A discussion on Trading

PC General Discussion
1

I am definitely a fan of many things that Diablo 4 is doing, I am also not a fan of some of the limitations that I believe Diablo 4 suffers from that prevents more engaging communities. I have a clan that I’ve made based on this game, and earlier today, I thought to myself “it would be great to see more clan members wanting to trade items with each other”. Seeing as the clan is currently a sizeable 60-odd number of players, there shouldn’t be any reason this wouldn’t occur, especially amidst our own discord which 30-40% of clan members are currently part of.

Trading is very, very limited in Diablo 4. Sure, the idea is you trade best rolled rares to those who have Legendary Aspects they’d like to imbue them with. But I can’t tell you how many times I’ve encountered a Legendary that would’ve greatly benefitted my friend’s Sorc. class, or an item that would’ve simply been more useful for someone else. The lack of open trading in Diablo 4 is just community-restricting. It doesn’t hurt my clan in any great sense, but it’s just one less fun thing to talk about and do actively as a clan. I would argue it’s one of the most important fun aspects of games such as these that just feels hollow for D4 currently.

I appreciate the mmo-lite elements the game has to offer, and aside from what there might be in Season 1, clan members really don’t have much else to look forward to when partying, other than the live events such as Helltides and World Bosses; while they are quite fun, would it not be equally interesting to trade that sick Legendary I probably won’t use for myself but I know could be useful for others, and to post that in my trading forum on discord and create a conversation with clan members?

It would be at least nice if we could trade anything we wanted amongst each other. And yes, this does mean players will get items they might not be able to access immediately due to level requirement (though they still have to work to get to that level), or that it could be seen as a way to cheese the grinding systems in Diablo (but players who want to grind for items will do so anyways, like myself for the most part). Players who want specific item pieces by trading gold or other items will have their fill as well as those who just want to grind on their own.

Open trading would only bolster communities in Diablo 4. This should be greatly considered and added to the game.

1 Like
2

I feel like there’s still a rather limited pool of uniques per class and opening trading in this environment would very quickly water down the limited item diversity. I could see them adding in trades after a season or two while they get more items to unlock more builds. I’m looking forward to seeing a lot of common concerns cleaned up as they develop more iterative content that adjusts based on how they see players engaging with the end-game and seasons.

Not to mention the historic issues of adding trading to a game with bots and third party scam sites and gold selling etc etc

3

there is something worth trading in the game ?

4

I think bots are bound to happen, and I’m sure if they opened up trading they’d do what they can to mitigate that. But I think that just comes with open trading and should be expected. Blizzard can always warn players of that risk, but it’s a risk a player takes on their own imo.

Edit:
As it stands now, there are definitely people jumping in trade chat selling gold for real monetary value. While bots and scams are definitely a concern I see that as something a player chooses to engage with on their own volition, it’s on them to recognize those things if they’re occurring and not the fault of Blizzard in that case.

5

As I’ve played the game I feel that the design emphasizes the solo-self-found playstyle, and couch co-op as its form of grouping.

Within those two approaches to the game I don’t really see much meaningful purpose to trading. It strikes me as rather unnecessary.

The benefits of trading seem negligible. At best you’re fostering some extra interaction between players. At worst you’re just getting shortcuts through the gear progression.

The drawbacks of trading are quite apparent however. Bots. Cheaters. Hackers. Money makers. And so on. All the ills of gaming.

If trading was central to the game and a big focus of the design, then I could see the argument for having trading emphasized a lot more. Some games choose that design focus and that’s cool. It just doesn’t seem like Diablo IV has, and therefore I don’t see the merit of trading – or more trading, as it is.