Alternative trading systems

[Malicious]

Sounds similar to what I had in mind. I assume items up for trade would be visible even when the seller isn't online, correct?

Let me repost my reply to JEB90's post from another thread here as well. In my reply I touched upon the possibility of keeping the AH, while improving the drops and why I think that wouldn't help things:

Yeah it should persist while offline. Though 1 thing I thought up later on which might be a problem is that if everyone has trade posts up, it could potentially be many pages of trades to sift through... and it could be even harder to search for rares. I guess u could add some sort of filter to excludes posts that don't have items with certain stats though.

An alternate setup could be an interface where u can list all the items u have for trade, and also where u can setup a wants list. Then to do the trade... when person A sees that person B has something he is after, A can offer a particular trade to B who would then get a confirmation window. B can accept, decline, counter-offer, or msg the other person to discuss the trade. Basically what would normally happen on trade forums like this, except with a proper in-game interface.

 

[Ev_]

Glad to see a thread trying to focus on how to make trading better instead of debating the AH removal. I had posted this the day the news broke, but I'll repost here since it's relevant and also very much along the lines of the systems already proposed here.

Implement an "I'm looking for" trade system that behaves like so:

• You open a UI that lets you log entries as "I'm looking for a [level range] [rarity] [general or specific item type] that has [up to three specific affixes]" or "I'm looking for [quantity] [commodity]."
• After specifying, you optionally state either the max gold you're willing to pay, or "trade only."
• In your inventory/stash, you can mark items you have as available for trade, and specify the minimum gold you're looking to receive, or "trade only." These items continue to take up space in your inventory, forcing you to be realistic about what is worth trading.
• The game trade engine scans for potential trade matches, and provides you with a list (~5 max) of options for each thing you're looking to acquire.
• If you see something you like, you contact the seller through the trade UI, and they get a notification.
• If they accept, you both get temporarily portaled to a trade game or something where you conduct a "face to face" negotiation and can show off other items you have (no restriction on only completing the marked transaction).
• When you exit, you get put right back where you came from.
• If you don't like any of the options presented to you by the trade engine, you can clear them and your request will go back into the trade engine queue (10 minute wait time?)

If done well, the trade engine could be really smart. If you're looking to trade items, it could prioritize or even flag matches for you if you have something that it knows the seller wants. If it's a gold-based transaction, it could match up people whose min/max gold ranges leave some room for negotiation (Seller wants at least 200K, buyer is willing to pay up to 400K. Put 'em together and let 'em talk it out. Odds are both come out with a win.)

 

[ADest]

I think a voucher system would be good. Someone, fan created a patch and posted about it on the Blizzard forums a while back with his idea for a trading house. He also posted later a different patch idea that offered tiered legendaries. Even had achievements that would be unlocked by finding stuff like a Grandfather sword. I like the idea of combining both into a voucher system. Say you just found a Grandfather and unlocked the achievement, but what you really want is a Windforce. Let's say both are considered Tier 1 items. You could post your Grandfather on the Trading House, and get a Tier 1 Voucher, which you could then use to trade for any other Tier 1 items on the Trading House, be it a Windforce, or whatever. The vouchers themselves would be account bound, so people could trade fairly, without worrying about getting ripped off, and never even have to talk to anyone. It would remain anonymous like the AH. Could probably even use the same interface. The only catch would be making sure everything really is placed into equal tiers.

 

[BohemianStalker]

Make a big town with limit of 1000 active players.
No PK, no duels, no mobs.
/merchant makes a little 1x1meter shop, you have 20 slots, you can put items in the shop, people can see them when they point on you
you can set message which will autorepeat every 15 min to 100closest people.
You can make it to repeat faster or to reach more than 100 people..that will cost gold/hour
other players can walk to different little shops and check what people have.
trading will be slowed by 100x but still 100x faster than some wtb wts ****.
You can also make weapon selling special towns, armor special...
your shop can be on even when you are offline, but that will cost gold too(muchh better goldsinks...)

 

[BRKO]

Rather complex solutions presented in this thread.
Im looking forward to making business via the trading subforum again like in d2 times.

 

[trocadero]

Rather complex solutions presented in this thread.
Im looking forward to making business via the trading subforum again like in d2 times.

http://youtu.be/uZ_y4H-Epto

Set and Legendary Items are soulbound (40 seconds in). If two people are in a game, then you can trade them for a limited period of time before the item binds to your account.

Add that fact to their insistence that rares are not going to be nearly as powerful as legendaries and sets, and they've de-facto killed trading, wholesale.