Curse

Acce · Jun 10, 2005, 02:04 PM // 14:04

As I stated in another thread, one gold sink could be to introduce items that are actually worth buying (even the slightest improvement in stats/modifiers will work)? Some (of us) don't care about the costmetic part, so that gold sinc concept doesn't really work that group.

Personally I don't understand what the actuall problem is with this 'inflation' as I havn't found anything worth buying anyway (you need to id things to unlock them anyway, and there're hardly any items worth buying which you can't find yourself anyway apart from armors which are custom)

spiritofcat · Jun 10, 2005, 02:11 PM // 14:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Acce

As I stated in another thread, one gold sink could be to introduce items that are actually worth buying (even the slightest improvement in stats/modifiers will work)? Some (of us) don't care about the costmetic part, so that gold sinc concept doesn't really work that group.

Personally I don't understand what the actuall problem is with this 'inflation' as I havn't found anything worth buying anyway (you need to id things to unlock them anyway, and there're hardly any items worth buying which you can't find yourself anyway apart from armors which are custom)

The premise of Guild Wars is that skill is more important than time spent playing.
If there were Uber items available to be bought for high amounts of gold, then this would favour people who play a lot and thus have time to amass enough gold for it.
As it is at the moment, items don't make a large difference in who wins or loses a match.

The problem with inflation is that as people get more and more gold, it become worth less and less, so anything that can't be bought for a fixed price from an NPC becomes very 'expensive', that is, it costs a lot of gold to buy. But everyone will have a lot of gold anyway. It just makes things cumbersome. If nothing was being sold for less than 1k, then you could essentially divide everyone's gold by 1000 and it would just mean they had to type less zeros in when they want to purchase something.

Acce · Jun 10, 2005, 02:29 PM // 14:29

I understand that, but my point is that most things that can be bought from NPC's (atleast what I've seen) are completely inferior to what can be found / purchused privately.

Galatea · Jun 10, 2005, 02:52 PM // 14:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by spiritofcat

Now, on a more serious note, what if player armour became dirty over time and you could pay to have it cleaned? Even pay more for special polishing job that makes it shinier than normal!

There was/is something like that in WoW, isn't there? I forget; the beta was a long while back when I played.. but didn't armor get worn out, and you'd have to get it fixed or something?

I hated that, lol.

The dirty/armor thing seems a bit hard to implement, since they'd have to make image designs that change overtime. Plus, there's different types of armor. What do the tattooed monks & scarred necros have to do? Take baths? lol.

FrogDevourer · Jun 10, 2005, 03:09 PM // 15:09

Ascetic rewards (trophies, haircuts, greetings from NPCs...) is indeed a good way to get a lot of gold out of the economy. Many people already have commented on that, so I'll expand on gambling, as it is a mandatory way to get gold off rich players who don't mind having a dirty armor and an empty guild hall.

First of all, gambling means burning something valuable such a gold, items or materials in order to get a random effect. The important word in this sentence is random. In all games including GW, you want to play the game and to be rich, and your wealth will increase your intrinsic power. There is no such thing as "100% skill, 0% grind" unless the UAS is used (which would be a lot worse for the community and the game as a whole). If two players are equally skilled, the richest player will always win. Runes, and perfect items will make you stronger.

So why is gambling a good thing for game balance?
Because using random rewards is just a way to reduce the power/wealth ratio in the upper layers of the game economy.

A good money sink is designed to get gold and items off rich players, not from poor weaklings. Veteran players already have gathered many runes, items and they have the most expensive armors/weapons in the game. The random reward ensures they can get some ultra-rare <whatever> that few other people have. Why does it have to be random instead of a fixed but exensive item (such as 15k armor)? Because gambling is addictive, and especially to players who have a lot of gold, and a lot of spare time to farm and to get more gold, or to PvP extensively for PvP rewards.

With gambling, you give useless to average rewards most of the time (read: acceptable for beginners and junk for rich players), but once in a while gamblers will get some very rare <whatever> that they can sell to keep gambling, or burn for their own use.

If the gambling fee and the reward are finely tuned, you remove gold from the economy and you inject only little wealth in return. This feature is good in that it doesn't needlessly hinder the average gamer, and it removes a lot of gold from top players. To that extent, it is the contrary of bags or ID/salvage kits. These are removing a marginal amount of gold from the economy and they are only affecting poor/average players. That's why they are very bad money sinks.

What would players want to gamble for?

- Random ascetic rewards: I know many players who would burn dozens of thousands of gold in order to have a unique and stylish weapon, armor aura or whatever. Just have a look at the popularity of black dyes, chaos axes or dragon swords. How does it translate in game? Example: Add a NPC able to randomly enchant your weapon and to change its look. 0.01% of the time, you can get a cool and very rare glow similar to chaos axe or collector edition emotes. With such a gamble, many players would burn gold, looking for stylish weapons, and very rich or very lucky players would get an ultra-rare collector weapon. Meanwhile unneeded gold is removed from the player economy.

- The perfect + epsilon item: burn gold to get a reroll your sword's mods from a crafter NPC. 99.99% of the time, you get average to good mods. Once in a while, you can hope to get very rare and valuable item such as a 15/23 sword or 17AL shields, in addition to existing mods. The ingame power of this rare mod should be small enough for casual or poor players not to be as disavantaged as when lacking superior runes or rare skills. Yet rich and competitive players would gamble quite a lot of gold in the hope of getting a perfect+epsilon item they can't buy/craft. As a result, you drastically reduced the wealth/power ratio. You have to sacrifice mountains of gold for a very small result. The power of gambling + diminishing returns.

- New quests and missions: create areas similar to UW/FoW and make them impossible to enter unless you give special items (let's call that kudzons) as entrance fee. These PvE places have average drops but they give good XP, as well as quests for elite skills (which you can still capture normally).

Each place require a kudzon of a given color. Some kudzons are common (eg: pink kudzon), some are rare, and some are incredibly rare (eg: black kudzon). You can get one of each kudzons from quests (to ensure that all players are able to play in these areas), and you can get common/rare kudzons from collectors.

Average players can visit these places at least once with fixed kudzons, and they don't need to play these areas repeatedly to enjoy the game. Grinders (read: people enjoying grind) can happily farm for kudzons and sell them to other players. Rich and lazy players will buy black kudzons for a good amount of money (thus only transfering money from one player to another).

Now let's add gamble in that. In addition to this 'fixed' way to get kudzons, add a NPC which sells random kudzons for a relatively high fee. Most of the time you would get common kudzons but once in a while you can get an ultra rare black kudzon. Casual players are not affected if they enjoy their own kudzons, and since black kudzon area won't give them anything special. Rich and lazy players who want shortcuts can get better XPs and elite skills (or just cool PvE sessions) with black kudzons, so they gamble and ditch useless kudzons. Gold is removed from the economy.

The new quests & areas do not bring anything into the economy. They only provide a shortcut for experienced and rich players. Faster leveling for alternate PvE characters, skills unlocked more easily. Casual player can play normally and go to these places once, while playing the game normally. However the main way to get to these places repeatedly is to gamble and therefore to burn gold. Rich players get a boost from their wealth (as usual) by being able to use shortcuts, but the power/wealth ratio is reduced.

- Unlocking: many PvP players are complaining about being forced to play PvE again and again to unlock skills, runes & components. This is also true for PvE players. Why can't I start playing my new W/E with the ubber Ice Spear I have unlocked with my ascended E/Mo?

After the last mission, add a NPC able to unlock skills (or component/runes for PvP only) in exchange for an item (kudzoo) that you get in PvE (quests, missions, and random drops) as well as in PvP (especially as consolation prize if you lose the game). You can get 'component kudzoos', 'skill kudzoos', and 'rune kudzoos'.

By playing the PvE game normally, you'll get enough kudzoos to unlock what you need for a few extra characters. If you want to PvP only, you can unlock stuff by getting kudzoos in PvP. If you want to unlock more or faster, you can grind and burn your wealth to buy kudzoos from a gambler NPC. Pay a few thousands of gold and you may randomly get a component kudzoo, or a skill kudzoo or even an elite skill kudzoo. Gambling is not mandatory here, but it adds a small addictive reward for players to come back and gamble for more.

Now to make it an efficient money sink, kudzoos could unlock things only temporarily, such as 24h of play time. If you don't want to play PvE extensively, just use your gold to buy kudzoos to keep your favourite setup unlocked. Gold is removed from the economy.

Conclusion: gambling is good as long as it provides items that you can get in a fixed way by playing the game. Its purpose is to provide random shortcuts to rich and lazy players who have completed all missions, as well as to promote trading between players. Using random rewards is just a way to reduce the power/wealth ratio. As long as you can still obtain what you need normally, gambling is a good way to remove gold from the player economy without injecting anything good in return.

Daedric Akaul · Jun 10, 2005, 08:27 PM // 20:27

How about charging a fee for a ticket to watch a GvG or any PvP fight.You can watch from a players view like when your dead.When you enter the arenas you have the option of "spectator" then buy a ticket to the fights.The higher level tournements would cost more than lower ones.Guilds could watch other guilds strategies like in real sports.hence the tournement options.I know lots of people would love to watch PvP.We could hold player tournements with the higher the level the guilds competing the higher the price of tickets to watch.That would create a great gold sink without giving anyone an advantage.There would be more focus on strategies by guilds to make new ones and puts focus on the guild ladder system.There wouldn't need to be a change in much programming since it already exists.It gives something the players can all get involved in regardless of their level.There's also the option of guilds charging there own prices to watch fights put on at their guildhall.
This gold sink couldn't be affected by farming or grinding and gives tons more content to the game.Imagine standing by the fire and talking to other players about last nights fight.This gives a chance to let others see certain guilds in action and become popular.Even on an individual basis with players.Seeing people win big in a fight and knowing who they are.I would definetly give respect to a fellow player in town that I saw kick butt in the PvP stuff.
I think this would give more purpose to all aspects of the game now and create a gold sink with having a great option to a much enjoyable game that no one else offers.This is my suggestion take it for what its worth
Deadric Akaul

spiritofcat · Jun 10, 2005, 11:44 PM // 23:44

Frog Dev and Akul, thanks, all your ideas sound great!
I agree that there needs to be something to sink the gold of players who don't care about looks.

eA-Zaku · Jun 11, 2005, 12:19 AM // 00:19

I like the Ascetic gambling and I like the item re-rolling even more.

Diablo II's item gambler were a huge gold sink. People would hide gold in PvP to stop others from stealing it, others would burn away their gold by gambling, in the hopes that they get something good as well as prevent the winner from picking up loot, and many, like myself, simply go PvP when we're broke and try to snag as much gold as we can from fallen players. Then we go gamble.

Mo/R9 · Jun 11, 2005, 02:58 AM // 02:58

Do the ales even do anything?

spiritofcat · Jun 11, 2005, 03:05 AM // 03:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by Galatea

The dirty/armor thing seems a bit hard to implement, since they'd have to make image designs that change overtime. Plus, there's different types of armor. What do the tattooed monks & scarred necros have to do? Take baths? lol.

Yes, Monks and Necros should definitely have to take baths occasionally.

I don't think dirty armour would be hard to implement. It would simply be a matter of reducing the shine and changing the colour towards a dirty brown.

Mo/R9, Yes, the Ale makes your screen go wobbly.

spikydude · Jun 11, 2005, 04:12 AM // 04:12

I like the idea of barbers to change your hair style and hair color

I also like the idea of being able to build your own house, and be able to furnish it.

BlaineTog · Jun 11, 2005, 06:25 AM // 06:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Daedric Akaul

How about charging a fee for a ticket to watch a GvG or any PvP fight.You can watch from a players view like when your dead.When you enter the arenas you have the option of "spectator" then buy a ticket to the fights.The higher level tournements would cost more than lower ones.Guilds could watch other guilds strategies like in real sports.hence the tournement options.I know lots of people would love to watch PvP.We could hold player tournements with the higher the level the guilds competing the higher the price of tickets to watch.That would create a great gold sink without giving anyone an advantage.There would be more focus on strategies by guilds to make new ones and puts focus on the guild ladder system.There wouldn't need to be a change in much programming since it already exists.It gives something the players can all get involved in regardless of their level.There's also the option of guilds charging there own prices to watch fights put on at their guildhall.
This gold sink couldn't be affected by farming or grinding and gives tons more content to the game.Imagine standing by the fire and talking to other players about last nights fight.This gives a chance to let others see certain guilds in action and become popular.Even on an individual basis with players.Seeing people win big in a fight and knowing who they are.I would definetly give respect to a fellow player in town that I saw kick butt in the PvP stuff.
I think this would give more purpose to all aspects of the game now and create a gold sink with having a great option to a much enjoyable game that no one else offers.This is my suggestion take it for what its worth
Deadric Akaul

Great idea, particularly if your physical character could be in attendance. In other words, there would be stands around the arena where yours and other avatars could stand and watch the fight (there would be "binoculars" which would let you get in close to watch, if you wanted). For these matches, there could be a "Crowd" channel wherein the observers can fling insults, comments, or cheers to the contestents. These areana stands would be like any other outpost, except overflow for a particular match would be stuck in binocular mode, I suppose (they could be called the "Nosebleed" seats. Or perhaps there could just be varrying degrees of price; ringside tickets are prohibitivelly expensive and only those observers could scream at the players; next would be general seats; and then nosebleeds).

The objection presents itself that a particular Guild may not want observers sitting in and taking notes. The way to fix this would be simple: if either side does not wish the match to be public, they hit a button before starting.

That would be rather cool. I know I'de pay to see a particualrly good fight, especially if it was advertised. (Monsters could drop flyers a few days before a particualrly big fight, or there could be postings in Lion's Arch or Ascalon or something).

ManadartheHealer · Jun 11, 2005, 06:52 AM // 06:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlaineTog

The objection presents itself that a particular Guild may not want observers sitting in and taking notes. The way to fix this would be simple: if either side does not wish the match to be public, they hit a button before starting.

This goes back to the argument someone else brought up that, in real life sports, opposing teams cannot opt to get rid of the crowd just because they don't want their strategy noted...

Mandy Memory · Jun 11, 2005, 07:09 AM // 07:09

Last night I was thinking about the addition of gambling as well. It could be implemented rather easily, and would create a huge money sink.

for example:

A kind of spinning disk game where whatever it lands on, you get.

100 possible slots, 1000 gold to play
all weapons are customized to the person who won it

25 slots are blank, Better luck next time

1 slot has a max damage gold rare item (of a random type) with 2 upgrades (not prefixes or suffixes, but like 15% while enchanted and 15% while health is above 50%) or a superior rune

4 slots have purple items, these would be 1 step down, but still good weapons or major runes

15 light blue decent items or minor runes

55 white items

so you want that slight edge of having a bonus while enchanted and while health is above 50%? well you have a 1 in 100 chance of getting it(1%) and a (approx) 1 in 50 chance of the rare being the sword you want (2% of 1% or .02%) at 1k per play and a .02% of getting that item you would have to spend, on average, 5,000,000 gold to get it, or have a night with lady luck

and this is just 1 game that could be implemented, what if there was a whole place where you could gamble on an island near the cometitive arena?

Quantum_Cats · Jun 11, 2005, 08:23 AM // 08:23

Player-Housing and hairdressing both come from UO originally, not Runescape.

Nomad · Jun 11, 2005, 09:39 AM // 09:39

I have heard a good deal of players mention that they wanted a 1v1 PvP arena. And with the amount of talking on here about gold sinks and gambling and an idea hit me.

A gladatorial arena, with an entry fee for all particapants (gold sink 1) say 1k from each competitor with the winner gettin 1500 gold back. Instead of charging admission to spectate the fights, during the 20 secs before the fight all the spectators get each participants level and class (and perhaps their 1v1 record) and can place bets from there, its quite common for the house to impose a small fee on all wagers (say 10%, Gold sink 2)...as extra incentive the gladiator with the best winning % every month could have a statue of himself in Lions Arch (at no cost). This idea could easily be expanded to include ladders for certain prizes.

I think that idea would be hours of entertainment for everyone, and if popular enough siphon off a ton a gold.
Nomad

PS i am really tired, so if this isnt clear i will elaborate on the idea in the morning.

Galatea · Jun 11, 2005, 03:14 PM // 15:14

I'm all for the hair-dresser & player housing/extra storage ideas.

BlaineTog · Jun 11, 2005, 07:32 PM // 19:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by ManadartheHealer

This goes back to the argument someone else brought up that, in real life sports, opposing teams cannot opt to get rid of the crowd just because they don't want their strategy noted...

It's an improper analogy. Real Life sports teams make their money off of the observers. If there was no one in the stands, they wouldn't have a compelling reason to play. In Guild Wars, you fight in the Arena because it's fun, and although you do get rewards, some of which affect everyone playing the game, there is nothing about the match that requires observers.

ComMan · Jun 11, 2005, 08:17 PM // 20:17

The long and short of it is that there need to be more things that can ONLY be gotten from vendors. If people can just get things from monsters (and only monsters, in many cases), then things will just go on as they are. People will farm to get their stuff, generating a ton of gold in the process, then spend it buying stuff that other players have farmed.

Nomad · Jun 11, 2005, 10:10 PM // 22:10

no doubt comman, the problem is finding somthing that is fun for players, and dosnt upset game balance. Consumable items have come up many times, i dont know what spells could possible be put into the consumables, i really liked the idea of reducing death penalty. However they could never contain healing spells (i didnt start a monk to be replaced by a vial of healing juice) and could never be usable in PvP, so really quickly the viability of consumables is reduced, im not going to pay much for a nonheal, no pvp potion.