Player to player trading

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Alpha-2 player trading UI.[1]
Alpha-2 trade request UI.[2]

There is player-to-player trading in Ashes of Creation.[1][2][3][4][5]

Q: Will Ashes of Creation have player-to-player trading? Will there be anything stopping me from gifting a friend that's fresh to the game a bunch of in-game money to help them get on their feet quickly?
A: There won't be anything to stop you from doing that.[4] – Steven Sharif
The nature of player to player trading already introduces that in an open economy game... that is why we have measures to attempt and heat flag suspicious transactions, active gms and other honeypot systems/agents that will be active in discovering those types of cheaters.[3] – Steven Sharif

Buying and selling

Player stalls, personal shops, and auction houses enable buying from and selling to other players.[13]

Player stalls Personal shops Auction houses
Cost
Location
Player presence
  • An attendant NPC is assigned to the stall. Character does not need to be online or at the stall.[23][15][16]
  • Player must be online and present at the shop.[23][16]
 N/A
Storage
Advertising
PvP
  • Players may be killed while occupying their personal shop and are subject to material loss due to normal death penalties.[24]
 N/A

Player stalls

Player stalls are scheduled for release in Alpha-2 phase-2.[30][31]

One of the key components of a functional economy is the ability to trade and not having that predicated just on chat. So, player stalls we prioritized to make it in by the 20th. These will be in a functional state to begin with. There will be an NPC within the market area that you will be able to list your goods at and other players will be able to interact with that NPC take a look at the different player shops that are listed and make purchases at those locations. So, this is something I think is very necessary. It's not quite an auction house and the reason it's not an auction house is because you basically have a little bit of a storefront: You go through this list of other players' stores and you can click into that store and you can see a number of different items that they have and you can make transactional purchases on a buy order basis for what they've listed.[30] – Steven Sharif

Player stalls (also called Kiosks and rental stalls) are rentable locations near the unique building in an Economic node[20], in Marketplaces (the constructible building available for placement by mayors of any Town (stage 4) node or higher), or as business buildings on freehold plots.[32][33][21]

All nodes do have the ability to spawn player stalls. If you're not an economic node and you don't have a market- that's essentially your unique building- then you can construct essentially what is I guess would be called a... marketplace; and that marketplace will then come with certain services and it will come with a certain number of stalls. The economic node as I recall has the ability to construct an auction house and the auction house serves through the economic means the ability to list and sell items and that comes with additional stalls as well for the players.[21] – Steven Sharif
  • Players list items for sale at a NPC within the node's market area. Other players can interact with this NPC browse and purchase from player stalls in that node.[34][30][24][15] Player stalls do not require the attendance of the character or for that character to be online.[16]
Intended to be part of the stall system where your shop can be set up for purchase by quantity, by amount, and value; but also to sell stacks and individual purchases as well.[34] – Steven Sharif
  • Player stalls are rentable by node citizens.[16]
    • The number of player stalls available are dependent on service building upgrades chosen within the node.[32]
    • Player stalls may be utilized for a period of time based on the price paid to rent the stall.[15]
info-orange.png
Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.
  • Player stall NPCs may be an "image" of the seller.[26]
  • Renting a player stall enables players to provide repair and enchanting services, even when they are not online.[15]
    • Players are able to input required items for repair and also purchase required materials for that repair.[36]
  • Players are not able to be attacked or robbed while occupying their player stall inside the limits of a node.[18]
  • Bulletin boards that list the items available in player stalls can be accessed from anywhere in the region.[26]
    • These give the location of the stall so players can travel there and purchase the items.[26]

Personal shops

Certificates to place Personal shops (player-owned shops) may be purchased by citizens and non-citizens from Markets in Economic nodes or Marketplaces in non-economic nodes.[32][17][18][19]

A player shop is where you have a certificate to essentially create a shop with your character and a little billboard will pop up above you as you sit down for that shop and advertise a custom message that you want say that has to sell things and/or services that are on your person. So players can then come up to you and they can interact with you. So you reside yourself to that shop.[23] – Steven Sharif
  • When a character creates a personal shop, a billboard pops up above them with a custom advertisement message for items or services available on that character's person. Purchasers can interact directly with the character to purchase these items or services (as if they were a Vendor NPC).[32][23]
Once you have a certificate, you can then place your player shop within the vicinity of a node's market- any nodes market. So, basically what that means is you will take that certificate and your character will sit down in place and they will spawn a UI billboard above them where you get to make a brief advertisement of what your shop is, and any player can come up to you and they can interact with your character and see your shop that you have listed goods for and make purchases as if you were a vendor from your shop. So, that's the difference between player stalls and the player shop system.[32] – Steven Sharif
The benefit that economic node's markets have over non-economic node markets is that their player shop certificates, when sold from a metropolis economic note, I believe, can be placed anywhere in the world independent of market proximity. So, you could be at a dungeon and set up your player shop there and it's like, "Hey you want to buy some health pots? Grab your health pots." And you could set up there.[32] – Steven Sharif

Auction house

Alpha-1 Auctioneer NPC.[37]

If a Node is the Vassal Node of an Economic Node, an Auctioneer NPC appears in that Vassal Node. The Auctioneer allows players to list non-resource/processed materials in the Parent Node’s Auction House, but players cannot bid on items from this Auctioneer. These resources and processed materials must be stored within an Economic Node in order to be listed in that Node’s Auction House. In order to bid, they must still travel to the Auction House in the Parent Node.[22]

Auction houses are node buildings in Economic nodes.[32][20]

Auction houses allow items and resources to be listed for sale at a specific node location.[38] – Steven Sharif
  • A listing fee will be charged to list items in the auction house.[20]
  • Vassal nodes of the auction house node will be able to view items that are listed on that auction house, regardless of node type of the vassal node.[20]
    • This will be possible through an auctioneer emissary NPC in that node.[20]
    • Items cannot be listed in non-economic vassal nodes.[20]
info-orange.png
Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.
That's probably how it's going to be surfaced... Your your mayor is going to have to build it for you.[41] – Jeffrey Bard

Escrow system

info-orange.png
Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.
We're going to have a UI... you're gonna put the resources in or they're gonna put the resources in. It'll be like an escrow system and then once [the job] is complete you'll get the item they'll get the money.[42]

Gear binding

There may be some gear binding (BoE or BoP) but it will be an exception rather than the rule, as this doesn't facilitate the objectives for the economy.[43][44][45][46]

Q: Right now, there's no soulbinding on any of the gear. Is that intended game design or is that something that'll be addressed later?
A: No, it is intended game design... Very little to no things are intended to be soulbound. They're all a part of an open economy, which are missing a few features in phase one. As we know phase one is about stability and performance, and as we enter into phase two and phase three, some of those additional features and systems will come online: one of which is deconstruction, tempering, over enchantments. Those are are expected to sink open economy items out of the economy to help reach that balance between the faucets and the sinks.[43] – Steven Sharif
A lot of what we experienced in games that usually come before us is that many things are account bound and they're soulbound to your character... Instead very little here is character bound. Very very little. The vast majority of gear- yes you will get quest related gear as rewards- but it won't be let's say one set in one dungeon and you must run the dungeon over and over. Instead we want to really emphasize the reliance on the economy and crafters and gatherers and processors to support a majority of the gear structure in-game, combined with that of world raid bosses and dungeon bosses; not a repetitive quest line through a single dungeon.[45] – Steven Sharif
Q: If items are intended to not have soul-binding, how is your team going to effectively plan to fight RMT?
A: We are going to be investing heavily in our GMS and in our CS teams, which we have a plan and we have some rudimentary elements of that plan currently in Alpha that relate to player heat-mapping, action heat-mapping, and RMT flags that will then cause some investigative things to occur on our side. This is something that I think has to be done in order to preserve the integrity of the economy of the game. RNT is obviously, even in a game where you had 100% soulbound, can still be done. Whether that be through things like power leveling, purchasing accounts, whatever it might be: a soulbound approach to the economy doesn't solve that per-se. You still have to, as a company, choose to invest in combating those things. And I think many players who played in this genre know that at some point the lights get turned off for many publishers around making those investments. However, that's not our mandate. Our mandate is to ensure that in order to provide a environment where integrity matters, we have to be willing to invest, not just in the tools that discover these types of things, but also in the CS response that includes the GM's availability.[47] – Steven Sharif

Mailing items

Alpha-2 mailbox user interface in the Lionhold starting area.[50]
From an item standpoint obviously we can't allow mailing to include any type of resource material or raw gatherable because those are central to the gameplay and transiting through the caravan system and economic regions. But it may be possible to send completed crafted items like gear, equipment, stuff like that. But it's something we're still discussing.[51] – Steven Sharif

Banking

There is a roadmap with the guild warehouse having been moved up a little bit. It was planned to be a little bit later- I think it was like March or April, but we have moved that up slightly.[55] – Steven Sharif

Storage

Storage chest in an Alpha-2 freehold.[61]

Storage points exist at warehouses within nodes and in chests (storage containers) that can be placed in freeholds and static in-node housing.[61][62][63]

Player housing storage

Alpha-1 chest concept art.[65]
Alpha-1 chest 3D renders.[65]

Chests are a type of furniture that provides localized storage within a specific house.[66][67][68][69]

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Some of the following information has likely been superceded by newer information. It is included here for archival reasons.

Security systems

What matters most in any MMO... is that you protect the integrity of the player activity. The player activity is what should be driving the in-game market, is what should be driving the in-game economy. These things are are paramount in making sure that players feel comfortable logging in each day and exerting effort to achieve whatever they're achieving.[74] – Steven Sharif

Security systems are in place to combat cheating, exploiting, botting, gold selling, real money transactions (RMT), item duplication and other things that affect the economy.[47][48][49][3][9][10][11][12]

  • A broad spectrum of approaches are going to be utilized in order to try to protect the integrity of the game once it launches. Testing of these systems will begin leading up towards Alpha-2.[74][49]
Security is always at the top of any concern when you have a closed system like an MMO is... We've seen a lot of MMO is launch without security in place and the economy gets ruined as a result thereafter. And every band-aid that's slapped on top of that wound is just making things worse. And so part of why you take the time in order to ensure that things are done correctly is also the security component of things; and that's where testing with a live audience is a bit different also than testing with a Q&A audience as well, because you're going to get those bad actors- and we call them bad actors because ultimately they're attempting to destroy the fun for others... So what we've done is we've hired some security experts who've worked on massive other MMOs like World of Warcraft and other games, and they bring with them lot of experience; and we're going to be testing that in leading up towards Alpha-2. It's a very important part of Alpha-2. It's not something that we really addressed with Alpha-1 because again, that was a much more barebones functional testing experience. We did see some issues during Alpha-1 and we made it important for Alpha-2 to test those systems. We have a broad spectrum of approaches that we're going to be utilizing in order to try to protect the integrity of the game once it launches.[49] – Steven Sharif
  • These systems collect user data and flag abnormal activities for investigation. This combined with player reporting functions generates a live "heat map" that draws attention to unusual behavior.[75][47][74][48][3][9][12]
We do have already built into the game on the outset is essentially behavioral metrics. So in the game, as a player does normal things and they acquire normal gold, that's all good and well, but if there starts to be item IDs that appear on the player account that are out of the norm, like either a large amount of gold, or significant legendary items, what it does in the back-end it flags the account for view so that we can take a look at where did this item come from. Is it coming from a known gold seller or a flagged bot, or whatever; and then we investigate. So we're going to be pretty hard on the ability for players to subvert the natural economy systems by RMT or botting.[9] – Steven Sharif
  • Botters, cheaters, gold sellers, and RMTers, will face severe penalties from the active GM/community team.[47][48][76][77][12]
It's important to note that there is a sanctity that must be protected within the game from RMTing; and let me just go into a little diatribe about this: But in games that I've played where the company or the publisher does not enforce rules, it becomes the standard that you buy gold if you want to be competitive. If you want to compete at the top tier levels in certain games, and everyone's buying gold, you almost either have to buy the gold or you're just not going to be able to compete with those people and that's a really shitty feeling to have. Excuse my French, I apologize. That is sucky; and in order for that not to be the case it is the responsibility of the publisher or the developers both to make sure that we have stringent practices from a CS- from a customer customer service perspective- to enforce our rules and to make sure that players are aware if they partake in this there is a huge risk in doing so. It's not going to be a slap on the hand. It's not going to be a "we told you once, we told you twice, we told you three, four, five six times okay. We're just taking some gold away", that thing. We have got to ensure that it is feared to do those things because that ashes has active GMS, it has active customer service, it has an active community team.[77] – Steven Sharif
Q: Is trading in game gold for non tangible resources like information allowed? And if so, how will the system distinguish between that and RMT?
A: We take into account behavioral metrics as well, right. So, can you sell information in game? Yes, you can. Where it becomes a problem is if that information you're selling is consistently being sold to gold that is generated fraudulently or through exploits or through botting. Then that becomes a pattern, that becomes a heat map. We identify those heats and we take action against them.[75] – Steven Sharif

Trade agreements

Trade agreements are established by Mayors to trade node commodities between nodes via mayoral caravans.[78][79][80][81][82][83][84]

info-orange.png
Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.
Mercenary guilds will be a viable way forward for different organizations. I think there will be a lot of business to be had with that; and one of the systems in our trade agreements is creating an escrow for those particular type of arrangements that we're looking into.[88] – Steven Sharif

Trade routes

Mayoral caravan launched by a mayor to establish a trade route with another node.[82]

For example: this node over here might have access to cotton as a resource and when that node processes that cotton it might be some very nice type of linen that only that node, or very rarely nodes would have access to. So when you initiate a trade route, you're bringing its supplies that the mayor has requested because they're trying to build, let's say a specific type of service building, or they're trying to unlock a blueprint that they have access to now to build up their node.[81] – Steven Sharif

Trade routes in Ashes of Creation refer to.

From a diplomatic standpoint the ability for the mayor or citizens to set up NPC routed trade routes between nodes as a trade agreement or as a diplomatic process.[81] – Steven Sharif
You might have a mountain pass and during winter that mountain pass is always closed and so the trade routes on land change with caravans and that's something that can not only exist on a cyclical level but also dynamically based on player activity.[89]

Escrow

info-orange.png
Some of the following information has not been recently confirmed by the developers and may not be on the current development roadmap.
We're going to have a UI... you're gonna put the resources in or they're gonna put the resources in. It'll be like an escrow system and then once [the job] is complete you'll get the item they'll get the money.[42]

Visuals

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Livestream, October 25, 2024 (53:02).
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Video, November 30, 2023 (58:54).
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 steven-rmt.png
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Livestream, May 15, 2017 (10:32).
  5. ↑ Livestream, January 18, 2018 (46:56).
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Livestream, February 24, 2023 (1:12:24).
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Livestream, October 28, 2022 (24:28).
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 Livestream, April 30, 2021 (1:14:49).
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 9.3 9.4 Interview, July 19, 2020 (1:12:37).
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 Livestream, November 17, 2017 (38:35).
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 Massively OP, 2017-06-1
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 12.3 12.4 Livestream, February 9, 2018 (20:40).
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 13.2 13.3 steven-player-stalls-shops.png
  14. ↑ steven-shops-on-ships.png
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 15.2 15.3 15.4 Livestream, May 10, 2017 (16:36).
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 16.2 16.3 16.4 steven-player-stalls-shops-online.png
  17. ↑ 17.00 17.01 17.02 17.03 17.04 17.05 17.06 17.07 17.08 17.09 17.10 Livestream, July 31, 2020 (1:34:06).
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 18.3 18.4 18.5 Livestream, October 16, 2017 (59:39).
  19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 19.2 19.3 19.4 19.5 steven-player-shops-placement.png
  20. ↑ 20.00 20.01 20.02 20.03 20.04 20.05 20.06 20.07 20.08 20.09 20.10 20.11 Livestream, May 30, 2019 (1:26:16).
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 21.2 Interview, July 8, 2020 (55:05).
  22. ↑ 22.0 22.1 22.2 22.3 22.4 Know Your Nodes: Economic Node Type.
  23. ↑ 23.0 23.1 23.2 23.3 23.4 Livestream, October 30, 2020 (1:03:52).
  24. ↑ 24.0 24.1 24.2 24.3 24.4 24.5 Livestream, October 30, 2020 (1:04:59).
  25. ↑ 25.0 25.1 25.2 25.3 25.4 steven-ah-purchases.png
  26. ↑ 26.0 26.1 26.2 26.3 Livestream, May 10, 2017 (35:16).
  27. ↑ 27.0 27.1 Interview, July 8, 2020 (57:46).
  28. ↑ 28.0 28.1 Livestream, April 30, 2020 (1:14:44).
  29. ↑ siege spoils.png
  30. ↑ 30.0 30.1 30.2 30.3 Livestream, November 27, 2024 (21:03).
  31. ↑ 31.0 31.1 2024-11-27 - Development Update with Alpha Two Giants and Demons.
  32. ↑ 32.0 32.1 32.2 32.3 32.4 32.5 32.6 32.7 32.8 Podcast, May 10, 2024 (41:42).
  33. ↑ Livestream, June 30, 2023 (25:05).
  34. ↑ 34.0 34.1 Interview, January 19, 2025 (1:35:11).
  35. ↑ Livestream, October 30, 2020 (1:06:09).
  36. ↑ player stall repair.png
  37. ↑ Livestream, March 28, 2020 (1:04:49).
  38. ↑ 38.0 38.1 steven-auction-houses.png
  39. ↑ Unreal Engine Interview, 2017-05-23.
  40. ↑ Livestream, June 30, 2023 (1:13:53).
  41. ↑ 41.0 41.1 Livestream, March 26, 2021 (1:15:03).
  42. ↑ 42.0 42.1 42.2 42.3 Livestream, May 10, 2017 (32:22).
  43. ↑ 43.0 43.1 43.2 43.3 Interview, November 10, 2024 (9:37).
  44. ↑ 44.0 44.1 44.2 Interview, July 18, 2020 (52:57).
  45. ↑ 45.0 45.1 45.2 45.3 Interview, August 24, 2018 (4:15).
  46. ↑ Livestream, May 15, 2017 (13:06).
  47. ↑ 47.0 47.1 47.2 47.3 47.4 Interview, November 10, 2024 (10:54).
  48. ↑ 48.0 48.1 48.2 48.3 steven-anti-cheat.png
  49. ↑ 49.0 49.1 49.2 49.3 Interview, July 9, 2023 (1:47:04).
  50. ↑ Video, September 27, 2024 (27:07).
  51. ↑ 51.0 51.1 51.2 51.3 Livestream, January 29, 2021 (1:14:53).
  52. ↑ Video, September 6, 2018 (3:53).
  53. ↑ Livestream, July 9, 2018 (50:16).
  54. ↑ Livestream, January 3, 2025 (1:23:08).
  55. ↑ 55.0 55.1 55.2 Livestream, January 11, 2025 (58:56).
  56. ↑ 56.0 56.1 Livestream, January 2, 2025 (2:01:15).
  57. ↑ Livestream, September 30, 2020 (1:06:14).
  58. ↑ Interview, August 8, 2018 (17:13).
  59. ↑ Npc vending.jpg
  60. ↑ 60.0 60.1 Livestream, June 28, 2019 (1:23:31).
  61. ↑ 61.0 61.1 Video, June 30, 2023 (19:20).
  62. ↑ Interview, December 6, 2018 (20:30).
  63. ↑ Video, May 31, 2020 (47:32).
  64. ↑ Livestream, June 30, 2023 (18:45).
  65. ↑ 65.0 65.1 Livestream, June 25, 2021 (22:34).
  66. ↑ 66.0 66.1 Livestream, January 11, 2025 (2:01:23).
  67. ↑ 67.0 67.1 67.2 Livestream, July 30, 2021 (1:14:33).
  68. ↑ 68.0 68.1 68.2 68.3 Video, May 31, 2020 (47:32).
  69. ↑ Livestream, August 17, 2018 (10:54).
  70. ↑ Livestream, April 30, 2021 (1:12:33).
  71. ↑ Livestream, June 26, 2020 (51:58).
  72. ↑ steven-personal-storage-access.png
  73. ↑ personal caravan launch points.png
  74. ↑ 74.0 74.1 74.2 Podcast, October 12, 2024 (53:37).
  75. ↑ 75.0 75.1 Livestream, January 31, 2025 (47:19).
  76. ↑ steven-penalties.png
  77. ↑ 77.0 77.1 Livestream, August 26, 2022 (1:32:45).
  78. ↑ 78.0 78.1 Interview, January 19, 2025 (43:43).
  79. ↑ 79.0 79.1 Video, September 29, 2023 (2:59).
  80. ↑ 80.0 80.1 80.2 80.3 Livestream, August 31, 2023 (2:10:23).
  81. ↑ 81.0 81.1 81.2 81.3 81.4 Podcast, September 29, 2021 (8:38).
  82. ↑ 82.0 82.1 82.2 82.3 82.4 Video, July 15, 2019 (2:12).
  83. ↑ 83.0 83.1 Livestream, June 30, 2017 (53:57).
  84. ↑ 84.0 84.1 City hall.
  85. ↑ Blog: Development Update with Village Node.
  86. ↑ Livestream, August 31, 2023 (44:21).
  87. ↑ Livestream, January 11, 2019 (1:04:32).
  88. ↑ Livestream, 2018-04-8 (AM) (18:59).
  89. ↑ 89.0 89.1 Video, May 27, 2022 (17:15).
  90. ↑ Livestream, August 26, 2022 (1:26:58).
  91. ↑ Livestream, 2018-04-8 (PM) (1:20:03).
  92. ↑ Livestream, August 23, 2017 (28:22).
  93. ↑ Livestream, May 17, 2017 (30:53).
  94. ↑ Kickstarter - We Just Broke $1,500,000!
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