Something like that concept applied to listing tax and a maximum initial bid price might be a decent solution - if a guy has only played 10 minutes in your club, for example, you might only be able to list him for sale at 1k for free, or up to his initial purchase price with a listing tax. If he's played for you 2000 minutes, conversely, you might be able to list him up to a $2M initial bid price with no listing tax.
This is another good idea.
If you buy an 18 year old trainee, give him seven seasons of training and turn him into a superb player, and then list him at a fair price but don't get bites for a while, the listing tax would be hurting a person for a behavior that one presumes should be encouraged.
I can see how a listing tax could be punitive, but we have to agree on what behaviour we're trying to encourage and what we're trying to prevent.
I believe the original point made while suggesting a tax on listings was to encourage lower asking prices and hit day traders. If you imagine a day trader buying for 1k and reselling for 250k he'd be hit by 50k (as the minimum fee used to be around 20%) whether he sells or not. With such a change he will likely list at a lower amount fearing the player would go unsold at 250k. A tax on listing would reduce the average listing price for players (hitting daytraders the most), but also would lower the number of players on the TL and increase the number of players being cut, which obviously are unwanted bad consequences.
The current minimum fee which is going to be deducted from a sale is 3%. That is only applied if you sell the player. If you're trying to sell a draftee for 800k, you could list at 1k and hope there is enough demand to push the price to that level or list at 800k and hope someone bids on him. Assuming 800k is a fair price, if the market is very liquid listing at 1k would often yield better results. If you had a tax you stand to lose a minimum of $3 plus the difference between the actual purchase price and 800k (which may be as high as $799k) in the first case; or $24k for each time you try to list the player in the second case.
3% is an arbitrary number which was decided upon by the developers. I'm not sure people would be against reducing that 3% number further for players held for 3+ seasons.
I believe Sokker.org has a similar system and doesn't charge you just for listing (I may be mistaken on this though). Sokker.org also differs in that the transfer market is a lot more liquid and you continue to get money from further sales of players you developed.
All in all, a lot of proposals on how to change the buying/selling mechanisms in the game have merit. I think what Marin decided to implement was quick and easy, it has a few unwanted consequences, but it does serve its purpose and people can easily live with it. The main criticism has been that it came into the game unannounced and that it (mildly) affects non day traders.
Last edited by Lemonshine at 11/10/2014 12:23:10 PM