Archived Pricecheck Plugin

[Mecharic]

So, I was chattin with some folks on TS and we were all annoyed that there was no accurate judge for the price of an item. So, naturally, we watched trade to see what the item went for. In this case, it was a stack of iron blocks and it went for 12, with the seller stating the average was 14-18 silver I think. Anyway, the idea was as follows: a plugin that looks at every single chest shop on the server and gets the average price of an item.

After this, I thought on it a while and came up with some ways to balance the idea a bit. Since someone could just put a chest with an obnoxious price to scew the results, the plugin would need to drop any price that is more then say, 10 silver of the average price.

This plugin would be equally benificial to new players on massive and oldies like myself, and would also help stabilize the economy and prevent those dumb sudden drops in price of an item (like how diamond was runaway cheap). Here's how it helps:

You're a new player, first time on massivecraft. You actually read the tutorial, but now your in the mighty city of Regalia, bombarded by shops and stalls selling everything from dirt to whither skulls. So, you walk up to a shop and see that its selling steak for 1 silver a steak. You remember from the tutorial that there is a way to check the price of an item, and so one /pricecheck steak later you know that the value of steak, averaged out, is .97 silver. Thus, you know this shop is very accurate and not trying to extort you of your silver, and can buy it.

Now you've been around a few months, managed to get the 50 silver needed to rent a shop yourself but wait, you don't know the average price of nether wart?! Well, one /pricecheck nether wart later you know the average price for nether wart is .05 silver (meaning a stack would be 3.2 silver). Now you've got a bench mark for selling nether wart in your shop!

This is a plugin to help people of all levels of experience on massivecraft to judge the real value of an item. If people overall start to value an item more, the price WILL go up, regardless of the average (people will adjust shops or be out of stock, causing others to charge higher). This will, however, prevent sudden swings in price or two shops having drastically different prices. The downside is that less 'merching' will be possible, but that's a borderline scam (buying from a cheap guy and selling to an expensive one) and I won't miss it.

So, thoughts, opinions, realistic possibility of this plugin?

 

[favoured]

Sounds nice, it would be really convenient to have something like this on the server, so I didn't have to ask like a dozen people about the price of an item each time I want to buy something.

 

[Joshy54100]

I think it should use the mathematics of a box and whisker plot and only count prices within the inter-quartile range. Look it up if you don't know what I just said.

 

[ilublo]

If we were role-playing in another era, perhaps. Not knowing the price, and the fear of being taken add a lot to the game. Having to shop around is to be encouraged. Having to socialize and gauge potential for trust adds intrigue and (realism). Remembering getting stung by that first noobish purchase is a memory that builds character - in some that character will try to insulate new members while in others will take a bedeviling turn and attempt to con the next unweary soul who passes - this is to be encouraged! Within limits, of course. But to introduce a "cheat" into the game that would give you the ability to see the average price of an item insulates one too much of two of the finer processes in any game - including real life:

1. mistakes - this is how we learn and minecraft is a game that exploits the potential enjoyment in this process
2. being lost - ibid.
3. Sharing the first two with others - communicating with others leads to friendships, alliances, enemies, repair, growth... etc.

I argue that a plug in for determining prices is not inline with the spirit of this role play server.
Rather, write a book - or start a forum thread - where you report on the current trade deals going down. Yeah... it could be a section in the daily creeper. The business section. I know there already are books for sale that help ease people into making sound business decisions...

 

[Mecharic]

I think it should use the mathematics of a box and whisker plot and only count prices within the inter-quartile range. Look it up if you don't know what I just said.

Click to shrink...

Translating from Smarticus to Dumbicus:

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Translated: It will take the all the numbers and eliminate anything that is too far out from the average/most common (forgot which).

 

[Grailen]

Eh this is a logical idea from a modern standpoint but in practice why would people just walking around be able to magically know how much some things worth? (Not to mention this reminds me of the very old plugin here which allowed items to be sold with a /command remotely at fixed prices.)

 

[EyebrowsJ]

Translating from Smarticus to Dumbicus:

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Translated: It will take the all the numbers and eliminate anything that is too far out from the average/most common (forgot which).

Click to shrink...

Median. I'll give an example:

Lower Extreme: lowest
Upper Extreme: highest
Lower Quartile: halfway between median and lower extreme
Upper Quartile: halfway between median and upper extreme
Median: middle amount

 

[yendor46]

The price of an item will always be what people are willing to pay for it. You want a plugin to give us that value. If that were the case then everyone, wanting a good deal, would only buy if the price were lower than what the plugin said. This would drive prices down and wreck the economy. Now there is a trade off between fast and easy and knowing you got a good deal.

 

[Imboring56]

I would like to point out another viewpoint, even though I do not entirely agree with this:

In Regalia, I see many overpriced shops. And not just by 20 copper, but 5 silver. The people that sell diamonds for 5 silver end up getting super rich while the poor players think that it is worth it. Thus, they continue to buy diamonds at that price, if not from the same shop, going bankrupt and feeling stupid at the end.

I get the idea of compeition, but most new players do not wander past the first few merchant houses before buying something. Usually, the people sitting next to the spawn get the most customers, and if their stuff is going for a lot of money, they are not familiar enough with our economy to get items at market price. As such, this locks them into a habit of buying overpriced. Believe me, I know. I always buy 1 silver a stack carrots from Thortuna's stall when I know I can find a double chest of them somewhere. :I

However, I disagree with this: It shouldn't give you the average price. Instead, it should be like this:

/price top <item>

This way, they don't find the average price, they find the best prices. This encourages compeition for sellers to remain on the list of maybe 5 to 10 people. Also, you could configure it to whatever you would need, so any item or ID could be typed in. Finally, it encourages RP because people usually hear about good deals through the general public, so you wouldn't know the complete average price, but you'd know the best prices and the areas to look around. Also, when people are selling in trade chat, they can say that their price for <item> is <number> on the /price top list.

This ends my rant for now. Discussion commence.

 

[Rooseus]

No, no, no...

 

[Jomdorr]

No player with expensive items will like this idea most wealth is generated by ripping players off

 

[Mecharic]

No player with expensive items will like this idea most wealth is generated by ripping players off

Click to shrink...

And then half these poor saps quit because they don't have any silver.

An alteration to the idea: Perhaps it only works for shops within a certain distance of you? For example, all shops within 4 chunks of the player and it gets the average of that. Some areas are going to be more expensive then others, really, so it shouldn't do too much to alter the economy.

 

[Grailen]

This just seems like another of the "People are quitting because this game isn't easy enough" arguments.

 

[Austinrules13]

The only reason the economy was getting better was because regalia shops are selling things more expensive and they would sell a lot then the items's value got better because the shop owners run out of a particular item(diamonds for example). And most of this starts with new players buying things. If they know the prices, then it ruins it. Regardless of this is the fact that regalia shops wouldn't be worth getting since you will get less money from it if this was implemented. The poor saps are responsible for their silver Just like everyone else. If they decide to spend all their silver and quit,then that's their issue. Telling them the prices of items wouldn't do anything since they would spend all their silver anyway. Shop owners would price their things as the same as other shop owners. And this would just make the people with shops closer to spawn make money. While the rest earn none. It's a well thought idea but in the long run I think it wouldn't be beneficial..

 

[Nordhbane]

I like a Median solution plugin, and I would like it even more if it checked and disregarded a value if a chest was empty. That way low prices would actually be removed from the calculation and the prices would go up when the supply gets low. I see a lot of cheap shops that sell stuff under value, but they are naturally empty most of the time.

A plugin like this would benefit the market as a whole and serve to inform the population about value. I have seen a lot of chest shop owners that will either go bankrupt because they sell too cheap, buy too high or overvalue and not sell at all. Half the merchant district is empty as it is, and I think one of the main reasons are very skewed economics. But also because the rental prices makes it very hard to get enough income to get anything after the month is up.

A plugin like this would also increase the incentative to go explore more than just the first few shops because you know that there might be somewhere that there's a better price than where you are.

That being said, I think shop owners need to take the responsibility to go look at prices themselves. Why would you put up a store where you're buying items for more than what people are selling them for in other shops? That is pure ignorance, and will put you out of business faster than you can say bankruptcy.

 

[ApatheticLlama]

I like this idea, but I think it shouldn't give you an exact pricetag. I would keep it within a 3s margin, as I believe haggling is a large part of commerce. While there are shopkeepers pushing wares for 4x their value, there are other salesmen who also like to work for an extra few silvers out of their trades, within reason of course.

 

[Mecharic]

So, the final draft of this plugin is as follows:

• Uses Box and Whisker Plot to determine the average value, only taking whats inside the box.
• Shows a value ranging from 3 silver below to 3 silver above (could be random?)

Or just don't have a plugin...

If an admin would be so kind as to post in this thread, just their thoughts or the servers thoughts?

 

[MonMarty]

I like the possibility of getting a couple of my alts together and spam buying diamonds for 1 copper, thus pushing down the average price of diamond trough false market mechanics.

I don't see how this is anywhere near to a good idea.

 

[Leon Vill]

You could find the standard deviant of the price, and limit it to a range of about 5 silver. Then, you find the mean of all the products that fall within that standard deviant's range. There you go, problem solved.

 

[MonMarty]

That's a lot of logic and anti abuse coding for fairly little gain.

 

[Mecharic]

Fair enough. I asked admins for opinions and now I have these opinions. Thank you for replying to the thread

Since it seems this idea will not be approved this thread can be closed.

 

[MonMarty]

I see the point of it, and I like it, but in my opinion it would ruin the game for a lot of roleplay and non roleplay merchants trough the use of a metagaming tool.

With that statement and request,I will lock it.