While it's true there was a significant upset in the Diablo 3 economy after the 1.0.8 patch came out, things are settling down again, and we're certainly not se

While it's true there was a significant upset in the Diablo 3 economy after the 1.0.8 patch came out, things are settling down again, and we're certainly not seeing the kind of delta that would make me call out a hyperinflation. If anything, the prices remind of me a bubble forming and consequently popping. Worse, the article is not just inaccurate, it's dishonest: it hides the data that contradicts it, despite being publicly available on a day-by-day basis. [1] is a wonderful resource. The eye-catching table near the end stops at peak prices. The prices since that peak are more-or-less hidden in the second half of an otherwise fairly unremarkable paragraph. We've seen a downward tendency, with prices moving back to pre-patch prices. We can illustrate that by looking up more recent data for the same examples as listed in the article: Radiant star amethyst: 20m before patch (april 29), high of 60m, 22m now. Radiant square ruby: 200k before patch, high of 528k, 266k now. Star emerald: 760k before patch, high of 1.6m, 770k now. Flawless square topaz: 3k before patch, high of 16k, 4.5k now. Tome of jewelcrafting: 1.2k before patch, high of 6.5k, 1.5k now.[1] All these items have a downward price trend, with the exception of the (relatively inconsequential) tome of jewelcrafting, which is stable. I would not be surprised to see these and other (harder to track) items reach month's end at roughly pre-patch prices. It's also worth mentioning at this point that the prices of each rank of gem is linked directly to the price of the rank below it. For example, a star gem costs 80k gold plus 3 radiant square gems of the same type to craft. This is an ingame feature. All gem prices are therefore functions of the price of flawless square gems, the highest rank that monsters can drop. The article mixes the prices of different gem ranks, which is either ignorance of the way the game's economy and mechanics works, or an intentionally and artificially pretense of diversity. It's a bad sign either way. Finally, and most important of all: the European market has been fairly stable throughout this whole debacle. The only difference between the European and the North American markets is that the latter suffered the (disastrous) bug described by the article, while the European market did not: Europe gets its patches 6-9 hours after North America does and the bug that it introduced was fixed before the patch hit Europe. This lends credit to the idea that all we're seeing here is the aftershocks of massive destabilization due to a simple bug. To me, the fact that prices seem to be returning to normal testifies to the relative stability of the Diablo 3 market, and long term price trends show the same. Huzzah, Blizzard! All in all, while interesting in a general sense, the article is flawed when it comes to the specific case it uses to promote its message, the turbulence of Diablo 3's economy over the last few weeks. This is not hyperinflation. [1] http://www.diablohub.com/price-tracker/ http://www.diablohub.com/price-tracker/