Does anyone else feel like Demand is killing CS?

[PandoraDiskenth]

Hey guys,

So I have been apart of this site since 2009, Just a year after it started. And I've been around for many of CS's major changes such as rarity changes, events coming and going, and the Rarity List. It's always been such a fun and colorful site full of welcoming players, Incredible artists and moderators who worked hard to keep it a safe and fun website to spend hours on! I would always log in every month or so, collect my monthly pets and move on but I never truly got into until the last 4 years.

Now I have my big dreamies, just like everyone else and the Rarity List made it easier to judge what was a fair trade and what really wasn't, even if it was unofficial (Everyone just treated it like it was). And I've unfortunately been swindled/Taken advantage of my fair share of times... and it sucks. But these days it seems that the dreamies everyone wants (IE, Cerberus, Marionette, Eat Me/Drink Me, Malk Dragons, Non-Dogs, etc... I got so RIDICULOUSLY lucky that someone actually gifted me mine or else it probably would've never happened.) are ridiculously hard to come by which is understandable given when they came out and how many had them. In addition of that there became the "Demand" section of trading, also understandable, but by the time that was established the CS trading economy had been born.

Eventually "Demand" became the basis almost everyone uses to try to get the most off of someone who only wants their Dream pet and be happy and have fun on this site. Suddenly A "Non-dog" is no longer worth a "Non-dog" and a Cerberus/Marionette/Eat Me/Drink Me/etc... is worth 5 to 6 of these Nons when they clearly are only worth 2 to 3 but they know they can get more because of this "Demand".

Even in the case of you offering 5 Nons to someone requesting 5 Nons for their valuable pet, which they already have 6 of that they received by paying a maybe a Nons worth for each, still isn't enough and they want more but you've already traded away nearly you're whole account for these pets.... There's no point to setting goals on this site anymore. The fun and excitement and hope have been bled dry and replaced with greed and inflation now dictated by "Demand" and how far people continue to stretch it to take advantage of the other people on this site.

This site used to be fun... and maybe one day it'll go back to how it used to be. I'm still incredibly appreciative to the talented Artists and vigilant Moderators for doing all they do to keep ChickenSmoothie alive. But DEMAND IS KILLING CS...

I've seen this circling the forms thanks to a certain CS user and it spoke volumes to me:
┍━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┑
Please Stop Feeding DEMAND!
★ Raven is not worth Nons!
★ Dragon PPS Cat is not worth the List!
★ Cerberus is not worth 5 Nons!
★ Black Advent is not worth Non!
★ LT Shima is not worth the List!
★ Very Rare is not worth more than OMGsr!

★ Zebras are not worthless!
★ Tribals are not worthless!
★ Rats are not worthless!

★ Nick Sunback PPS is worth more than Joker!
★ Nick Blue Tox is worth more than Joker!
★ UR Apple is worth more than Joker!

★ Re-released pets has SAME rarity as True Dates!
Please be aware of how demand is causing the trading economy to crumble.
A pet's rarity determines its value. Demand is up to you.
┕━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┙

Maybe we should think on that.
Happy Holidays everyone!
I hope you all achieve your dreams here on CS as well as anywhere in life. And I hope your Dec 18th box rocks your stockings this year!

EDIT: I just wanted to say thank you to everyone for sharing their valuable opinion and keeping this thread an informational and civil one. I know we all have our ideas of how we think trading should be handled and in the end it is ultimately up to you and your trading partner. What I love about the CS community is our ability to stay compassionate with each other despite our disagreements and each one of you have respected the other, I really appreciate y'all. You guys really are awesome <3

[.wren.]

I've only been on this site since 2014 and I 100% agree.

I took a small hiatus a few months ago and, even since then, I've come back and everything is so much different than it used to be.
I was fortunate enough to get one of the new UR pets this December 18th- the teacup/coffee cup, and auctioned it just to see where it stood.

I got an offer for a dogtag, which naturally I auto'ed because wow! a dogtag? that's so far up the retired list (I still go by, which is a whole different discussion- I think it plays a major part in demand for sure.), that it's even past all other UR's if I remember right. If not, then it's past most of them.

Anyhow, I mean even still it's one of the first pets released on the site, considering it was July of '08, but somehow now it's hardly worth anything? I mean my break from here wasn't particularly long nor intentional, but how things have changed are crazy.

How can I not get one raven or one joker from this high-listed pet, and struggle to get more than two mainlists unless they are also of "bad demand."

And, of course, this is just one example. Don't misunderstand either, I am not trying to complain or anything. It's just wild how demand is the sole determining factor of a pets worth and god forbid you're not around when that sudden shift in demand takes place. For then you can get stepped over so easily by anyone taking advantage of it. (for clarity- I was not stepped on in this offer, I actually am still glad I took it simply for how highly I value the pet, even if hardly anyone else does.)

Not that this is a serious issue really, I mean this is a virtual pet trading site right?
But there are some people that spend their actual money here and invest a lot of time here because it is something that makes them happy.

Demand has always been an issue, but in my opinion ever since the rare's list was retired, it's become even more so of an issue because the system that was in place for so long is now suddenly left not updated so, unless you ask around or have the right sources, you don't know what anything valuable is actually worth.

Yes, I acknowledge this very thing could've happened still if the rare's list was kept up. But I honestly think that it was certain to happen if it wasn't, and well, here we are.

I feel for new players too, because you about need a guide just to trade anything. Which, there are several forums floating around to help, but they've become rather controversial because suddenly rarity and demand are so far from each other. This controversy has also kept a lot of experienced users from even replying there in fear of anyone telling them that "because of demand" they're incorrect.

(I hope you don't mind my input here! I love a good discussion and this is one topic I've been struggling with a little anyway haha)

[serenitymontaza]

Demand has always been an issue, but in my opinion ever since the rare's list was retired, it's become even more so of an issue because the system that was in place for so long is now suddenly left not updated so, unless you ask around or have the right sources, you don't know what anything valuable is actually worth.

I completley agree with this, as someone who voted to get rid of the rares list, I'm not sure how I feel in the decision I made. I find it very difficult to explain what a valuable pet is to a newer person, and i also wonder if more newbies have got ninja'd this year because of it. Even when my friends ask me if their trade is fair, I never know what to say because there's no guide to it. But maybe that's the way chicken smoothie was supposed to be anyway, it's more light-hearted and people aren't as rude when trading anymore.

[PandoraDiskenth]

I didn't even touch the subject of new players... I can't imagine having just started this site and falling in love with it just to see how broken the trading system is or even worse, getting a really good pet in Dec 18th and trading it away for something not even close to it's worth because some jerk saw an opportunity to step on someone who didn't know any better. That alone would turn me away from this site.

Im already considering limiting how much time I spend on this site from now on until it either works itself out or ultimately falls apart. Im praying for the first...

[Minaethiel]

That's just supply and demand for you. The older pets are rereleased every year and the store pets are not. And as demand rises while supply falls, value goes up. That's just how economies are. It's just not feasible to keep value the exact same when everybody and their mother wants a Raven, or a Cerberus, or whatever. Only way to alleviate it would be to reintroduce the animals and make them more common, but it would have to be done through the store.

[mothflight]

Yeah I understand what you’re saying and it makes everything really difficult. It feels like it’s impossible to move from the spot that I’m at, because everyone wants more than what their pet is worth when I can barely even afford the pet itself, making it hard to even achieve my dreamies. I used to think I’d be able to make it to a certain point but now I doubt that no matter how hard I try, and I understand people wanting to get a lot in return but it’s just like not everyone is capable of doing that. Like all we can do is sit in the sidelines and watch people trade their pets for the highest on the main list. Oh well I guess though.

[SheepSheepy]

I'm a new player and I already undertraded my list pet, not because I didn't understand its value (i mean, a little of that too)... but because I didn't want it, and I did want what was offered! Most trades should be like that.

Personally I don't understand who actually wants most of the list pets, because they're really not that cute. In that way, I think demand should influence it, driving their value down. People just want them because they're "valuable" or "rare" but... I just want cute pets!

Also..

Rats are not worthless!

This hurts my heart to think some people find them worthless...

[FallFiresideFirefly]

Another very new user here, I agree completely. I’ve only been around for a month or two and I can see how hard it is to understand the demand of pets. I’ve been extremely careful trading and haven’t really traded anything higher than an uncommon for fear of being “ripped off” by getting a low demand pet in exchange for a high demand one. It’s really hard for me to follow what is popular and what isn’t, much less understand how the list has changed and why very rares can be worth more than omg so rares. I also agree with the hoarding of lists; that just seems like a really unfair thing that tanks the order of value on CS, and maybe if that problem was solved a bit of balance would be restored? Just some thoughts from a newbie haha.

[serenitymontaza]

this reminds me of brexit hahah, it's like i didn't know what i was voting for.
i'm not sure anything will be able to change it at this point tbh, it's too big of a deal. i mean if there was at least a demand list so we could have some sort of guidance it would be very helpful, but skelebuns are going for like 10 nons (i didn't know people liked rabbits!) so i'm not really sure of it anymore, i don't think anybody is (enough to make a list).

[dawnchu]

Demand has always been an issue, but in my opinion ever since the rare's list was retired, it's become even more so of an issue because the system that was in place for so long is now suddenly left not updated so, unless you ask around or have the right sources, you don't know what anything valuable is actually worth.

I completley agree with this, as someone who voted to get rid of the rares list, I'm not sure how I feel in the decision I made. I find it very difficult to explain what a valuable pet is to a newer person, and i also wonder if more newbies have got ninja'd this year because of it. Even when my friends ask me if their trade is fair, I never know what to say because there's no guide to it. But maybe that's the way chicken smoothie was supposed to be anyway, it's more light-hearted and people aren't as rude when trading anymore.

I agree! It’s almost as if the Rares List (regardless of how faulty it was) was maintaining some semblance of order. Without it, demand has started running rampant. Similar to a dictatorship, no one liked the Rares List, but but due to its power over the CS community, everyone abided by it and followed its rules.

the downfall of the rares' list was something i wasn't expecting.
i don't really understand why people voted to get rid of it when we could've restructured it. it's obvious that the list won't stop being in use soon, so why cause more havoc by discontinuing it? i think that if we restructured the list, although timely, it would ultimately be a great and reliable guide for traders that helps the economy by setting at least some sort of norm.
please do share opinions! i'm very interested in each and every one c: