We need to talk about trading.

[Darkcloud!]

The issue with help threads is that often times people will not get responded to, ever. During events, the threads are unusable due to volume of requests, and the speed at which releases get traded away.

Outside of events, only trades with pets vr and above are consistently responded to. Lower value trades have a few people who try to go through and get a reply out, but we can't be putting the burden/worth of pets all on the shoulders of a few people. I have noted elsewhere on a discussion of fair trade threads that the rules of the thread also threaten to actively punish users who provide "bad" advice, which drives away anyone else from helping. Fair trade advice get shot down in favor of arbitrary "because i said so" overpay advice given. This leads to people who want to post with fair advice feeling like they will be reported and targeted for speaking up in those advice threads.

In other threads across the site, the guides to trading are also set by a group of users, the prices for certain pets are set by them, and if you try to counter this by trading fairly, you will be sought out, taken advantage of, and harrassed for not complying with the current wave of "x pet is worth MORE!", or harrassed for not using the guide/taken advantage of if you are willing to "trade down"/have a more generous take than the "3 month" rule.

These guides also focus primarily on trading "list" pets and other high values, which does not help a new or returning user without those pets, who is not is not going to be trading for them anytime soon.

This means that the trading culture ends up being one of suspicion, combativeness, and lying. People who mostly trade in lower value pets have no resources, and newbies/returning players are targeted, and they do not have any sort of welcoming, active, responsive, and trustworthy resource to use to get help with values and trades. There are no site warnings against overpay, and ninja warnings are only posted on the 18th instead of being visible year round.

I believe a good starting point would be to rework the fair trade threads as someone else as suggested in the site suggestions forum. "Trade advice" makes it much more clear what is being received, and allows more people to speak up.

I'd also like to see a second advice thread to give those who aren't trading vrs/lists etc a space to have their asks for advice responded to, and treated with equal worth, value, and kindness as everyone else.

[.Starling.]

I think I'm going to have an unpopular opinion. I think we all need to remember that this is a game targeted towards children. Trades are completely up to the 2 people a part of them. I don't think they should be policed at all. If mods get complaints about scammers or people being rude, they should definitely be punished. But no one is forcing anyone to push the accept button. And if you regret a trade you originally accepted, that's kind of on you. We need to remember that these are pixels and worth NOTHING irl.

That being said, if you want more people to actively give advice in FT threads, we need to start a community around that. This website is a hobby. I don't think we can employ people to take up shifts on the is this a fair trade thread.

So what can we do? We can band together as users and decide simply to not trade w people who are not abiding by trade etiquette. But if not enough people care, then the movement is going to go nowhere. Idk. I don't think it's that serious, and I don't think people are serious enough about this site full of cute pets to have a paradigm shift. I very much agree with Darkcloud that having an uncommon and lower trade thread is a really good idea. I think that would do the most good.

[angst]

I love these threads that come up every few months. I think we really think we need these spaces to come together as a community; I wish we had more dedicated time and space to talk about trading culture and gripes. Like, at least one dedicated thread. These always get shut down after awhile. Thank you for making this, peachy!

This is a smaller question, but it's something that I struggle with a lot:

What is the standard for offering trade advice on the advice thread?

I love that thread and always use it as a resource and frequently see it being used by newer and returning players getting used to the trading system. However, I'll admit that sometimes I'm hesitant to give advice, even when a user has been asking for multiple days; I'm worried it won't be correct or objective, and I will inadvertently give bad advice or push my own personal or aesthetic anecdotes and advice onto someone else.

I'm wondering how we as a community can provide better support for newer users and if that thread is the proper place / if it's even working at all (as Dark cloud brought up, many users questions are never addressed at all). If it is, what is good advice? Is imperfect advice okay? How can we get more users involved as a way of sharing and exposing different opinions?

I know it's hard because I'm guessing many of us live in a culture that tends to avoid conflict, but one thing I actually love about the trade thread is the rare times people do have different opinions, as I feel it shows the 'cracks' in the imperfect, subjective world that is trading and offers an opportunity for any newer users reading the thread to become privy to and engaged in the process of pet values and trading norms as they change and evolve. That being said, I also don't want people to receive blatantly wrong advice, and I don't want a culture of shame that means people are afraid to post a trade opinion even if it may be imperfect (but maybe I'm wrong there?).

Anyways, just putting these out there as additional questions! The Fair Trade thread is my favorite and I want to make it better, both possibly in literal structure and also in culture somehow, and I feel like in the spirit of this post we can do that as a community and have these discussions about trading.

💜🩷

[musicgurl333]

- yes and no. there have been a lot of high value item and list scams going around lately.

Where are you seeing these? Are they in discord or another site? I'm not saying people don't scam or ninja trade, but what specific scams are going on that you have seen?

This is what I'm wondering as well.

This is a smaller question, but it's something that I struggle with a lot:

What is the standard for offering trade advice on the advice thread?

I love that thread and always use it as a resource and frequently see it being used by newer and returning players getting used to the trading system. However, I'll admit that sometimes I'm hesitant to give advice, even when a user has been asking for multiple days; I'm worried it won't be correct or objective, and I will inadvertently give bad advice or push my own personal or aesthetic anecdotes and advice onto someone else.

There not really a defined standard. But you definitely don't need to be an expert to help, as long as you can explain your reasoning, admit what you don't know, and make it clear what is your opinion, and what is "fact". For example, I don't always agree with some of the standard trading values. When that happens, I say what is "fair" according to the commonly used values, then then I explain how I would personally value the trade, and why.

For another example, I'm not always up to date on demand of certain pets. There are some pets that I know are more popular than average, but if I haven't traded them recently, I often don't know how much extra they go for. In those cases I'll say if the trade is fair or not based on date/rarity, explain that X pet does have some extra demand, and advise them to get a second opinion to double check.

Something else to keep in mind about imperfect advice is that people LOVE to correct other people when they think they're wrong. There have been times when I've seen someone asking about a trade for DAYS and not getting any answers, so I'll weigh in and say "hey...I'm not really sure about this, but I saw you haven't gotten any responses, so here's what I think and why, but I'm not an expert so I could be wrong." And then 5 minutes later someone responds to my message and tells me why I'm wrong. lol. And that's okay! Because in the end, the person go the answer that they were looking for, so in a way, my response still helped!

I hope that helps a bit! I definitely think that people offering advice should have at least SOME idea what they're talking about, but imperfect advice can still be more helpful than no advice. Just be upfront and make it clear to the other person what the limitations are in your knowledge.

[ELMSTREETS]

It's such a dynamic problem that there is no easy fix and I don't feel like blaming staff or expecting them to fix it is fair. The fix has to come from us.

Completely agree! I find that using outdated lists made in the opinion of users on what's high demand, has done irreparable damage. Realistically pets should probably be traded based off rarity and dates, the terminology of nons/mas/tiers is not at all user friendly when it comes to learning the ropes, it's hard enough for newer users to memorize popular pet names.

[ELMSTREETS]

I think I'm going to have an unpopular opinion. I think we all need to remember that this is a game targeted towards children. Trades are completely up to the 2 people a part of them. I don't think they should be policed at all.

Another good take, I agree that trying to find a way to enforce an exchange between two people, both of which consent doesn't seem like a possibility. Punishment being a result of a trade that two people agreed to, also doesn't seem like a fair outcome. Everyone will value pets differently based on their own personal taste, not everyone will trade based off value. Unfortunately this is where the water gets muddy!

[queenkitters]

- Refusal to research values and fairness: I've also noticed a lot of newer and returning players becoming increasingly frustrated that their trades are being canceled, or were scammed. This seems to go hand in hand with the lack of knowledge, or want, to check the fair and successful trade threads. There are multiple clear guides on high value trading that I (and others) feel are being ignored. These threads exist for a reason, and it's really unfortunate that people are just choosing not to use them to their detriment. I feel as though highlighting these threads more often, like pinning them to the trade forum or even making an official cs post to acknowledge these things exists could help tremendously.
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I come with what might be an unpopular opinion, particularly among the older/more experienced crowd, but quite frankly there is a clear dissonance between older and newer users about the helpfulness of a lot of those guides and threads. This isn't said to downplay the hard work of users who have spent a lot of their own time making guides for the benefit of the community, but as someone who made an account, didn't use it at all for several years and then started using the site heavily last year, most of the guides that are toted as being very helpful or knowledgable are incredibly overwhelming in their size and scope, and often are borderline incomprehensible to newer users.

There's a lot of terminology used in them that makes sense to an experienced user that sounds like complete gibberish to anyone else. Not to mention all of these guides seem to work in reference to one another--meaning that there are terms or aspects of one guide that you would need to have read one or multiple other guides to understand, and many of them are like this. As such, to understand Guide A fully and completely with good comprehension, a beginner would also have to read Guides B, C, D, E and F, each of which has the same issue of needing to have read numerous other guides or threads to have full comprehension of what the guide is trying to impart.

It's incredibly overwhelming for many, and expecting new users to read half a dozen (at least) guides compromising thousands of words or numerous forum pages in order to be able to access any real semblance of trading is unrealistic and not user friendly at all.

Not to mention, many more experienced users will gesture to using such resources as the "Is this a fair trade?" thread or the "How much is this pet worth in C$" thread--but the former is very slow to receive any real response to the question, with most people having to repost their same trade numerous times before anyone will help them, if anyone does at all, and the charts used in the C$ value thread seem to be wholly ignored by the community at large at this stage, with the majority of people selling pets at double what the thread indicates their purported value is.

I'm not trying to say that appropriate resources and guides aren't the answer--I think they are. But I also think that the ones currently available are not nearly as beginner friendly as the more experienced community thinks they are. If my partner hadn't been an experienced player who I could very frequently ask for help with my trading confusion, I probably would have given up on playing by now. I'm just wanting to offer a perspective from someone who was, until very recently, very much that confused newer user who was struggling to understand the trading scene despite wading through many guides and threads attempting to make sense of it.

Another issue at work here is simply that people who have higher value pets have a very set idea in their mind on what that pet is worth and they will not be swayed, even if every resource available indicates that they are overvaluing it--this does seem to be a mentality largely at work among more experienced players. But the fact of the matter is that we can't police what people value their pets at. It would undermine the entire trade system, and make matters worse rather than better.

Ultimately, the only way to see any real marked improvement with the trading scene at the moment is a community driven commitment to doing so.

[Regency]

I'm in the "trades have become to stressful" boat. I've had to give up looking for certain pets (specifically the PPS draft) which is upsetting to me since I wanted to complete 2024 (not including the URs because lets be honest I'm not that lucky)

I've had to devote a lot of time to school over the last month or so just to pass. I can't afford to spend a lot of time on this website anymore. I'm not willing to severely overpay for what'll end up being a 2024 rare. People have way over inflated the value to be 2-3x more than a normal 2024 rare. It's stressful and I hate it. As someone who will never buy C$, it feels nearly impossible to get the rarer outcomes since a lot of people give them a high price and chuck them into shops. I miss being able to do simple litter swaps at server time midnight (which hits at 8 PM for me) and being done with the day in 10-15 minutes.

Normal trading is also stressful. Like someone mentioned above, the whole value system is confusing. I still have no idea what a MA or a NON is, let alone how to determine if my stuff is worth a List pet. People have tried to scam me before for what little valuable stuff I have (I have attachment issues so all of those trades were declined). It was mainly players who've been here for a while who did it. Back to the value system, it NEEDS to be simplified. Someone once sent me a guide to MAs and NONs and it was such a huge info dump that I couldn't comprehend anything. The "how much is this pet worth" and "is this a fair trade" threads are barely helpful, especially the former. I've been ignored on "how much is this pet worth" even after resending my question several times just to be told "oh well none of us know sorry :)" or "well in MY opinion...". It's made me want to never do high value trades. I'm starting to edge towards either not wanting to trade at all or rarely trading.

This is a pet trading browser game. It shouldn't be this stressful or confusing.

[pinetreesheep]

I think I'm going to have an unpopular opinion. I think we all need to remember that this is a game targeted towards children. Trades are completely up to the 2 people a part of them. I don't think they should be policed at all. If mods get complaints about scammers or people being rude, they should definitely be punished. But no one is forcing anyone to push the accept button. And if you regret a trade you originally accepted, that's kind of on you. We need to remember that these are pixels and worth NOTHING irl.

That being said, if you want more people to actively give advice in FT threads, we need to start a community around that. This website is a hobby. I don't think we can employ people to take up shifts on the is this a fair trade thread.

So what can we do? We can band together as users and decide simply to not trade w people who are not abiding by trade etiquette. But if not enough people care, then the movement is going to go nowhere. Idk. I don't think it's that serious, and I don't think people are serious enough about this site full of cute pets to have a paradigm shift. I very much agree with Darkcloud that having an uncommon and lower trade thread is a really good idea. I think that would do the most good.

I read a lot of comments here prior to this and I agree the most with this.

I only think that information should be easier to find and more cohesive. I’m not a new player but I STILL struggle with what is considered fair and what’s not. Mostly because every guide I’ve read has only helped me so much, I still have questions and there isn’t any one place to find all the answers.

PLUS, as mentioned above. It’s really up to the two traders to decide if they’re happy with the trade that’s all that matters. And if they regret it later on, then that’s on them. That’s part of life, sometimes we regret our decisions. Learn from the mistakes. It is just a game after all.

Edit:

I come with what might be an unpopular opinion, particularly among the older/more experienced crowd, but quite frankly there is a clear dissonance between older and newer users about the helpfulness of a lot of those guides and threads. This isn't said to downplay the hard work of users who have spent a lot of their own time making guides for the benefit of the community, but as someone who made an account, didn't use it at all for several years and then started using the site heavily last year, most of the guides that are toted as being very helpful or knowledgable are incredibly overwhelming in their size and scope, and often are borderline incomprehensible to newer users.

I’m also right here in this boat. Word for word.

[Celozon]

Just a quick reminder to please keep any ranting/complaining/etc out of this thread. Its totally fine to discuss the current state of trading on CS and ways to improve it, issues moreso come up when people start talking about specific users/trade/etc or just talking about things they dislike without giving any other input. Additionally, please remember that if you have a site suggestion that would need staff to implement, please make a thread for it over on the suggestion board. We don't monitor discussion threads for suggestions and its unlikely they would make it to a stage they could happen without a dedicated suggestions thread.

I did want to clear up a few things while I was here;

- Lack of/inconsistent moderation: Personally, i've reported many users for scamming as of late. Disappointingly, no punishments have been made by my reports, or others. This is extremely concerning, as trading is the main point of the site, and it seems that every staff member has different opinions on what fair trading is, and what is a scam vs. what isn't. This is.. obviously an issue. When there is clear proof that a user who knows values is misrepresenting them, something should be done so that they can't do it again.
What can we suggest from staff to help this issue?

Please keep in mind we (staff) cannot tell you when/if/how someone was punished for something. Even if a punishment did result from your report, we are not allowed to tell you about it in any way, shape, or form.

Additionally, our own personal opinions on what should or shouldn't be considered fair or scamming doesn't really play into this. GMs might be the ones often answering your tickets, but we don't make the final decisions on whether a trade is considered a scam. We can usually tell you if a trade is definitely not going to be considered a scam, because a trade can only be considered a scam if the scammer directly lied about the value of a pet/item/etc.

Attempting to expand the definition of scamming creates a lot of grey area that means there would be added complexity to determining if someone is actually scamming or not. I'm not saying thats not something thats worth doing, but the difficulties in implementing it should be considered because knowing the specific details on how we would determine when something is or isn't scamming would be necessary to being able to punish it. Simply asking us to 'punish scamming' doesn't really help us as staff do anything in this case since we already have a definition that is officially considered scamming that is punished consistently (that I personally have seen at least).