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[Proposal] Removal of PLEX as payment for character transfer.
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Sara Brandie
Odysseus Enterprises
#1 - 2012-10-24 20:38:18 UTC  |  Edited by: Sara Brandie
Has anyone taken a look at the character bazaar recently? Pretty funky calculations to determine character worth going on over there. For example:



What do these have in common? If you guessed massively inflated prices, you'd be right. Prior to PLEX being introduced as a way of paying for character transfers, these characters would be worth anywhere from half to a quarter of what they are now. These are simply examples, if you look for yourself you will see that every single character is worth massively more than they should be. And just in case any of you think this is coincidental, that this is a natural player-driven market phenomena that will subside (just in case you forget this has been a trend since the introduction of PLEX for transfer), I give to you these quotes:

Mia Hialnen wrote:
You do get he would be better to biomass the toons as it costs 1.2Bil just to trade them

Nande Saraki wrote:
Offering less than the cost of plex for the transfer isnt very smart. You want me to pay someone for the pleasure of giving my toon a new home... it would be cheaper not to sell them lol.


"What's wrong with someone incorporating the cost of transfer into the character price?", you might ask. Well, that's just it. It's a clear violation of the CCP Character Bazaar Rules and Resources where it says, and I quote:

CCP Spitfire wrote:


  • The owner of the character being sold is responsible for the character transfer fee paid to CCP.



    • To summarise, and to finally get to the point of why CCP should remove the usage of PLEX's for character transfers, the use of PLEX for character transfers has had two negative consequences for the character market as a whole:


    1. First; it has created a culture in which, in clear violation of CCP's Rules and Regulations of the Character Bazaar, it is not only acceptable, it is necessary for the seller to place the cost of the character transfer upon the buyer if they wish to turn a profit and avoid paying cash for the transfer.
    2. Secondly, it has massively distorted the worth of characters in the character market, leading to low SP characters being sold for their estimated worth + 1.2 Billion isk, a gross distortion of the characters worth.


    Thus, and in conclusion, CCP's introduction of using PLEX as an alternative method of payment for character transfer has created several negative and easily foreseeable consequences, which must be addressed.
    Gizznitt Malikite
    Agony Unleashed
    Agony Empire
    #2 - 2012-10-24 20:58:09 UTC
    Sara Brandie wrote:

    CCP Spitfire wrote:


  • The owner of the character being sold is responsible for the character transfer fee paid to CCP.



    • To summarise, and to finally get to the point of why CCP should remove the usage of PLEX's for character transfers, the use of PLEX for character transfers has had two negative consequences for the character market as a whole:


    1. First; it has created a culture in which, in clear violation of CCP's Rules and Regulations of the Character Bazaar, it is not only acceptable, it is necessary for the seller to place the cost of the character transfer upon the buyer if they wish to turn a profit and avoid paying cash for the transfer.
    2. Secondly, it has massively distorted the worth of characters in the character market, leading to low SP characters being sold for their estimated worth + 1.2 Billion isk, a gross distortion of the characters worth.


    Thus, and in conclusion, CCP's introduction of using PLEX as an alternative method of payment for character transfer has created several and easily foreseeable consequences, which must be addressed.


    I don't understand your point here.... The owner of the character is responsible to pay the character transfer fee, but why shouldn't the prices be inflated to transfer that cost to the seller... If you buy milk in the grocery store, everyone that touches the product between you and the cow that produced it adds a markup. There are real-life man hours associated with transferring a character, both in the form of development time, GM time, etc... so CCP charging to do this is extremely reasonable. Additionally, allowing people to use plex for the transfer (rather than RL cash), makes selling characters available to a wider range of players. Finally, if it costs me 15$ to transfer that character, rather than a plex, do you really think I'm going to value my RL cash at below the PLEX to CASH conversion rate?

    TL;DR;
    1.) CCP has the right to add a markup to character transfers (be it in cash or plex), because it costs them MONEY to perform that service.

    2.) As long as I can buy Plex with my Cash, and isk with Plex, there exists a cash to isk conversion rate.... so any cash payment has an isk equivalent value.

    3.) Third party markup costs are ALWAYS transferred to the buyer from the seller... that's just standard business policy! You accept it anytime you buy something in game or out!
    Sara Brandie
    Odysseus Enterprises
    #3 - 2012-10-24 21:08:35 UTC
    I accept your premise that, in the real world at least, cost incurred by the seller are transferred to the buyer. However, this is not the real world, this is a highly artificial and tightly regulated economy overseen by the creators i.e. CCP. As such, there are rules which, if you do not follow, you will be punished for. In this instance, the rule is that the seller shoulders the cost of character transfer, not the buyer. To ad absurdum your analogy, this would be analogous to the buyer being forced to pay £15 worth of their own money to pay the transfer fees. Since we can assume that a PLEX, bought out of game for a set amount, can thus be ascribed a real world value, the principle of my statement is the same: is there a difference between being forced to pay £15 to buy a character, and paing a PLEX worth £25?

    On a side note, my first conclusion is objective. It has analysed the empirical evidence to arrive at a logical conclusion, and that process can be observed and duplicated by another individual. My second conclusion is thus subjective, as it is simply my opinion. Felt the need to clarify that.
    Gizznitt Malikite
    Agony Unleashed
    Agony Empire
    #4 - 2012-10-24 21:58:55 UTC

    Sara Brandie wrote:
    I accept your premise that, in the real world at least, cost incurred by the seller are transferred to the buyer. However, this is not the real world, this is a highly artificial and tightly regulated economy overseen by the creators i.e. CCP. As such, there are rules which, if you do not follow, you will be punished for. In this instance, the rule is that the seller shoulders the cost of character transfer, not the buyer. To ad absurdum your analogy, this would be analogous to the buyer being forced to pay £15 worth of their own money to pay the transfer fees. Since we can assume that a PLEX, bought out of game for a set amount, can thus be ascribed a real world value, the principle of my statement is the same: is there a difference between being forced to pay £15 to buy a character, and paing a PLEX worth £25?

    On a side note, my first conclusion is objective. It has analysed the empirical evidence to arrive at a logical conclusion, and that process can be observed and duplicated by another individual. My second conclusion is thus subjective, as it is simply my opinion. Felt the need to clarify that.


    1.) The EvE market works very similar to the Real World Market... and while it is centered around space pixels, it is a highly functional market economy based on supply and demand. In most ways, EvE's economy is much LESS regulated than the Real World Market! While it is monitored by CCP, it is not tightly regulated... The price you pay for goods and services is almost completely determined by player created supply, player determined demand, and player market manipulations, not by NPC buy/sell orders. Sure, there are several sources and sinks of isk and commodities that CCP controls, but those are pretty much kept static so the market equalibriates around player activities. In short, CCP could regulate supply and demand, but rarely do!

    2.) EvE sellers are selling things for profit... To do that, they must transfer all costs incurred in creating and delivering that product to the seller! The Character Bazaar is no different! Why do you think it should? This is not a communist society where people devote their efforts for the general good... they devote their efforts for profit....

    Quote:
    12.) The owner of the character being sold is responsible for the character transfer fee paid to CCP.


    3.) This rule does NOT mean the owner of the character cannot or should not factor in the "costs" of transferring a character into the sell price of their character! Why do you think it would or should? The point of the rule is to explicitly state whom is responsible for the character transfer fee that CCP demands for their delivery service.
    Alliria Seedspawn
    School of Applied Knowledge
    Caldari State
    #5 - 2012-10-25 03:47:52 UTC
    And I'm of the mindset that I'll only pay so much for a character, or will only sell for a certain amount. These posts that say "Keep in mind I'm using PLEX to pay for the transfer" means nothing to me. Here's my price, take it or leave it. I don't care how you pay for the transfer fee. If you're over priced; you're over priced. I will not buy a toon that I do not feel is worth the isk.

    And since we're on the topic of value, I've always had a hard time wrapping my head around how people try to standardize value. That toon (or car, or house, or whatever) may be worth X to you, but to me, it's worth Y. Who are you to tell me what something's worth? I'm no economics expert, but to me, value is 100% subjective.
    Sara Brandie
    Odysseus Enterprises
    #6 - 2012-10-25 07:49:18 UTC  |  Edited by: Sara Brandie
    Gizznitt Malikite wrote:


    Quote:
    12.) The owner of the character being sold is responsible for the character transfer fee paid to CCP.


    3.) This rule does NOT mean the owner of the character cannot or should not factor in the "costs" of transferring a character into the sell price of their character! Why do you think it would or should? The point of the rule is to explicitly state whom is responsible for the character transfer fee that CCP demands for their delivery service.


    Actually; yes, yes it does. Whilst I can agree that everyone who sells something is looking to make a profit, or at least minimise their loss, the point I was trying to make with the artificial market was not that the EVE market was tightly controlled, but that the Character Bazaar and only the Character Bazaar was. CCP may not have an active interest in controlling the prices (save in one or two instances), but I'm sure they have an interest in making sure the rules of the market are followed.

    Now, again to my point, which you seem to be missing: if the rules of the market prohibit the seller from placing the costs of transfer on the shoulders of the buyer, then by adding the price of 2 PLEX to the sell price that is literally what they are doing. And thus in doing so they are breaking the rules of the artificial market . Now, to reiterate a previous point, and expand upon it slightly, why should I pay an extra £25 (since that is what I am doing, as we have established that PLEX's have real world value) to allow the seller to break the rules?

    If somebody wants to make a profit on a character, that is fine. I used to buy and sell characters all the time, before the introduction of PLEX for transfer, and what kept the price relatively stable was the absolute knowledge that you were wholly and simply paying for the character. Now, you're paying for the character and the transfer fee, and that is simply unacceptable.
    De'Veldrin
    Republic University
    Minmatar Republic
    #7 - 2012-10-25 15:11:54 UTC
    Alliria Seedspawn wrote:
    And I'm of the mindset that I'll only pay so much for a character, or will only sell for a certain amount. These posts that say "Keep in mind I'm using PLEX to pay for the transfer" means nothing to me. Here's my price, take it or leave it. I don't care how you pay for the transfer fee. If you're over priced; you're over priced. I will not buy a toon that I do not feel is worth the isk.


    This. Same rule I use when I go to estate sales and auctions. Know what you're willing to pay for something and stick to it.

    Quote:
    I'm no economics expert, but to me, value is 100% subjective.


    Yes and no. You can objectively measure the value of a given object by determining what people are willing to give up (in terms of real costs or opportunity costs) to obtain that object. Subjectively, you may be willing to give up less or more than someone else for the same object, but it's average of those values that determine the market value of that object.

    (And all of that assumes I remember my freshman economics classes).

    De'Veldrin's Corollary (to Malcanis' Law): Any idea that seeks to limit the ability of a large nullsec bloc to do something in the name of allowing more small groups into sov null will inevitably make it that much harder for small groups to enter sov null.
    Lykouleon
    Noble Sentiments
    Second Empire.
    #8 - 2012-10-25 16:13:09 UTC  |  Edited by: Lykouleon
    Sara Brandie wrote:
    if the rules of the market prohibit the seller from placing the costs of transfer on the shoulders of the buyer, then by adding the price of 2 PLEX to the sell price that is literally what they are doing.

    To quote the rule (again):

    CCP Spitfire wrote:
  • The owner of the character being sold is responsible for the character transfer fee paid to CCP.

    • No where in the rule does CCP specify that price of a character sale may not be determined with consideration of the costs of the transfer. All the rule states is that the actual character transfer fee at the time of the transaction on the account support page must be paid to CCP by the transferor, not the transferee or some third party. There is currently no way for the transferee to pay for the transfer via the account support page, nor has there even been. Interpreted as such, this is a hang-over rule from the days when the transferring of characters was paid for via cash only. People in the Character Bazaar were dealing in monetary transactions, and per other areas of EULA, we are not allowed to put down any forms of real-world currency for items and/or characters in the game. Thus, if you paid for the character transfer fee externally from the system, you were technically violating the EULA (even if you were paying for the actual character with ISK).

    If you enter into an agreement with the seller of character for the value of the character plus two PLEX that you purchase separately with your own money and transfer ingame, I doubt CCP would object to the transfer. Alternatively, you could just pay the price of the character which then includes the tranferor's purchase of PLEX or his financial investment. The actual calculation of PLEX price into a character transfer is a matter of the market determined by active traders and investers in character transfers. If they have all mutually assented to calculating their prices based on them paying for their character transfers now in terms of PLEX instead of real-world currency, that is a matter of efficient capitalism and does not violate the rule.

    To be clear, you're also mistaking the definition of value with the definition of price.

    Lykouleon > CYNO ME CLOSER so I can hit them with my sword
    Obsidiana
    Atrament Inc.
    #9 - 2012-10-28 17:16:17 UTC
    Anything that hurts the Character Bazaar is a good thing; it's a necessary evil IMHO.

    Cost of transfer is what, $20? That already puts cash in favor of ISK (esp. with rising PLEX prices). If this was not the case, I would suggest it as a compromise.

    People make serious ISK off of characters. You may have to shell out more ISK to get the PLEX, but you will just have to find a way to make it back on the character sale. That's called business... and inflation.