Cash Shop "gifting" comes to ESO

Iselin

From the PTS patch notes:

Crown Store Gifting
Beginning with Update 18, many Crown Store products (with the exception of Houses and Instant Unlocks such as Vampire bites) will be available to gift to other players!

It uses the mail system and not a secure trading interface. When you buy something in the Crown Store you now have two options: buy for yourself or gift for someone. If you chose gift mail is sent to the recipient with a link to claim the gift.

This is not all that unusual in MMOs these days and many let you just put cash shops items for sale in auction houses. It would be extremely naive to think that this won't be used for crown item for gold exchanges in addition to it's titular purpose, gifting.

But they're doing it in a way that is risky as hell since someone needs to go first: you give them the gold first or they gift you the item first. Scams galore will happen not unlike what used to be fairly common with gold for vampire or WW bite exchanges, but IMO this will be much more common since it's an obvious way to buy gold with a couple of intermediary steps... or maybe the high risk won't make it all that common?

What do you guys think?

Sovrath

Iselin said:

From the PTS patch notes:



What do you guys think?

I guess I'm more in line with "it's a gift". An actual gift.

Why would I buy something for someone I didn't know?

Still, you are correct, someone is going to convince someone else to buy them something because they are sooo going to help them x,y and z or and eventually gamer drama will happen.

I think people should only buy things for people they know/have known for a long time.

Otherwise, "let the buyer beware" or "get better/real friends".

Renoaku

Iselin said:

From the PTS patch notes:

Crown Store Gifting
Beginning with Update 18, many Crown Store products (with the exception of Houses and Instant Unlocks such as Vampire bites) will be available to gift to other players!

It uses the mail system and not a secure trading interface. When you buy something in the Crown Store you now have two options: buy for yourself or gift for someone. If you chose gift mail is sent to the recipient with a link to claim the gift.

This is not all that unusual in MMOs these days and many let you just put cash shops items for sale in auction houses. It would be extremely naive to think that this won't be used for crown item for gold exchanges in addition to it's titular purpose, gifting.

But they're doing it in a way that is risky as hell since someone needs to go first: you give them the gold first or they gift you the item first. Scams galore will happen not unlike what used to be fairly common with gold for vampire or WW bite exchanges, but IMO this will be much more common since it's an obvious way to buy gold with a couple of intermediary steps... or maybe the high risk won't make it all that common?

What do you guys think?

They should just allow items to be sold as is in game, but obviously, they are trying to prevent this due to what gold sellers could do.

And yeah scams could happen, but that is why you have to become known for not being a scammer, and the use of a 3rd party site could lead to bans if real money is involved outside so unless there is a legally binding agreement id think between buyer and seller for in-game currency that is a problem because either party can get scammed.

laserit

I know that when I gift, I'm not expecting anything in return.

Buyer and seller beware indeed.

Iselin

laserit said:

I know that when I gift, I'm not expecting anything in return.

Buyer and seller beware indeed.

Oh I know and used for its gifting purpose it's a nice thing. I could even gift myself (lol) since I have 2 accounts: one with a sub that accumulates crowns just from that and a second one that I never sub. I could use it to gift my mule account the thieves guild DLC for example, so that those mules can loot thieve's troves when they see them.

But we all know its use won't stop with gifting and the TOS has nothing to say about gift trading just like it has nothing to say about in game vampire bite scams - something that still happens although rarely these days.

Tiller

Time to make a female avatar


Yeah I'm kidding

TheDarkrayne

You're right. Gift trading will happen and they should just make a proper system for it if they insist on the gifting feature.

I'm all for people selling cash shop items for gold. I have tons of gold burning a hole in my bank.. literally like 50 million. I wouldn't mind having something to spend it on. Gold doesn't make you powerful in ESO. All the best items for builds are bound and earned through gameplay and it's easy to get top tier crafted sets. The only thing it might really affect unfairly is bidding for guild trader NPCs.

Gold selling is already happening a lot in ESO behind the scenes so they might as well bring it in house and gain more cash shop sales from it.

immodium

I just don't know why they implement what SWTOR does. Allow the majority of cash shop items BoE and tradeable on AH, or in the case of ESO, Guild Stores.

Just let the market decide how much they're worth and cut down on the scamming aspect.

Phry

Scammers will be all over this feature, thats about the only thing that is guaranteed.
Given how much deception goes on in these kinds of circumstances i would be very wary of 'trading' these things with people other than those you have known for a long time and is in the same guild as you, and i'd still be more than a little cautious even then.
It would have been best if Zenimax had implemented a secure trade feature, or at the very least a CoD feature to support the gifting one.
There is going to be a lot of arguments over this i am betting.

Scot

There is only one rule of Cash Shop, it always gets worse. ESO had the advantage of starting of with one that was not a game breaking P2W from the get go and it was not there at launch. But it does not matter where along that path you start, they inexorable get worse.

This does not take it further down that road at first sight, but it allows people to trade items they have paid for in game. Even though they seem to pay nothing for items, calling it "gifting" is an attempt to disguise what this is, and of course this is just how it stands now, as always it never stops here.

Phry mentions the ease of scamming, this will lead to calls for a more secure system and then Zenimax steps in and creates a secure fully featured trading system. Which takes them further along the route of bringing real money into the game and they got the players to ask for it. OK call me a cynic, but we have seen this all before.

BoA, bind on account is a good way of ensuring that items are not sold or traded and as we know the more you allow real money to influence a game the worse it gets.

ESO is still not even near the worst when it comes to cash shops as far as I can tell and long may it be so. But once you have one, the direction of travel is only one way.

Iselin

Scot said:

Phry mentions the ease of scamming, this will lead to calls for a more secure system and then Zenimax steps in and creates a secure fully featured trading system. Which takes them further along the route of bringing real money into the game and they got the players to ask for it. OK call me a cynic, but we have seen this all before.

Well, call us both cynics because that scenario occurred to me instantly as well

Renoaku

I think both BDO, and ESO should allow players to sell cash shop items for any price they want to with in-game currency (Supply & Demand) if people don't like it they don't have to buy or if its insane people wouldn't buy anyways.

Phry

Renoaku said:

I think both BDO, and ESO should allow players to sell cash shop items for any price they want to with in-game currency (Supply & Demand) if people don't like it they don't have to buy or if its insane people wouldn't buy anyways.

I have seen too often how that can get out of hand though, i think by limiting the value of items it prevents market manipulation by unscrupulous individuals, it has happened in other games after all, so while i would have preferred to have set my own value on items i put on the market place, i totally understand why they do things the way they do.

Renoaku

Phry said:

Renoaku said:

I think both BDO, and ESO should allow players to sell cash shop items for any price they want to with in-game currency (Supply & Demand) if people don't like it they don't have to buy or if its insane people wouldn't buy anyways.

I have seen too often how that can get out of hand though, i think by limiting the value of items it prevents market manipulation by unscrupulous individuals, it has happened in other games after all, so while i would have preferred to have set my own value on items i put on the market place, i totally understand why they do things the way they do.

Yeah I get you but who cares about Manipulation, or people who buy and resell I don't, given its a free 2 play game for example "Black Desert" you sell pearl packs, or Costumes worth $30 USD each are generally not worth so not many people even bother which makes the chance of getting the costume you want quite small having to deal with snipers and stuff unless you find someone to sell directly to you for a favor or something which is really hard to do.

But for example if a person wants to sell it for 1 Billion Gold I don't see what the problem is if no one buys it no one buys it big deal, people should be free to buy and sell as they please thus promoting sales of items on the market in BDO aka if people could sell a costume for 100-500 mil for a full package more people would be selling them and it would create a bidding war if many people did it of who sells for lowest price that's all nothing bad about it.

The problem though and the only problem is "Fraud" like in the game I really don't like to talk about people can commit fraud and Gift items in Black Desert, Warframe, or ESO to themselves, alts, or friends / other people and preventing that is the must because otherwise they get hit with lots of charge-backs other than this I see no problem with it.

^ This doesn't stop outside sellers or 3rd party sites from selling items as gifts though doing the illegal method but sure as hell makes it easy for GM to track.

To me having any type of limits on sales destroys a free economy something I am glad some games do not do like if a user doesn't like a costume someone selling for 1 billion in game gold, then just throw down $30 and buy it yourself, for example, no one forces another person to buy an item off an in-game market where it be BDO, or ESO.

Scot

Renoaku said:

Phry said:

Renoaku said:

I think both BDO, and ESO should allow players to sell cash shop items for any price they want to with in-game currency (Supply & Demand) if people don't like it they don't have to buy or if its insane people wouldn't buy anyways.

I have seen too often how that can get out of hand though, i think by limiting the value of items it prevents market manipulation by unscrupulous individuals, it has happened in other games after all, so while i would have preferred to have set my own value on items i put on the market place, i totally understand why they do things the way they do.

Yeah I get you but who cares about Manipulation, or people who buy and resell I don't, given its a free 2 play game for example "Black Desert" you sell pearl packs, or Costumes worth $30 USD each are generally not worth so not many people even bother which makes the chance of getting the costume you want quite small having to deal with snipers and stuff unless you find someone to sell directly to you for a favor or something which is really hard to do.

But for example if a person wants to sell it for 1 Billion Gold I don't see what the problem is if no one buys it no one buys it big deal, people should be free to buy and sell as they please thus promoting sales of items on the market in BDO aka if people could sell a costume for 100-500 mil for a full package more people would be selling them and it would create a bidding war if many people did it of who sells for lowest price that's all nothing bad about it.

The problem though and the only problem is "Fraud" like in the game I really don't like to talk about people can commit fraud and Gift items in Black Desert, Warframe, or ESO to themselves, alts, or friends / other people and preventing that is the must because otherwise they get hit with lots of charge-backs other than this I see no problem with it.

^ This doesn't stop outside sellers or 3rd party sites from selling items as gifts though doing the illegal method but sure as hell makes it easy for GM to track.

To me having any type of limits on sales destroys a free economy something I am glad some games do not do like if a user doesn't like a costume someone selling for 1 billion in game gold, then just throw down $30 and buy it yourself, for example, no one forces another person to buy an item off an in-game market where it be BDO, or ESO.

Renoaku this is about a fair playing field, keeping cash shop influence to a minimum, from other posts you have done I know you think MMOs need the opposite. If you look at the history of MMOs the influence of player money on gameplay and systems has not been a good one. But it has kept some MMOs alive that would have gone south otherwise, for me that is its only redeeming feature. As ESO is not in danger, I can see no excuse for this.

The difference between us here is as fundamental as PvE or PvP, your argument is not unreasonable but I for one will never agree.

laserit

Iselin said:

laserit said:

I know that when I gift, I'm not expecting anything in return.

Buyer and seller beware indeed.

Oh I know and used for its gifting purpose it's a nice thing. I could even gift myself (lol) since I have 2 accounts: one with a sub that accumulates crowns just from that and a second one that I never sub. I could use it to gift my mule account the thieves guild DLC for example, so that those mules can loot thieve's troves when they see them.

But we all know its use won't stop with gifting and the TOS has nothing to say about gift trading just like it has nothing to say about in game vampire bite scams - something that still happens although rarely these days.

The "gifting" just absolves Zenimax from any financial responsibility concerning players scamming other players.

Wellspring

THIS is why I don't play MMOs w/ cash shops.