create a new 'Purchase Alert' to protect GTN buyers

[anonnn]

See, this is confusing. You're basically saying, you want all people who disagree with the concept of a mandatory inconvenience to compromise and accept the inconvenience. But when they propose an idea that would allow themselves to opt out manually, you have been unwilling to compromise.

 

The very design of the suggestion is already infused with consideration of all players. And during the early debate of this I already tuned the design of it to be reduced to a 3-second delay on the 'OK' button if the Preference for "Purchase Confirmation Dialog" is switched off. So you see, you've arrogantly stumbled into an ongoing debate and illuminated the fact that you and the other over-stated opponents to this suggestion are entirely uncompromising, even in the face of gracious compromise every step of the way on my part. No more compromise is possible, without undermining the effectiveness of the fix and leaving players still vulnerable to major GTN accidents. The single biggest guarantee that the new Purchase Confirmation would be effective IS the fact that it would be guaranteed to pop up when the purchase is an expensive purchase. The guarantee is the foundation of its effectiveness.

 

I am fairly confident 99% of players would not be helped. They would merely be annoyed by making a GTN purchase have a wait period they can't avoid.

...

For the majority of players who will never lose millions of credits in a GTN mistake, they are in no way assisted.

 

That's a lie of course. Everyone who makes purchases on the GTN would be helped by this suggested upgrade to the Purchase Confirmation. Several people in this thread have described the effort they go to in order to avoid making mistaken purchases on the GTN - and even tried to use this as a reason that the GTN doesn't really need to be fixed. But what they didn't realize is that they're describing in perfect clarity the extra burden all GTN users have now, that would be cleanly eliminated if this suggestion were implemented. Using the GTN would suddenly be a carefree experience instead of the slightly stressful experience it is now.

 

Feeling that a player is ultimately accountable for each button press they make in the game is not bashing a victim.

 

Why do you find it so compelling to keep creating strawman arguments in order to provide the illusion that you've refuted a point? That's the sure sign of someone who has only weak arguments to offer.

[anonnn]

Well here's a perfect analogy. Parallels like this aren't seen very often:

 

.

. . . . Delta flight skids off LaGuardia runway

 

(CNN) — A Delta airplane slid off a runway late Thursday morning at New York's LaGuardia airport, its nose breaking through a fence before skidding to a halt.

 

Video from CNN affiliate WABC shows people getting off the commercial jetliner and trudging away from it on the airport's snow-covered ground.

 

Emergency vehicles could be seen around the MD-88 aircraft, which Delta said had 125 passengers and five crew members aboard.

 

Passengers used slides to get off the plane, then boarded buses that took them to LaGuardia's Delta terminal, the airline said in a statement. New York's fire department said everyone exited the aircraft within about 30 minutes of it landing.

 

Six people reported minor injuries, some of whom will be transported to area hospitals, the fire department said.

 

"Our priority is ensuring our customers and crew members are safe," Delta said. "Delta will work with all authorities and stakeholders to look into what happened in this incident."

 

 

Ok now anyone with critical thinking skills can figure out that the airline and the airport, without even the slightest doubt, exceeded the necessary safety parameters in some ways. Maybe they didn't exceed the established safety parameters, but they most certainly exceeded the necessary safety parameters. They could improve the runway heating system that's supposed to melt the snow and (always) prevent the runway from icing up, they could better train their pilots to handle snowy conditions, they could put better runway-monitoring systems in place to detect when conditions are truly too dangerous. Simply put, airplanes aren't EVER supposed to skid off of runways.

 

By the (exact) same token, GTN buyers aren't supposed to ever make major purchasing errors. Since humans are human and human error will always exist, the bulk of the responsibility to prevent purchasing errors has to rest on the shoulders of the GTN design itself. It has to prevent GTN buyer error in whatever ways are possible and reasonable.

 

Pretending it's unreasonable for all players to be forced to wait 3 seconds to buy the GTN items that cost 250K+ credits won't get you anywhere. That's a VERY small inconvenience since only a small percentage of the player base even buy ONE item for 250K+ on a given day. Especially considering the drastically horrible events that are averted (or 'thwarted'?) if this suggestion is implemented... this is an extremely excellent tradeoff for the benefit to the player community that it provides.

 

The same way LaGuardia Airport and Delta Airlines both should have already had more strict safety standards for snowy conditions, and the same way they're obligated to INCREASE their safety standards now that an entire airplane slid off the runway and endangered 130 people's lives, the GTN is obligated to have in place a more effective Purchase Confirmation so that the finalization of a major GTN purchase can be interrupted with 100% accuracy if the buyer didn't actually mean to be purchasing that item at whatever price it is. Luckily, my suggestion here in this thread is exactly that solution. And it's a VERY easy and non-risky solution to implement. Put simply it's a perfect solution. Unless you're a GTN scammer... then it won't seem very perfect.

[azudelphi]

Why do you find it so compelling to keep creating strawman arguments in order to provide the illusion that you've refuted a point? That's the sure sign of someone who has only weak arguments to offer.

 

Then why do you accuse those who disagree of victim bashing?

I believe that would be along the lines of Poisoning the well

Why do you speak of your intelligence and logical capacity?

I believe that would be along the lines of Appeal to Accomplishment

Then why do you believe the protections must be guaranteed instead of merely improved as an option?

I believe that would be along the lines of Nirvana Fallacy

Then why do you claim that those against you are lacking in compassion where you are looking out for others?

I believe that would be along the lines of Moral high ground

 

Make it optional to help those who want it and I guarantee there will be overlap with those who need it... at that point, it is a good suggestion in my book. Short of that, you have not compromised in a meaningful way (2 seconds off the delay is not addressing the true grievance myself and others have with your proposal) and judging from the other people responding in this thread, I suspect you will not have their support.

 

Pretending it's unreasonable for all players to be forced to wait 3 seconds to buy the GTN items that cost 250K+ credits won't get you anywhere. That's a VERY small inconvenience since only a small percentage of the player base even buy ONE item for 250K+ on a given day.

 

That is purely opinion. You are entitled to yours. But that does not establish what you say as fact.

Edited March 5, 2015 by azudelphi

[JPryde]

Pretending it's unreasonable for all players to be forced to wait 3 seconds to buy the GTN items that cost 250K+ credits won't get you anywhere.

Pretending it's unreasonable to allow the option to turn any kind of safety measure voluntarily off won't get you anywhere.... but it doesn't stop you from repeating it over and over and over again.

 

Besides I did so far only see a single person calling other players arguments outright bulls... which in my books makes you the only one trolling.

Edited March 5, 2015 by JPryde

[Jrr_hypernova]

so at what point did this red past filled impression in the ground stop being a horse?

[branmakmuffin]

Well here's a perfect analogy. Parallels like this aren't seen very often:

 

[...]

 

Simply put, airplanes aren't EVER supposed to skid off of runways.

 

[...]

 

By the (exact) same token, GTN buyers aren't supposed to ever make major purchasing errors.

"Inapt" does not even begin to describe how flawed this "analogy" is. These are so completely different, once again it is impossible to believe you are not simply trolling.

[gbrumback]

The very design of the suggestion is already infused with consideration of all players.

 

No, consideration for ALL players would recognize that NOT ALL the players want this mandatory warning and delay forced on us with no ability to disable it in our user preferences.

 

You really should consider running for Congress. That is the career if choice for people that KNOW what is best for everyone, even if they disagree.

[anonnn]

No, consideration for ALL players would recognize that NOT ALL the players want this mandatory warning and delay forced on us with no ability to disable it in our user preferences.

...

 

Oh, you must have missed the side note in my original post, that's been there the entire time:

 

.

 

Side note on objections and feasibility:

 

I realize many people will say they (strongly) dislike mandatory popup windows. Well so do I. However, there's no way to stop the (major) GTN accidents without slightly inconveniencing buyers each time they purchase an expensive item.

 

One of the greatest things about this solution is that it won't require very much effort to implement, since it involves fairly trivial changes to the GTN's current "Purchase Confirmation Dialog" functionality.

 

 

 

.

The 3-second-delayed mandatory purchase confirmation IS the way that these GTN purchasing errors will be stopped. It's insufficient to say "they just have to read carefully" or the even more callous rationalization of "that's their own mistake". The problem has to be fixed regardless of where fault is believed to rest.

 

And a 3-second delay is NOTHING. Three seconds goes by fairly quickly, and what's achieved by those 3 seconds (in conjunction with a brightly-colored price for purchases 250K+) is the entire magic of ending these GTN purchasing errors for good. AND the 3 second delay only occurs if the purchase is 250K+ credits, so complaining endlessly about the 3 seconds is absurd since we're talking about, on average, one purchase a day at the most. 3 seconds a day, in order to end the millions-of-credits catastrophe that keeps happening to another fresh SWToR victim is a very worthwhile tradeoff.

 

.

Edited March 16, 2015 by anonnn

[ekwalizer]

Oh, you must have missed the side note in my original post, that's been there the entire time:

 

.

 

Side note on objections and feasibility:

 

I realize many people will say they (strongly) dislike mandatory popup windows. Well so do I. However, there's no way to stop the (major) GTN accidents without slightly inconveniencing buyers each time they purchase an expensive item.

 

One of the greatest things about this solution is that it won't require very much effort to implement, since it involves fairly trivial changes to the GTN's current "Purchase Confirmation Dialog" functionality.

 

 

 

.

The 3-second-delayed mandatory purchase confirmation IS the way that these GTN purchasing errors will be stopped. It's insufficient to say "they just have to read carefully" or the even more callous rationalization of "that's their own mistake". The problem has to be fixed regardless of where fault is believed to rest.

 

And a 3-second delay is NOTHING. Three seconds goes by fairly quickly, and what's achieved by those 3 seconds (in conjunction with a brightly-colored price for purchases 250K+) is the entire magic of ending these GTN purchasing errors for good. AND the 3 second delay only occurs if the purchase is 250K+ credits, so complaining endlessly about the 3 seconds is absurd since we're talking about, on average, one purchase a day at the most. 3 seconds a day, in order to end the millions-of-credits catastrophe that keeps happening to another fresh SWToR victim is a very worthwhile tradeoff.

 

.

 

So you want to slightly inconvenience the entire player-base because some players cannot be inconvenienced enough to be responsible, read, and pay attention to what they are spending their fake, in game only money on?

 

 

 

 

 

[Ratajack]

So you want to slightly inconvenience the entire player-base because some players cannot be inconvenienced enough to be responsible, read, and pay attention to what they are spending their fake, in game only money on?

 

 

 

 

 

That pretty much sums up his whole argument.

 

He refuses to acknowledge that you can't fix stupid.

[anonnn]

So you want to slightly inconvenience the entire player-base because some players cannot be inconvenienced enough to be responsible, read, and pay attention to what they are spending their fake, in game only money on?

...

 

I'm willing to accept a minor inconvenience to myself, in order to shut down the guaranteed future occurrences of major detriments to GTN buyers when they accidentally buy the wrong GTN items thinking they didn't have a price tag of millions of credits.

 

Your way of wording it is perhaps considered clever ... amongst dishonest types.

[anonnn]

That pretty much sums up his whole argument.

 

He refuses to acknowledge that you can't fix stupid.

 

Did you know there was a time when crosswalk signals didn't have the little chirping sound?

[ekwalizer]

I'm willing to accept a minor inconvenience to myself, in order to shut down the guaranteed future occurrences of major detriments to GTN buyers when they accidentally buy the wrong GTN items thinking they didn't have a price tag of millions of credits.

 

Your way of wording it is perhaps considered clever ... amongst dishonest types.

 

None of what you replied is either an answer to the question or proof of a required 'fix". Nor is what I said dishonest or a straw-man argument. It is a valid question that encapsulates your desire for this "fix".

Edited March 17, 2015 by ekwalizer

[ekwalizer]

Did you know there was a time when crosswalk signals didn't have the little chirping sound?

 

Speaking of straw-man arguments ...

[anonnn]

Speaking of straw-man arguments ...

 

Do you even know WHY they added the chirping sound to the crosswalk signals?

[ekwalizer]

Do you even know WHY they added the chirping sound to the crosswalk signals?

 

Yes I do and it is in no way a valid comparison between trying to prevent blind people from being ran over in a cross walk and further assisting players that already cannot be bothered to READ in a GAME.

[branmakmuffin]

Did you know there was a time when crosswalk signals didn't have the little chirping sound?

I guess the implication here is that blind people are stupid?

[anonnn]

Yes I do and it is in no way a valid comparison between trying to prevent blind people from being ran over in a cross walk and further assisting players that already cannot be bothered to READ in a GAME.

 

My question is:

 

WHY would they add a specific implement that really only helps blind people, when only about 2% of the population is blind??

 

In fact, couldn't it be said that the chirping sound is an annoyance to a large percentage of the rest of us?

 

.

 

WHAT EXACTLY IS GOING ON WITH THAT ???

 

.

[branmakmuffin]

My question is:

 

WHY would they add a specific implement that really only helps blind people, when only about 2% of the population is blind?

I'm gonna say ... to help people who, by no choice of their own, are blind.

[anonnn]

My question is:

 

WHY would they add a specific implement that really only helps blind people, when only about 2% of the population is blind??

 

In fact, couldn't it be said that the chirping sound is an annoyance to a large percentage of the rest of us?

 

.

 

WHAT EXACTLY IS GOING ON WITH THAT ???

 

The answer is, of course, that:

.

• it's the right thing to do, even though it's only a small portion of the player population
  .
  
• the consequence of NOT doing so is that that small group of people, if they still choose to venture into the unprotected venue, might meet with a very catastrophic fate as a result of there being no guidance/protection mechanism
  .
  
• not doing so would leave the management of the venue with a sense that it's inadequate, because it's obvious that it's the needed change
  

 

.

 

Let's compare the two things, side by side:

.

• GTN buyers buying items that cost 250K+ have to wait 3 seconds before being able to click 'OK' to finalize their purchase
  
• GTN buyers who aren't yet familiarized with how easy a mistake can happen on the GTN... end up time and again losing MILLIONS of credits (but not the same person twice) on the GTN on egregiously overpriced items because they didn't realize the price tag was so high
  

 

.

NO MATTER WHAT the actual reason(s) any particular purchase error occurred, the fact of the matter is that the Purchase Confirmation is the last step of the purchase process, and the entire purpose of the Purchase Confirmation is, by definition, to prevent mistaken purchases, and so the Purchase Confirmation failed to do its job in these cases. So it's a no-brainer that the Purchase Confirmation should be enhanced. NO MATTER WHAT the reasons are for the purchase errors.

[anonnn]

So you want to slightly inconvenience the entire player-base because some players cannot be ...

 

How about the ability to switch off the redesigned Purchase Confirmation Dialog will be a Legacy unlock that requires the maximum Legacy level, and costs 15M credits to unlock?

 

Do you see my point or will I have to explain it to you? . .

 

.

[azudelphi]

I'm gonna say ... to help people who, by no choice of their own, are blind.

 

Did they have a choice to be blind? No.

Was there real potential for harm to their life or limb? Yes.

Are we really attempting to compare (or worse, equate) damage to life and limb to the loss of internet space monies? Apparently...

Is OP using a terrible analogy yet again? Yes.

 

Seriously. Instead of a mandatory 3 seconds, why not just personally go in-between instances of fleet saying in general chat: "Remember to sort by price." Not even kidding; see your server's response to you sending that message out on a relatively frequent basis...

[anonnn]

You missed the point. How about we start with "it's the right thing to do" and see what sense you can make of that concept...

[azudelphi]

You missed the point. How about we start with "it's the right thing to do" and see what sense you can make of that concept...

 

Easily. Your particular definitions of "right" and "wrong" are a bit different from mine. I don't believe protecting people from their mistakes when there is an unreal loss is comparable to protecting someone from loss of life or limb. I don't see your proposal as the "right thing to do." I believe it is based in your set of morality as the right thing to do, but it doesn't translate to an in-game solution.

 

But in terms of the ethical question, "Should society protect the blind from oncoming traffic?" the answer is clearly yes. Because people who are blind did not have an alternative; they did not "choose" blindness. The GTN user who gets hasty and careless has an alternative. They can be more careful; they can go a bit slower (take 3 extra seconds). So that's why it isn't a matter of right and wrong...

 

Now, I am all for improving the GTN if it can satisfy the following conditions:

1. Low resources to change
   
2. Doesn't affect market functionality
   
3. GTN convenience remains the same or improved
   
4. Community support for the change
   

To those points, I have been a proponent for the following to improve the QoL of the GTN:

• Unify decimal formatting (removed or .XX even for integers)
  
• Default sort changed to lowest total price
  
• Allow players to change default sort (Total price, Price per unit, Time remaining, etc)
  

Convenient, simple, practical, optional... that's what I support.

 

Edits performed.

Edited March 19, 2015 by azudelphi

[DOHboy]

Did they have a choice to be blind? No.

Was there real potential for harm to their life or limb? Yes.

Are we really attempting to compare (or worse, equate) damage to life and limb to the loss of internet space monies? Apparently...

Is OP using a terrible analogy yet again? Yes.

 

Seriously. Instead of a mandatory 3 seconds, why not just personally go in-between instances of fleet saying in general chat: "Remember to sort by price." Not even kidding; see your server's response to you sending that message out on a relatively frequent basis...

 

am i the only one that thought of "Bring out your dead skit" when reading this...i approve. Maybe instead of a gold spammer you can just make it a GTN sort reminder.