Diablo 3's auction house is a factor in item drop rates.

[Kahunaburger]

Taking a wild stab I'd say most of the people complaining in this thread a. haven't played the game or b. have played the game very little. It's incredibly obvious. I don't why people are going ape shit over this. The auction house is beneficial for the players, it creates a massive marketplace where people can trade items easily.

Basically the same reason why people dislike Farmville's (similar) business model - giving players a skinner box with an option to fork over IRL cash for an appetitive stimulus is pretty fucked up.

 

[Kahunaburger]

I don't think I understand. If the loot drop rates are too high then everybody gets the best gear too quickly and there's nothing left to do in the game.

Yeah, then the game would have to rely on things like "being fun" and "having good gameplay," or nobody would want to play it!

 

[loa]

You can buy items with in-game gold. Right?
You also don't need retarded amounts of it akin to the influence points in league of legends, do you?
And even if you do, you can sell your own items for those large sums of gold then.
Not seeing the problem here.
Not seeing why you wouldn't want to use the non-real-money auction house.

It IS part of the game.

 

[WoW Killer]

I did some quick searching and found the original quote

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5150112701?page=2#33

Thanks. Looks like there's a big announcement tomorrow so we'll have to see.

Yeah, then the game would have to rely on things like "being fun" and "having good gameplay," or nobody would want to play it!

No real change from Diablo 2 to be honest. Clicking and loot is what the series is about.

Idunno, it's never failed me, and it removed a fuckton of grind. The game was only dropping level 15 weapons by the time I hit 30 so I just went onto the AH and bought some rares, all while giving the grind the finger.


The RMAH can go fuck a rusty railroad spike, but the gold AH is a godsend and a half for people who fucking hate grind. I'll let some other poor dumb bastard grind away for a pointless boost of a pointless inventory stat.

Something else I've been wondering: there are no bind on pickup/equip items in this game. Once you grow out of an item, be it magic, rare, legendary, you can stick it back up for auction. Unless you vendor that item it'll stay in the economy, and yet every new drop is a fresh addition. Surely before long the market will be so saturated with cheap loot that I can't imagine anybody handing over real money for gear.

 

[WoW Killer]

Having account-bound shit in a single player game would start riots I think.

Giving away free puppies would start a riot in the gaming community at the moment

But do you really think soul-binding would meet much resistance? I'd have thought it was a better way to deal with market saturation than fiddling drop rates. Right now there's only the blacksmith and repairs as money sinks (other than the hackings I guess; inb4 conspiracy theories). Even the gems aren't really a resource given that you can take them out of slots.

 

[yaydod]

Question to everyone who instantly jumped on the "because the AH is a factor in how loot is dropped they are doing so to make it impossible to not use the AH to gain money from you"

2 questions.:

A:
Where is the evidence for this assumption.
"I wonder if there's anything stopping Blizzard from lowering a drop rate to zero, waiting for that particular item to increase in demand, then selling it themselves under the disguise of a normal player for 100% profit when the RMAH hits. This works with the gold auction house as well because it is possible to buy and sell gold with real money."
While it is a possibility, it is still only speculation. Is there any evidence besides the actual possibility of them doing so?

B:
How does crafting factor into this?
A large amount of the loot on the AH is crafted. You cannot adjust that drop rate.

Well for A i cant really say but I would not be to surprised about it.

For B: To get the components you need to "destroy" magical and above gear to get the stuff but they give 2 of that maximum.
Then to craft you need some thing around 40 of those components + allot of gold and on higher difficulty's you need some thing like 6 "forge page" to craft them which is kinda a rare loot (i would say it is around the same drop rate as the gold items).
After all that you are not even sure to get a decent item for your trouble since all the stats are random and in my opinion their must be some thing about not giving the right stats since once i crafted 6 times in a row for better armor but only got the wrong stats and bonuses for other classes.

So yes I think Blizzard rigged their game so that the AH is a necessity or a very very tempting option to get some thing decent, which is sad.
Personally i will not buy from the AH because i do not like the idea of and i prefer to trade with my friends.

 

[miketehmage]

I'm enjoying the game.

I haven't looked at the AH. Doubt I will. And if I do, it will be on the GOLD auction house.Not that I have a problem with the RMAH for other people to use.

Also, blizzard should be taking a cut of the profit, they are the ones enabling you to make ANY money from this AT ALL.

These companies produce games to make money. That's how capitalism works. If they can make money from something, they will.

I suggest you start getting over it.

 

[MetallicaRulez0]

I knew something like this would happen. Always-on + Auction house = Disaster. It is unacceptable. I can't believe more than 6 million PC gamers were dumb enough to buy this game.

Right? HOW DARE WE buy things that are entertaining for us.

It looks bad from the outside, but personally I'm a fan of D3. I'm not going to speculate on what may or may not happen with the RMAH until it's actually released, which at this point looks to be a few months down the road. It is entirely possible that they'll post items themselves for more profits. This is Blizzard after all, the same company selling mounts for $25 in WoW.

 

[evilneko]

Y'know, I'm sure glad I didn't buy this steaming turd. After all that I've learned I wouldn't even waste the bandwidth and disk space to pirate it, when it is inevitably cracked.

 

[Kahunaburger]

These companies produce games to make money. That's how capitalism works. If they can make money from something, they will.

Nobody is saying "there oughta be a law." People are saying "Blizz released a shitty product and we would prefer if they released a less shitty product."

 

[miketehmage]

These companies produce games to make money. That's how capitalism works. If they can make money from something, they will.

Nobody is saying "there oughta be a law." People are saying "Blizz released a shitty product and we would prefer if they released a less shitty product."

Well... thats just like..... your opinion man.....

What I'm saying is that it is subjective. I for one am enjoying the game. It was what I expected from diablo and I don't feel like the AH is impacting my game at all.

 

[Verzin]

I've been whining about this crap in DIII for about a week now. I ended up deciding that I just wouldn't play Blizzards games anymore. Too much grind when they've removed so much of what made DII fun. Item drop rates and value in DIII are bullshit, and that's not the only thing. They've also changed an awesome skill system to a extremely mediocre one. the skills in DIII just aren't as much fun as the old system.