couple times. Spire, Tourney, FAs - no problem. It's doable. A solid FS with diverse boosts helps a LOT.

*ETA: My fun budget is limited. Chocolate & books & toys for my cats, mostly.
Unfortunately my trader is full of all types of trades looking for crystals, I have decent to build a factory for crystals and upgrade them as much as I can . Everyone is looking for them in my us server Khelonaar .
I think my gaming will be better enjoyable rather than frustration, my trader is up to almost 1million in coin for trades cost . And at that price point my days will be filled with collections rather than enjoyable game play.
 

crackie

Chef, Scroll-Keeper, Buddy's #1 Fan
Unfortunately my trader is full of all types of trades looking for crystals, I have decent to build a factory for crystals and upgrade them as much as I can . Everyone is looking for them in my us server Khelonaar .
I think my gaming will be better enjoyable rather than frustration, my trader is up to almost 1million in coin for trades cost . And at that price point my days will be filled with collections rather than enjoyable game play.
I am a crystal boosted player and I rarely list my trades because I am plucking trades from the listings. It's a common mistake to rely on trade listings when you should just list your own trades. As @Nerwa says. that is the real test. All I see on my EN server is 0 and 1-star trades on sentients. That doesn't mean people only post 0 and 1-star trades on the whole server. That shows the crumbs no one wants. If I post my own trades for sentients combos I need, it gets gobbled up right away.
 

DeletedUser29356

Guest
Unfortunately my trader is full of all types of trades looking for crystals, I have decent to build a factory for crystals and upgrade them as much as I can . Everyone is looking for them in my us server Khelonaar .
I think my gaming will be better enjoyable rather than frustration, my trader is up to almost 1million in coin for trades cost . And at that price point my days will be filled with collections rather than enjoyable game play.
Two things to note: Trades from discovered neighbors and your own FS. Neighbors are hit and miss and that is not a great indication of the overall trades market because it is dependent on your location on the map and how far you have scouted.

Now From your FS its all about asking for what you need and then trading it. You have to ask or post trades for what you need and let the FS know in chat.
I play all US servers, and I am noticing that there are several trading issues. For example in one of my worlds there is no one trading crystals at all , at all hours if the day . I do not know if this is a strategic decision by the developers to force poor people out of the game , or force people to buy diamonds. What say you ?
I can say that in my case it is a decision to only trade within the FS for items that are rare or being scalped by others. the unexpected scarcity is caused by players quitting the game.
 

Zoof

Well-Known Member
My little area on Sinya Arda is short on scrolls being offered up for trades while there's quite a few people looking for scrolls in their requests. Thing is, if I post a request for scrolls as well, it somehow ends up getting taken anyway within a day, regardless of what I'm posting for it.

If the trade listings are failing, the second most important part is this trader feature:

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Someone can source the needed goods somewhere in the world. Let that someone else fumble around with the listings; they might have a better time of it than you. Or that someone's else's someone else. Depending on how deep your neighbors' pockets are (or their neighbors), they may end up taking up trades they themselves know will get turned around from the other side of the map

EDIT: Yeah, This bit of reasoning falls apart slightly when it comes to globally traded goods, but all that means is the hop distance is always 1.
 

Inspiration

New Member
What I have found in my search for members for my FS is that in Khel where we have a shortage of Steel and Scrolls, Most of the players with that boosted are INACTIVE! If Inno would maintain the worlds better getting the ACTIVE players together it would help a LOT! Maybe the problem is there are too many worlds!!!!
 

ajqtrz

Chef - loquacious Old Dog
Yep, scrolls are in short supply on K, in my area. I have 16 million + gems, mostly from players offering gems for scrolls. If I offer the same trade -- gems for scrolls -- I have to discount my gems by 1/3 or more. So it's costly. My other option is to stop taking gems for scrolls offers....but that's difficult for those players who are sticking to the 2 star measure of how many gems are worth how many scrolls. They are usually smaller players (smaller than I) and I hate to see them have to wait a long time for their trades to be picked up. So in essence, since I'm getting the satisfaction of keeping the smaller players in my trading area going, it's "fair" to me. On the other hand, at some point I will have to consider it too costly. But as long as somebody is picking those two star, gems for scrolls trades up, well, why ask for fewer scrolls than you can get?

In the end I've taken to asking some players to recognize that gems are in overwhelming supply and scrolls in very short supply. Some have shifted and began asking for fewer scrolls for their gems, and that is helping. But there are quite a few doing the gems for scrolls 2-star thing so that's that.

In the end, the problem can be seen as a restrictive social conditions, and untrained or poorly trained trader base. Instead of trading based upon supply/demand, they rely on the star system. And as long as larger players, like myself, keep taking the gems for scrolls type 2 star trades it's probably going to stay that way. If all were to abandon the star system and trade based upon supply/demand the markets would be more volatile, but also more responsive to changing conditions. Which would mean "corrections" in supply/demand would take a lot less time to arrive.

Just my thoughts.

AJ
 

SoulsSilhouette

Buddy Fan Club member
I play in all the worlds. I have noticed a trend of T3 being offered for T1s and T2s. And so many players putting out one star trades because and I quote 'there is no rule against profiting off another's player desperation for a good'. There seems to be a glut of T3 out there and not so much of everything else. I have trouble getting the T2s that I need but I just keep posting trades, taking what I can and AVOIDING one stars from people that are posting them for the above reason. If I see a slew of one stars, I contact them and ask them why ... AFTER I've looked at their city, and ask them why. If they are struggling with no inventory I will take them if I can, but in this ... I trust but verify (elvenstats comes in handy)
 

SoulsSilhouette

Buddy Fan Club member
Because of this thread, I was paying close attention to my cities and their output as well as the builds in my inventory. Here is something I noticed about what I have. .... Many of the event buildings that I have won are producing T3 goods and at least for me, that explains why I have a high inventory of those goods versus the T1 and T2. This may also apply to others.
 

samidodamage

Buddy Fan Club member
I play in Elcy (5yr old city - marble, crystal, gems) and Khel (4yr old city - steel, scrolls, elixir). Both cities move slowly through chapters when they are moving; they're both parked right now. Both cities are primarily combat. The side effect of all that is millions of regular goods in inventory. Since I don't need them, I rarely post trades for regular goods. I have tried to make a daily habit of visiting the trader and taking all the 2*+ same tier trades I find from neighbors. It's been years since I've seen an 'undiscovered' city in my regular goods trading, but if I see one, I will evaluate the trade as placed (without the trader mark-up) and take those as well if appropriate. Since it's not my highest priority, I might miss a day here and there where I only clear the FS trades (on Khel those are easy: no cross tier allowed from FS members, so I can just click and not think about it).
That's my play style; it works for me; ymmv. In both worlds, if you're in my neighborhood and you need scrolls (my crystal boosted city has 70million scrolls in inventory thanks to the boneyard I have of moonstone sets!) you can easily get as many as you need by trading crystal or silk for them in a straight up 1:1 swap. I will not post scroll trades. I don't wish to flood the market and be part of the reason scrolls became worthless to begin with.
If you prefer a more complicated market strategy, like making excess T3 and trading for the more expensive to produce as well as more in-game demand lower tier goods, that's your play style. At a certain point in the game, nobody needs any more T3 than they have, so producing an excess seems a valid strategy to get more of the needed goods cheaper. I'm just not playing that way.
I do wonder if everyone did this, who'd be producing the T1 & T2? But that's just me...
 

Darielle

Chef, Scroll-Keeper, and Buddy Fan Club Member
Unfortunately my trader is full of all types of trades looking for crystals, I have decent to build a factory for crystals and upgrade them as much as I can . Everyone is looking for them in my us server Khelonaar .
I think my gaming will be better enjoyable rather than frustration, my trader is up to almost 1million in coin for trades cost . And at that price point my days will be filled with collections rather than enjoyable game play.
I hope you aren't building crystal factories if they aren't your boost. (I figure if they were your boost, you wouldn't have a shortage.) Build only your boosted goods, even if you're in short supply of the others. Then sell your boosts at 3 star trades, if you have to. For example, if you are silk boosted, then sell 1000 silk and ask for 950 crystal. Your trades will likely get picked up before the two star and you'll still be FAR better off than if you build a nonboost factory.
 

StarLoad

Well-Known Member
Because of this thread, I was paying close attention to my cities and their output as well as the builds in my inventory. Here is something I noticed about what I have. .... Many of the event buildings that I have won are producing T3 goods and at least for me, that explains why I have a high inventory of those goods versus the T1 and T2. This may also apply to others.
This does seem to be the norm and has been for a while, I put all my T3 factories away LONG ago right around the time I got to halflings.

Ed

Yup just looked and they are at level 20 and below
 

ajqtrz

Chef - loquacious Old Dog
@samidodamage So in your world scrolls are in abundance and you are holding back 70 million scrolls so that it doesn't get imbalanced? To me it's already imbalanced and the longer you hold back the longer the imbalance will last. In essence holding back excess goods you have is like building a dam on a river and, eventually, the lake behind the dam will get full and the flow of things will resume it's usual and customary volume downstream from the dam. In real life you can use the water behind the dam in many ways, but in economics such storage of goods eventually backfires as eventually you just stop selling the excess goods (as they have little to no worth). Since your storage is unlimited, it only hurts you if you need some other good and are using higher value goods to trade for those other goods. Yes, it may, in the short term, help others, but in the long run not at all. Here's why.

Whatever the value of a good, it's relative worth is determined by supply/demand. By "worth" I only mean what others will trade for it. And that is directly influenced by the amount of goods on the market. So by holding back any goods you are actually keeping the cost to others of those goods higher than they would be if you "flooded" the market. In other words, you are inflating the cost of those goods by removing a large chunk of them from the markets. You can, of course, simply say, "I'll just keep absorbing the excess inventory of others" and that might be your style of play. But, in the short run you are removing the value of those goods from your own balance sheet (so to speak) because you won't sell them. A thing that won't be sold has no market value. And, as I said earlier, you are driving up the cost of that good to others.

Such market manipulations (intended or not) are effective only in the short run and in the long run actually cause the markets to be less efficient.

So while the sentiment is admirable, in the long run it's not effective.

AJ
 

StarLoad

Well-Known Member
Aj you may be correct in many aspects, but the reality is that due to the less desirable traders out there that will take you trades 1:1 and retrade them at outrageously inflated rates all you would be doing is feeding the leechers. That is a less desirable outcome too. So its a catch 22.
I have one account that is boosted in shrooms on "A" that if I offer trades 1:1 or even slightly less they get snapped up by the same folks that over trades like 347K shrooms for 1.8Mil soap ....

Ed
 
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samidodamage

Buddy Fan Club member
Things do seem to get skimmed over/lost in translation when I write long responses, don't they? I am not playing a market/economy game and don't want to. My choices are not altruistic or admirable, they're downright selfish. The two sentences I put in to try to make that point were:
That's my play style; it works for me; ymmv.
I'm just not playing that way.
I see it as similar to how some players choose not to play a combat game. I don't understand it since I enjoy the combat portion. My first thought is usually 'oh, they don't see how they'll end up with extra resources for other city activities if they just learn and use the combat option more'. But, after conversation, I find 'no, they get it, they just don't like it and aren't playing the game that way'. Fair enough, so I stop trying to convince them that my way is best, since it's obviously not best for them because they don't enjoy the game that way.
 

crackie

Chef, Scroll-Keeper, Buddy's #1 Fan
It’s amusing to me that we are going to talk about supply and demand, but completely ignore the fact there is no demand for gems at the price of scrolls. Cross trade to your heart’s content, but people don’t have a shortage of T3’s is why those trades sit. We don’t see cross trades for T1s for T2s or T2s for T1’s flooding the trader because people still want those. Those cross trades get taken and removed from listings and do not marinate in the trader for days on end. People don’t want T3s for T2s, let alone for scrolls, and it takes into consideration whatever perceived value or self-esteem one attaches to a mock digital goods based fiat currency system. Evolve and event buildings that give out mana or seeds tend to give T3’s until S&D chapter. Where’s the lesson in taking initiative and adjusting one’s city to also produce less of T3s if your city is making an excess? Oh wait, that is too much personal responsibility and effort when we can just blame everyone else as we continue in our same path of doing things the way we like to the same undesirable results.

For the record, my other city is scroll boosted so I have first hand experience of the nightmare of having problems acquiring unboosted T2’s in the flooded scroll market era. The scroll issue was much worse on the EN server than my US city because it’s much older with more older players with large Moonstone sets flooding the market with scrolls. In the end, I had to get a BTG and level it really high, then did extra super time consuming neighborly visits to buy from wholesaler. Is it fair that scroll players have to do this? No. But these are the tools available to me within the game to fix my problem and I used them instead of wallowing in a pool of my own tears waiting for Inno to adjust Moonstone sets. Now I am one of the few scroll survivors that didn’t quit to see the market now favors my scrolls. So absolutely BIG FAT NO, I don’t want anyone’s stinking gems or any other T3s for my scrolls now because I get to add my survivor experience onto the value of my scrolls too. Also, I make plenty of my own T3s at the museum souvenir shop so I can get unboosted T3s via same tier trading.
 

SoulsSilhouette

Buddy Fan Club member
I always try to trade tier for tier. If I do a cross tier trade, it's three stars and a bargain and then only when I am absolutely desperate. I have stopped taking cross tier trades unless they are from my fellowship OR from newbies. I have made a more pointed effort to contact the person placing the trades and telling them IF they are desperate for one of my boosts that I will take the trades IF they contact me and ask. I no longer assume a one star trade is because they are desperate after a few interactions with players that are playing this like its LoL or Smyte or WoW. If I wanted to play a merchant game like that I would. So, as has been said, I play the way that I enjoy and try to adjust things so I don't stall for too long. And I'm trying to stick to my guns and my principles. Not always easy to do.
 
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