Haggling Perk Changes

[mcw11]

From USKP v.1.2.6:

 

"The haggling perks deliver inconsistent results. Specifically, Haggling00 only gives 9% on buying when it should be 10%. Haggling20 buy price only gives 13% when it should be 15%. Haggling 40 only gives 17% on buy prices when it should be 20%. Haggling60 only gives 20% on buy prices when it should be 25%. Haggling80 only gives 23% on buying when it should be 30%. All of the selling bonuses on these perks are correct, the buy prices were using incorrect decimal values to produce the expected bonuses. (Bug #8551)"

 

It's a minor issue, but it seems to me, that the initial values were indeed correct.

 

The perk doesn't say that buying prices are reduced by x%, but that they are x% better. The former (which is what the USKP changes the perks to) would be calculated as buyprice * (1 - perkbonus/100), while the formula for the latter (buyprice / (1 + perkbonus/100)) would match the original numbers. To make my point, a theoretical 100% better buying prices would result in a 50% reduction according to the original formula (making them effectively 100% better, since you can buy twice as much), while the USKP formula would give a 100% reduction, which would not fit with the perk description.

 

Not much more to say other than thanks for everyone's hard work on these patches, it's greatly appreciated.

[SilentSpike]

Y = gold

X = item

 

Without perk:

 

Y = X

 

With 15% better prices:

 

Y = X*1.15  âˆ´ (X*1.15)*((1/1.15)*100) = Y*((1/1.15)*100) = 0.87Y = X

 

I see the logic. You're simply multiplying the cost by the percentage "1" is of the new amount of items you're getting

[Arthmoor]

And I can predict with absolute certainty that it will simply be reported again if we undo this. The whole convoluted logic of it defies common understanding, because nobody I know thinks 15% better results in a $100 item costing $87. They expect that to result in a $100 item costing $85.

 

It makes the whole thing come off like a shifty accounting practice rather than being logically understood.

[SilentSpike]

100% better pricing = you get 100% more goods, so instead of 100% goods you get 200% goods

 

It's the word "better" that does it. The reason people expect the other results is due to misunderstanding of intent rather than misunderstanding of calculation.

[Arthmoor]

Common understanding of "15% better" is entirely the problem here. It's not really going to fly to explain it with fuzzy accounting math.

 

Try an experiment. Start up a lemonade stand. Mark each glass as $1 for the first day. Then stick a sign out the next day saying "Today only: 15% better prices!" You tell me how many people question why you're charging $0.87 for a glass of lemonade instead of $0.85.

 

I can tell you with absolute certainty that such a sign in a store window here in the US would result in a shitstorm of public outrage, and might result in lawsuits over false advertising even. Juries would view the fuzzy math as a con job.

[Sclerocephalus]

I can tell you with absolute certainty that such a sign in a store window here in the US would result in a shitstorm of public outrage, and might result in lawsuits over false advertising even. Juries would view the fuzzy math as a con job.

 

But that doesn't make it right. The bare fact that the IQ of those persons is less than that of a baked potato must never become a reason to deny the truth. By the way, there's nothing wrong with starting lawsuits, since juries rarely decide on right or wrong. They will decide on whether or not conformal to law, but that's something totally different. Not logical either, but the truth.

 

 

Try an experiment. Start up a lemonade stand. Mark each glass as $1 for the first day. Then stick a sign out the next day saying "Today only: 15% better prices!" You tell me how many people question why you're charging $0.87 for a glass of lemonade instead of $0.85.

 

Everyone intending to sell the glass for $0.85 the next day would advertise this as "15% off", right ? I would expect that everybody who's using his brain at least occasionally might start thinking that something else is meant when he reads "15% better prices" instead. Sadly however, I would also expect that some people would not be wondering if they had to pay $1.15 ... After all, it's a well known fact that one out of four people cannot calculate percentages properly. That's more than 60 percent !! :grin:

[VaultDuke]

hm, you usually see "15% price reduction" or "15% more content" advertised.

 

with 15% better haggling you actually do get 15% more goods for the same price, it's just that this way of thinking/advertising is rarelly seen in every day consumers life.

 

but then again, haggling in skyrim isn't from an RP POV about consumerism, it's about the business practice of haggling.

so a little accounting math should be the least that would be expected from someone with the perks :-D

[NightStar]

This made an interesting read and I must confess that I've never given the haggling description much thought. I've just assumed that X% better prices equals X% off

[taleden]

I realize this thread is a little stale now, but I just ran into this USKP change because my numbers weren't coming out right, and there's no sense making a whole new thread for it. So let me just offer one more argument in favor of the original design:

 

If you have a bonus that says "prices are 10% better", and a penalty that says "prices are 10% worse", would you not expect those two things to cancel eachother out? With the original design, they would, because "1.1 * 0.91 ~= 1", "1.25 * 0.8 = 1", and so on. But with the USKP interpretation of that wording, you instead get 1.25 * 0.75 = 0.9375.

 

The tradeoff for this natural balance is that one multiplier or the other has to be a little less intuitive, so it looks to the player like a 9% buy price reduction instead of a 10% buying power increase. But for the sake of effect stacking, maybe it's worth ensuring that things cancel out when they're expected to; it's probably not such a big deal for barter prices (is there even a "prices are worse" debuff in the base game?) but as a more general design principle, maybe it's something to keep in mind.

[bluedanieru]

FWIW, I thought the same thing about the Matching Set perks, where originally they gave a bonus of AR * 1.2. The "bug" was that the description reads something like "Additional 25% armor bonus when wearing a matched set of heavy/light armor." But, if the "additional" means "in addition to Well Fitted/Custom Fit" this is actually correct, because 1.25 * 1.2 = 1.5 for a 50% total bonus with both perks (so, the perks are additive - Matching Set is additional - instead of multiplicative). I said my piece in the original ticket comments, but USKP changed it anyway. Then Bethesda changed it as well in 1.9. So I was "wrong". (Actually, I think both USKP and Bethesda are wrong on this, and I've changed it to the "correct" values for myself, but there it is.)

 

Sound logic and correct math are the right way of doing things in Skyrim modding only until they aren't. I think in this case, they probably aren't :-(