Out-of-game trading

Do any of you think that trading items will also be done on forums or websites?

I have not yet experienced this with other games, but I found quite a few forums and websites for other games that did offer a place to trade goods, outside the game.

I am unsure on how big of an influence crafting will be in GW2, but if it comes close to "craft to win" I see great potential in "trading websites" or forums. Ingame you can put things on the auction house, shout in trading channels but wouldn't it be profitable as well to be able to buy & sell 24/7 and have your goods "advertised" at any time?

I guess it all depends on the outcome of the crafting system, and the worth of the items you can obtain. But in most games I felt too restricted to the auction house, where the person that undercuts the most, gets the most profit, it gets so frustrating after a while. I would love to see combined crafting packages, "buy 2, get 1 for free", that would make trading so much more interesting. For that reason alone I would be a big fan of such websites or forums. Heck, I might even add a system to our site (itrader is very suitable for this).

Your thoughts?

External trading always feels like a grey area to me, to be totally honest.

In our current situation right now from my standpoint, many of the action gaming points and graphics have been emphasised in the game trailers we've seen so far over the craft and material system. (Although we did get that single crafting system trailer.) I haven't played Guild Wars 1 at all, but since this is a sequel it may adapt the successful traits of the material system in that game and push it here. Whether there is a material system in place for crafting or not, gatherables and other loot from foes outside weapons and armour is pretty much a fog area that has only room for speculation right now. If it is true that there are gatherables and such, (even the fact you could obtain hides and talons from creatures by killing and harvesting them as loot would appease me.) it would expand the trading factor much much more. Either way there is always an economy in an MMO, terrible or not, small or huge. It's not quite clear how Guild Wars 2 will qualify at this point in the game since no single person has played long enough to get a sense of establishment in the trading or economy area.

Regardless, I would actually like to see what you have proposed in terms of on-line forum trading. I would note though, that simply forum threads of 'want to buy' and 'want to sell' arn't very appealing because sometimes the reader never usually knows if the proposed item they wish to purchase has been sold by the auctioning party. I would like to see, out of a system like this, perhaps some kind of compulsory 'sell end date' and 'buy end date' added to each selected buyer/seller so we know if the item is still available to buy/sell or not. That's honestly my only posing problem with forum trading.

Overall though, it's really down to you. I imagine you have some method in mind about going about this, but I think its a good idea if Guild Wars 2 has a strong economy.

I have to admit this is not a subject I have given or ever will give much thought on. I’m not the type to earn gold or even attempt to. It’s never a point of interest for me. However while reading this the steam trading did come to mind. It’s a cross platform out of game method of trading. I can see this working well with things like forums and message boards. Where people can’t access the game but can access the Internet.

Wow let’s players see their auctions and mail on their official website homepage also. So we know it is possible to track and interact with in game functions out of game. If this is a feature that has a future I wouldn’t be surprised if A.net did something to cater towards it. More so now with things like the D3 Real Cash auction house coming into play.

Please note I fully understand A.Net would not condone such a feature, however it is still an out of game AH. As such could be applied in this situation.

I am not sure, but i am going to assume their smartphone app will allow auction tracking. A web (pc) based one would be only normal to have then.

When i've read the topic title, what came to my mind first was the Auction in Diablo III where it was said that we can use real money (paypal) to purchase.
Any thoughts on that?

I’m perfectly Ok with a real life cash auction house with games like Diablo 3, that are single player - lan based multiplayer games. that is their design focus. However in mmos where you’re in constant competition with other people I’m really against anything letting cash be a factor to success. So for GW2, no. I cannot and will not condone a real life auction house. Luckily enough Arena Net agrees with me because it would work against their company philosophy.

However, being able to trade from outside of the game, some web based application that lets you access both your inventory bank and the in game AH. I’m perfectly fine with that, it just means potentially people who enjoy working the economy can do so on their phone maybe. I see nothing wrong with that.

Originally Posted by Laida

Do any of you think that trading items will also be done on forums or websites?

Though there might be trading, due to the nature of wiki's, it will likely not result to the actual trading of recipes or even crafting items but rather more about what locations to get what materials on different parts of the map. Since multiple people can mine from the same resource without having to worry about using it up for another player, the information sharing will be strictly on how to best collect or find recipes. For crafters, this likely means alot of time in front of the actual crafts area since friends/guilds can give them materials to make the crafting without them physically moving anywhere.

As for aunction houses, rare items, amongst other things regarding this topic I really can't say I am able to give an opinion.

However, being able to trade from outside of the game, some web based application that lets you access both your inventory bank and the in game AH. I’m perfectly fine with that, it just means potentially people who enjoy working the economy can do so on their phone maybe. I see nothing wrong with that.

So like the WoW Action House mobile app?
I used that a lot :)

Exactly, that's a very apt and current example. See there are people who will use and take advantage of such applications and it will enrich their gametime. Not myself but as Erlook gives us an example in himself, there are clearly people who do and will