One of the best parts of those difficulties was that markets emerged from within the player base to provide conveniences around them. Necromancers could summon

One of the best parts of those difficulties was that markets emerged from within the player base to provide conveniences around them. Necromancers could summon a player's corpse if they were within some distance, like 500 meters. So Necros would camp out near famously tricky areas, and offer to pull corpses for 10 platinum pieces ("10pp") a pop. Enchanters and Druids were the only classes with a teleport spell, so likewise they'd charge a small fee to teleport players across the continents, like from Qeynos to Freeport. Sometimes a chanter would spend an hour or three grinding out teleport runs like an Uber driver (we didn't know that analogy - uber wouldn't exist for another 10 years!) to make some extra cash. And there was no auction house at all. The de facto auction location was a big cave in the desert outside Freeport. Players would all meet there and post in the general chat, hawking their goods: someguy: WTS Swarmcaller LEGENDARY bow for ranger 1k coolwizard: WTB pally helmet lesscoolpriest: WTS leather pelts 5g each As a kid, I'd spend time in the that zone just trying to swap and find good deals, buying low and selling high, just because I found that lots of fun. I never really was great at that - there were always a few legendary big-deal traders who had tons of capital and thus tons of good equipment. Fun times. I miss that sort of emergent magic.