Splitting the market forums

[Cz]

The suggestion of splitting the market forums has come up again, and we've been considering the alternatives for a while. Mainly there are three suggestions:

1. Splitting in "Want to Sell" and "Want to Buy"
2. Splitting into item / service categories (e.g. "Weapons", "Armor", "Services")
3. Both of the above

Option #1 will mean people can limit searches to either buying or selling threads, and window-shoppers can check just what's for sale instead of everything.

Option #2 is a bit tricky, as one needs to cover all categories without overlapping too much. Also, many people seem to enjoy "window-shopping" (browsing through and looking at threads), and splitting the forums into item / service categories might make this more difficult.

Our conclusion is to start with #1 (WTS / WTB split), try that out for a while, and then see whether there's any need for doing #3 (adding categories).

Before doing such a change, we'd like to know whether people want this. So please tell us what you think. Poll runs for 7 days.

[Engelen]

Splitting it into WTB/WTS is the best choice. It allows people to choose what they want, and still letting them browse and "Window shop" (I love that!). It will be a bit too much to start clicking thru several choices just to get an overview over the current markets, even more refreshing the pages regulary to view all "WTS items".

So:

Rimor Market -> Want to Sell

Rimor Market -> Want to Buy

is my favorite here.

You should think about adding Want to Trade though. Many people are interested in only trading items, this would make it easier for them.

[Cz]

Oh, and "Want to Sell" of course includes "Want to Trade" and "Want to Auction". We'll try come up with better names.

A separate "Want to Barter" (items only) might be an idea for later.

[Wrangeline]

I think WTS, WTT and WTB is best. Those 3 catagories.

If u wanted to make a "WTS or WTT this item" then u could make 1 thread in WTS and 1 in WTT.

I think it would be easy for both seller and buyer that way and I actually dont think 2 sections are enough atm because of the silly speed a thread will move downwards atm.

[Trgeorge]

BTW link from Anathean market forum didn't work for me
Can someone check it

[Sjonkel]

I usually browse the forums now to see if anyone is selling something I want, and if I see someone wanting to buy something I have, I check it out. If you split, I probably won't browse the WTB thread much, and I think many others won't do so aswell.

[Sariah]

I think splitting the forums is a great idea.

WTS, WTB, WTT, and Services seem like a good idea to me.

Splitting want to sell into different catagories (like weapons, armor ect.) seems like a bad idea to me though, because a lot of people do bank sales which sell many different types of items.

[Remmance]

Originally posted by Soriana
I usually browse the forums now to see if anyone is selling something I want, and if I see someone wanting to buy something I have, I check it out. If you split, I probably won't browse the WTB thread much, and I think many others won't do so aswell.

Ditto, many of the time people won't check the WTB forums if it is separate and this will make it harder to buy items by posting for them.

Remm

[drdoak]

Just WTS, WTT and WTB please.

Categories = more moderation needed and driving ARKs and Forum MOD's crazy :/

K.I.S.S

Keep It Simple Stupid

[Tenkx]

I'd prefer to see a more controlled trading system with software similar to online auction sites such as e-bay. This would cut loads of admin out of managing threads of things that you are selling/buying. A really nice spinoff from this would be that the sticky "Market Prices" thread could become automatic, triggered from the trading data off the auctions.

[Bothead]

I think WTS, WTB, WTT and WTH (want to hire) would make it easier finding the stuff we want. WTH would be for blitzers, assassins, tradeskillers, dungeons guides, lap dancers etc It's hard enough marketing ones 'services' as it is... especially in areas with low suppression :/

Edit:
Player-controlled vendors would be a great addition, if they can be made to function while player is logged off. I hope this gets implemented well in Alien Invasion.

[skyfear]

It works... don't fix it.

[Vuelhering]

Splitting into WTS/WTB categories is clearly not much of a win. The ratio of WTB:WTS is about 1:10, if not lower, so splitting that off will not have much effect on clutter. [edit: I just checked a random page and found 39 WTS, 9 WTB, and 1 service request. So the ratio is more like 1:4, or 20% WTB posts. I'm still skeptical if 20% would reduce the clutter wrt searching for items.]

Splitting into categories of armor/weapons/services is probably not a big win, either, as people tend to post a HUGE number of items (bank sale, which would span all categories). [edit: almost all of the posts I checked would've fallen into multiple categories] It would be useful for only a few folks posting a single item... and it would cause folks with a few different ones to make multiple posts across forums, destroying any advantage you would've had by separating categories.

My opinion is that splitting into level categories (not QL, but what is useful for particular character levels) of 1-100, 100-150, 150+ would be most useful for the shoppers. However, I also realize this is a judgement call by the author, so perhaps splitting based on QL would work.

I've also found, after years of running web-based forums, that too few categories is almost always better than too many.

[Marquess]

The ratio of WTS to WTB is very low and not truly worth the complexity.

I don't think the problem is in the categories, but rather the searching capability. If Funcom would enhance the search facility to do exact phrases, encourage use of de facto standard posting tools (Helpbot store listings), and put a expiration date on posts to exclude them from the default search it would improve the quality of the player economy.

I would prefer that Funcom implement an independent pickup/dropoff service. That would be a huge win for Funcom. Didn't Omni Intel get wind that the Yutto's have plans for something like that?

This would also be helpful for transferring items between a player's characters...

[zerxiez]

In my opinion if you seperate the WTS and the WTB post the WTB post will turn into a dead thread because people do not come on to search for people that are WTB something so they can get rid of thier stuff because it is much easier to put up a post of WTS with everything you hve and let people that are interested in it contact you. Most often the WTB post that people have on the market anyways are not necessary because if they would do a search they could most often find what they were looking for in someone elses WTS post, of corse in some cases there are those rare items that are hard to find. I feel that with having a wtb post people will post stuff hoping that someone will browse the WTB section and have their item, but most likely no one will waste their time browsing the WTB section so that they can sell someone a 500k nano...it just isn't worth the time.

[____________Jeremiah]

Split it into three sections

Buying
Selling and Auctions
Tradeskill and other services

[sarangas]

Splitting between ,WTT,WTS,WTA<-----3) i think is a good idea. to trade ie barter with items,to sell ie fixed price,to auction ie bid against others.Wtb is just for those to lazy to search threads.

Tradeskill services should be in the professions column,whichever 0ne is relevant. imho.

[___________Amaglaria]

The thing I would most like is it seems, at least in my experience, maybe I am wrong, that one is unable to search for strings.

Using quotations around a search parameter does not seem to affect the outcome, and simply using AND modifiers does not allow me to find
Running Waist Symbiant
threads any quicker, as there are plenty of threads which have something with running in it, something with waist, and something with symbiant.

I think implementing a search string option would nearly eliminate the need for WT buy threads.

[mulps1]

one thing i'd like changed would be the removal of auction forum posts from the view active thread lists. As being so active they tend to fill 60% + of the list.

[Barimen]

4 forums for each server would suffice, and would be really great.

WTB Items
WTS Items
WTB Service
WTS Service

Allthough it might be a nightmare to moderate, IE moving incorrect posts from one to the other.