Trading Hub Feedback

[HeatherMarie]

I really really wish we at *least* had pagination implemented by now. Two full months after the feature was introduced and still lacking basic functionality like a way to actually *see* more then the most recent hour or two of trades. It's very very tedious to filter by breeds one at a time over and over and over just to see more then a handful of posted trades. 

[purplehaze]

True! and we really need "Have" field. With everyone posting details of what they have in the "Want" field, it makes trying to search that field useless! Those are my two main complaints at the moment that seem like they should have been fixable by now -- but then I'm not TJ and not a programmer, so...

[13310]

I really enjoy the Trading Hub and appreciate that it was added. It has allowed me to adopt a lot of interesting lineages that I would probably never have seen otherwise. Some generous traders have also helped push me closer to that platinum trophy! That said,

 

"Have" input area would be my first vote. Would simplify posting lineages, of course, but the current way can also be a bit frustrating for newer players. Say someone would really like a Purple Dino. She has gathered enough rare hatchlings to overpay by a bit, and just wants to trade. Well, she can't, because 1. She hasn't had a Purple Dino to unlock the egg, and 2. She didn't find enough Dino eggs in the hatcheries in time to unlock that type of Dino for drop-down searching. This leads to...

 

Multiple pages/option to shuffle listings. Due to the above, the newer player would need to post her rares & ask for the Dino in her listing. This wouldn't be a problem, except.. During the time of day when there are the most people online to see the listing, it may, within minutes, get pushed back by the same 10 or 20 people re-posting the same trades over and over. Or even just new posts which flood by so quickly, her trade is not visible for long enough for a Dino-catcher to see it. More pages, listing shuffle, or really anything to help show more listings would be nice.

A newer player with rares to offer could "luck" into seeing a new type of rare to offer on. For the more whimsical among us, it offers more variety of trades to surf. I often look at the trade page without really knowing what I want, and something will just strike my fancy. Or I'll see someone needing a specific 2G or bloodswap, and breed one up, because why not. Most of the time, though, it'll only be half (or none) of the page being of interest, since the same stuff is getting pushed to the top.

 

Quick lineage link and any already-known genders being listed would also be very helpful. I suppose the second could be implemented in another way, though, which would be good for more than just trading.

Some sort of notepad (wishlist) may also be of use. Checkbox to "show wishlist on trade". Honestly, not sure if I'd use it, but many people know -exactly- what they're looking for (and it is probably at least a little longer than the Wants box allows). At the same time, I like how having a shorter "wants" box can streamline things. And looking through too many long lists can become exhausting.

Username's Trade - Wishlist

Has: Chicken S1 Hatchling

Wants: See Rare or For Freeze section of my wishlist. Other offers fine.

Edited July 21, 2018 by 13310

[HeatherMarie]

42 minutes ago, 13310 said:

 

Quick lineage link and any already-known genders being listed would also be very helpful. I suppose the second could be implemented in another way, though, which would be good for more than just trading.

Some sort of notepad (wishlist) may also be of use. Checkbox to "show wishlist on trade". Honestly, not sure if I'd use it, but many people know -exactly- what they're looking for (and it is probably at least a little longer than the Wants box allows). At the same time, I like how having a shorter "wants" box can streamline things. And looking through too many long lists can become exhausting.

Username's Trade - Wishlist

Has: Chicken S1 Hatchling

Wants: See Rare or For Freeze section of my wishlist. Other offers fine.

 

A wishlist-type section has been mentioned before (in this thread I think?) and it seems that most people don't want that because they don't want to make the extra effort of clicking through to a wishlist and reading what could be a very long/detailed list. While I don't completely agree with that, it seems to me the best compromise would simply be making the 'Wants' box bigger. I've posted before about the Wants box being very very limiting (for example, I usually have multiple breeds I'll accept, but only messy-lineaged and not from a specific dragon, and usually those different elements won't all fit in the Want box). Some people are currently posting the url to a wishlist-type group on their scroll as a workaround, but I think expanding the Want character-limit would be very helpful.

 

YES to your other points! Just looking at the main page of the Trading Hub right this moment, you can only see trades posted in the last *forty minutes* (currently 3:27, bottom trade was posted at 2:50), which is a little ridiculous. We definitely need pages, a way to easily see more then just a handful of the most recent trades (shuffling listings is an interesting idea too, hadn't thought of that!).

[Aalbiel]

On 7/20/2018 at 7:08 PM, HeatherMarie said:

I really really wish we at *least* had pagination implemented by now. Two full months after the feature was introduced and still lacking basic functionality like a way to actually *see* more then the most recent hour or two of trades. It's very very tedious to filter by breeds one at a time over and over and over just to see more then a handful of posted trades. 

 

Following repeated (very repeated) discussions on the unofficial Discord on this topic (in case it isn't clear, fully in support):

 

[Dohaerys]

pagination please

[Aalbiel]

 

(I'm usually more wordy but.... a picture is worth a thousand words?)

Edited July 21, 2018 by Aalbiel

[Naraku]

Pagination please.

 

I get no offers when my trades fall off the front page (especially if it's not Gold, ND, etc) so I have to bump it up every 30 minutes or so. I usually just give up after second try or more and gift/abandon it.

Edited July 21, 2018 by Naraku

[SunFish]

I have the same problem like Naraku. Especially while wanting a gender or colour swap... it's always lost in the hub after some mins

 

 

Edited July 24, 2018 by LadyLyzar
Meme removed - let's keep things on topic please

[osmarks]

Especially without pagination, the current system of requiring having seen a breed before (or having the encyclopedia entry for it unlocked, I don't know exactly how that works) does kind of defeat the point of trading for stuff you don't have.

[HeatherMarie]

13 minutes ago, osmarks said:

Especially without pagination, the current system of requiring having seen a breed before (or having the encyclopedia entry for it unlocked, I don't know exactly how that works) does kind of defeat the point of trading for stuff you don't have.

 

You need to have the egg for that breed unlocked in the encyclopedia, which you can do by clicking other people's eggs (I think it takes 5?). I personally think it should be a bit clearer on the page exactly what you need to do, to my knowledge it doesn't actually *say* anywhere that you need to unlock the egg in order to filter by that breed, which means *many* people have posted with the same questions of why isn't that breed listed, what do I need to do, etc. (However, once you know that it is fairly easy, anyone who uses hatcheries simply needs to click some of the eggs there.)

[Jazeki]

Is there any way to discourage people from posting silly things in the hub? I'm trying to trade and I don't really want to have to refresh to search through song lyrics to do it. 

[The Dragoness]

3 minutes ago, Jazeki said:

Is there any way to discourage people from posting silly things in the hub? I'm trying to trade and I don't really want to have to refresh to search through song lyrics to do it. 

You can hit the report button if it's especially bothersome, but the mischief seems to have already cleared up.

[Jazeki]

Just now, The Dragoness said:

You can hit the report button if it's especially bothersome, but the mischief seems to have already cleared up.

Yes, I get that. It's time-consuming and a problem that should be addressed.  That's why I posted in feedback. 

[HeatherMarie]

1 hour ago, Jazeki said:

Is there any way to discourage people from posting silly things in the hub? I'm trying to trade and I don't really want to have to refresh to search through song lyrics to do it. 

 

I'm not sure what could be done except use the report button... There is already a warning right next to the Want box when you make a trade, and presumably if the report button is used they won't be able to keep doing it (tho I really have no idea what happens on the reported-user's side). The only other possible thing I can think of would be to ban certain words/phrases from even being able to go through, but I definitely don't think that would be a good idea.

[Fuzzbucket]

Further up the thread that was suggested, but TJ pointed out all sorts of legitimate reasons one might want almost any word that would be blocked.

[Jazeki]

It's a pain to have to individually report when there are 12 or more posts that definitely don't have anything to do with trading. I know that you can also pm a mod with screenshots. I don't know if blocking will even help and I understand that sometimes you want to be silly, but I just wish TJ could address that people have the ability to just clog the hub with memes or conversation or song lyrics on a fairly frequent basis. 

 

If there were on-site mods to monitor the hub and remove the posts as they happen, maybe that would help.

[olympe]

I think that consequences would help more than mods, to be honest. Quite a bit of that could even happen automatically, similar to warn levels on our forums. This is how it could work:

 

1. A trade is automatically considered "warned" once a certain number of different players have reported it. This number should be higher than 3 (accidents do happen), yet lower than 20. Since I have absolutely no idea how many warns actually happen, it's up to TJ to figure it out. Each warned trade gets you a 10% warn. Warns in-game go down after 2 weeks, just like on the forums.
2. Every "warn" results in the trade being taken down. The player gets an automated message telling them that their trade got taken down due to too many user reports. Add a link to the site rules and a way to contact a mod, maybe a common e-mail address all forum mods have access to in case they don't understand why they got reported.
3. If a player reaches 30% warn, they cannot use the want-field for public trades until their warn level goes down.
4. If a player somehow manages to reach 50% warn, they cannot post public trades until their warn level goes down. (Can only happen if someone posts several misdeeds at once.)
5. If a player somehow manages to climb even higher on the warn ladder, more permanent actions are being taken at the discretion of the modding team. (This could include permanent inability to fill in the want field in public trades, permanent inability to post public trades of their own or even permanent exclusion from the trading hub.)

Of course, mods would need to be able to see the reported trades in order to mediate or judge a case. Also, the identity of the people who actually reported the trade should be visible so abuse of the report feature can be punished, too. If it's always the same group of accounts reporting trades, it might be advisable to check for multi-scrolling. (=> the fewer trolls, the better!)

[HeatherMarie]

I have no clue how the report button works right now, so it may already be automatic to some extent, but I worry about it being *too* automated... There are, and will always be, malicious players who would take joy in deliberately reporting every single trade a specific user posts. It would only take a small group of people like that to completely block someone from trading at all, by continually reporting all their trades. I like the 'warn' system here on the forums, in that a mod actually has to specifically warn you, it's not just done automatically if someone decides to use that report button on your post. (Again, for all I know the Want-box report button is totally automated....)

 

3 hours ago, Jazeki said:

It's a pain to have to individually report when there are 12 or more posts that definitely don't have anything to do with trading. I know that you can also pm a mod with screenshots. I don't know if blocking will even help and I understand that sometimes you want to be silly, but I just wish TJ could address that people have the ability to just clog the hub with memes or conversation or song lyrics on a fairly frequent basis. 

 

If there were on-site mods to monitor the hub and remove the posts as they happen, maybe that would help.

 

From what I've seen reported trades seem to get removed fairly quickly.... I've seen stuff mentioned here on the forums and I go to check it out and it's already no longer in the hub, within 15-20 minutes or so. I get that it's frustrating to see tons of totally irrelevant 'trades' when you are looking for something, but they do seem to disappear relatively fast and there is an easy way to report them, I'm not sure I'd support anything more severe then that. (I also think that PAGINATION DANGIT would go a long way towards relieving the frustration over the random non-trades, since you could just click to another page and 'skip' the non-trades.)

[Jazeki]

See I'm not sure if they're actually removed for review or if the speed at which people post just kicks stuff off the page. As it is, you can only see 18 posts at a time.

 

I do want pagination, but that's a separate issue.

[olympe]

2 hours ago, HeatherMarie said:

I have no clue how the report button works right now, so it may already be automatic to some extent, but I worry about it being *too* automated... There are, and will always be, malicious players who would take joy in deliberately reporting every single trade a specific user posts. It would only take a small group of people like that to completely block someone from trading at all, by continually reporting all their trades.

That's why I had this bit added to the suggestion:

5 hours ago, olympe said:

Of course, mods would need to be able to see the reported trades in order to mediate or judge a case. Also, the identity of the people who actually reported the trade should be visible so abuse of the report feature can be punished, too. If it's always the same group of accounts reporting trades, it might be advisable to check for multi-scrolling. (=> the fewer trolls, the better!)

I must admit, the multi-scroll-check was only an afterthought, but it might be worth trying. Of course, some people might hate "player X" and try to block them from trading. However, this is where the ability to contact the mods comes in. A simple "I don't understand which rule I broke." could lead to an investigation that will get the maliciously reporting players punished instead. Which means that this kind of bullying should not become much of a thing.

[HeatherMarie]

That'd definitely be a good thing, to have a way to track/notice if certain scrolls are constantly using 'report' when it doesn't seem justified. But honestly I really really don't like the general idea of 'let people abuse a feature and *then* punish them after it becomes obvious'... It's the same reason I think something needs to be done about viewbombing besides just tracking the viewbombing source after the fact. While I totally agree that 'want' box text should be reportable, and people who abuse that report button should be punished, I don't think it's a good idea to *allow* people to abuse it in the first place, if can possibly be helped. 

 

I mean, if that's how it *has* to be coded, that the button automatically hides trades or something, well not much I can do about that. But I can speak out against the idea that that's how it *should* be. A handful of vindictive players should not be able to totally block other users from trading by consistently reporting every single trade that user posts, and then *later* those vindictive players get punished for abusing the report button, meanwhile that innocent user has been unfairly shut off from trading for however long (and probably totally turned off from trading in general because let's face it that's just a horrible thing to go through). 

[olympe]

Well, that's where the notification comes in. "One of your public trades has been taken down due to numerous reports. If you don't understand why your trade has been reported, feel free to contact our moderators at DCmods@dragcave.net. [insert link to rules]" 

So, you've been wrongfully reported. You contact the mods and ask for clarification. The mods check what's happened - and then deal with the result. Whatever it may be.

Although it's probably true that punishments for higher warn levels shouldn't come automatically. Still, I felt that I should put the idea out there. 

Edited July 22, 2018 by olympe

[Whirlaway]

So, pagination is going to happen when, exactly? Nearly two months and counting now... 

[olympe]

The more people ask, the faster it will happen. /sarcasm