Making the General Store useful again?

[DragnFly]

There was a point in time before unlimited store inventorys, the grand exchange, and trade limits that people frequently used the general store.

 

 

 

Looking thru the store, you never knew what you could find. A bargain on afew lumps of coal, afew uncut gems at a steal.

 

 

 

But now... prices paid to players are the old prices, whereas prices sold at higher than even their grand exchange counterparts.

 

 

 

Why?

 

 

 

By doing so, you have effectively rendered the general store useless for anything than dumping junk. Even in regards to junk, why would they sell their junk there now when they can almost always get more on the grand exchange? Why would anybody buy a thing there, when it costs alot more?

 

 

 

I think that the general stores, in peticular the player stock section, need abit of a tweak. Giving people some incentives to use it again.

 

 

 

Maybe sell items in the player stock to players at a rate of say 80% of their lowest grand exchange price. That way, theres still alittle room for profit for those who have a lucky find or willing to invest the time running back and forth between the stores and bank.

 

 

 

Given that the player stock is NOT a unlimited stock, it would not some exploited as an infinite source of money, but would give players some profit from buying there and a reason to check said stores again. Those who wanted it faster or a guarantee to find what they were hunting would still use the grand exchange.

 

 

 

Also, maybe the profit margins payed to players selling to the store could be adjusted alittle. Not by alot, but it might would entice some players to sell more of their items there as well.

 

 

 

Not sure of the perfect solution or the right figures, but the general store does need to be made useful again.

 

 

 

So the question is, how can the general store be made useful again? For the last year, its been practically useless.

 

 

 

EDIT: I closed the thread on RSOF, as I figured it would get buried under pages of junk in a matter of seconds. It did. So I removed the quotes, and left it here.

[Rahila]

interesting...

 

 

 

General stores are definately useless now and I would like to see them "upgraded" this year...

 

 

 

I'm not so sure how, and i'm a little bit confused on your idea...but they definately do need tweaking

[DragnFly]

interesting...

 

 

 

General stores are definately useless now and I would like to see them "upgraded" this year...

 

 

 

I'm not so sure how, and i'm a little bit confused on your idea...but they definately do need tweaking

 

 

 

My idea is just practically changing and adjusting prices.

 

 

 

At the moment, theres no real incentive to buy a thing from the general store as it costs entirely too much.

 

 

 

Since the stores are usually short stock, if you charge alittle less (80%) of the lowest grand exchange price, people would check there again to find a bargain. Which is what people often did before the change in the first place.

 

 

 

It also needs to pay more for the items sold to the store, make to be alittle more competitive with the GE, otherwise nobody is going to sell there in the first place. If nobody sells there, then theres nothing to buy there (obviously).

[la la la]

But then rwt'er 1 sells an AGS to the general store and rwt'er 2 buys for 80% GE and sells on GE, making an instant 10m. The only way I could see it working is if you make unstackable items less than 10k on the ge general store prices.

[Mike_Ike111]

Thus, making the GE useless. Who would use the GE if you can buy the same item a minute away for a lot less?

[Zaverak]

But then rwt'er 1 sells an AGS to the general store and rwt'er 2 buys for 80% GE and sells on GE, making an instant 10m. The only way I could see it working is if you make unstackable items less than 10k on the ge general store prices.

 

 

 

Exactly what i was thinking, you took the words right out of my mouth

[DragnFly]

But then rwt'er 1 sells an AGS to the general store and rwt'er 2 buys for 80% GE and sells on GE, making an instant 10m. The only way I could see it working is if you make unstackable items less than 10k on the ge general store prices.

 

 

 

Figures would have to be adjusted, obviously. I was using 80% more as an example figure, rather than a final figure.

 

 

 

Yeah I fully expect there to be some small room for profit, otherwise if theres not you end up with what you have now.

 

 

 

As for real world trading, yes theres always a small potential. You just have to make it profitable enough for people to use it, but not profitable enough to really be explited on large scale by real world traders (like the trade system).

 

 

 

Thus, making the GE useless. Who would use the GE if you can buy the same item a minute away for a lot less?

 

 

 

It would only make the GE useless if it was a unlimited stock, it carried everything, and guaranteed to be available. Obviously none of these are the case.

 

 

 

Say you walk into the general store, you find 100 coal at 80% of the GE. Obviously you save abit of cash on the 100 coals here, but you did not know for sure that they would be there. You also have to run them back to the bank, since they wont be noted.

 

 

 

Then you have to obviously be lucky enough to find it. Plus your bound to its limited stock (100) as it is dependant on what players sold there, and keep in mind items disappear from general store at regular intervals.

 

 

 

It would not make the GE useless at all.

[Soma2035]

But then rwt'er 1 sells an AGS to the general store and rwt'er 2 buys for 80% GE and sells on GE, making an instant 10m. The only way I could see it working is if you make unstackable items less than 10k on the ge general store prices.

 

 

 

Exactly what i was thinking, you took the words right out of my mouth

 

 

 

:wall:

 

 

 

RWT Seller buys AGS from the Grand Exchange. He loses 60M.

 

 

 

RWT Seller sells AGS to the general store. He gains 500K.

 

 

 

RWT Buyer buys AGS from the general store. He loses 48M.

 

 

 

RWT Buyer sells the AGS to the Grand Exchange. He gains 60M.

 

 

 

Net? RWT Seller loses 59.5M for RWT Buyer to Earn 12M.

 

 

 

Is that really a big issue? Because you can already transfer faster and more efficiently than that through about a dozen other methods... if you used these figures directly, this method would transfer at an efficiency of 20%. Considering BH transfers are nearly risk free with the new techniques, and Jagex's constant mistakes with pricing (30k for a poisoned corrupted Morrigan Jav, 5K for a non poison... each weapon poison = 125K transferred), anyone who would actually use this as a method of transfer is probably pretty stupid.

[ghoulmeister]

This is a brilliant idea. The fact that general stores are useless now other than NPC trading has been bugging me for quite some time. The figures would definitely have to be tweaked perhaps for each item individually, but this could work.

 

 

 

Those saying that it would be used for RWTing, even if this was a good way to transfer money, it won't always work, plus you would need money to start with. Those with the cash to buy any sort of godsword I would like to think don't need to be buying money. Besides, there are much much faster methods, which I am not at liberty to say due to the tip.it code of conduct, as well as runescape's rules.

[Den]

I havent used a general store since the ge was released. :lol:

[Gravy]

Looks like theres no going back to making things like the stores useful.

[meili]

Er am I the only one who still frequently uses the Gen Store to buy hammers, tinderboxes, chisels and such when I need them? I simply can't be bothered to search for things like that in my bank so I just head off to the nearest Gen Store then drop the item when I am finished.

[Juhnie]

Er am I the only one who still frequently uses the Gen Store to buy hammers, tinderboxes, chisels and such when I need them? I simply can't be bothered to search for things like that in my bank so I just head off to the nearest Gen Store then drop the item when I am finished.

 

 

 

When it comes to that, I'm a slave of G/E. :lol:

 

Unless I have a few in my bank, and I usually do. If not, I'll buy some from G/E. :P

[Kenneh]

I bought a hammer for bandos from a shop once because i was wayyy to lazy to go to the GE. Next time at the GE i bought 100 hammers.

 

 

 

The GE is there to be used, so why not use it

[Silver_Corner]

The reason general stores are no longer used is not due to prices, and making a 80% less than G.E. price wont fix it really, it has to do with accessibility.

 

 

 

Before the G.E. EVERYTHING was sold in large quantities or even amounts. If you wanted to sell coal, you'd go and sell it in amounts of 1k, 2k, 3k... You wouldn't be able to sell 829 coal because nobody wanted to do the math to figure out a funky number. Instead people would sell their core (1k, 2k ect..) amount to players, and general store any extra left off, or something that wasn't worth the time selling, such as unstrung sapphire amulets.

 

 

 

The Grand Exchange gave accessibility for things with a uneven amount and items that had very little market such as sapphires. That is what made general stores un-used. It really had nothing to do with the prices, it was more than the Grand Exchange made everything sell able, even junk.

 

 

 

I don't really see this as a problem, but I guess if you wanted to, you could have all the general stores be able to SELL and BUY items at the lowest G.E. Price. This would do a lot in getting the "Junk" out of the economy, because everything would be "sell able" and potential give you a "sale" for finding an item at the lowest G.E. price instead of medium or high.

 

 

 

But really, the G.E. is a much better improvement than the old shop/selling systems ever were.

[Zimbu]

This is a brilliant idea. The fact that general stores are useless now other than NPC trading has been bugging me for quite some time. The figures would definitely have to be tweaked perhaps for each item individually, but this could work.

 

 

 

Those saying that it would be used for RWTing, even if this was a good way to transfer money, it won't always work, plus you would need money to start with. Those with the cash to buy any sort of godsword I would like to think don't need to be buying money. Besides, there are much much faster methods, which I am not at liberty to say due to the tip.it code of conduct, as well as runescape's rules.

 

 

 

I think you're forgetting that the RWTers can always trade everything back instantly at GE price after selling and buying from the general store. So if it's 80% of GE on both selling and buying price, then the buyer only needs 2M to transfer 500k with one "buy from GS, sell back to seller". Also, you don't need to risk an expensive item. The seller can use quite inexpensive items because the GS (it's been a while since the last time I used that abbreviation) allows the buyer to buy 27 of that said item at a time. The seller could also have large quantities of the item used to trade as notes to replace any lost items.

 

 

 

If the GS bought items at 50-60% of GE price and sold them at 90% GE price, then RWTing wouldn't be as easy (sellers 10M would become buyers 6-7M minus the items lost with GS updates in one "buy form GS, sell back to seller"), but you could still buy cheaper than GE.

[bedman]

The reason general stores are no longer used is not due to prices, and making a 80% less than G.E. price wont fix it really, it has to do with accessibility.

 

 

 

Before the G.E. EVERYTHING was sold in large quantities or even amounts. If you wanted to sell coal, you'd go and sell it in amounts of 1k, 2k, 3k... You wouldn't be able to sell 829 coal because nobody wanted to do the math to figure out a funky number. Instead people would sell their core (1k, 2k ect..) amount to players, and general store any extra left off, or something that wasn't worth the time selling, such as unstrung sapphire amulets.

 

 

 

The Grand Exchange gave accessibility for things with a uneven amount and items that had very little market such as sapphires. That is what made general stores un-used. It really had nothing to do with the prices, it was more than the Grand Exchange made everything sell able, even junk.

 

 

 

I don't really see this as a problem, but I guess if you wanted to, you could have all the general stores be able to SELL and BUY items at the lowest G.E. Price. This would do a lot in getting the "Junk" out of the economy, because everything would be "sell able" and potential give you a "sale" for finding an item at the lowest G.E. price instead of medium or high.

 

 

 

But really, the G.E. is a much better improvement than the old shop/selling systems ever were.

 

 

 

I've sold a fair bit of stuff, and people had no problem if it was 1327 or 1000 or ... . Calc is your friend

[Mylez]

I remember using the General Store alot when I first started.

 

But maybe you're aiming at the wrong audience?

 

 

 

If you go to a busy f2p world, at Varrok general store it will be full. Just because you no longer need to use it, doesn't mean the same for everybody. Lower level players will still use them, and from time to time, I still use them.

 

 

 

Lets say I need some black robes for a quest, I'll nip to the clothing shop. :)

[K112]

I see your point, it has become very unused.

 

 

 

You can always still find a bargin in Falador general store, mainly on gems, you have to wait a while most of the time though - Saying this though, I normally play in un-populated worlds, so maybe it varies?

 

 

 

I remember once back in the good old days, I went into Varrock general to use the west bank (the old hotspot), and thought, why not go to the General Store? I was lucky and found a Yew seed for something like 180gp, I then sold it instantly at the bank for a nice 60k \

[Patr1ck]

100% agree with you my friend.

 

 

 

I remember back in the day when I just stood in the general store for hours looking for bargains, it was actually quite fun to be honest, you never knew what someone would put in.

[bronzewarrior]

MAKE THE STORES SELL CHARMSSSS

 

 

 

/sarcasm

[r4ngewarlord]

general stores are still sorta usefull for selling junk that wont sell in the ge, but i agree the genral stores are pretty useless atm

[Everyonedies]

The general store like other things have been around since RS1. That being the case many things from RS1 that are still around have become unused or under-used. How many people get their regular strength potions from the apothecary or thieve nature runes? Not many people. The game changes and people use other routes to get to the same place. Thats just how it is no need to fix it.

[holycannoli]

It seemd to me that they're making alot of the older content, the ones which the game was really built on, useless.

[Yomyth105]

But then rwt'er 1 sells an AGS to the general store and rwt'er 2 buys for 80% GE and sells on GE, making an instant 10m. The only way I could see it working is if you make unstackable items less than 10k on the ge general store prices.

 

 

 

what i was thinking.