I want to start by appreciating the Forever devs in working on an iconic game. It is no small feet. I am excited again for another launch experience.
My first encounter with the AH in the beta convinced me that it is still a work-in-process. I am sure the AH we see in the beta will not be the one we see on launch day. I have faith that the devs are building—to the best of their abilities—an AH that looks and feels classic. That is their 1st challenge to tackle. Many have addressed this already, so I will not be discussing it here.
The 2nd challenge which they face is of AH design around going “realmless” which I am largely in favor of. In this post, I note my concern and provide a potential solution.
My concern centers around an oversized AH market. I would estimate that there is somewhere between 25K and 40k players in the beta on the PVE server. The typical classic server back in the day was limited to 3k per realm. Classic’s re-release may have had more around 10k per realm. My numbers are likely inaccurate to some degree, but going realmless is no small matter. I can easily imagine 100k players on PVE at launch.
The main effect of this will likely be a massive number of AH postings in comparison to a normal realm. In theory, this is good as increased supply drives down the price of everything. However, it may be to a degree that some players will be driven away from posting at all. Depending on the tradegood, some have been posting at the vendor value. This discourages a player from posting an item and just selling at the inn-keeper.
In a real economy, this would be good because it would encourage innovation and differentiation. However, in wow there are only so many goods in existence to pivot too. A player cannot invent a new kind of mageweave or put their brand on their product(as cool as that sounds). So my concern is that the Forever AH economy will be so flushed with goods that players don’t try to sell on the AH because it isn’t worth it.
My proposal is simple: separate the faction auction houses. Think about how this would affect the AH economy. It would take one very large AH and split into 3 semi-smaller ones(per faction).
Hypothetical Pros:
· Smaller supply means higher prices for buyers but more profit on goods for sellers—incentivizing selling on all the AHs and profiting from the imbalances between them.
- Greater nuances and interest that AH junkies can delve into.
- Potential city-specific AH identities. “Mageweave is always on sale in Org…”
- Gives the player a reason to visit each of the faction capitols(maybe even Darnassus). to sell and to buy.
- Beloved classic friction.
- Possible revival of the Steamwheedle AH? Inter-faction Trade potential?
An argument against my proposal might be that players might just flock to one of the AH’s with the lowest prices. This is possible, but they would still need to travel to do so and prices fluctuate.
This still might not tackle the magnitude of the realmless dynamic or may be an over-reaction. I think it is an interesting thought though.
At the time of writing, the beta has only been out about a week so this is mostly a thought experiment as my concern is based on limited information/experience thus far. Over the long run, the economy will find an equilibrium and a norm will be established. I simply hope it will be a good and profitable norm for AH buyers and sellers.
The auction house(AH) has always been one of my favorite parts of the game in classic wow. I believe it will still be so at launch. I am curious what other’s thoughts might be. What could we do to the AH to make it more interesting? What could be done to the Steamwheedle Cartel AH that would encourage more inter-faction commerce and interaction?