D4 Trade Suggestion: Anonymous Trade Matchmaking System

General Discussion
1

(This has been revised quite a bit)

THIS IS NOT AN AUCTION HOUSE! YOU CANNOT BID ON/BUYOUT ITEMS WITH GOLD/MONEY!

Summary:

Instead of allowing open trade, I am proposing a trade matchmaking system. It is not an auction house, you can’t just browse items for sale. Instead, a buyer searches for a specific item in real time from sellers who are online. The search interface can be opened in lobby, or in game, it doesn’t matter. When you select an item to search for, it starts searching in the background, leaving you free to do whatever in the meantime.

With this system, you can no longer approach someone and request to trade. Instead, you have to use the matchmaking system, which matches a random buyer with a random seller. Player names are hidden during the trade. This system should, in theory, stop illegal sites from operating, since they’d have no way of ensuring the item they are supposed to give ends up in the right hands.

It also streamlines the trade process. You can queue for a trade and continue playing while the game searches for a match. No more spending hours just to try and trade one or two items.

How it might work: (Lengthy explanation ahead)

Let’s say you’re looking to buy a Nagelring. Someone else is looking to sell a Nagelring. The matchmaking system matches buyer with seller, but it’s random and player’s have no control over who they actually end up trading with. And, as an additional security measure, player names are hidden during the trade, so you’d have no way of knowing who you’re actually trading with.

When the trade matchmaking system finds a match, trade windows open on each player’s screen, and their names are hidden from one another and you would just see “Buyer” and “Seller”. No chatting, since that could open the doors for “verification” activity from illegal sites. (type “ABC123” to verify its you, etc).

So how would you communicate? Think Hearthstone pre-defined buttons that input replies.

“What you got?”
“Yes”
“No”
“Place Offer”
etc…

How else could you communicate things you were interested in?

Give each player the ability to highlight items in the other player’s trade screen to show interest.

On the Seller’s side:

Place Nagelring in a special container, or designate that you want to sell it, somehow, where it will become locked and unable to be accidentally sold/DE’d for the duration of your play session, or until you un-flag it. The game enter’s the item into the trade system, where it continually searches for a buyer. The seller can go about his business playing the game until a match is found.

When a match is found, a message displays, but does not tell the player’s name. Click OK to accept or Cancel to back out. Clicking OK opens the trade window, assuming the buyer also clicked OK. (Maybe insta-ports you to town for safety first).

The Nagelring you listed for sale is displayed but locked. You cannot move it, you cannot do anything with it. It just sits there for the buyer to look at. However, depending on how the trade goes, maybe you and the buyer haggle a bit. You still have space in the trade window to add items, if necessary, in order to sweeten the deal, again if necessary. But you can’t remove the original item you listed, it’s locked in place for the duration of the trade. You can haggle with him until either of you cancel the trade, or you both accept it. Of course, accepting the trade, the item is given to the buyer, and the items/gold offered from him are transferred to you.

You cannot see the buyer’s name during this trade process, but you can still communicate using pre-defined chat commands and highlighting items you will take for it.

On the Buyer’s side:

You open up a menu where you choose an item you are looking to buy. You select Nagelring from the options and click Search. The system continually searches for the item you want from online players that have that item flagged. The buyer can go about his business playing until a match is found.

When a match is found, a message displays, but does not tell the player’s name. Click OK to accept or Cancel to back out. Clicking OK opens the trade window, assuming the seller also clicked OK. (Maybe insta-ports you to town for safety first).

The trade window opens, and you see the Nagelring sitting there. It’s locked and can’t be moved by the seller. You can offer items, gold or a combination of the two to the seller. You can haggle with him until either of you cancel the trade, or you both accept it. Of course, accepting the trade, the item(s) is/are given to you, and the item(s)/gold you offered for it are transferred to the seller.

You cannot see the buyer’s name during this trade process, but you can still communicate using pre-defined chat commands and highlighting items you are interested in.

I believe this would take care of the 3rd party sites problem, and maybe to a lesser extent, botters.

Bottom Line:

Players can still trade the items they want, they can bargain with one another, and 3rd party illegal sites are no longer a problem, because they’d have no way of ensuring their item gets to the right person.

:coffee:

3 Likes
2

With out some form of currency it would never work. Like what is the worth of a Nagelring. Since the person will be “random” you don’t know what that person wants. And with the randomness, it would be nearly impossible to match trade for trade without a middleman currency.

Why do you think that in D2, SoJ’s became the defacto currency in a way. Its because its nearly impossible to put a trade value on an item and gold is not a good currency in D3 (or in d2 for that matter)

Item for item trades just never work in any game. There’s always been some form of middleman currency

3

Quite problematic system. How would one find specific item with specific affixes? People don’t want to buy random version of an item, they want specific version.

4

It is not up to Blizzard to determine item value, it is up to the community. Blizzard would just design the framework for trades, the community determines what things are worth. And really, there’s no real answer. The answer is, what is it worth to you and how much are you willing to trade for the item you want? That’s how bartering works.

5

That may be but due to the randomess of items, its not possible here in d3. It would be a waste of time since you are matched up randomly to a person that has your item and now you have to “randomly” have the item they want.

At the same time, items are NOT hard to come by in D3. The basic version of an item can easily be gotten. Its the Near perfect rolls that would be of any value and then what would they be worth which makes it even less likely that you will be able to trade for it.

Bartering hasn’t been a thing in ages and wouldn’t work in d3. Items are not rare enough to warrent or need a bartering system without being overly complicated and a waste of time.
Not to mention that there are other things that if any dev were to happen need more attention then the trade system.

1 Like
6

Nah.

D3 is 7.5 years old, part of Classic Games lineup. It will stay as it is. If you don’t like it, find another game.

7

Yeah, I do think perhaps its a little too late to add this feature into current D3. But perhaps it’s something to consider in the next game?

1 Like
8

Before even considering any trading system, some other key mechanics need to be properly designed. In D3 trading is pointless for many reasons and would even be detrimental to overall experience due to itemization. Items should complement the build, not be the build as in D3.

Thus I’m really hoping D4 will do better job with itemization and other systems which all make the builds.

9

Hey brother, I sense you are troubled or upset over something. It’s going to be okay :slight_smile: I already play other games, many others in fact.

I am simply making a suggestion. The great thing about suggestions are, they do not require any sort of commitment, so I am free to like or dislike the current system and methodologies.

But thank you for your concern :slight_smile:

2 Likes
10

Maybe if legendary and set items had “fixed” affixes like in D2 LoD uniques had not RNG BS like we have right now than we could have some sort of trading, but honestly if someone got a perfect rolled item what would stop him from trying to sell it for over 100b gold or other ridiculous price?

This would only benefit botters and people who play over 10h a day, while others would be left far behind… Even further than now…

11

Interesting idea. You might be on to something there.

2 Likes
12

If no one has the currency to pay for what the seller is asking, then the seller will never sell the item. It goes both ways. Eventually they would sell it for less. But honestly, a perfect item should be held to a higher value than a non-perfect item. But it’s still between the buyer and seller to work it out. You might be able to get the item with a combination of gold and items, provided the value seems to match up.

Using your same example of Diablo 2 LoD Uniques, nobody really needs a perfect item though. Most builds worked great on mid or even low rolled uniques. A perfect was generally attained much further down the road, once you had completed your build, and were looking to upgrade the pieces you already have. So I don’t think anyone would be left behind, just because they didn’t get a perfect item.

Perfect rolls are something players would strive for over a long period of time, while still being able to enjoy their build with low or mid rolled items. Because in Diablo 2, those items were still powerful, just not perfect, and that was okay.

13

In D2 LoD all uniques had fixed affixes no RNG crap like in D3 RoS, so just like you said even with low rolled affixes most builds worked fine.

You don’t have that luxury in D3 RoS unfortunately…

1 Like
14

Yeah I know. That’s why I suggested adding in dropdown boxes to search for the affixes you wanted, to narrow down exactly what you’re looking for, and that should help the situation for D3. On the seller’s side, when you put an item into the “sell” box, it auto-populates affixes for that item so that there is no dishonesty. But I also know this system probably won’t happen this late in the game.

However, I’m really just throwing this idea out there as a general suggestion. Perhaps in the next Diablo game, as a way to bring back a form of trading while eliminating illegal sites.

:coffee:

1 Like
15

I’ll just simply say it won’t work.

The first thing you’d obviously need a means to discern the affix values on the desired item. For those who play 24/7 via illicit means, meeting this requirement isn’t as difficult compared to someone who only plays an hour or two here and there.

From there, you have to determine what is traded. Item-for-Item pretty much becomes a nightmare since you’ll have people constantly trying to overvalue what they want to trade, or introduce further complication if multiple items are involved in a single transaction. If it’s forced to be Item-for-Gold, you still have the same issue of those who play more having more buying power, while you’d also have numerous sham auctions of junk gear to consolidate gold into main “bank” accounts. Some would argue this also really wasn’t any different than the AH of old, with further positing the anonymity hurts the legitimacy of the process (as well as not having an ownership trail on items).

Frankly, I’m more keen on the devs themselves determining the values of items than the players. Yes, you may have the occasional outlier item that is useful for more builds than something of a comparable level or rarity, but I’d rather have that than the community tanking the worth of everything that isn’t the 95% quality or higher (with perfect mods). And the best way to pull this off is to otherwise mandate a certain degree of PvE activity via things like event exclusive currency or rep grinds.

Which really just segues into the topic if things are so rare to mandate trade, you’re hurting everyone else who doesn’t no-life or get super lucky. With proper drop rates, trading isn’t needed at all despite the backlash of those desperate to cut corners in progression.

16

Sounds like too much work and it’s not impervious to third party site and bot abuse either. To prevent abuse trade system must be restricted at the first place.
People shouldn’t be able to mule trade bots easily with first grade items, but trade restriction should force you to buy it from the first owner.

Ain’t it better to find someone from general chat and continue with whispers? Also there’s the question, the item you looking for is available for sale at the first place on both accounts; is it a tradeable item and current market has it yet?

Why? Who you gonna call out if you get scammed? Who are you trying to protect? Scammers and bots?

17

I’m not exactly sure what you mean by “discern the affix values”, but I’ll attempt to respond.

As I’ve mentioned in my previous posts, adding in drop down boxes for affixes helps narrow down the search on the buyer’s side. On the seller’s side, affix values would be auto-populated when you go to place the item up for sale.

As for playing 24/7 via illicit means, yes this is a problem and should be dealt with. But not from the perspective of having an advantage over the player, because there are legitimate players who play almost as much - 10-14 hours per day, and they obviously still have a distinct advantage over people that can only play 1-2 hours a day. I am on the side of, if you can play that much, more power to ya. You should have an advantage. You put in the work, you deserve it. The same is true for anything in this world - your career, sports, anything. The more time you spend on something, the better you’ll get at it. Those that can only play 1-2 hours a day, they will get there eventually. But catering to people who can’t play as much ruins games. Speaking as a dad and full time IT guy.

That is the beauty of bartering. If you don’t like what’s on the table, make a suggestion. It could be item for item, or item for multiple items, or item for item(s) and gold. If you can’t agree, hop back into the trade MM system and find another to trade with. Or go back to farming.

Yes, those who play more have more buying power. That’s life, and really how it should be. But as I said before, it could be item for item(s) and gold, it just comes down to what is agreed on.

I’m not familiar with what you mean by sham auctions? How would they get gold for junk gear exactly? Are you talking about players having two accounts?

I disagree. If you can play the game more, you should have more power. That’s life, really, and catering to people that have responsibilities ruins games. Again I am speaking as a dad and full time IT guy.

Now we are getting more into debating game design mechanics and player mentality. I come from the camp that thinks super rare items are something attained, one day, at some point in time. Something to strive for. Something to one day rejoice over. In the mean time, be okay with your mid-level items. Theoretically speaking, your build still works, and you are still powerful. You’re just not “the best”. But players have a problem with that, apparently.

I also don’t think everyone needs best in slot items after one play session. Player’s obsess with having “the best” all the time and fail to realize there is a middle ground when it comes to games like this.

Using Diablo 2 as a reference, you could have low or mid rolled uniques, and you were still powerful, you still had a great character once fully geared.

But getting those perfect items, that took time, effort and dedication. But it also gave you something to work towards.

1 Like
18

sounfs like an ah :slight_smile: no problem with me. no trading sometimes is a pain, a mate of me found a cindercoat five minutes after i left game. we psrty up so many times and he does not need it. why no trading with people you are used to play with

19

This is better than an Auction House. Auction Houses rely on currency alone. A trading system allows bartering, so you could trade another item, or items, or even items + gold. It’s way more flexible in how you can pay for something, rather than - “Just give me X amount of gold”.

20

You don’t solve the RMT problem if you have both a MM system and free trade/bartering. The odds of the MM system being used would pretty much be minimal.

As for the junk sales, it’d be contingent on whether or not you could trade in any other manner. Legit players, for example, wouldn’t be selling a cracked sash for 5m. On the other hand, when the RMT want to move gold around, they can do just that. Further imagining players would be restricted on the number of items they could list, you couldn’t exactly expect everyone else to try and sell junk gear to swindle them, either. Further, if you do have the ability to fine tune desired affixes in a sale, it could just shift to some quirky blue with something like pick up radius and +dex. Again, something no one would likely ever buy.

Otherwise, I’m not really going to dive into the whole have/have not/deserving rhetoric. Having a functional build is not the same thing as having BiS, where foregoing the ability of the average player to achieve the former is not something I wish to lock behind high rarity. Something like the Zod situation of D2 needn’t be repeated. Otherwise, I’d like people actually playing the game and not swiping their credit card to make even more progress than those who do play legit.