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Auction House - Time Left

10 replies [Last post]
Sun, 08/26/2012 - 08:34
Mookie-Cookie's picture
Mookie-Cookie

Now, forgive me if this has been suggested before, or if it seems unreasonable to you lot; but this is, after all, my first post here.

Anyhow, the suggestion I have is that the "Time Left" part of the auctions within the AH be changed. At first, you might be thinking "Why? What's wrong with it as is?". The main issue I see is that the later ranges (Long, and Very Long) are too wide. If you're browsing through and decide to bid on something with a time left of Long, it could end at any time between 4 hours and a massive 24 hours. That's an incredible 20 hour difference!

This might not seem like much of an issue for those players that can play almost all day long, but what about those that play in short sessions when they can? Those that check in to check for any updates just before they go to sleep? (those guys exist, right?).

Differences like 20 hours are too significant to just ignore.

Now, what I suggest is to make it more accurate. Not pin-point accuracy, cause that'll just stuff everything up. Very short, Short, and Medium are fine, but Long and Very Long ought to broken up into, say, 3 hour chunks. Doing so would help those stuck in restricted time frames to determine whether they can bid or not.

Let's take a scenario, shall we? You're bored of an afternoon, so you hop on and give yourself a solid 2 hours play time on SK. After After you've burned through your ME, you decide to go on the prowl for a certain item (doesn't matter what); so you head over to AH to get bidding. You find what you're after, and it's on for the elusive "Long". Now, you know this could be on for 4-24 hours, and you also know you'll be back in, let's say, 6 hours, to play again. So, you figure you'll risk it, bid, and log off. 6 hours later, you're on again, you've got mail saying you were outbid (which is fair enough), so you head back to AH to bid again, just to find the auction has ended! That "Long" was in the 4-6 hour range, not the massive 6-24. You're disappointed, you search again, and it's either not there, or it's overpriced.

What can you do?.. Wait. Oh, joy. It can become a long, painful process, and the lack of accuracy in Time Left can just make it even worse. Break it up a bit. Albeit, Very Long could stay, but I believe Long definitely needs to be broken up.

Tl;dr: Shorten the "Long" time left in AH into smaller time scale chunks, such as 3 hours.

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 08:46
#1
Deltikon's picture
Deltikon
Just a question

Why not actual accurate time? It's just to prevent bid "sniping"? And I guess your suggestion sounds alright.

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 08:54
#2
Mookie-Cookie's picture
Mookie-Cookie
Well, I had asked about

Well, I had asked about accurate timing by the AH in SK itself. All I got back was "accurate would be bad as people would wait for 1 sec, then bid".
I'm not so sure they understood what I was getting at considering I was asking about the "Long" only, but there you go.

So, yes, to prevent bid sniping, as you put it.

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 09:05
#3
Deltikon's picture
Deltikon
Ah I figured.

But yeah, it would be a nice idea, a bit more accuracy won't hurt and it wouldn't put much effort for the devs I guess.

+1

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 09:42
#4
Derpules's picture
Derpules
+1

Although I'd prefer accurate time up to 1h (when it would just say "<1h", or "<5mins" when on v short).

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 09:44
#5
Aureate's picture
Aureate
Processing Thoughts of You Always

Hmm... giving a rough idea in terms of hours remaining would be nice, yes.

+ 1

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 09:46
#6
Skyguarder's picture
Skyguarder
^

What you three said. I agree to make it accurate.

+1

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 09:52
#7
Mookie-Cookie's picture
Mookie-Cookie
Gradual chunks?

Plus, if you didn't want multiple small same-size chunks, you could do gradual chunks, like it already does, but smaller, such as;
Very Short / <5 mins
Short / 5 min - 1hr
Med / 1hr - 4hrs
name 1 / 4hrs - 8hrs
name 2 / 8hrs - 14hrs
Long / 14hrs - 24hrs
Very Long / 24hrs +

That way, it's still more accurate, but also quite loose.

EDIT: name in <> doesn't show up? Okay then...

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 13:20
#8
Dukeplatypus's picture
Dukeplatypus
No, I like the current

No, I like the current system, makes it so you have to put effort into bidding. Perhaps adding an "less than X minutes/hours left" would be better, though, so there's less confustion as to what "short", "medium", and "long" actually mean.

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 13:25
#9
Derpules's picture
Derpules
Bleh.

I'm an inveterate AH stalker and rely partly on the ignorance of others to nab my bargains, so I agree that having to put in some effort is a good thing. But I really think that not knowing whether an auction has 4 h 1 min to go or 23 h 59 mins to go is a bit much! There should at least be a band between 4 h and 12 h.

Sun, 08/26/2012 - 14:38
#10
Purrifier's picture
Purrifier
I hate it when an auction

I hate it when an auction that has been outbidded and is very short, but it goes sold earlier than the ones that are upper than this auction. But timers will make auctions reflex wars more than auctions.

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