Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Pantheon Economy

    • 154 posts
    January 8, 2015 9:17 PM PST

    So I have not seen much discussion regarding the Pantheon in game economy. I think it is something that is really important and critical to both immersion and game play. I was wondering what everyone is hoping to see from the in game economy? I decided to share some of my thoughts below.

     

    One of the economy based things that is necessary IMO is that the economic iterations are part of the lore and geography. We know that in real life a lot of the difficulties are based off of proximity and some basic disagreements come from the economic troubles. It would be great if say you started getting better faction by defending a town on one side of the river and you lost faction with the economic competitor across the river, which then resulted in higher prices when you were in the neighboring town.

     

    I would also like to see a living macro economy. It would be great if I was hunting polar bears and gathering pelts in the arctics and then take a trip down to a Mediterranean sort of city where I could sell them for a worthwhile profit. But if to many people started making the same run the market would get flooded and the profitability would decrease. That way you would have to be ahead of the curve for what the NPC demand would be.

     

    I think we have all experienced the repercussions of rapid inflation within an in game economy. Inflation is something that is inevitable in any in game economy with multiple players because they will all receive some sort of drops but the only way for money to be removed from the economy is via the merchants but as we all know the intra-player based economy will always undercut it. I would really like to see some means to help control the influx of money beyond the supercilious items like buying a house. I imagine some sort of investment system where you can sponsor expeditions that may succeed or fail but the returns fluctuate based off things like in game weather and can be mechanism to tie up money and reduce inflation.

     

    These are just a few of my ideas. What are yours? I also wonder if the devs have started developing the economy along side the lore?

    • 87 posts
    January 9, 2015 6:39 AM PST

    Add casinos. inflation comes from too much money in an economy. Add things that take money out of circulation. So, things like casinos, lotteries, taxes, gear repair, quests that require a monetary investment, etc...

    • 595 posts
    January 9, 2015 9:40 AM PST

    I'm glad that you created this post, as I have long been considering something similar.  I briefly laid some of my thoughts out in a Think Tank posed by Joppa in November, but I think some further discussion is important.  

     

    You can view the whole discussion at https://www.pantheonrotf.com/question/view/216/item-durability-system 

     

    Below is my reply to Joppa's content:

     

    Without getting too far off topic, I wanted to quickly discuss possible implications of having items that are immune to degradation and/or indestructible.  I'm by no means an authority on the subject, but one of the key functions of having repair costs (and other such "gold sinks") is maintaining a healthy in-game economy.  Mechanics like these, however minute, force players to spend money in an effort to keep inflation low.  Essentially players can look at these types of "quality of life" fees as taxes, but they play a vital role in keeping the economy strong.  I'm sure we all can give examples of games that have suffered from currency inflation, currency selling, botting, etc.  All this is to say, I would be careful in implementing too many tiers of items that are impervious to degradation, especially if repair costs will function as one of the primary inflation prohibiting mechanics.

     

    This isn't so much for you and the rest of the Dev Team, Joppa, as I certainly don't want to imply that you haven't done your due diligence.  But I think a strong in-game economy should always be on the minds of the community; it's one of the most important, less-obvious pieces of a successful virtual world, but can also be a major contributing factor to a failed one.

     

    In continuing with this line of thinking, I think it's crucial to implement as many "gold sinks" as possible, without compromising other game-play mechanics.  As you mentioned in your OP, integrating these gold sinks into the game-play mechanics and also the geography of the world will help to alleviate some of the negative perceptions the community will have regarding these kinds of "taxes".  If the mechanics can justify themselves by creating a seamless connection to the world and the lore (as you mentioned) then the community will come along for the ride.

     

    And of course, there will need to be tangible consequences for those individuals who take it upon themselves to compromise the integrity of these mechanics.  I am all for someone finding a viable way to make money in-game (especially by less obvious means), but individuals selling currency, botting, and engaging in other malicious economic activities need to have sever punishments placed upon them.  As a community, we will need to take it upon ourselves to police these kinds of activities in order to maintain this vision.  If the dev team stays small, as it likely will, accurate reporting of incidents, screen shots and chat logs will be of the utmost importance in keeping our economy, and community as a whole, clean and healthy.

     

    There is much more I can offer on both of these points, but let's just see where the discussion goes!

     

    • 154 posts
    January 9, 2015 10:11 AM PST
    Nikademis said:

     

    In continuing with this line of thinking, I think it's crucial to implement as many "gold sinks" as possible, without compromising other game-play mechanics.  As you mentioned in your OP, integrating these gold sinks into the game-play mechanics and also the geography of the world will help to alleviate some of the negative perceptions the community will have regarding these kinds of "taxes".  If the mechanics can justify themselves by creating a seamless connection to the world and the lore (as you mentioned) then the community will come along for the ride.

     

     

    As you Keiiek have mentioned the amount of gold sinks are important but I think the balance is also key. One of the problems that I have with things like durability knocks is that the cost does not effectively stay proportional as the item power increases. If you have some incredibly rare Epic armor it would make sense that to repair it you would need to either do it yourself which might require some sort of gathering quest or something, or having it take time to repair when its damaged or you have the option to pay a premium to get it done faster making it a choice between a second set of items or paying a stiff repair fee could keep some money tied up.

     

    Attached to this could be things like the requirement to have food like EQ did. In theory at least that is a money sink as well. While I am not sure about casinos and lotteries I would not be opposed to games of chance being include but I would like there to be more of a reason to sink you money in. Im thinking something like toles placed in certain areas that scale with the relative distance from civilization. I think an awesome mechanism would be bandits who will occasionally come out and hail you and you can either give them all the money you have on your person or you can fight them/run from them. If you win you keep you money, if you loose your dead and they take your money, or you can just capitulate. Something like this would encourage traveling in groups through certain areas and would be an integrated means of pulling money out.

    • VR Staff
    • 587 posts
    January 10, 2015 5:29 PM PST
    Keiiek said:

    Add casinos. inflation comes from too much money in an economy. Add things that take money out of circulation. So, things like casinos, lotteries, taxes, gear repair, quests that require a monetary investment, etc...

    Correct.  We need money sinks, and we also need item sinks, since most items will be tradable/sellable to other players.  MUDflation can be controlled -- it doesn't have to be eradicated by making everything no-trade of bind-on-equip, etc.

    • VR Staff
    • 587 posts
    January 10, 2015 5:31 PM PST

    From a blog I posted a while back:

     

    (Ok, this is from a post.  I'm going to work on it as a blog further, but am putting up what I have now.  This came from the forum where we talk about what might happen in the game, not what is set in stone.  How we will handle twinking is still up in the air at this point, which is why I'm bringing it here to this blog (and to my FB site) -- to get people talking about it, the pros and cons.  Lots of debate so far -- this is definitely one of those controversial issues, even within the audience Pantheon is targeting).

     

    Notes thus far:

     

    1. I repeat, that this falls into the 'not set-in-stone' section of development.  

     

    2. I brought up this issue because it's a big one with me and becuase I knew that even though Pantheon is targeting a type of user, that there are some issues that people within that type will still disagree on.  Those are issues we need to indentify and then determine what we are going to do regarding them.

     

    3. The issue of twinking may become much less of an issue depending on how and if we implement a 'more horizontal' content system.

     

    4. In general, if there are some core issues that even those people targeted by Pantheon really disagree on, the optimal answer would be to have alternate rulset servers.  One server could allow twinking, while the other not.  Being able to do this, however, depends on how many servers/worlds we launch with or add later.  Way too early to know that. 

     

    5.  If we had to switch back to a more 'modern' system of bind-on-equip, no-trade/drop, etc. it would not take a lot of time or resources, so this is something we can work with during alpha and beta without taking significant risk.

     

    Question: I honestly never understood why so many game developers go out of the way to stop twinking.  There are people who enjoy doing that and there are people who enjoy leveling up characters without the added help. To either player, though, the behavior of one should not have a bearing on the enjoyment of the other.  If twinking is not to my particular enjoyment, I simply won't do it, but that gives me no call to demand that you cannot.

     

    Brad:  I honestly do understand why:  they are afraid of the game degenerating into a situation where lowbies all have high level gear and there's no reason to do anything but the highest level content, because anything that drops in easier dungeons has now dropped so many times that just about everybody has one.  I've played MUDs when it was this bad, and trust me, it's no fun.

     

    But, neither, IMHO, is no-trade items.  Player driven economies are fun.  Some twinking is fun.  The key I think is to try to stay ahead of it, and to control the rate of MUDflation.  Make it so there are a lot of attractive things to do if you are a high level player and you're wanting to get rid of an item because you just earned a slightly better one.

     

    Quick note: there will still be no-drop/trade items when necessary. A good example would be a quest item.  It's unlikely we want you trading those around -- do the quest yourself! :)

     

    1. Situational gear should help here.  There is no ONE best sword.  There's one best sword for the situation and climate you are in. This means that you will be hoarding more items, and when you hoard, you're keeping the item out of the economy.  You may find some bracers that aren't generally as good as you have now... but instead of dumping them on a lower level player, you keep them because they have some crazy anti-confusion attribute... and while you've never been in an area with 'confusion' and while you're not sure what it will do to you... it still doesn't sound fun, and so you hide away that bracer in case one day you really do need it.

     

    2. Many quests to get that better item should require you to turn in your previous item.  

     

    3. There will be temples where you can sacrifice your item to the gods, giving you long term buffs that really help you in-game.

     

    4. Zone revamps:  some really good items should stop dropping.  Similar items may start dropping far, far away.  Some really good items may never drop again. This gets into collectability/good hoarding.  You may have some leggings that only dropped for the first month of the game.  We then removed that item from drop tables.  We then put a similar item, but called something else, and looking like something else, elsewhere in the world.  So maybe you're not necessarily a better tank or you may not do more dps than the guy who has the newer item... but you like wearing that older item because it shows you're old-school.

     

    5. Zone revamps (2): After there's been some MUDflation, put slightly better items into already existing areas.  And then make the mobs slightly tougher too.

     

    6.  You like the way it looks when you wear/wield it.  Remember, while we'll likely have cosmetic items that allow you to make your character look really cool in a social situation, the way you look when donning your actual play gear will be based on how that gear looks.  When you see a high level guy walk into a starting city you should be thinking 'damn, he's bad-ass -- i want to look like him one day'.

     

    7. Alts/Progeny System. First, let's just talk about alts. If we do a good job, you're going to want them.  You'll likely not be able to experience all of the world leveling up one character.  Yes, I know this is a little controversial... some people have argued that you are entitled to playing/seeing/experiencing the whole world with your one character.  I get it, but I can't agree. First, the world should be huge and should be added to via digital updates, expansions, etc.  So just physically checking everything out before you out-level it may be difficult. Secondly, do we want races to really matter?  One way they can matter is that certain races simply can't access some areas of the world (they're KoS, or something like that).  

     

    Progeny System? This is something we've wanted to implement going way back to EQ/Vanguard days.  It's not set in stone, and it probably won't be there by launch.  But I'm still going to talk about it, albeit briefly.  The idea is that you can retire a high level character, start an alt, declare that alt as a descendent and heir of the retired character, and then that alt has some advantages a regular new character or alt wouldn't normally have.  The trick here is he or she can't be too powerful.  But giving him or her some advantages could be cool... maybe a twinked item isn't quite as scaled down as it would normally be if picked up by a true noob character.  Maybe skills can go up more quickly.  Maybe they have access to certain exotic spells and abilities your first character had to search the world for... but now, you don't have to do it again.  Instead, hopefully you can focus on exploring and reaping from other areas of the world you couldn't get to before, or that didn't even exist when you were leveling up your first guy....  In any case, how this relates to slowing MUDflation is that now you've kept your bad-ass items in the family, so to speak.  You twinked yourself, which isn't potentially nearly as harmful as twinking a true noob.

     

    8. If we do a good job with the player economy, then money will have value.  For money to have value, there have to be things to buy from an NPC/etc. that are truly useful to the player.  Preferably, these items are consumable, meaning you have to come back and buy again.  If money has value, players will use it not just to buy items and consumables from NPCs, but they will also use it to buy items from other players.  How much will they pay?  Classic supply and demand.  How does this relate to MUDflation?  We need to make sure really good, rare items are sellable to NPCs (and the NPCs generally do not turn around and re-sell them) and that you get a decent amount of cash for it.  

     

    What does this all do?  Hopefully it provides you with lots of avenues... lots of options as to what to do with that item you don't think you really need anymore.  Hopefully simply twinking it down to a lower level character is the exception, not the rule, because you'd be giving up a lot of good things in return for your item just to make this other character a little bit better.  I bring up the 'little bit better' because items will scale to some degree in power.  If you twink a Fiery Avenger to a level 3 Paladin, he's not going to be able to solo an entire dungeon like a super hero.  Which brings up another controversial related issue:  Should that level 3 Paladin with the Fiery Avenger be 'as good' as a non-twinked Paladin who has the best item for his level, or should he be 'a little better?'.  I like the latter, but can argue both sides.

     

    Anyway, there's more... I'll continue to work on this here, as a blog.

     

    -Aradune

  • January 10, 2015 5:44 PM PST

    Nice post, Brad. 

     

    I have to ask a question here.  In early EQ,  didn't the slower pace keep items on characters longer?  Didn't the lack of 'extraordinary' items preserve the need for something like Adamantite Epaulets for quite a few levels?

     

    The world becomes larger and everything has more value when the advancement pace, and looting pace, are slower, right?

     

    Screenshot


    This post was edited by BloodbeardBattlecaster at January 11, 2015 6:33 AM PST
    • 311 posts
    January 10, 2015 6:15 PM PST

    I have a question about getting an item say a ring with +400 to stop confusion and its lvl 30 say lvl cap is 50 the ring has 200 less mit/str/dex/int than a lvl 50 ring with the + 200 mit/str/dex/int but doesnt have the +400 confusion. Wouldn't most tanks and raiders more likely still go for the lvl 50 ring over the 30 cause the mob hit like a frieght train. 

    I believe crafters still need to be a big part of the economy. They should also be able to make raid quality gear, also along with harvesting and (I hope Diplo). I think it would be wise to be able to break down old equipment to get mats from.

    Personal I did twink a little for my alts but I also still went back through the same dungeons and had a better time not dieing as much. If you remember vanguards' system anything orange or above was usually BOE blue and lower was usually trade able. I liked the system it worked fine for me.

    I do like the sound of the progeny system you are talking about I could go with that too. Also making Zones harder will be good except for the true noobs to the game that might get frustrated or might like it.

    Some good ideas but I don't think we should control how people play you still have to learn to play your character to be any good.

    • 9115 posts
    January 10, 2015 6:33 PM PST

    That was some good info, thanks Brad.

    The Progeny system actually sounds very interesting, I am not sure I could bring myself to retire a main personally, as I usually grow very attached to them but not knowing what retirement actually means, has me very curious, this system sounds pretty interesting and I am sure a lot of players would find great value in a system like this.

    Thinking from a raiding perspective too, retiring a max level character to raise a new one with special bonuses may be the edge some of us need to take down some of the toughest raid mobs.

    Hmm you have me thinking about it now and I agree with a lot of the concepts here too, they all sounds like mechanics or systems that either worked well in EQ or VG, which is good to see them being continued on, good write up, thanks mate :)

    • 671 posts
    January 10, 2015 10:16 PM PST

    Good read, thanks Brad.

     

    I like the idea of having a lineage. As the game ages, perhaps you can pass on certain flaggable traits to each "off spring" ..? Etc, as you have said. Set the flag, have a full year before we have to discuss in earnest. But the direction is perfect. Thanks.

     

     

    • 432 posts
    January 11, 2015 5:42 AM PST

    The economy is certainly a very important issue. It is a natural outlet for crafters and adventurers alike. It provides a motivation to trade.

    Some players even enjoy becoming traders and dedicate their time to provide trading services (for a fee) like it was the case in EC tunnel.

    It increases interaction between players.

     

    However the biggest threat to a virtual economy like to a real economy is inflation.

    These issues are rarely talked about because most players prefer stats, Equipment combat etc.

    This is a good thread. I am trying to write a real economical analysis of a virtual world and specifically about the inflation factors but it is not yet ready.

    • 595 posts
    January 12, 2015 9:30 AM PST
    Aradune said:

    8. If we do a good job with the player economy, then money will have value.  For money to have value, there have to be things to buy from an NPC/etc. that are truly useful to the player.  Preferably, these items are consumable, meaning you have to come back and buy again.  If money has value, players will use it not just to buy items and consumables from NPCs, but they will also use it to buy items from other players.

     

    Thanks for this post Brad, there are some really insightful things here.  I particularly like the concept I have quoted above regarding consumable items.

     

    Consumables obviously includes things like food/water, projectiles, potions, etc., but the key to make these viable money sinks is the amount of game mechanics that rely on these types of consumables.  I would say most of us are familiar with the concept of reagents for certain spells (ie, I need a "Griffon Feather" to use my Levitation spell or a "Molten Scarab Heart" to use my Meteor spell).  Lets take this a step further; What if specific items required reagents to use?  Say I have a really sweet sword (as Brad mentioned in the OP) which has an elemental effect or maybe some sort of proc - what if in order for my sword to proc I had to be carrying a specific reagent which was the catalyst for the effect?  This could be extended to the realm of cosmetics as well.  Maybe certain reagents have the ability to add specific elemental effects to pieces of gear, and now suddenly I have a sweet set of flaming pauldrons.  By creating cool mechanic like these (whether they effect a player's power or are purely cosmetic) create tangible ways in which people can spend their coin.  These are just a couple examples but this concept can be taken much further.

     

    • 154 posts
    January 12, 2015 10:58 PM PST
    Nikademis said:
     

    Consumables obviously includes things like food/water, projectiles, potions, etc., but the key to make these viable money sinks is the amount of game mechanics that rely on these types of consumables.  I would say most of us are familiar with the concept of reagents for certain spells (ie, I need a "Griffon Feather" to use my Levitation spell or a "Molten Scarab Heart" to use my Meteor spell).  Lets take this a step further; What if specific items required reagents to use?  Say I have a really sweet sword (as Brad mentioned in the OP) which has an elemental effect or maybe some sort of proc - what if in order for my sword to proc I had to be carrying a specific reagent which was the catalyst for the effect?  This could be extended to the realm of cosmetics as well.  Maybe certain reagents have the ability to add specific elemental effects to pieces of gear, and now suddenly I have a sweet set of flaming pauldrons.  By creating cool mechanic like these (whether they effect a player's power or are purely cosmetic) create tangible ways in which people can spend their coin.  These are just a couple examples but this concept can be taken much further.

     

    First I want to say thanks for the info Brad. It was very informative and I am really glad to see you thinking along the same lines we are. I am interested in your opinion on a living macro economy though. I would imagine it would be possible but I wonder if you would want it from a developer side?

     

    I really like Nikademis' idea for consumables for items with magic effects. I actually think we have come up with a few fairly good ideas on here. I think the best money sinks are ones you dont always see as money sinks and just make sense, buying spell and materials for them for example.

    • 43 posts
    January 13, 2015 11:12 PM PST

    I'll mention the system that was used in Runescape, one the best MMO's in terms of economy and skills. In Runescape you could only trade for something if you posted equal value in the trade within a certain threshold. If there is such a thing as perfect virtual economy, Runescape was it, if not very close. I'm not advocating this, though I'd support it, I think it's a mistake to not at least discuss it. Someone on the Runescape team must have had a degree in economics.

     

    eg. Player Jack wants to trade a dagger worth 100plat to Player Jill. Player Jill can only receive 1p with nothing in return once an hour (lets say 1P is the threshold for level 1). This means in order for Jill to receive the 100PP dagger she needs to put some combination of items and PP that combines to atleast 99PP. It Jill had received 1pp from someone else for free 10 minutes prior, she would need to post 100pp combined to receive the dagger (or more, up to Jack's threshold limit).

     

    What this meant is that if Jill didn't have 100PP net worth leading up to this, there was no way to get the dagger without Jill earning 100PP some way, other than it being given to her by another player. This did not mean she had to farm some camp for hours to get the dagger, enter tradeskills. Yes, you could give Jill 1pp every hour to help boost her up, but this just wasn't feasible in Runescape the numbers didn't work, nor should they.Jill could, however, train a gathering skill which had very little if any startup cost, like a fishing pole or axe for cutting trees, and sell wood/fish (or any other number of gathering items) while she worked up to the 100P to get the dagger she wanted. The more she trained her gathering skill, the higher PP/hour she would earn. Unlike EQ, you were not limited to max level of any skill by overall level (combat was a skill just like fishing/woodcutting). A high level gathering skill was invaluable. 

     

    So what were the takeways of this kind of system? You had to monitor and build your net worth, items were easy to sell, you could track the value of items online, buying/selling items and speculating was a real thing. Your net worth in the game was vital. 

     

    Pro's:

     

    -Gold farming/selling: Gold was difficult (near impossible) to trade to other players, since Runescape was loot based pvp, you could goto an area to have the other player kill/loot you, and probably various other exploits, but trying to bot/farm gold mainly benefited that character as you could not simply just transfer wealth. Exploits could be safeguarded.

    -Twinking problem is solved. Alt's have nothing to put in trade in return. There could be built in bonuses though for chars on the same account, relaxed restrictions on plat/hour that you can trade, etc. (IMO no restriction would be a bad idea, but maybe an autotransfer from Main to ALT every hour even when offline to help boost the ALT's finances)

    -Crafting thrives, there were dozens of skills in Runescape that would boost your net worth. You could gather all day, buy non-level restricted armor (no need for level restrictions since you are already restricted by $$) then level up your actual char after you were proficient in some skill that made you money. For me the answer was fishing, I maxed fishing which took a lifetime, but while I did it I boost my net worth substantially. Gathering definitely paid off. A 99 fisher who was low level in combat, but in dragon armor with a high end sword/shield was legit because 99 fishing took months and months to achieve. 

    -Item liquidity (Everything was quick and easy to buy/sell for fair prices). The tiers of weapons/armour you bought could go right back on the market for around what you paid.

    -Much less reliance on NO DROP items, could do away with the NO DROP concept entirely. 

    -Combat was optional, you could make a career in the game in many ways. I'm not saying it should be that way in Pantheon, but if all you wanted to do was travel the world and fish, it was certainly viable. 

    -Best economy I've seen hands down. 

     

    Con's

    -Can't just give a friend an item that you don't want/need and don't have desire to sell. (The upshot though, is you can just throw it on the AH and sell it easily)

    -Runescape was not group centric, all mobs you killed you picked up all the items. In a group game ninja-looting would become a concern because whoever picked the item up would get that boost in net worth (unless a better system was developed to support it)

     

    Con/Pro

    -Trading done primarily through AH system.

     

     


    This post was edited by Zircon at January 14, 2015 1:24 AM PST
    • 9115 posts
    January 14, 2015 1:31 AM PST
    Zircon said:

    I'll mention the system that was used in Runescape, one the best MMO's in terms of economy and skills. In Runescape you could only trade for something if you posted equal value in the trade within a certain threshold. If there is such a thing as perfect virtual economy, Runescape was it, if not very close. I'm not advocating this, though I'd support it, I think it's a mistake to not at least discuss it. Someone on the Runescape team must have had a degree in economics.

     

    eg. Player Jack wants to trade a dagger worth 100plat to Player Jill. Player Jill can only receive 1p with nothing in return once an hour (lets say 1P is the threshold for level 1). This means in order for Jill to receive the 100PP dagger she needs to put some combination of items and PP that combines to atleast 99PP. It Jill had received 1pp from someone else for free 10 minutes prior, she would need to post 100pp combined to receive the dagger (or more, up to Jack's threshold limit).

     

    What this meant is that if Jill didn't have 100PP net worth leading up to this, there was no way to get the dagger without Jill earning 100PP some way, other than it being given to her by another player. This did not mean she had to farm some camp for hours to get the dagger, enter tradeskills. Yes, you could give Jill 1pp every hour to help boost her up, but this just wasn't feasible in Runescape the numbers didn't work, nor should they.Jill could, however, train a gathering skill which had very little if any startup cost, like a fishing pole or axe for cutting trees, and sell wood/fish (or any other number of gathering items) while she worked up to the 100P to get the dagger she wanted. The more she trained her gathering skill, the higher PP/hour she would earn. Unlike EQ, you were not limited to max level of any skill by overall level (combat was a skill just like fishing/woodcutting). A high level gathering skill was invaluable. 

     

    So what were the takeways of this kind of system? You had to monitor and build your net worth, items were easy to sell, you could track the value of items online, buying/selling items and speculating was a real thing. Your net worth in the game was vital. 

     

    Pro's:

     

    -Gold farming/selling: Gold was difficult (near impossible) to trade to other players, since Runescape was loot based pvp, you could goto an area to have the other player kill/loot you, and probably various other exploits, but trying to bot/farm gold mainly benefited that character as you could not simply just transfer wealth. Exploits could be safeguarded.

    -Twinking problem is solved. Alt's have nothing to put in trade in return. There could be built in bonuses though for chars on the same account, relaxed restrictions on plat/hour that you can trade, etc. (IMO no restriction would be a bad idea, but maybe an autotransfer from Main to ALT every hour even when offline to help boost the ALT's finances)

    -Crafting thrives, there were dozens of skills in Runescape that would boost your net worth. You could gather all day, buy non-level restricted armor (no need for level restrictions since you are already restricted by $$) then level up your actual char after you were proficient in some skill that made you money. For me the answer was fishing, I maxed fishing which took a lifetime, but while I did it I boost my net worth substantially. Gathering definitely paid off. A 99 fisher who was low level in combat, but in dragon armor with a high end sword/shield was legit because 99 fishing took months and months to achieve. 

    -Item liquidity (Everything was quick and easy to buy/sell for fair prices). The tiers of weapons/armour you bought could go right back on the market for around what you paid.

    -Much less reliance on NO DROP items, could do away with the NO DROP concept entirely. 

    -Combat was optional, you could make a career in the game in many ways. I'm not saying it should be that way in Pantheon, but if all you wanted to do was travel the world and fish, it was certainly viable. 

    -Best economy I've seen hands down. 

     

    Con's

    -Can't just give a friend an item that you don't want/need and don't have desire to sell. (The upshot though, is you can just throw it on the AH and sell it easily)

    -Runescape was not group centric, all mobs you killed you picked up all the items. In a group game ninja-looting would become a concern because whoever picked the item up would get that boost in net worth (unless a better system was developed to support it)

     

    Con/Pro

    -Trading done primarily through AH system.

     

     

    This is something I agree with completely, I also played RS many many years ago and really liked the system they had in place, if done correctly, this could eliminate gold sellers for the most part.

    I would love to also see some kind of trader/economy/market/commerce skill that you could level for better prices with some kind of trade/delivery system that put trade and mail back into the players hands. Which would be another blow against gold farmers/sellers as they would have to not only subscribe and support our game but then also level up and trade amongst our community, who would be able to spot them a mile away and report them.

    It would just not be worth it for the gold sellers/traders in the long run.

    To handle the free trial too, there are many ways but a successful one is to limit trials to an island or trial starting area so they could try early portions of the game out but couldn't interact or interfere with paying customers. That is one way there are many though.

    • 610 posts
    January 14, 2015 3:20 AM PST

     

     

    To handle the free trial too, there are many ways but a successful one is to limit trials to an island or trial starting area so they could try early portions of the game out but couldn't interact or interfere with paying customers. That is one way there are many though.

     

    but if you put new players on a starting island you lose the whole starting city feel...unless when they go from free to sub they have to start from scratch?

    • 308 posts
    January 14, 2015 3:30 AM PST

    i was thinking about Economy in general the other night and i started wondering what would happen in a game if the amount of cash available in a game was set in stone. like say 3,000,000 gold is all that there is per server? wouldnt this help keep inflation at bay? its part of the system in a real world economy.

    • 9115 posts
    January 14, 2015 4:51 AM PST
    Sevens said:

     

     

    To handle the free trial too, there are many ways but a successful one is to limit trials to an island or trial starting area so they could try early portions of the game out but couldn't interact or interfere with paying customers. That is one way there are many though.

     

    but if you put new players on a starting island you lose the whole starting city feel...unless when they go from free to sub they have to start from scratch?

    This is just speaking from my own thoughts, but I was referring to a system for people who download the game and start a free trial (that may be timed?) they would be able to create characters as per normal but then enter the world in a trial/free zone/island starting area to test out the first X amount of levels and this way no gold spammers could infiltrate the "mainland" with tons of free accounts, they would have to sub.

    This method would of course allow all subscribers and paying members to create a character and start in the starting area of their characters race. If someone converted their free trial into a sub/membership, they would start again fresh on the mainland without restrictions in their characters racial starting area.

    Again, just an idea I had, not speaking on behalf of VRI here, just trying to brainstorm and come up with a few idea's that could be implemented if needed. I have seen methods like this work very well in other games. this wouldn't affect you or I or any other supporter with a pledge or membership/subscription and it would allow players who are not sure to "try" a controlled portion of the game.

    • 610 posts
    January 14, 2015 4:59 AM PST
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:

     

     

    To handle the free trial too, there are many ways but a successful one is to limit trials to an island or trial starting area so they could try early portions of the game out but couldn't interact or interfere with paying customers. That is one way there are many though.

     

    but if you put new players on a starting island you lose the whole starting city feel...unless when they go from free to sub they have to start from scratch?

    This is just speaking from my own thoughts, but I was referring to a system for people who download the game and start a free trial (that may be timed?) they would be able to create characters as per normal but then enter the world in a trial/free zone/island starting area to test out the first X amount of levels and this way no gold spammers could infiltrate the "mainland" with tons of free accounts, they would have to sub.

    This method would of course allow all subscribers and paying members to create a character and start in the starting area of their characters race. If someone converted their free trial into a sub/membership, they would start again fresh on the mainland without restrictions in their characters racial starting area.

    Again, just an idea I had, not speaking on behalf of VRI here, just trying to brainstorm and come up with a few idea's that could be implemented if needed. I have seen methods like this work very well in other games. this wouldn't affect you or I or any other supporter with a pledge or membership/subscription and it would allow players who are not sure to "try" a controlled portion of the game.

     

     

    One thing that EQ2 did with the free trial people...You started in the newbie zones and any char you created would continue on once you subbed BUT as long as you were on the free trial you had NO access to any universal chat, no zone chat, couldnt send tells (unless the person was on your friends list)...Pretty much all you had was /say or /group (though no one grouped in that game). I thought it was a pretty good system and worked pretty well.

    • 9115 posts
    January 14, 2015 5:03 AM PST
    Gawd said:

    i was thinking about Economy in general the other night and i started wondering what would happen in a game if the amount of cash available in a game was set in stone. like say 3,000,000 gold is all that there is per server? wouldnt this help keep inflation at bay? its part of the system in a real world economy.

    Technically there is a sort of cap as there is only so many ways to make money in game, only so many items released, only so much players will pay and usually the characters are capped at a certain amount just as a safe fall.

    The only thing that ruins this apart from gold farmers/sellers are exploits/dupes that blow the amount of money out of proportion and then spread among a small group. Then we see inflation and crazy prices because these now "rich" players don't care how much they spend and throw it around like they are kings, which leads to a huge imbalance but if this can be controlled and you guys help us test the game through alpha and beta we can pick these exploits and dupes up before we go live, stopping this from happening.

    • 9115 posts
    January 14, 2015 5:07 AM PST
    Sevens said:
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:

     

     

    To handle the free trial too, there are many ways but a successful one is to limit trials to an island or trial starting area so they could try early portions of the game out but couldn't interact or interfere with paying customers. That is one way there are many though.

     

    but if you put new players on a starting island you lose the whole starting city feel...unless when they go from free to sub they have to start from scratch?

    This is just speaking from my own thoughts, but I was referring to a system for people who download the game and start a free trial (that may be timed?) they would be able to create characters as per normal but then enter the world in a trial/free zone/island starting area to test out the first X amount of levels and this way no gold spammers could infiltrate the "mainland" with tons of free accounts, they would have to sub.

    This method would of course allow all subscribers and paying members to create a character and start in the starting area of their characters race. If someone converted their free trial into a sub/membership, they would start again fresh on the mainland without restrictions in their characters racial starting area.

    Again, just an idea I had, not speaking on behalf of VRI here, just trying to brainstorm and come up with a few idea's that could be implemented if needed. I have seen methods like this work very well in other games. this wouldn't affect you or I or any other supporter with a pledge or membership/subscription and it would allow players who are not sure to "try" a controlled portion of the game.

     

     

    One thing that EQ2 did with the free trial people...You started in the newbie zones and any char you created would continue on once you subbed BUT as long as you were on the free trial you had NO access to any universal chat, no zone chat, couldnt send tells (unless the person was on your friends list)...Pretty much all you had was /say or /group (though no one grouped in that game). I thought it was a pretty good system and worked pretty well.

    Yes, that can be a very good way also mate, good point. I don't think gold farmers would care about talking in chat though, they just create multiple accounts to farm on, so as long as we cut the level off early enough and restricted the free trial players in a way that protected the paying members and the game in general (possible time limit too with an account block to stop multiple free trials) I think we will be ok but again, we can test these things in alpha/beta when the time comes ;)

    • 610 posts
    January 14, 2015 5:17 AM PST
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:

     

     

    To handle the free trial too, there are many ways but a successful one is to limit trials to an island or trial starting area so they could try early portions of the game out but couldn't interact or interfere with paying customers. That is one way there are many though.

     

    but if you put new players on a starting island you lose the whole starting city feel...unless when they go from free to sub they have to start from scratch?

    This is just speaking from my own thoughts, but I was referring to a system for people who download the game and start a free trial (that may be timed?) they would be able to create characters as per normal but then enter the world in a trial/free zone/island starting area to test out the first X amount of levels and this way no gold spammers could infiltrate the "mainland" with tons of free accounts, they would have to sub.

    This method would of course allow all subscribers and paying members to create a character and start in the starting area of their characters race. If someone converted their free trial into a sub/membership, they would start again fresh on the mainland without restrictions in their characters racial starting area.

    Again, just an idea I had, not speaking on behalf of VRI here, just trying to brainstorm and come up with a few idea's that could be implemented if needed. I have seen methods like this work very well in other games. this wouldn't affect you or I or any other supporter with a pledge or membership/subscription and it would allow players who are not sure to "try" a controlled portion of the game.

     

     

    One thing that EQ2 did with the free trial people...You started in the newbie zones and any char you created would continue on once you subbed BUT as long as you were on the free trial you had NO access to any universal chat, no zone chat, couldnt send tells (unless the person was on your friends list)...Pretty much all you had was /say or /group (though no one grouped in that game). I thought it was a pretty good system and worked pretty well.

    Yes, that can be a very good way also mate, good point. I don't think gold farmers would care about talking in chat though, they just create multiple accounts to farm on, so as long as we cut the level off early enough and restricted the free trial players in a way that protected the paying members and the game in general (possible time limit too with an account block to stop multiple free trials) I think we will be ok but again, we can test these things in alpha/beta when the time comes ;)

    Well the thing about restricting the chat was the farmers would create an account...spam the crap out of every channel until banned, rinse and repeat

    • 9115 posts
    January 14, 2015 5:20 AM PST
    Sevens said:
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:

     

     

    To handle the free trial too, there are many ways but a successful one is to limit trials to an island or trial starting area so they could try early portions of the game out but couldn't interact or interfere with paying customers. That is one way there are many though.

     

    but if you put new players on a starting island you lose the whole starting city feel...unless when they go from free to sub they have to start from scratch?

    This is just speaking from my own thoughts, but I was referring to a system for people who download the game and start a free trial (that may be timed?) they would be able to create characters as per normal but then enter the world in a trial/free zone/island starting area to test out the first X amount of levels and this way no gold spammers could infiltrate the "mainland" with tons of free accounts, they would have to sub.

    This method would of course allow all subscribers and paying members to create a character and start in the starting area of their characters race. If someone converted their free trial into a sub/membership, they would start again fresh on the mainland without restrictions in their characters racial starting area.

    Again, just an idea I had, not speaking on behalf of VRI here, just trying to brainstorm and come up with a few idea's that could be implemented if needed. I have seen methods like this work very well in other games. this wouldn't affect you or I or any other supporter with a pledge or membership/subscription and it would allow players who are not sure to "try" a controlled portion of the game.

     

     

    One thing that EQ2 did with the free trial people...You started in the newbie zones and any char you created would continue on once you subbed BUT as long as you were on the free trial you had NO access to any universal chat, no zone chat, couldnt send tells (unless the person was on your friends list)...Pretty much all you had was /say or /group (though no one grouped in that game). I thought it was a pretty good system and worked pretty well.

    Yes, that can be a very good way also mate, good point. I don't think gold farmers would care about talking in chat though, they just create multiple accounts to farm on, so as long as we cut the level off early enough and restricted the free trial players in a way that protected the paying members and the game in general (possible time limit too with an account block to stop multiple free trials) I think we will be ok but again, we can test these things in alpha/beta when the time comes ;)

    Well the thing about restricting the chat was the farmers would create an account...spam the crap out of every channel until banned, rinse and repeat

    Yeah exactly, I agree with you but I think also restricting the level and possibly the zone can further deter them from farming too. They are a cancer on the gaming industry and I really want to control them in Pantheon :)

    • 154 posts
    January 14, 2015 7:21 PM PST
    Zircon said:

    I'll mention the system that was used in Runescape, one the best MMO's in terms of economy and skills. In Runescape you could only trade for something if you posted equal value in the trade within a certain threshold. If there is such a thing as perfect virtual economy, Runescape was it, if not very close. I'm not advocating this, though I'd support it, I think it's a mistake to not at least discuss it. Someone on the Runescape team must have had a degree in economics.

     

    eg. Player Jack wants to trade a dagger worth 100plat to Player Jill. Player Jill can only receive 1p with nothing in return once an hour (lets say 1P is the threshold for level 1). This means in order for Jill to receive the 100PP dagger she needs to put some combination of items and PP that combines to atleast 99PP. It Jill had received 1pp from someone else for free 10 minutes prior, she would need to post 100pp combined to receive the dagger (or more, up to Jack's threshold limit).

     

    What this meant is that if Jill didn't have 100PP net worth leading up to this, there was no way to get the dagger without Jill earning 100PP some way, other than it being given to her by another player. This did not mean she had to farm some camp for hours to get the dagger, enter tradeskills. Yes, you could give Jill 1pp every hour to help boost her up, but this just wasn't feasible in Runescape the numbers didn't work, nor should they.Jill could, however, train a gathering skill which had very little if any startup cost, like a fishing pole or axe for cutting trees, and sell wood/fish (or any other number of gathering items) while she worked up to the 100P to get the dagger she wanted. The more she trained her gathering skill, the higher PP/hour she would earn. Unlike EQ, you were not limited to max level of any skill by overall level (combat was a skill just like fishing/woodcutting). A high level gathering skill was invaluable. 

     

    So what were the takeways of this kind of system? You had to monitor and build your net worth, items were easy to sell, you could track the value of items online, buying/selling items and speculating was a real thing. Your net worth in the game was vital. 

     

    Pro's:

     

    -Gold farming/selling: Gold was difficult (near impossible) to trade to other players, since Runescape was loot based pvp, you could goto an area to have the other player kill/loot you, and probably various other exploits, but trying to bot/farm gold mainly benefited that character as you could not simply just transfer wealth. Exploits could be safeguarded.

    -Twinking problem is solved. Alt's have nothing to put in trade in return. There could be built in bonuses though for chars on the same account, relaxed restrictions on plat/hour that you can trade, etc. (IMO no restriction would be a bad idea, but maybe an autotransfer from Main to ALT every hour even when offline to help boost the ALT's finances)

    -Crafting thrives, there were dozens of skills in Runescape that would boost your net worth. You could gather all day, buy non-level restricted armor (no need for level restrictions since you are already restricted by $$) then level up your actual char after you were proficient in some skill that made you money. For me the answer was fishing, I maxed fishing which took a lifetime, but while I did it I boost my net worth substantially. Gathering definitely paid off. A 99 fisher who was low level in combat, but in dragon armor with a high end sword/shield was legit because 99 fishing took months and months to achieve. 

    -Item liquidity (Everything was quick and easy to buy/sell for fair prices). The tiers of weapons/armour you bought could go right back on the market for around what you paid.

    -Much less reliance on NO DROP items, could do away with the NO DROP concept entirely. 

    -Combat was optional, you could make a career in the game in many ways. I'm not saying it should be that way in Pantheon, but if all you wanted to do was travel the world and fish, it was certainly viable. 

    -Best economy I've seen hands down. 

     

    Con's

    -Can't just give a friend an item that you don't want/need and don't have desire to sell. (The upshot though, is you can just throw it on the AH and sell it easily)

    -Runescape was not group centric, all mobs you killed you picked up all the items. In a group game ninja-looting would become a concern because whoever picked the item up would get that boost in net worth (unless a better system was developed to support it)

     

    Con/Pro

    -Trading done primarily through AH system.

     

     

    Its an interesting thought. I don't particularly like it though because it requires each and every item to have an preset value. I like the value of items to change with the growth of the game. Like Brad said above by changing the availability of an item the cost of the item will change. I remember when I first started playing EQ the Short Sword of the Yekeshia was pretty expensive but a few years later the price dipped do to lack of demand as a result of the changing dual wielding combo's and it availability. 

     

    The mentioning of someone with an economics degree is interesting to me. It is a question I would ask the Devs is if they plan on bringing in an economist to design the in game economy? I know my buddy wrapped up his econ masters and went off and got a job designing in game economies (I have a suspension at least part of his work is the F2P economies). If the team were to do something like that when in the development cycle would it be?

    • 154 posts
    January 14, 2015 7:36 PM PST
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:
    Kilsin said:
    Sevens said:

     

     

    To handle the free trial too, there are many ways but a successful one is to limit trials to an island or trial starting area so they could try early portions of the game out but couldn't interact or interfere with paying customers. That is one way there are many though.

     

    but if you put new players on a starting island you lose the whole starting city feel...unless when they go from free to sub they have to start from scratch?

    This is just speaking from my own thoughts, but I was referring to a system for people who download the game and start a free trial (that may be timed?) they would be able to create characters as per normal but then enter the world in a trial/free zone/island starting area to test out the first X amount of levels and this way no gold spammers could infiltrate the "mainland" with tons of free accounts, they would have to sub.

    This method would of course allow all subscribers and paying members to create a character and start in the starting area of their characters race. If someone converted their free trial into a sub/membership, they would start again fresh on the mainland without restrictions in their characters racial starting area.

    Again, just an idea I had, not speaking on behalf of VRI here, just trying to brainstorm and come up with a few idea's that could be implemented if needed. I have seen methods like this work very well in other games. this wouldn't affect you or I or any other supporter with a pledge or membership/subscription and it would allow players who are not sure to "try" a controlled portion of the game.

     

     

    One thing that EQ2 did with the free trial people...You started in the newbie zones and any char you created would continue on once you subbed BUT as long as you were on the free trial you had NO access to any universal chat, no zone chat, couldnt send tells (unless the person was on your friends list)...Pretty much all you had was /say or /group (though no one grouped in that game). I thought it was a pretty good system and worked pretty well.

    Yes, that can be a very good way also mate, good point. I don't think gold farmers would care about talking in chat though, they just create multiple accounts to farm on, so as long as we cut the level off early enough and restricted the free trial players in a way that protected the paying members and the game in general (possible time limit too with an account block to stop multiple free trials) I think we will be ok but again, we can test these things in alpha/beta when the time comes ;)

    Well the thing about restricting the chat was the farmers would create an account...spam the crap out of every channel until banned, rinse and repeat

    Yeah exactly, I agree with you but I think also restricting the level and possibly the zone can further deter them from farming too. They are a cancer on the gaming industry and I really want to control them in Pantheon :)

    The free trial issue is an interesting one. I am with you guys about the EQ2 sort of way but instead of an island or something it would be something less detached like a cloistered "training" area. Beyond that I find it interesting how many people hear have had bad issues with gold spammers and farmers. The only game I have played that they were really plagues was Lineage. I don't remember them in EQ, EQ2, or VG. I always thought the combination of a monthly fee, the game difficulty, and the lack of easy auto target, attack, loot macros made it difficult. I remember being able to sell whole EQ accounts to people but that never bothered me because I did not see it advertised in game and it still would require someone to spend the time to get a character to lvl 60 or whatever.

     

    I also feel that really one key part of this could be what I discussed in the original post a living breathing macro economy. If someone is hunting a specific  population and they are slaughtering everything in sight it would make since that the next group that spawn or "migrate" would have less money on them do to not being alive as long. I know this would not work in newbie areas but I can't imagine that if you removed the auto-target feature, requiring non grouped people to actually click on a target that it would ever be worth the time to simply harvest a newbie area. Maybe I am wrong but for most gold sellers there has to be a time cost benefit if the farming method does not generate the monthly fee or to much above it then its not going to be worth it to gold harvest.


    This post was edited by cram9030 at January 14, 2015 7:42 PM PST