While you are probably all playing the beta, we at mein-mmo.de take a closer look at the deeper features of The Elder Scrolls Online, or TESO for short.
The first steps in Tamriel, the new world, new adventures, and new quests are attractive. And the focus of many of you is currently on the combat system, the PvP, the crafting skills, and the class skills, but long-term motivation in games now also includes a robust trading system.
Here, Zenimax is taking amazing new paths in The Elder Scrolls Online.
The pros and cons of the old system
World of Warcraft, Guild Wars 2, also WildStar, and many other games prefer an auction house to facilitate player trading. The irony is: An auction house takes away from players the opportunity to interact directly with one another. And that in an MMORPG.
Instead, an auction house serves as an intermediary, turning the busy spam in the trading channel, the back and forth between negotiating parties, into a list of numbers and items. The player picks out what they need.
Interaction with other players is reduced to a minimum.
A seller placing items in an auction house is to the buyer as much as an NPC.
Players often buy directly through instant purchase and do not compete with other players by bidding on auctions. Even eBay – one might chuckle – still demands too much interaction from MMORPG players; it must be the anonymity of Amazon instead.
Most auction houses take a certain percentage of each transaction as a commission fee. This acts as a gold sink, so at least some wealth flows out of the game. Without such gold sinks, every game would face permanent hyperinflation.
Fairly, the advantages of an auction house should also be mentioned. They are the same as with Amazon. It is incredibly convenient to find everything in one place, neatly organized with the cheapest offer at the top. Plus, everything is just a click away, there is no risk, no need to travel anywhere or talk to anyone to get your stuff.
And someone is changing that now?
For a bit, the auction house system felt like one of those axioms that are just set in stone. Just as there are no more open dungeons, only instances, and just as you need a tank, a healer, and a specific number of DPS.
And just as there are achievements and online shops and the price of RAM keeps rising and Sundays often turn out disappointing and the wireless mouse always runs out of juice when there are no batteries at home and the stores are closed, and you fumble around with the battery compartment for the TV remote and – well, it doesn’t matter! In any case, the auction house seemed to be set in stone.
But now Zenimax comes and does everything differently. Just like that: Bam. There is no auction house.
Oops! That was surprising.
And what comes instead of the auction house?
The terrible JRPG solution where players simply go AFK in the capital overnight and leave their toon logged in with some kind of belly stand, allowing anyone passing by to help themselves?
Yes?
Rest assured. That is not it.
For starters, you can trade directly with other players old-fashioned style, just like your fathers and their fathers did. You know, with “Want to Sell” and “Want to buy,” some haggling over the price, and a “Where shall we meet?” at the end. You need to talk and trade with other players, thus interacting. I know: Innovative concept for an MMORPG.
But the system is of course even smarter.
Players can join guilds that can accommodate 500 members. Each player can be in up to 5 guilds. These guilds have their own guild shop, accessible to guild members.
Thinking it through, it can be incredibly valuable to join one of the top trading guilds on the server. This sounds like secret societies, cartels, and huge bribery fees. Because what types will make up the best and richest trading guilds? Well, from people who have become very wealthy. And they certainly didn’t do it by always playing by the rules and never eating fish on Fridays, but because greed oozes from them.
I predict that the finest guilds will have entrance fees that everyone must pay if they want to participate in the trade of the elites. Perhaps some guilds may even limit themselves to 100 players or only 50 to be particularly exclusive.
Link to PvP
But Zenimax does not stop there. Because player guilds can claim a fortress in PvP and offer their goods in a shop that is also available to non-guild members.
Through this integration into both the trading and PvP systems, guilds take on a central role in The Elder Scrolls Online.
[pull_quote_center]It will no longer be only important for raiders and hardcore PvP players to hang out in the popular guilds. It will also play a decisive role for traders and collectors.[/pull_quote_center]
While in other games they often pact in circles, wasting their time with price fixing, tier sacrifices, trolling in forums, and ruining individual lives, they are now forced into the light.
New ways – new dangers, new potential
You see: With a little imagination, exciting scenarios can already be thought up and considered solely through the changes in the trading system in The Elder Scrolls Online.
- What if a guild forbids its members to trade outside of their ranks?
- Could it be worthwhile for a guild not only to poach valuable raiders from other guilds but also to draw attention to a particularly skilled craftsman?
- And how will the guilds position and organize themselves?
- Will it be completely relaxed and everyone can blossom freely?
- Or do certain guilds want exclusive rights to goods and try to dominate the realm in this regard?
We at mein-mmo.de believe:
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The decision not to have an auction house is a bold and interesting step. It will help to differentiate TESO from competing games. The renunciation emphasizes the image of a game for more mature players who value roleplay.
However, new paths often come with dangers that cannot be assessed. Where there are winners and trading masters, there will also be poor losers. The risk of permanent spam in the trading channel exists when traders feel excluded from the small circle. It would be exciting if the individual realms on the various servers developed differently.
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And what do you think?
Will you miss the auction house or are you looking forward to finally interacting more closely with other players? Do the new paths Zenimax takes excite your interest in the game, or is the concept, the hint of a sandbox, too far-fetched for you?
