Diablo III is now waiting for 1,000,000 MF swap tears

[Cerzi]

I think that the two AHs will interact a lot more than that, with anyone serious about making money selling on either the gold AH or RMAH, depending on the gold exchange rate and the relative prices on each. ie they will both regulate each other.

Plus anyone who is focusing on improving their ingame wealth/power might be better off selling for gold as a better way to reinvest it in their character (less cut), with only people at the very top using the RMAH exclusively.

But yeah fuck the RMAH regardless, I'm on HC so can happily ignore its shitty nature.

[donjehova]

The massive chunk blizz takes of the rmah, will keep the gold ah alive I think. Its a 1$ plus 15% if im correct, which is fucking huge. In gold ah, its just the 15%?

Gold is 15% plus a base listing fee.

I think Alenar has it right on the money though. There is no reason for someone to list an uber item on the gold auction house as opposed to the RMAH. There's zero incentive. The cut Blizzard takes is really irrelevant because:

A.) Kids don't give a shit about that stuff, they just want to make monies off their sweet lootz.
B.) 85% of a sale in real life money is still better than 100% in fake interweb golds...and this is what Blizzard is banking on.

Blizzard has admitted to lower drop rates of top notch gear because of the ease of trade and purchasable class specific upgrades that the AH provides. So here's the scenario we face:

1. You farm Inferno looking for good gear of any class to list on the AH.
2. You take the gold made from listing other class's gear and purchase upgrades for your class.
3. Blizzard's transaction fee acts as a small gold sink.

All fine and good. Now the RMAH goes live.
1. You farm like before, except now, you list the good drops on the RMAH, because you'd be crazy not to (as detailed earlier).
2. You take the RM made from those listings and purchase your own class upgrades.
3. The trend eventually starts to seep down into lower and lower tier gear until the gold AH becomes a ghost town.
4. Blizzard's built in $1 base ensures that no matter how flooded the RMAH becomes with gear, an artificial price floor always exists.
5. Blizzard's maniacal laughter is only drowned out by the sound of executives literally choking on money.

It's a really evil genius model on their part. They're going to make silly money.

There is just as much incentive to sell for gold as there is for real money, as long as the gold is sold for real money. This is already going on at a pretty large scale - outside of ah mind you.

The nature of the artificial price floor will also mean that it is more logical to sell lesser items for gold, and then sell the gold in bulk on rmah.

[Cool09]

The gold AH has no fee for listing an item, only 15% of the price.

The RMAH has $1 plus 15%, so there is a significant cost of a few real dollars to sell an item on there. Only very expensive items will be on there, due to a few dollars of real money overhead to each sale.

Many people will want nothing to do with the RMAH and will continue buying and selling on regular AH. People who want to buy gold can do so by purchasing high demand items from RMAH and selling them on gold AH, so a rough exchange rate will be established. Cheap items won't go on the RMAH since $1 overhead could be far more than the item is worth... why pay $1 to list a 50 cent item?

Sounds perfectly stable to me.

[Nicho Void]

Cheap items won't go on the RMAH since $1 overhead could be far more than the item is worth... why pay $1 to list a 50 cent item?

Ah yes, that's true, I was thinking of that $1 list fee backwards.

Many people will want nothing to do with the RMAH and will continue buying and selling on regular AH.

Buying yes, selling I don't see. If I get a drop that is worth $5 on the RMAH, what incentive do I have to list it for gold that I can just continue to farm?

[Alistair]

Obviously no way to know till it's here, but I wonder what kind of cash items will sell for on RMAH.

Thinking if I get a lucky few drops, will the RMAH be so spamful of the same items that they're like $2 a pop. Or will it be WoT'ian with $50.00 "Sword of Lowe" about?

I like the idea that RMAH could be used to fund buying other Blizz games I don't currently have tbqh.

[Nottheface]

The massive chunk blizz takes of the rmah, will keep the gold ah alive I think. Its a 1$ plus 15% if im correct, which is fucking huge. In gold ah, its just the 15%?

Gold is 15% plus a base listing fee.

I think Alenar has it right on the money though. There is no reason for someone to list an uber item on the gold auction house as opposed to the RMAH. There's zero incentive. The cut Blizzard takes is really irrelevant because:

A.) Kids don't give a shit about that stuff, they just want to make monies off their sweet lootz.
B.) 85% of a sale in real life money is still better than 100% in fake interweb golds...and this is what Blizzard is banking on.

Blizzard has admitted to lower drop rates of top notch gear because of the ease of trade and purchasable class specific upgrades that the AH provides. So here's the scenario we face:

1. You farm Inferno looking for good gear of any class to list on the AH.
2. You take the gold made from listing other class's gear and purchase upgrades for your class.
3. Blizzard's transaction fee acts as a small gold sink.

All fine and good. Now the RMAH goes live.
1. You farm like before, except now, you list the good drops on the RMAH, because you'd be crazy not to (as detailed earlier).
2. You take the RM made from those listings and purchase your own class upgrades.
3. The trend eventually starts to seep down into lower and lower tier gear until the gold AH becomes a ghost town.
4. Blizzard's built in $1 base ensures that no matter how flooded the RMAH becomes with gear, an artificial price floor always exists.
5. Blizzard's maniacal laughter is only drowned out by the sound of executives literally choking on money.

It's a really evil genius model on their part. They're going to make silly money.

They and Paypal. Likely nobody else unless Blizz changes their stance (they won't) on sales limits and the ability to cash out your account balance. The more I think about it the more likely scenario for players to make bank off this game is for them to get all classes to 60 then sell the account. Gear em up enough with loot from a flooded Gold AH and list it.

[Paradox]

Question: Why would anyone buy stuff from the RMAH if the whole point of the game is to run around and get omgsweetlootz?

I know I'm being dumb but I don't really "get" this.

[donjehova]

Obviously no way to know till it's here, but I wonder what kind of cash items will sell for on RMAH.

Thinking if I get a lucky few drops, will the RMAH be so spamful of the same items that they're like $2 a pop. Or will it be WoT'ian with $50.00 "Sword of Lowe" about?

I like the idea that RMAH could be used to fund buying other Blizz games I don't currently have tbqh.

Sword of Lowe cannot be farmed by chinese sweetshops, where everything in d3 can. We will see. The chance of rolling the theoretically perfect rare / unique is insanely low.
That and the fact we have no bots yet (as far as I know) and there will be pvp means there should be low supply and high demand.

PvP'ers in d2 where insane twinkers in many cases. Just on point variation of perfect stats, could mean only half the price on d2jsp.

I think there is potential for very high priced items. But the average shit people farm, will be pretty much worthless.

[blaad]

Question: Why would anyone buy stuff from the RMAH if the whole point of the game is to run around and get omgsweetlootz?

I know I'm being dumb but I don't really "get" this.

Because that would be first game ever in which people use RL cash to "by pass content".

[Paradox]

Question: Why would anyone buy stuff from the RMAH if the whole point of the game is to run around and get omgsweetlootz?

I know I'm being dumb but I don't really "get" this.

Because that would be first game ever in which people use RL cash to "by pass content".

Yeah but why would you buy the game if you wanted someone someone else to play it for you then effectively sell you their progress? It would be like me buying a save for Skyrim which had all the quests complete.

[Cerzi]

Because theyre getting a virtual epeen item that exists in a secure (in theory) space, and has value just like a non-virtual good. This isn't like paying for a Skyrim save because it has more integrity, can't be copied, and is easier to show off. Whether people pay for something purely for cosmetic reasons, or for power reasons, or as an investment in being able to get cooler looking & more powerful stuff later, it basically all comes down to the game being online and having social features, which Skyrim does not.

I've never spent a thing on in-game MMO-like stuff but I'm not going to deny it can have real value. Made plenty of real life cash over the last decade cashing out from MMOs I've quit. Sold my Ultima Online account in 2001 for 300 quid back you could still use ebay for it and most people didn't even know an economy existed.

[Nicho Void]

Question: Why would anyone buy stuff from the RMAH if the whole point of the game is to run around and get omgsweetlootz?

I know I'm being dumb but I don't really "get" this.

Because that would be first game ever in which people use RL cash to "by pass content".

Yeah but why would you buy the game if you wanted someone someone else to play it for you then effectively sell you their progress? It would be like me buying a save for Skyrim which had all the quests complete.

It's not really a new concept. Why do character leveling services exist? There are always going to be people that either can't or won't put in the effort to achieve the "end game". In this case, it will probably be PvP, so people will pay for the best gear possible to give them the greatest edge possible. It's a business model leveraging people's competitive nature and getting there via the path of least resistance.

[Trindermon]

It's not really a new concept. Why do character leveling services exist? There are always going to be people that either can't or won't put in the effort to achieve the "end game". In this case, it will probably be PvP, so people will pay for the best gear possible to give them the greatest edge possible. It's a business model leveraging people's competitive nature and getting there via the path of least resistance.

Speaking of PvP is there only me that thinks its going to consist of seeing who can 1 shot the other one first?

[Itiken]

Why do character leveling services exist?

To steal account details and later empty idiot's accounts of all their gold / epix.

[Alenar Rumanev]

The massive chunk blizz takes of the rmah, will keep the gold ah alive I think. Its a 1$ plus 15% if im correct, which is fucking huge. In gold ah, its just the 15%?

Gold is 15% plus a base listing fee.

I think Alenar has it right on the money though. There is no reason for someone to list an uber item on the gold auction house as opposed to the RMAH. There's zero incentive. The cut Blizzard takes is really irrelevant because:

A.) Kids don't give a shit about that stuff, they just want to make monies off their sweet lootz.
B.) 85% of a sale in real life money is still better than 100% in fake interweb golds...and this is what Blizzard is banking on.

Blizzard has admitted to lower drop rates of top notch gear because of the ease of trade and purchasable class specific upgrades that the AH provides. So here's the scenario we face:

1. You farm Inferno looking for good gear of any class to list on the AH.
2. You take the gold made from listing other class's gear and purchase upgrades for your class.
3. Blizzard's transaction fee acts as a small gold sink.

All fine and good. Now the RMAH goes live.
1. You farm like before, except now, you list the good drops on the RMAH, because you'd be crazy not to (as detailed earlier).
2. You take the RM made from those listings and purchase your own class upgrades.
3. The trend eventually starts to seep down into lower and lower tier gear until the gold AH becomes a ghost town.
4. Blizzard's built in $1 base ensures that no matter how flooded the RMAH becomes with gear, an artificial price floor always exists.
5. Blizzard's maniacal laughter is only drowned out by the sound of executives literally choking on money.

It's a really evil genius model on their part. They're going to make silly money.

They and Paypal. Likely nobody else unless Blizz changes their stance (they won't) on sales limits and the ability to cash out your account balance. The more I think about it the more likely scenario for players to make bank off this game is for them to get all classes to 60 then sell the account. Gear em up enough with loot from a flooded Gold AH and list it.

My point was mainly this: let's say you get really lucky and drop a godly plate of the whale, or zod, or whatever the equivalent for the end game items end up being for D3. Someone has to, law of averages says so. If it turns out you cannot use that item, you have a couple of possible choices now: sell for $$ or attempt to exchange for an equally godly item you can use (either via auctioning for more money than god or direct 1:1 trade). Before in D2, the only legitimate choice was to barter that zod for something you needed (since if you tried to sell you could get, scammed, hacked, banned, etc.). Now, Blizzard and PayPal want in on that action and thus the guarantee they provide means that someone, somewhere will decide that D3 is just a game, but with that 10 quid I can go get drunk with friends so I am going to cash out. By removing whatever item that was from the gold AH a chain reaction is generated. Now if you decide you want/need that item you either have to pay for it or exchange your own godly item of equal perceived real world value. This in effect places a $$ value on whatever you dropped. You now have a disincentive to list on the gold AH because your item has less purchasing power there (sure you could get godly amounts of gold, but your godly amounts of gold won't buy you the item you want, it is listed for $$. Likewise, gold will not be bought or sold for $$ because it further dilutes the purchasing power of that $$ beyond Blizzard's cut).

As long as the flow is $$ > gold > stuff we will be fine. If it is $$ > stuff directly then I think the gold AH will die.

edit-spelling

[Cool09]

^^ why are you assuming that you can't continue to use gold for high end items? The gold AH is secure, thus can be used to buy and sell items with extreme value. The "chain reaction" you mentioned makes no sense. Some people will buy/sell on gold AH, some on RMAH.

There's nothing stopping you from selling your sweet loot for 100m gold or whatever, then buying the loot you want with that, just like people are doing now.

Why do character leveling services exist?

To steal account details and later empty idiot's accounts of all their gold / epix.

Not to mention their RL money as they PAY for the service.

[I Legionnaire]

Logged in today to find my character stripped of items and gold, guessing I got hacked. Should I send a petition to blizzard, or what is my best course of action?

[Lex Fasces]

Logged in today to find my character stripped of items and gold, guessing I got hacked. Should I send a petition to blizzard, or what is my best course of action?

moan about it on blizzard forums

[Jack bubu]

Logged in today to find my character stripped of items and gold, guessing I got hacked. Should I send a petition to blizzard, or what is my best course of action?

dont play public games
oh and make a ticket, they will roll your character back to some point

[Space Panda]

Logged in today to find my character stripped of items and gold, guessing I got hacked. Should I send a petition to blizzard, or what is my best course of action?

i'm starting to believe the rumors. 2 good friends of mine got hacked. i wanted to just call them retards, but instead i set up my account with an auth.

they called blizzard directly and the situation was resolved, with their items restored. it took them about an hour though.