What's wrong with trading?

It would unbalance the game even more. I have 3x of some HoTM and 0 of another (true story). One of my 5 alts pulled the missing HoTM with a free token (fake news - I don’t run alts, but I do know someone who claims to have 5, and 3 of them are higher level than I am). Now I trade with main.

If I have two of the three devices I play E&P (again true) next to each other I can set it up on both for the trade and get it done executed in under a second easily.

With all due respect this thread seems in line. The question is what’s wrong with trading and why can’t we have it. There are folks who are answering that question with their opinion, and others who have counter points.

Completely agree; I like this discussion. I’m just hoping it retains its distinctive flavor rather than going into the specific of trading mechanics, which is better discussed in the other thread.

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I just don’t think this is a real life situation. In order to get these HOTM you need to spend. If somebody spends on multiple accounts and then spends further for the tax everyone agrees on for trading, SG is just making money on this player and the player has made a mistake. Could’ve just spent those gems on the main account.

The scarcity of items and heroes creates value for those items/heroes (supply/demand).

Trading effectively reduces the scarcity thereby reducing the value.

This it what is wrong with trading from the game designer/business POV.

It really is as simple as this IMO.

If I’m SG, I don’t change this. What they have is working very very well at the moment and a change of this type could really upset the whole apple cart for numerous reasons.

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Apologies… I was just using mechanics to make a counterpoint to the fear of abuse of such a system.

As for the issue of reducing the value of heros, that is going to happen anyway as long as events and featured hero’s come back every month. We will se a fresh new batch off Guins very soon.

Here’s a scenario I expect we’d see a fair bit. I’m not sure whether it’s good or bad, but I expect this would be a frequent outcome:

Big spender Susan has her heart set on obtaining Kageburado from the Atlantis portal. 300 pulls later, she finally gets him. Huzzah! Along the way she got six Evelyns.

Allies of Susan, Chris and Bo, haven’t been luck enough to pull Evelyn with their accumulated epic hero tokens, but they do have a few spare 5* from their TC20s; Chris has an Obakan, Bo has a Thorne.

If Susan trades an Evelyn to Chris for Obakan, and another Evelyn to Bo for Thorne, then everyone’s happy: Chris and Bo now have a great HotM, Susan has the same number of 5*s for food as before and will also have two stronger allies in wars and against titans.

The loser in this scenario is SGG. Chris and Bo no longer feel as strong a need to buy some gems to try to get Evelyn.

Tangentially, it becomes very advantageous to belong to an alliance that happens to have some big spenders, who can dole out their cast-offs.

A similar scenario plays out with ascension items. Based on conversations with allies, I believe that most of us have plenty of 3* and 4* mats in aggregate, but that we’re missing certain key ones. I’ve got perfectly balanced D blade and Tome of Ts, but an ally has 15 ToTs but no blades. I have extra darts and rings, but could really use ten more tonics. If everyone in my alliance could put all our 4* mats into a pool and pull out the same number, choosing what we need, I’m sure we could greatly improve our position.

Who loses? SGG. Am I going to buy a tonic when it comes up on the calendar this month? You bet. If I could have traded out of my short position in tonics, would I still? Perhaps, but I’d have less appetite for it. It would benefit high-end alliances with a lot of depth.

PS: @Hazard just said in 40 words what I said in 200. This is about creating/relaxing scarcity. Lower scarcity = lower value = lower income.

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That was really well said, all have to lose on a PvP traiding mechanism, developers (in money) and players (in balance).

If you switch the PvP system in something more game related, we can talk about it.
But as @Kerridoc noted, this probably was covered in another thread.

Some of the issues of SG getting shorted can be covered by a transaction fee on trades. For Mats, SG has some idea on how much they want an item to be worth, charge 90% of that as a fee for a trade, or 110% percent because someone can get the Mat now and not later. Whatever, they point is they don’t have to be a loser for trading Mats.

Heroes is harder, I’m sure they have the some average number of $$ they except for specific heroes b4 someone can pull them. I suspect that maybe higher than most of us think, and I’m not sure they want to expose that number to us.

But the other aspect you talk about - the strong getting stronger and unbalancing the game more, I am worried about. And can you image the demand it would create to get into the training alliances of the top 30?

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Do you honestly care if someone trades between two accounts they own? I don’t understand why that’s such an issue?

Yes. It would totally unbalance things. Each account has built in limits on many things. Start to allow those to cross and you might as well take away all the limits for everyone. I’ve seen people do this in other games.

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Trading just by itself doesn’t benefit new players or anyone, not from a business perpective, otherwise it would have been implemented already. Trading makes heroes and materials lose value because there’s less incentive to buy when the availability of them becomes abundant. So how would SG make valuable heroes and still be in business? They could make even better heroes in the future (hence why I suspect power creep but that’s my opinion), really lower the odds of getting legendaries, or simply not allow trade.

Again, I’m open to trading if the right limitations are in place. I don’t want paying players to feel that their legendaries are becoming worthless to the point of quitting and feeling ripped off. I also want to see newcomers willing to pay, even just a little, because they see value in this game. I want this game to be profitable so it can strive. Having no trade seems to be fine for business at the moment. But in the future, having the right plan to allow trading with the right limitations can be beneficial.

The answer to the OP’s question is that trading can go wrong, but it can also go right. We just don’t know how its being executed. I feel a more interesting question should be, how can trading be a win/win situation between SG and its players? How should trading be executed without decreasing the value of its existing and future legendaries? Can trading enhance the player’s experience or will it backfire making the game dull quickly? How can we convince SG that allowing trade is beneficial for business?

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Do what exactly, because I’m so confused. Trading heroes between two accounts you own seems rather harmless. It’s like being upset that someone who owns both versions of a Pokémon game can trade with themselves between the games. Maybe I don’t get it, but I honestly feel like the opposition to this is pretty much from the “powerful” trying to maintain the “power”. This game is already terribly unbalanced, so adding trades would balance it out.

@Kerridoc, would being in an alliance with a big spender be beneficial, of course… if that person has a giving nature, but you would have to get to know them first, which is another aspect of the game that needs to be expanded. The social aspect. Also, to say that the two guys who didn’t spend as much or stop spending as much in hopes that someone else will pull an extra hero for them doesn’t make sense and is kinda impractical. If I spend my money to get two HoTM, odds are, I’m not going to trade. If I get some rare hero by chance that I don’t want, but someone else does, that’s when trading would matter. Your example is just too flawed because it is extremely specific.

@TheAdrian, those are some great questions to ask.

Now you probably are too much of a good guy and you can’t see how you can gain from this.

Let’s make a simply example: you running a single paying account. Let’s say your budget for that account is 100 $
Right after you open 10 different account that don’t spend a single penny. You just collect free stuff from that, like gems or coins.

Every time you want a hero, you use your budget to try for it. 100 $ can give what you want or not, it’s not so high but not low either.
If you obtain what you want, you simply keep collecting gems and tokens on the other account. Just waiting.
If you don’t succeed, you use all you gain with that 10 free accounts trying for it, and if you get it, you simply trade with the duples of the main account.

How is that suppose to be fair for Small Giant and other players?

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What you said seems overly complicated and takes all the joy out of playing for me. Again, this is a very specific example using a very specific kind of person. Most people wouldn’t go that far, just ask them, because that is incredibly… ambitious and borderline compulsive behavior.

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I fail to see revenue as an issue.

I am a big spender. Maybe not the biggest, but I have spent at least $150 (Usually $300)a month on just gems for pulls. The value of my heroes? $0.00

I already see my spending dropping because the value of pulls is dropping. I stopped doing elemental pulls long ago after I had all the S1 heroes I wanted. Event Heroes? I have those too. Im down to Atlantis summons for a chance of aHOTM I am missing (and there are only a couple I want), but mainly for the item chests.

Am I missing some heroes I would like? Sure, but none left that I am willing to spend big on. However, if there were a trade option, I could see dishing out $15-$30 to SGG to facilitate it. Im still going to do Atlantis pulls for matts and other players are going to still do hero pulls because you still need a hero to trade. If anything, it encourages pulls because it takes the sting out of getting those duplicates.

Thats really all they have to do. Find the average spent on pulls and charge that for a trade. No money lost on those that do pulls (because both heroes were already paid for or someone got lucky on a token). It would be like making money on each hero traded twice.

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For ten yes, you probably don’t find many people doing it. It’s really long and take time, still i’m sure someone will go that far.

I personally running 3 or 4 probably, if something like this take place.
And i’m really a lazy person.

Because criminals get involved and use the game to launder money.

The simple bottom line is…it would take money out of SG’s pocket, which they just won’t stand for.

Like it, detail with all the consequences