The Bazaar of Nexus/Luclin

[Ashimar]

People have been saying Luclin damaged Everquest because of the Bazaar.
But in retrospect- The Bazaar was an empty and desolate zone for the longest
time even after more expansions were released after Luclin. I think it was sometime before the Planes of Power expansion that the Bazaar became
a player merchant zone.

Was it like that on every server?
on Rodcet Nife that's how it was.

[Messianic]

People have been saying Luclin damaged Everquest because of the Bazaar.
But in retrospect- The Bazaar was an empty and desolate zone for the longest
time even after more expansions were released after Luclin. I think it was sometime before the Planes of Power expansion that the Bazaar became
a player merchant zone.

Was it like that on every server?
on Rodcet Nife that's how it was.

You played on Rodcet Nife? What was your character name(s)?

[burkemi5]

why did everyone hate the bazaar so much?

[Ashimar]

You played on Rodcet Nife? What was your character name(s)?

Ashimar was my first ever character. 32 Human Cleric :P
Kandayin Oakplume (WE WAR)
Waddy Waddykins (GNM WAR)
Ndayr (DE SK)

Lots of friends on there too
Chorum (Half Elf Bard)
Wanforezek (BAR WAR) (R.I.P MARK)
Airlia (HUM CLR)
Nikely ( WOOD ELF RNG)

< Adventurer's Company >

[Messianic]

Ashimar was my first ever character. 32 Human Cleric :P
Kandayin Oakplume (WE WAR)
Waddy Waddykins (GNM WAR)
Ndayr (DE SK)

Lots of friends on there too
Chorum (Half Elf Bard)
Wanforezek (BAR WAR) (R.I.P MARK)
Airlia (HUM CLR)
Nikely ( WOOD ELF RNG)

< Adventurer's Company >

I know I remember Waddy Waddykins - but I probably just saw him somewhere and liked the name :D

I was Madmmiller, human monk and Hayaet, Dark Elf Wizard...

[Ashimar]

I know I remember Waddy Waddykins - but I probably just saw him somewhere and liked the name :D

I was Madmmiller, human monk and Hayaet, Dark Elf Wizard...

Yeah i used to have TONS of screenshots of various players from the server during the glory days. However i remember seperating the good shots from the
bad ones and eventually the folder of good ones became lost in time.

Madmmiler sounds pretty familiar. Waddy was an actual gnome too in a story.

[burkemi5]

IIRC it wasn't immediately implemented? I quit very shortly after Luclin for a while because I felt the PvP immune zones had wrecked the game. Came back and played PvE after that...

The issue with the bazaar was it gave us, metaphorically, Internet shopping. Is shopping even remotely the same now as it was even 10 years ago? No way... back then you had to go to the store, call them on the phone or read their ad in the paper. In EQ prices were very temperamental; HUGE difference between being in EC when there are a ton of buyers and when there are very few. As much as it would be a pain, I think removing item links would bring us the rest of the way back to original EQ economy, except that now you can easily tab out and very quickly and reliably find item stats. I used to have to go search on a list by slot on Alla back then...

The bazaar i remember is when you had to sit there, logged in, and people would find you, run to you, and basically buy your wares as if you were a merchant. there was a useful search function and everything. I thought it was a great way to buy and sell, but then again I only started playing in the middle of kunark. I don't really see how this is as horrible as everyone makes it seem; I guess i am not as much of a purist.

[Mcbard]

All of the trading on T-marr was happening there before PoP for sure. It took a couple of months to happen, but I remember rolling into EC and wondering where everyone went. I was devastated.

[guineapig]

Not everyone hated the bazaar, Only the people that could either 2-box or the ones that were online all the dame time.

For people that only had limited play times it was basically the only way to sell stuff effectively without having to cut into what little play time I had.

I was a huge fan of the bazaar for that reason.
This is why I have bags and bags full of mid-level gear that will probably never go up for auction and tons of researched spells that I usually just sell to random vendors. I don't have enough play time to actually spend a chunk of it selling stuff in EC.

[Ihealyou]

The bazaar created a more efficient market by giving buyers and sellers more and better information. Anyone that hates it is an America hating commie.

[Ele]

Bazaar was awesome. Throw a mule up and price your stuff just under everyone else ??? Profit.

Was also super easy to buy up all the pet weapons.

[Nedala]

It made me sad that gfay was empty the day luclin was released, thats why i dont like bazaar. Gfay > Ec > bazaar

[guineapig]

It made me sad that gfay was empty the day luclin was released, thats why i dont like bazaar. Gfay > Ec > bazaar

Bazzar wasn't live when Luclin launched. Gfay was empty because of the new expansion.
I'm pretty sure Gfay will be empty the day Kunark launches as well.

[Kassel]

Gfay is the worst possible trading zone.

[hateshadow]

I can't believe there were actually servers in which the trade zone was Gfay?!
EC is meh, North Freeport was the best!
"Selling big bag o crap, behind Jade" anyone?

[Messianic]

Gfay is the worst possible trading zone.

No, Kerra Island is the worst possible trading zone.

[Darian]

[Disclaimer: I know this will not be happening.]

Just wondering... is it feasible to code in the Bazaar buy/sell functions to another zone? Say, perhaps, EC? Or was that just a completely unique zone that can't be replicated? I remember on live a "Find" function was added in cities, similar to the function that located Bazaar sellers for you. How much of a nightmare would it theoretically be to have that merchant feature set up in a classic zone?

[guineapig]

No, Kerra Island is the worst possible trading zone.

Permafrost is much worse... kerra ridge is only 1 zone away from druid rings and wizard spires. :p

I agree though, there are far worse places that Gfay to trade in, unless of course you are an evil race.

[NZV]

I like EC. It really gives the world a center of the community. The Bazaar wasn't like that - everyone was just an afk pseudo-NPC merchant. It took out the human aspect of buying things from people by not requiring you to even talk to them to do so. Trading buffs after a sale is also a nice little touch, and the tunnel provides an amazing place for low level characters to quickly fly through the very beginning of the game with the help of high level buffs.

[Wotsirb401]

Bazaar is like internet shopping, Go to Google, search for what you are looking for and find the cheapest price or best price you are willing to repair. Bazaar just cuts out on people having to be at their computers just to spam /auction /ooc every 4-5 minutes and spamming everyone else's chat log

[Striiker]

The bazaar was great in my opinion. I could put stuff up for sale and go to bed. I didn't have to haggle over pricing, I could find cheap items and could sell stuff that I can't be bothered to sell in EC. I have very little play time and I don't want to spend that time siting in EC. I just wind up with bags of stuff in my bank which I either sell or give away. Bazaar didn't kill the game. The thing which killed the game was the expansion which housed the Bazaar zone.. PoP. The PoK books shrunk the world down. That plus adding zone with insane XP (Paludal Caverns on Luclin comes to mind) really made a ghost town of the classic starting zones.. Luclin was the start of the decline with the Nexus. It shrunk the world down too much.

[Odeseus]

As someone else has said, the bazaar took the human element out of the equation. I have no problem with the fact that it made things easier. But you couldn't haggle over prices because everyone was AFK. You couldn't trade items because they were AFK. You couldn't keep a higher price on an item hoping the other person with the item would go to bed. You were forced to put the rock bottom price down, and then wait 5 mins to see you get undercut and your item doesn't sell.

People got very rich by playing with how it worked. They could drive down prices by posting it at a low price, then buy up the now greatly discounted items as others reacted to you. Then selling them at a monopoly price. Or by constantly searching to catch errors (like someone forgot a 0, so a 1k item is listed at 100pp) and taking advantage of it.

[Knightmare]

I kind of hated Luclin personally, and left shortly after PoP was released. And I was one of those 2 boxers who had a character online in the Bazaar and one to play on. It wasn't just the Bazaar.. it was shoddy lore, silly changes and then the later effect the Bazaar had on the economy.

Luclin began the trend of instant self-ports, which would be carried farther in PoP and was really annoying to the 2 porting classes.

The Shissar. A mighty, enslaving, god killing race long thought dead is found alive on a far away moon. Not conquering the race that was there but rather hiding in a locked atmosphere-free zone out of pure fear. Oh right.

The Bazaar itself:

First, what made EQ so great then is the same thing that makes P99 great right now: personal contact with players. Beyond just grouping. You could avoid groups by soloing, but if you wanted to buy/sell anything decent, you had to make contact with people. Yes there are some jerks, but mostly, good people. It encouraged contact, like any good MMO should. The Bazaar began a rift in the personable economy that gave rise to such impersonal things as the modern WoW Auction House. An MMO in which you need no personal contact? Why even call it an MMO?

Second. In any game that releases expansions there is a degree of "mudflation". This is where old items drop drastically in value. However because the Bazaar changed the entire way the player driven economy worked, it caused an unbelievable amount of mudflation. In fact it was so drastic that the term became popularized because of the Luclin expac release..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudflation

And this is why so many people are against, and hate it. Myself included :(

[Foxx]

bazaar is good for the economy and great for people who want to buy and sell things without sinking time into it

other than that, luclin is garbage... especially aa points, vah shirs, beastlords and just about every zone. one exception was paludal caverns, it was the #1 place to pk people on my twink delvl 24 sk on rallos zek, especially killing many other peoples twinks for A++ gear

[Kassel]

Luclin was "ok"

I liked:
Nexus Ports
Bazaar AFK selling and browsing.
AA points that where not super OP
Horses?

I Hated
New Graphics
CAT People
The Moon
Cats from the moon
Snakes
Bane weapon grinds
CAVES!!
Monks got nerfed -(

I dont think that Nexus ruined the scope and scale of the world, i do think that it was the slippery slope that lead to POK books.

[Foxx]

only good part about AA was 2boxing my cleric in ascending dawn in sebilis, and boxing my manaburn wizard in lucid vision.... running around inspecting people to find the best item to get, then running into seb and manaburning them for a 1shot kill, and instagating back to the bazaar for safety.

best days of my pvp career

[mitic]

iam all for bazaar already now!

place a porter at shady in EC tunnel who brings u directly to bazaar and disable all zonelines in there, imo.

[burkemi5]

iam all for bazaar already now!

place a porter at shady in EC tunnel who brings u directly to bazaar and disable all zonelines in there, imo.

i like this idea A LOT, but it will ruin too many people's immersion :(

[Vendar]

the bazaar killed player merchanting, period.

[Grizlor]

I Hated
New Graphics
CAT People

Luclin models are to EQ what Male Draenei are to WOW

[Psionide]

I think the pinnacle of my frustration with luclin was when I saw netherbians.

[Ellia]

To avoid creating a new zone, the Arena could be used...pop an NPC vender and NPC Banker. Dervs could sill keep the Arena function, outside area for /bazaar.

[Pezmerga]

Most the good stuff is sold on these forums anyway. You can go to EC to buy noobie stuff basically. Kinda lame IMO. Also regarding traders I usually sent offers via pm to traders lol they usually got em before I would log.

[Felizcat]

Second. In any game that releases expansions there is a degree of "mudflation". This is where old items drop drastically in value. However because the Bazaar changed the entire way the player driven economy worked, it caused an unbelievable amount of mudflation. In fact it was so drastic that the term became popularized because of the Luclin expac release..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mudflation

And this is why so many people are against, and hate it. Myself included :(

I'll take this statement with a grain of salt. And I fear the wikipedia article might not be fully accurate, either. Mudflation is not caused by new expansions, accelerated, yes, but not caused. Primary cause is, that unlike in a real world economy, goods are produced (looted) but they never disappear. You may sell them at a vendor, but you still get money for them. The impact of consumables like food, arrows and potions is minimal. Making tradeskill armor helps somewhat, since the money that needs to be paid for the materials is non-trivial.

Thus, the more hours people put into the game plus the more people play, the larger the amount of money that is generated gets. The amount of goods held by the players is limited by bank slots and other constraints. Thus, a lot of cash is available on the one hand, and a fixed or limited amount of goods on the other hand. That's inflation. The prices go up. The existence of a bazaar doesn't change anything in this equation.

But the Luclin horses do. There's now a way to dump a lot of money into. Which deflates the amount of available money and lowers prices somewhat. Of course it won't stop mudflation, because the item and plat drops keep producing money: 1 fine steel, 1 velium gets you 5plat. And nobody is using those anymore and they will be sold instantly. And the money bubble gets bigger.

In re-reading this post, it comes to mind that with Luclin also the number of available bank slots increased. Thus, more items could be stored in the bank and wasn't turned into platinum. Which has probably helped even more to keep mudflation at bay.

As an additional example, look at WOW. 5000 gold for fast flying. A money sink right there.

[astuce999]

The bazaar was great in my opinion. I could put stuff up for sale and go to bed. I didn't have to haggle over pricing, I could find cheap items and could sell stuff that I can't be bothered to sell in EC. I have very little play time and I don't want to spend that time siting in EC. I just wind up with bags of stuff in my bank which I either sell or give away. Bazaar didn't kill the game. The thing which killed the game was the expansion which housed the Bazaar zone.. PoP. The PoK books shrunk the world down. That plus adding zone with insane XP (Paludal Caverns on Luclin comes to mind) really made a ghost town of the classic starting zones.. Luclin was the start of the decline with the Nexus. It shrunk the world down too much.

You've contradicted yourself a couple times there. You talk about how you have little time to play, and that bazaar was a great convenience and that you didn't want to spend time sitting in EC.

Then you mention that what killed the game was the PoK books (people didn't want to spend time waiting on boats or looking for ports), and you also mention zones with insane xp (people didn't want to spend time in the low levels).

The same argument is used in all three situations, but in the first you mention it as a good thing, and the other two as a bad thing.

To me, they're all bad things. There are two things that made everquest great, community and difficulty. Anything that entrenches on those two aspects kills the game.

Community is having to interact with other players. It has a lot of aspects (i.e. grouping, trading, competing for limited resources, showing off, chatting, raiding, and the illusion of distance).

Difficulty also has a lot of aspects like being limited on what you can kill because of level, class, skill, gear, numbers. It can also mean being limited on where you can go because of level, travel time, or dangers along the way. It can also mean being limited on what you can acquire because of level, distance to the trading zone, availability of items in said trading zone, and time you're willing to devote to trading items.

In every expansion since Velious, at least one aspect of community and difficulty was negatively effected, and this is why people didn't like them and thought it killed the game.

For example, in Luclin, the Nexus zone attacked both the community and the difficulty of the game. It created a hub where all races could bank and bind, and had portals from the 4 corners of the world that all lead there. It became almost stupid to be bound anywhere else.

If the nexus had been mutiple zones from multiple areas on luclin, and that the nexus portal required you to wait for the spaceship, and that once on the spaceship it took 15 mins to get to luclin, and that no one else could enter the spaceship while it was on the way to the moon, and that the zone the spaceship traveled was a real zone and not just the nether, then it would have had a shot.

I have lots more to say about this, but I have to go to work,

cheers!