New Trading Standards Discussion (please join in!)

[Loelya]

it does seem like most people are in favor of keeping the "currency words" we've been working with the last few years

I'm not pitching in to this discussion because I do not trade at that level, but yeah, as someone who has tried to engage with it a few times, it is pretty inaccessible to me. I'm not even commenting on the other higher rarity trade threads cause, what could I say? I really don't understand what people are talking about well enough (even though I do know what MAs are and other things).

As Lacuna says, I think it's important to keep in mind that these discussions are mostly getting people who frequently trade at that level, and not really engaging with people who may have given up on understanding or engaging with that system. It's kind of hard because, I don't think I can contribute, other than "I hope whatever is decided I can understand it and enter into it."

So while I trust y'all to have those conversations, I also feel that "most people" is probably more like "most people who already use and understand it" and it's just important to be aware of that.

that’s a really good point! I didn’t think about the fact that players who don’t trade in that range often might be hanging back out of uncertainty. personally I’m more in favor of revising the terms & system but I’ve felt discouraged about the possibility due to the lack of obvious support for that idea.

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For those who feel really confused about the Nons/MAs/09 rares system, truly and sincerely I don't blame you at all. it's objectively confusing even though we've found ways to make it "work" over time. I think it was a significant improvement over how values were previously written, where every single high value list pet had its own distinct value and would be added together in long chains; indecipherable to anyone who wasn't part of that very small group trading at that level.

but just because it may have been an improvement doesn't mean that now it's perfect and its definitely what we should be using forevermore. here's how I've tried to explain it for others in the past: these terms "Nons," "MAs," "09 rares," are basically just "currency" words and don't really mean exactly the pet they're named after (in most contexts.)

it's like how the words "dollar" and "dime" and "penny" just bring to mind a type of "value" rather than necessarily make us think "where did the word 'penny' come from? what does that mean?" that's how these pet terms have been handled on the high end side of trading for a while now. I think it does help to have numerical "currency" ideas in high-value pet trading, but if we keep that system, I'd ideally like to see us move to a set of words that cause less initial confusion and make people feel like they have to understand where the words came from in order to understand trading based on that system.

(I'm gonna write out some hypothetical ideas using that "100 rares" benchmark but I'm not in the camp that we have to keep these things defined as high as 100 rares either.)

what does anyone think about these potential currency words?

"Old Rare" or "ORs" - could be the most "basic" currency unit, replacing "09 rare"
"ERAs" - "extremely rare advents" - pets released in advent seasons that have a rarity of "extremely rare," could replace current "MAs"
"LEGs" - spitballing here - "Legacy" pets? - pets released back in the early early days of the site, 2008-2009, that were standard-release pets (not URs or stores, regular litters), that are so old and so rare they're now OMGSR with this new update. could replace what we've previously thought of as the "non" value unit?
"URs" - this is more like regular terminology than currency terminology - but these are the pets that are limited-release only in the dec 18th boxes. maybe these pets could be understood to have a specific "worth" but could still be adjusted in accordance with demand on different user guides?
"SLEGs" or maybe "$LEGs"? - "store legacy" pets? any store pet that's gotten up into that "OMGSR" label?

[SolarSonnet]

Posting to add I've been thoroughly convinced by a lot of the above posts.

Nons should be worth less than they were before (~90 old rares? maybe less?), it was kind of absurd. Trading should be more accessible. And nons should also no longer be one of the baselines.

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I still think its going to be valuable to have terms that mean "100 old rares" kind of like a dollar means 100 pennies. Nobody says "Yeah, this is worth 175 pennies." they say it's worth 1.75 ("one seventy-five" or "a dollar and 75 cents" depending on who you ask), and the terminology is so widespread that everybody who uses the currency knows what a dollar is, and some people who don't use the currency even know what it is. It's also an easier concept to understand than nons.
Except, people do say "that's worth 100 Dollars" so if "Old Rares" are more like Dollars than Pennies, then a new term wouldn't quite make sense.
Then again, a lot of people will say "1k" instead of "1,000 dollars" so I guess the gap is just bigger between dollars and pennies before people start dropping it. I do think that ORs are more like pennies than dollars, though, in terms of the high-trading currencies.
So when people say "1.75 nons" it's like saying it's worth 175 old rares. Except that isn't right anymore so we need a new word. I'd like a new word, at the very least.
And, ideally, I'd like a new word that is not related to any specific pet or group of pet(s), because those can change value, as we've seen with the non.

We should just make up a bunch of words, slap them on a poll on the guide and see which one sticks. They could be "Non Units" to separate them from Non Dogs, to make it easier for people to transfer over from just calling them nons. "That pet is worth 1 NU, which means it's worth 100 Old Rares" And then when newbies ask what a Non Unit is its easy to say, "1 Non Unit is equal to 100 rares from 2010-2011" none of that "Oh, a Non is 25-37 09 rares" bullcrap, it's a solid unit, not based on a pet because pet values have fluctuation to them and can change.

Alternatively, I threw around the name "OMG Unit" in my head for a moment, but figured Non Unit might be easier to adopt after coming off of Nons and MAs.
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As for the questions proposed by @MetaX

1: I like the equalization, I don't think a non should be 100 old rares anymore though. So I'd prefer to move away from the 'Non' wording entirely ngl. I'd rather we come up with a new word that means nothing (see above for that take)

2: Same method, I like that. 10 2010 rares = 1 new "MA" -style Unit.

3: I think we should figure out what unit names we're using first. I don't like the idea of there being "new nons" and "new mas" because I think we should move away from using specific high-value pet category names that could change drastically in the future.

What happens years from now when the "new MAs" right now are no longer worth 10 Old Rares and we have to go through this whole process all over again ? I think trying to future-proof is a good idea.

Editing to Add:

What about a value for lower rarity pets, to get people into trading for Older Rares first? I'd love to come up with a system where "Older Rares" can be = to a certain amount of other year uncommons+

Why does OR have to be our lowest value in terms of trading for high value pets?

It could be a lot easier to get people into trading if we have a "set value" kind of like Mid-Advents were, for trading up to Older Rares with Newer Pets.

I.E. "1 2010-2011 Rare = #X-#Y 2014-2015 VUC-EUC", just as a baseline, like 1 Advent used to = "7-9 09 Rares"

And anything after 2014-2015 VUCs to EUCs are kind of a lot easier to trade down to. Meaning that if we can find an "equal" and relatively "agreed upon" value of 2014-2015 VUC-EUCs (or even rares? but rares are harder) to 2010-2011 rares, then we can get players "in" on the trading faster. I say 2014-2015 and not any other year because, its where I see the monthly rarities start to even out. 2012-2013 is a lot harder to trade-down to, imo, but at the same time I don't think we need a "rule" for trading 2012-2013 to 2011, people can do that kind of naturally with how close they are in age.
A lot of people use the 3-year rule now, so 2014-2015 means that people can trade down from 2017-2018, and then all the way down to 2010-2011 with a "rule" to get from VUC-EUC that's widely accepted, even if its a larger range.

With my own rarity math, it ends up being 1 OR = 2 2010 EUCs = 4 2014-2015 EUCs / 8 2014-2015 VUCs
So it'd be "1 OR = 4-8 2014-2015 VUC-EUC", for me personally.

And having a date like 2015 makes quite a few things more accessible.

[lil rascal]

It’s getting a bit confusing having this conversation across 3 threads, 4 if you count the conversation which has happened in the announcement thread, especially when on mobile so please excuse me if I ramble or repeat things already discussed.

I’m really glad to see more people popping up with their say. I have been trying to post in the different threads in an effort to bring in different ideas and perspectives but the reality is that if you don’t/do like the way things are you need to please post your ideas, opinions or questions so that it’s not overshadowed. Whether you trade by the current “non”/MA system or not your thoughts are just as valid as anyone else!

I posted similar in another thread but I’ll say it here too. Personally, as someone who has a lot of high value pets and therefore stands to lose a lot of perceived value, I think it’s time for a big shake up of how we value pets and a dropping of valuing things according to “Nons” and mid advents. I don’t feel like concern that someone might be dissatisfied because they paid more before the update should affect decisions, every time CS does a big overhaul there are some that look back on recent trades and are disappointed while others look back and are ecstatic.

The main reasons I think that we should get rid of the system of valuing things in terms of “Nons” is that one, many people express confusion about the terms and valuing system and two, I personally don’t feel like we should be supporting a system that claims any non-store OMGSR is “worth” 3-6 other neutral demand non-store OMGSRs. I’m not saying that there is not a gap in rarity and demand in non-store OMGSRs, but surely that gap can be bridged with Extremely Rares, not other OMGSRs. I just can’t see how any Non-store OMGSR can be worth more than 2 neutral demand OMGSRs. It honestly feels like endorsed scamming to me.

I have personally always traded with more emphasis on rarity change history and personal preference but I don’t think rarity change history is a reliable way of judging pets after these recent changes to the system.

Unlike other big rarity updates where we see big rarity changes from CS changing one part of the rarity system, with this update we know thanks to Nick’s information on the first post of the announcement thread that three parts of the rarity system were changed:
1 we got additional rarities, which led to
2 the benchmarks of what makes a pet fall into each category were changed, though we still don’t know the numbers behind each tier. Finally the big one that I don’t see getting much discussion
3 the way the system counts pets in inactive accounts was changed again. This last one is why we have weird things like a pet going from rare to extremely rare or uncommon to very rare with this update.

The last time we had a change to the way pets in inactive accounts were counted we saw massive changes but as it was only one change to the rarity system we were able to track it. This time with 3 changes at once I can’t see how we can really say that previous rarity changes are relevant to current rarity. For all we know someone with a large Malk dragon, Grinner or Tribal hoard has now been counted as inactive by the system and they are therefore now the rarest non-store pets on the game according to the system. Or maybe someone with a Guinea pig or Rainbow PPS Egg hoard has gone inactive with this new change and they are now the rarest of the Extremely Rares and on the verge of being OMGSR. (Obviously only examples, not at all saying this is the case).

I honestly don’t think we’ll really be able to genuinely know more than the current rarity labels and demand until after the next Dec18 rereleases, where pets on the lower end of the rarities traditionally drop.

[conarcoin]

Personally to me I have always found the currency system we use for high value trading to be more accessible since I can just look and see exact numbers to work off. But at the same time I think my biggest issue with it has always been the weird ranges. Like I can't stand trading something that's say, "2-2.5 nons" because like. That is literally two completely different values? And I have no way of knowing which my trading partner follows. I just tend to default to the max of any range as a result.

[Loelya]

Okay this might be totally out of left field, but what if instead of making several larger “value” terms, we moved to designating value with just old rares? Maybe we could write the notation something like “OR-#”

so if something was worth ten old rares we could note it as “OR-10.” or something that goes higher like “OR-35.” when posting to something like “successful trades,” it could be written like “Hollyfox cat (OR-10) for gray fluffy rat (OR-5) + 2016 flying dog store pet (OR-5).”

[Lanayru]

Personally to me I have always found the currency system we use for high value trading to be more accessible since I can just look and see exact numbers to work off. But at the same time I think my biggest issue with it has always been the weird ranges. Like I can't stand trading something that's say, "2-2.5 nons" because like. That is literally two completely different values? And I have no way of knowing which my trading partner follows. I just tend to default to the max of any range as a result.

Agreed with this. I personally hope nons/MAs as measurements of value stick around (though the amount of old rares a non equals to could and probably should be changed up, something that has been discussed in Horror's thread) because as someone who has been here a LONG time it just... works well, imo. I also agree we should ideally just do away with larger ranges and settle on firmer values.

I genuinely think changing from simple metrics to completely new, potentially more complex ones would harm the trading economy and make things even MORE inaccessible for people new to higher value trading.

[Loelya]

I’ve been keeping an eye on the value discussions! it makes sense why it’s getting confusing switching between threads but I also don’t know if we can consolidate since each thread is discussing something slightly different.

after the currrent poll ends tonight I’m going to save those results and then I think I’ll update the poll to something that allows players to vote on value “terms” specifically - not to “decide” which ones we’re gonna use, but just so there’s an understanding on where maybe different preferences are leaning. Then I think I’ll run a final poll that gives voting options for whether we should change or keep the current values of those terms. again, not to set anything in stone, just to provide the survey data for anyone reading. ^^

does anyone have insights or opinions on what terms should go into a poll?

I’m thinking about including these options:
- keep nons/MAs/09 rares the same
- keep nons/MAs but change 09 rares to “old rares”
- keep nons but change MAs to “ER advents” and change 09 rares to “old rares”
- keep nons but change MAs to something else and change 09 rares to “old rares”
- keep the same system but reassign previous values to different rarity-specific terms (example: “non” changing to “mid omgsr” or “MA” changing to “upper extremely rare”)
- keep the same system but change all of the terms to something else that falls along some kind of common value system (example: gold/silver/bronze)
- change the system and value things in one type of “currency” rather than multiple different terms
- I do not want to keep the “currency” system

[Solloby]

I'm really happy that you guys like my charts <3
I also like the new version SolarSonnet made!

Loelya I don't really get why people are talking about rares anymore in terms of highly valuable pet trades. We now have VR, ER and OMGSR. Rares, even old ones, shouldn't really be entering the equation anymore. If you look at the early 09 rares that were originaly used for these calculations (early 09 being worth a lot more than mid and late), most of them are VR/ER. So these are the rarity labels we should be referring to if we want to keep the old values consistent, no?

Also, a side note - a lot of 09 Easter pets have similar rarities to 08 Advents. That seems important but it's too late at night for me to write anything sensible about it, so I'll have to check in again tomorrow.

[Loelya]

I'm really happy that you guys like my charts <3
I also like the new version SolarSonnet made!

Loelya I don't really get why people are talking about rares anymore in terms of highly valuable pet trades. We now have VR, ER and OMGSR. Rares, even old ones, shouldn't really be entering the equation anymore. If you look at the early 09 rares that were originaly used for these calculations (early 09 being worth a lot more than mid and late), most of them are VR/ER. So these are the rarity labels we should be referring to if we want to keep the old values consistent, no?

Also, a side note - a lot of 09 Easter pets have similar rarities to 08 Advents. That seems important but it's too late at night for me to write anything sensible about it, so I'll have to check in again tomorrow.

I totally get where you're coming from, yeah! I keep seeing others talk about "09 rares" - despite the update significantly reducing the presence of 09 rares - so I thought maybe it would make sense to have them in the poll options, moreso to indicate there's proposed changes rather than to encourage continued use of them.

but to attend to the idea that it shouldn't just be "old rares" instead of "09 rares," do you think potential poll options should include "09 very rares" or "old very rares" instead? if you were going to put a poll together in that regard how would you go about structuring it? I would really love to hear what your (or anyone's!) thought processes would be

updated poll brainstorming:

- keep nons/MAs but change 09 rares to “old rares”
- keep nons but change MAs to “ER advents” and change 09 rares to “old rares”
- keep nons/MAs but update the "base unit" from "09 rares" to "09 very rares," adjusting higher value terms accordingly
- keep the term "non" but change MAs to “ER advents” and update the "base unit" from "09 rares" to "09 very rares," adjusting higher value terms accordingly
- keep the same system but reassign previous values to different rarity-specific terms (example: “non” changing to “mid omgsr” or “MA” changing to “upper extremely rare”)
- keep the same system but change all of the value terms to something else that falls along some kind of common value system (example: gold/silver/bronze)
- change the system and value things in one type of “currency” rather than multiple different terms
- I do not want to keep the “currency” system

[wolfykins]

Right now I'm trading rarity for same rarity, I don't really understand the value of 2 or more lesser rarities for a higher one, so until the new trading system is in place and crystal clear, common for common, uncommon for uncommon, etc