Merchant Archive
Thread: Economic Indicators ?
Ok i ahve been noticing something the past 3 weeks atleast.
You see my main profession is master architect. So i need tons of resources and tons of factory made componets. This means i generally have days at a time with nothing really to do while the harvetsors harvest and the factories factor...
During this time i usually SHOP!!!!!!!
I travel around and watch the bazaar looking for really good deals to sell in my shops.
Now my shops havent been doing as well the past couple of weeks. buisness just seems down. but thats ok.
What is bugging me is that in my travels i go to vendor after vendor and they are just empty...nada, nothing. even BIG NAME places are just devoid of items.
The bazaar listings keep getting thinner and thinner as well.
Has any one else noticed this.
Is it due to
1) holocrons
2) holidays/finals
3) people jsut not playing anymore
I am just trying to make sense of this trend. I am just finding fewer and fewer things to buy. The stuff that is for sale is just way over priced as well.
I am on radiant and i agree with you...things seem to be slowing down.
I think its all 3. Holo's are switching people around, people on vacation, and peope quiting.
Yep, me too. I don't see a lot of people quitting (in fact, I'm mostly seeing people coming back). It's got to be the holocrons.
Actually you can probably attribute it to multiple reasons.
Personally I've seen quite a few people have openly stated they are quitting (some big names too that were here since the beginning of our server), a few people have simply idled out/vanished, and others are tired of their profession and moved on.
I break it down as follows:
- People in general leave due to nerfs, big bugs, lack of testing, and other assorted complaints.
- Crafters are leaving their professions due to holocrons and/or they are tired of their profession and want to try something new.
- There are a lot of new holomerchants that are setting up empty vendors just to get the XP.
- There have been some major imbalances in pricing. From one of the following reasons:
- Holo-crafters are sucking up the existing resources for grinding.
- Exploiters are injecting masses of cash into the system and causing a 'gold-rush' situation.
- Resource collectors/sellers are chasing after holocrons/jedi slots.
- Holocrafters are generating large amounts of items for cheap prices thereby flooding the market with below cost items driving the 'real' crafters out of the market.
You may think its stupid of me to say that on one hand there are price increases while on the other there are massive price drops, but I'm not talking about the same items. I'll explain further (you can stop reading now if you don't care about economics.) 
The price of resources has steadily gone up, and the price of maintaining housing, cities, vehicles has all gone up, while the amount of cash coming in from missions is going down. The primary produce has steadily become rarer and more expensive as people give more time to other persuits. This drives costs up, and the money drain has become more apparent.
The price of finished products has steadily gone down due to massive competition in the market. With large numbers of items being generated by masters that have ground their way to the top (either because of holocron requirements, or their own desire to get to the top fast), the competition has gone up through the roof, this has lowered many items to cost/below cost. The people that are what I call 'real' crafters are unable to handle this situation and some are leaving (the profession or the game) because of it.
The problem here is that the person selling cheaply today is not a crafter tomorrow, and someone else fills their place. Its a constant cycle of new blood filling the crafting roles, mastering it, selling or giving away stuff cheap, then moving on. The 'real' permanent crafters are not able to keep up with the continual competition from multiple sources.
The only place where this generally doesn't happen is when quality matters. Usually in the Weaponsmith/Armorsmith/Doctor categories, the suppliers remain fairly constant, unless they have gone off to seek fame and fortune. I have found that even some of them have quit as well, although probably for non economic reasons, as the good quality crafters usually have good markets and stable customers.
That is true I've seen a number of people back on in the last few days. More than usual. Must be the vehicles that are bringing them back for a look.
Faellyn wrote:
Yep, me too. I don't see a lot of people quitting (in fact, I'm mostly seeing people coming back). It's got to be the holocrons.
Artistan wrote:
Of course, even Csin can't keep up with the rush to by ferrous and non ferrous metals for vehicles.
Not to mention that I've been offline with the uber-flu for over a week now. I tried to restock the vendors but the lag was so bad the vendors wouldn't load.
C'est la vie
it isnt really just vendors either...
i am "online" most of the time and i might check email, news and then skim the bazaar every 2-3 hours or so...
the bazaar is really empty too...even the "junk" has dropped off...
maybe towns are having a weird effect as well...
people are changing locations and its hard to find where vendors have moved...maybe the supply chain is messed up...