The Problem with the Official Runescape Forum (long)

[Adam007]

For those who aren't up to date with the whole market of runescape, there is a problem right now. It isn't clear to everyone, but there is a definite problem, at least in my opinion and view on things. This has nothing to do with the forum itself. It's nicely set up and all - it just has quite a bit of bad side effects, which I'll get to now.

 

 

 

#1: Market price controls. With the forum being introduced, slowly there became standards for all items. And from that, the highest bidder would get the item. And everyone in runescape would know what that highest bid was. It in turn made a lot of items go up in price, specifically herblaw materials. Remember when you could actually buy ranaars 3k each? With the runescape forums being introduced, everyone had to compete with everyone.

 

 

 

#2: Merchant/Economic Impact. No longer could merchants make quick little deals off of people who didn't know the exact price of something. Everyone would just dart to the runescape forum, and sell in game close to the max it went for. Because of that, merchants didn't have a wide margin to resell the item at, forcing the price up even more. I'm not saying the margin is gone - it has just lessened and is more rare to find a margin. I'm also not saying people not knowing the price and getting 'ripped off' is a good thing to occur, just that it was a cause of a section of merchanting lost, and another price control. The economy almost in a way turned socialist instead of capitalist, with controlled prices for everything. Sure, jagex didn't set them, but the forum pretty much did. You had to compete with one source - the richest players, or be forced to buy in extremely minute amounts. Otherwise you just couldn't get items in any decent amount of mass.

 

 

 

#3: Manipulation. Right here is the biggest problem caused, effecting and changing how the rares economy would be forever. By using the forum and taking advantage of how many people read it, some merchanters became extremely corrupt. They would form groups, and choose a particular party hat, and make fake posts all over the board pretending it to buy it higher than it was worth. That would make the hat go up a lot, and surprisingly was extremely successful for them. People were almost certain that it was just the party hat going up naturally for awhile. Anyways, after the hat ran its course and peaked, the group would then sell all of theirs to quench the demand, and then they would force the hat to fall once more, often rebuying it for millions less later in the day. The once stable (except for the dupe) party hats now were going in cycles of manipulation. There would be a targeted hat, it would rise, and it would fall. People caught on, but couldn't do anything. It became a domino effect. People would freak out, and inevitably the prices of the party hat would fall greatly, like a snowball rolling down a snowy hill, until it exploded and hit bare minimum. The problem isn't as big now as it used to be because people caught on to it and it isn't as exploitable anymore, but it is still done.

 

 

 

Another big problem with the fake posts were the discussion posts. In a rares forum, there were tons of discussions about party hats(and other stuff), which directly influenced the hats prices in addition to the fake posts. People would spam both ways trying to convince buyers/sellers to do something, which shouldn't happen. There aren't enough forum moderators to watch over and lock those, which almost looks like Jagex doesn't even recognize the problem.

 

 

 

The Solution

 

 

 

Well, I just ranted on for a long time about just some of the problems caused by the forum. Again, I'm not saying that it's a bad thing itself. It helps people sell things, obviously, is great for checking prices, and has probably been extremely useful to everyone on this forum, which is why I'm expecting some disagreeing opinions from the people who actually took the time to read through all of this.

 

 

 

But here is how things could be changed for the market part of the forums. Instead of allowing so discussion, there will be a simple system that could even be implemented into the game instead of the forums. You would just have a few drop down selection menus depending on which section you were selling/buying in. You would choose from the drop down the item you were selling, the price range, and how many of it you wanted to sell. From there, people could easily search and get great results. Possibly they could check their name there if interested in the deal, which could even send an alert to the person in game if develeped by jagex enough. Possibly there could be a few lines left for comments by the seller to further explain the deal, but there should be a limit only allowing a few words if even allowing anything. That would get rid of a large portion of manipulation and discussion which shouldn't be influencing the market. It wouldn't fix anywhere near all the problems I listed, but at least it would help the rares economy and scare away some of those people who only made money through manipulation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anyways, that's about it. I'd love to hear comments or adjustments you think should be made about my ideas.

[Duke_Freedom]

Well, I don't agree that the official forums made the margins of items smaller. In fact, margins of things like p hats have never been as big as they are nowadays before, although that might be caused by the weak stability of p hats nowadays. I think the difference between margins nowadays compared to about one and a half year ago is that there now are more players, thus also more merchants all in the same markets: this leads to smaller margins. These smaller margins don't necessarily mean less profit though, as the general player base grew a lot too, so merchants nowadays just sell MORE of an item for a little less profit per item, getting the same profit results as before.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As to your suggestion: I've always thought about something among that lines. Many other mmorpgs have a auction-type of system, and thats basically what you promote. I would take your suggestion a little further and actually let trades take place for pure gp via that system.

[TheWereWolf]

Lets see with one post, you have lowwered my opinion of the tip it events team.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Let me simply, direct u to line 2: buying stuff off noobs who dont know any better, is a cheap way to make gp.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2nd if u put forward the time it is very easy to make money in rs and collecting herbs has never been easyer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

99% of what u have presented, could be simply taken care off if u did the training urself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As for making gp simply do what i did look at where u can make gp in rs. There's the new barrow in rs take the next 2 weeks and collect and sell it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

personal got 85 slayer a month after it came out, collected a few whips gp solved.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

kills me when people only, gripe truely is they have to work hard for something.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Also the key reason rares are going up so much is more people playing rs, as well as with all the new stuff everyday, those who do the work get fast easy cash.

 

 

 

more gp out there, more prices will rise.

[Adam007]

"Let me simply, direct u to line 2: buying stuff off noobs who dont know any better, is a cheap way to make gp."

 

 

 

I made it clear that I didn't actually stand behind that being a good thing to do. I was just saying for merchanters it wiped out an area of merchanting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"2nd if u put forward the time it is very easy to make money in rs and collecting herbs has never been easyer. "

 

 

 

I was talking about buying herbs in mass. If you want to take that route, you have to outbid the richest players out there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"99% of what u have presented, could be simply taken care off if u did the training urself."

 

 

 

You took my thread the wrong way. The main problem I was presenting was manipulation. To the side, I was mentioning how the richest runescape players have such a market control.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"As for making gp simply do what i did look at where u can make gp in rs. There's the new barrow in rs take the next 2 weeks and collect and sell it."

 

 

 

Who is that directed to?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"kills me when people only, gripe truely is they have to work hard for something."

 

 

 

This was in no way a gripe. It was saying problems (in some people's eyes) that the forum lead to, and a way to change the forum to get rid of the problems.

[TheWereWolf]

I may be the one in fault as to the way i took it at face value, but really, items like u stated "herbs".

 

 

 

While yes the prices have gone up majorly on these and rares.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Herbs u can gather hundreds by killing, druid, banshees, chaos druids, ect.

 

 

 

Actually with slayer and the metal drags, the pots are in a highly increased demand.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Basicly the way i look at prices is the increased number of people in rs.

 

 

 

I dont look at the rs forum as a dictating factor in the prices of items.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A couple of the bigger traders, actually where putting out buy santas now at 750k about 3 weeks ago because they would be going up soon.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The larger traders on rs have a bigger factor on rare prices than the rs forums do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tip it itself I would say has a large part of the blame since, free side cant post on rs forums. which is still where u will find the most ores and crafting items such as cow hides.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

People will look at what one person will buy at a overprices value, and hold out till they get that price or close to it, hence driving up the price.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I look at not only tip it as a factor, but will not list the other larger trading forums out there in tip its forums.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No one will ever do away with trading forums completely so this will always be a issue.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I just dont see the piont, when rs prices will continue this way until people find a easy way to get something, i.e. the regular items.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Or they make rares none tradable, or do a redrop of them. Sorry to say i cant blame the rs forums for that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Those my biggest issue really is they game it's self since in rs2 it is so much easyer to lvl and make money.

[Lode]

Here's my problems with the RS forums:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-Not fullscreen but in a frame

 

 

 

-You can't refresh them because that brings you to the main page

 

 

 

-Very lacking search function

 

 

 

-No direct link "view your posts"

 

 

 

-Very lacking functionality overall

[inureface]

And we have most of the merchants to thank for this :D . Lets give them all a warm round of applause! :o Then we choke them all

[Adam007]

Thewerewolf, about what you mentioned other forums having an effect just like runescape. That part I disagree with. Things were fine with people used tip it and other fan sites because they were separated, and because of that, there wasn't one controlling price for everything. And the main thing that fan forums have over runescape's is that discussion is locked, and there isn't such manipulatoin here except for a few fake posts, but tip it or any other forums never really had a bad effect. They were very useful for buying/selling in mass, and contributed no problems at all to the game like the rs forum did.

[TheWereWolf]

lode,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-Not fullscreen but in a frame

 

 

 

dont see where this effect anything but looks

 

 

 

-You can't refresh them because that brings you to the main page

 

 

 

simple just hit go back to forums works the same.

 

 

 

-Very lacking search function

 

 

 

Strong agree

 

 

 

-No direct link "view your posts"

 

 

 

check the top there is and has been a view ur posts.

 

 

 

(will not be there if it has gone past page 50 and dropped off)

 

 

 

-Very lacking functionality overall

 

 

 

functions past no way to sit on a post and just refresh it, work decently.

 

 

 

basic design looks ugly.

[elk]

You'v drawn all of these problems to everybody's attention but what do you say we do about them? Their isnt much that we CAN do except have the main forums deleted, which with any matter of ranting will NOT happen... :-(

[Adam007]

You'v drawn all of these problems to everybody's attention but what do you say we do about them? Their isnt much that we CAN do except have the main forums deleted, which with any matter of ranting will NOT happen... :-(

 

 

 

I did say what we should do about them. It's bolded as The Solution. :lol:

[Eric2203]

Lode,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-Not fullscreen but in a frame

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The frame doesn't bother me, but the width of the window doesn't use the full frame.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-You can't refresh them because that brings you to the main page

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There's a refresh button at the top of every forum page. It looks like a couple of arrows turning around each other.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-Very lacking search function

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yep, despite the thread finder.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-No direct link "view your posts"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Profile, accessible from main page, but it only holds last 10 posts (not threads) and they disappear if the thread is past page 50.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-Very lacking functionality overall

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yep, but safe because of that and interfaced to your player's name. Wouldn't mind some basic text effects though.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Werewolf, sorry for repeating some of what you said, but I had a few things to point out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As to the issues raised here, I somewhat agree. But other fan sites have the same problem. Can't say it's less important here than on RS forums. Just less people use the fan sites for merchanting I guess, but that doesn't mean they don't use the official forums for reference. So the problem is simply transferred.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes they need to change the whole market system there. For one, it's insane how fast the official forums move. Can't keep track of anything. However, even with a drop down system, you could still set a high price range, have a friend reply and pretend he bought it and you end up with the same problem: others start to follow and the prices go up.