Since the change, I haven't sold anything as artisan or in any of five other trades, except what I could make from the stocks I had before the change went in, which are nearing depletion now. Whenever I've played the "you supply comms" thing that people here on the forum always hail as the best thing since changing underwear, there's no sale. If I, with puzzle points in villages and a merchant's ledger and six trades and relatives in the other trades, can't get reasonable prices on comms, my customers can't even more.

I made a key. And I donated some watches. But I made no profit from the key, the jerk didn't tip.

After not really having read the thread, I think that, by this point in time, the best thing we can do is cope with the commodity change rather than hoping that things would just rewind back to the prices we've all gotten used to. I note and appreciate the effort expended to standardize how the commodity market is capable to be manipulated by now, but I agree that designers have taken a considerable hit lately (what with the recent doubled commodity change as well as the now escalated commodity prices) and certainly hope that trades would actually be thrown a bone sometime in the near future.

Trades have taken a hit and have always been put back second to combat-related features from what I've experienced, and, wish as we might, this won't be changing for a bit yet, especially not in this September month. I'd say, besides letting things fester on here, to just start thinking of things that would need some tweaking, but would meld well with the current system rather than hoping things will just revert back. I know I'd personally adore addressing why it is a majority of design patterns are considered frivolous, obsolete and unneeded rather than being both pretty and utility-bound. Of course, this would all have tied in with a tradeskill report if it were voted on, but, you all already see the decisions there.

Anyways, long story short - things won't be rewinding miraculously back, I think. Best to just think of things that would coincide with the new system now so that it would benefit both sides of the problem rather than just the administration's pov. Maybe then, if we get the chance to, we'd be settled on things we'd definitely like to address in regards to trades as a whole rather than just continuously skirting around the problems we encounter right now.

/late night babble

Player reaction: Stop buying unnecessary frivolities. Most of the design tradeskills are now pretty much pointless. Fewer items made, everyone wins.

Except the people who spent 300cr learning trades and then all that gold on designing, but eh. They clearly should not have been so silly.

Everything costing 4x+ as much... hooray! The absolute cheapest novice blades possible costing 4k gold, woo!

You can ask players to cope. I don't think you can reasonably ask players to be happy, which is what these posts are about; there is much unhappiness floating about from this whole fiasco.

That's not really a good example. Whatever comms are being used here are averaging out at 32gp per. What is this witchcraft, Xenthos?

And why are trademasters still asking for more, different design types? It's almost enough to make a non-player think that nothing's all that wrong. If people are asking for pennant and flask patterns, then one might guess the number of frivolous items being made isn't going down!

Right now I'm just crossing my fingers and hoping that Paavik and Shanthmark actually produce cloth/leather in a manner sensible for the distribution of ewes/steers. Last weave was the first time it's made one bit of sense, and hopefully it will repeat tomorrow.

That's an idea. Novice weapons made entirely out of milk.

Wait, novice weapons? Oh, you did say blades. Why did I read that as novice robes? Time to layoff the comm quests.

That sword of yog hurt.

I am actually tempted to design a cheese-club now.

Design a proper carrot stick whilst you're at it too!

I'm still confused as to what prompted such a radical and detrimental change after six (6) years of designing and commodities being perfectly fine... There's never been a complaint about the comm/design system before this. Willy-nilly changes that upset the playerbase = bad game administrating

But it wasn't perfectly fine. There certainly were complaints or bug reports from those who saw sudden weird spikes or drops in both inventory and prices in the commodity stores. The fact is that there were bugs that we had been patching and putting band-aids on for years. We were at the point where we couldn't fix the encroaching commodity system bugs anymore without using "guesses" or "faking it" solutions.

This was hardly a "willy-nilly" change but rather a needed overhaul that we were dragging our feet on for a long time. (And it shouldn't have been exactly a surprise as I've been discussing it on the forums for awhile leading up to the overhaul.)

Without offense, what seems willy-nilly to us is that the base prices the villages were going off of seem to have been adjusted upward without much consideration given to the old prices, and we don't understand why.

Edit: Also, preemptive, I've heard before "Well it was broken before!" but that doesn't change the fact that the game economy and people's value of things is all based off the old "broken" prices.

ah alright. Well, I did come back right as the changes happened, so it was "sudden" to me. Thanks for the clarification.

We used the old prices. The broken old system may have been skewing things.

Look, the old system was broken and the new one has just been in a few weeks and we've been monitoring and tweaking it. Just give it time and it will be fine. I promise.

No one was ever paying 50 gold for cloth. The floor price for cloth was 15 or 16 depending on the village, and being produced in several villages, you could find it near enough this price with no problems.

By making the target price 50 gold, you're effectively tripling the cost to use cloth in a design, after already doubling the cloth requirement. People are not complaining because you took the time to revamp an ailing system. They're complaining because the cheapest greatrobes cost 6 times more than they used to, to make.

The problem is that the prices you stated are the base are not the old prices.

Not even close.

Doesn't really matter what they were 'supposed' to be, really; what matters is what they were for years and years, and that they are not that any more. They are multiple times higher, along with doubled commodity costs.

We've also been giving it time... it's still looking very scary out there.

Yup, they were the base prices in the old commodity system.

Regardless, as we may all be agreeing, lets stop dwelling on how the old broken system was trying to run things. Fixes are being made even now so give it time.

Yet the prices were never, ever that as an observed base. They were a fraction of that.

Essentially, it's hard 'not to dwell' on what the old system did because the old system's pricing was so radically different from the new one. The radical difference in prices is a huge issue.

It's also been given time, and as time goes on it seems to be settling at the prices you stated were the base... which is why there are still complaints. The new base is not the old base (as seen by us, the players using the comms).

Nobody is telling you the overhaul was a bad idea to do. We are just saying that (edit: as implemented) it's a massive increase in prices along with a doubling of comm costs...

I think the problem is not the old system/new system. It lies with the prices themselves (whether they were base line of the old system or not) and the increase of comms needed for designs.

Imo, it should have been New system put in place -> Increase of Comms needed for designs. It would've been easier to accept once people had been given time to adjust to the prices and thus could adjust designs and whatnot as needed. The fact that it was comm increase for designs -> new system placed means that things got really screwy. (Numbers are random, and not actual) The design that needed 60 cloth, which could be bought for 15 gold per, suddenly jumps up to 120 gold per. It is a pretty big leap up, and thus people are unhappy and it is taking a longer time for adjustments to be made (both playerwise and designwise).

Just my 2 cents.