[X] My Assistant

This one: [hvmarket.xyz] Manage Prices

Buy & Sell orders are listed in the order added, which makes them effectively end up in a random order compared to the "Canonical" order of the top page. It makes it hard to quickly find items you're interested in.

This one: [hvmarket.xyz] Manage Prices

Buy & Sell orders are listed in the order added, which makes them effectively end up in a random order compared to the "Canonical" order of the top page. It makes it hard to quickly find items you're interested in.

Sell orders are sorted by item ID, but yeah, buy orders weren't so... fixed that.

Sell orders are sorted by item ID, but yeah, buy orders weren't so... fixed that.

Works, thanks.

How do you feel about open-sourcing HVMarket so other people can add non-trivial features?

How do you feel about open-sourcing HVMarket so other people can add non-trivial features?

No, not a good idea.

Then what about letting specific people have access to help work on new features?

Then what about letting specific people have access to help work on new features?

No.

I don't think you understand the magnitude of the problem yet.

Hentaiverse is a free-to-play, pay-to-win game that attracts money to the site. Making your efforts more efficient within the game, or adding passive income, are things that have been carefully regulated. In order to attract and keep players, the game needs to be fun.

The HVMarket trading platform is a recent addition, and is incomplete. The susceptibility to arbitrage is a bug. Why would anybody run arenas for 7K credits and a chaos token, or pay money, when they know that Xeda is snarfing up millions in the background without having to play or pay? That's not the same as getting better drops or monster gifts because you earned it within the system. It does not fall within the envelope of normal player trading, and it only benefits one person.

As soon as two people are trying to do it, the profits stop. But Xeda then goes into overdrive trying to drive them away so he can go back to making millions unearned. Camping the exchange for no profits to make him earn it is not enjoyable for players, and does not add to the experience of the game. A parasite draining millions without playing or paying undermines product integrity.

A true proxy bidding system for the exchange would probably solve the problem. If you don't have the time to work on it, and don't want to let even one other person have access to the source, there is another option: The Monsterbation approach. Let the community develop one official trading bot userscript, features of which have to be approved in advance, which everyone has access to, and which is the only one that is legal to use. Then arbitrage profits would be minimized and people wouldn't have to camp like insane 12 year olds. Rewarding camping the exchange is a severe game design flaw; one that can be removed.

If people are trading in the forums, they can refuse to trade with someone who is creating a problem. The pre-sale anonymity of the current version of HVMarket shields bad actors; it makes it impossible to avoid selling to them, and infeasible to avoid buying from them. You'd have to return every purchase that came from them, and manually go through the players' shops looking for the next-best offer.

If this problem is ignored, it is going to start driving contributing players away from the game. For the vast majority of players who don't have a catgirl aura and over 800 million invested in monster lab, it's enough unearned profit to make them feel like suckers for playing properly. And he only has to earn it if we burn time uncompensated forcing him to earn it.

One person's exploiter of arbitrage is another person's market maker.

But it is true that the site's built-in markets all have a small trading fee specifically to be less susceptible to highly aggressive arbitraging, so the easiest solution is probably to just add a 1% trading fee to HVMarket, the proceeds of which could be spent on some sort of event or lottery or whatever.

Before we move into taxing things could I suggest something simpler by trying to merge the "buy" and "sell" sections of the market into one? There's no reason to be able to do both at the same time and doing so would leave individuals open to market swings if they're "on the wrong side" of the deals. At the very least it might slow down operations enough to not make it attractive anymore. Same suggestion for the hath and GP market.
Yes, as you can see I'm allergic to taxes (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

I would like people to be able to automate the tedious part of market-making, provided it can be done in a fair and non-disruptive fashion. There are enough time sinks already in the game. User time is a resource; if they burn it all camping, they won't use it on anything that actually contributes.

I think I'm still not getting across how this works to people who haven't already tried to be a market-maker too. I have credits; I'm willing to do it too. He goes up one credit, and so long as he is one above you, you can't buy anything. But automating bidding to your true maximum is not allowed. 100% of the profit goes to whoever is most willing to obsessively meat-bot, and none goes to anybody else. That is the problem. It's an artifact of the specific way the platform works, including the specific rules, and it's not very healthy.

I don't think a 1% tax would fix it. The spreads are frequently 3%, 6%, 10%, or more.

This post has been edited by Necromusume: Jun 13 2021, 12:02

Since it's the specifics that matter, I'll go through the whole process.

Stage one, the market is operating with a wide spread, because nobody else is bothering. We'll soon see why that is. In this stage, he can make millions easily without having to check often.

Stage two, someone else comes in and tries to be a market-maker too. As soon as he notices, he goes into obsessive mode, checking more and more often, going up 1c on them every time they adjust prices, so they can't buy. A notification script doesn't help, because he is willing to sit there and do it continually.

Once player 2 has bid-warred up high enough that the spread is no longer attractive, he drops to a large offer at 1c above the second-lowest price and waits. Player 2 now has to buy & sell with no profit margin continually, wasting time recycling items back to the shop, and risking losing money due to price movements. Meanwhile a large dump will still break through and result in profits for him. If they move down, he immediately starts it up again.

Stage three, they decide it's not worth their time, and leave. He goes back to making easy money with no competition.

The problem is not market-making, it's that the specific way the system operates allows the most obsessive player to shut out all the other market makers. It is dependent on other players operating out of pure spite to reduce his profits and increase his time spent at all. How is that a healthy system? A 1% tax wouldn't do anything since he's effectively forcing a large spread by periodically driving competition out.

Even if you drove him away with a concerted effort over a long time, the next monopolist would just replace him, because that's the dynamic the current system creates.

Since we are being told that real life is a poor example for Hentaiverse, I'm going to criticize it on game-design grounds and say that it's a poor gameplay experience to leave in a game.

...

Okay. I've been reading your posts fully, but I'm only going to answer this many points once, so please don't wall-of-text me again - I have more enjoyable things to do with my life than bicker over economic philosophy.

The capacity for arbitrage on HVMarket is not a bug, it's intended behaviour.

HV has a very small userbase. Prices are often set by the consensus of a handful of suppliers who can be bothered to run shops, and historically, everyone's gone along with that, without it reflecting any sense of supply and demand. We reached a point where you basically couldn't buy fox/owl/cheetah/protection bindings for a while because they were priced at about half of what the market would actually bear, and yet Bindings of Slaughter hovered around 90k despite the supply exceeding the demand enough that they've now dropped quite significantly to less than 60k.

The reason why I make this point is that our overall volume of trades is also very low, and for some goods, not even close to enough to reflect the actual state of the market. There can be entire weeks where there's no genuine demand for some goods. Resellers fill the gap between sellers trying to make a quick sale, and buyers that won't exist for some time yet. Everyone has equal opportunity to resell like this and part of the reason why HVMarket now uses an anonymized exchange interface is to remove the resale stigma.

The closest thing we can get to a 'fair price' for a good is the point at which both the buyer and seller are getting the least advantageous deal. Resellers tend to find these points faster, ensuring a 'fairer' price for all participants. You might want to argue that resellers make the market susceptible to price gouging, but that doesn't really apply in a market where no individual can control the supply - if they want to artificially raise the price, that means they have to keep buying out anyone who undercuts them... and unless they can sell large enough quantities to offset that (implying the demand exists with or without them for that amount of goods at that price) they're just going to lose money.

A parasite draining millions without playing or paying undermines product integrity.

HVMarket isn't a product. I make nothing out of it. I lose money running it, not to mention the uncompensated development time and ongoing user support.

If you don't have the time to work on it, and don't want to let even one other person have access to the source, there is another option: The Monsterbation approach. Let the community develop one official trading bot userscript...

Monsterbation is not comparable to what you're proposing.

But it is true that the site's built-in markets all have a small trading fee specifically to be less susceptible to highly aggressive arbitraging, so the easiest solution is probably to just add a 1% trading fee to HVMarket, the proceeds of which could be spent on some sort of event or lottery or whatever.

We had a 5% tax before - for about 6-9 months? - and it didn't work out. HV's active userbase, and the supply of most materials, is not really high enough for HVMarket to have persistent supply of almost any major good unless there's an extremely high participation rate. Many of the biggest suppliers - particularly from certain language communities where either HVMarket wasn't trusted as a tool, or where tax is considered theft for various reasons - chose not to use HVMarket until after the tax was removed. I worry that adding it back would just render it near useless again.

100% of the profit goes to whoever is most willing to obsessively meat-bot, and none goes to anybody else. That is the problem. It's an artifact of the specific way the platform works, including the specific rules, and it's not very healthy.

Have you considered that, for some people, trading and economy is more fun than the actual gameplay of HV? It's just a different way to play. Nobody is being forced to do the things you're describing.

HVMarket isn't a product.

I meant the whole game as a product. Like Blizzard disallowing buying Warcraft gold because they think it undermines the integrity of their product.

Have you considered that, for some people, trading and economy is more fun than the actual gameplay of HV?

Yes, certainly. And it's not possible for most people to participate. You try to buy for resale, you get shut out.

The capacity for arbitrage on HVMarket is not a bug, it's intended behaviour.

I get that. The problem is it turns into a monopoly on arbitrage.

Please don't wall-of-text me again.

It isn't possible to say everything in one word. I can't expect you to be aware of all the behavior the system produces when you're using it completely differently.

HVMarket isn't a product. I make nothing out of it. I lose money running it, not to mention the uncompensated development time and ongoing user support.

fwiw, i think you're doing a big service to the community and community should thank you. i just hope your losses aren't very big. otherwise, you may add a "donate" button for those who want to help you. it'll be chips, but better than nothing, no?

This post has been edited by Scremaz: Jun 13 2021, 15:23

But it is true that the site's built-in markets all have a small trading fee specifically to be less susceptible to highly aggressive arbitraging, so the easiest solution is probably to just add a 1% trading fee to HVMarket, the proceeds of which could be spent on some sort of event or lottery or whatever.

I like this idea, the trading fee actually could feed the events in the forum (If big enough maybe other events outside HV section)

We had a 5% tax before - for about 6-9 months? - and it didn't work out. HV's active userbase, and the supply of most materials, is not really high enough for HVMarket to have persistent supply of almost any major good unless there's an extremely high participation rate. Many of the biggest suppliers - particularly from certain language communities where either HVMarket wasn't trusted as a tool, or where tax is considered theft for various reasons - chose not to use HVMarket until after the tax was removed. I worry that adding it back would just render it near useless again.

Maybe what is needed to do first is some advertisement, so more people know about HVmarket?
Regarding the tax, perhaps if people know it is distributed in the community (like having a log) and not to one person, people don't give up?

(....)you may add a "donate" button for those who want to help you. it'll be chips, but better than nothing, no?

Also a good idea


This post has been edited by hgbdd: Jun 13 2021, 15:25

fwiw, i think you're doing a big service to the community and community should thank you. i just hope your losses aren't very big. otherwise, you may add a "donate" button for those who want to help you. it'll be chips, but better than nothing, no?

It's not really an expensive venture, it's more the principle of the fact that I'm paying money to be routinely told, by people who use it anyway, that it's not good enough because it's not perfect (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

Maybe what is needed to do first is some advertisement, so more people know about HVmarket?

The players that I was talking about knew about HVMarket and deliberately abstained. I talked to a number of people about the tax, and observed the various language communities (both on- and off-site) when gathering feedback. I also know from various metrics that HVMarket had, from fairly early on, pretty high acceptance among the overall active playerbase - it was just missing some of the most important suppliers, and some of the most important buyers.

Unfortunately, acceptance by the extreme players is everything, because we don't have enough volume to offset it.

Also, for what it's worth, I don't think a 1% tax would actually add up to that much, when accounting for the expected decline in trade volume.

i think hvmarket came to replace (whether intended or not) the trading on the wtb section and a bit less on wts. Or, at least, it had a great impact on the community. Now it has become a habit for most of the players sending their stuff there without even checking the forum, so i think it would be kind of unfair to tell people not to use market if they don't like it, even if it's just a few players. Tbh, before market's update, i used to pick who i was buying from almost all the time.
I hope this can be solved somehow (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

It's not really an expensive venture, it's more the principle of the fact that I'm paying money to be routinely told, by people who use it anyway, that it's not good enough because it's not perfect (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

Welcome to running things on the internet. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/duck.gif)

(I don't have strong opinion on this btw; some people do of course avoid using anything with even a minute trading fee if they can help it, but most people probably wouldn't be too bothered by 1% unless it was being pocketed. And if the spread is significantly more than 1%, then other traders are just being lazy.)

I like the HVMarket the way it is. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

It's extremely convenient and fast. Much better than opening your own WTS, or having to check the price in dozens of stores both in WTS and WTB. In my case, today I earn more and spend less than before I started using HVMarket. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/happy.gif)

About resellers, I believe that no mechanism is really effective to inhibit them. It's a "cat and mouse game". And I do not particularly care too much about it. Not creating a monopoly or cartel (with prices agreed between players), it's enough.