Curse

Nexus Icon · Nov 20, 2006, 08:57 AM // 08:57

Now this one will get a LOT of people riled, but I'll pre-empt that by stating that those who hate this idea the most will be those who play GW purely for the economy.
I also in no way, shape or form expect this to be implemented, even though one of the benefits to ANet would be killing off the eBay gold market.

Kill the economy.
Destroy it, dispatch of it, remove the need for it.
In a game, I see no need for a market that tries to emulate real-world economies.
At the moment, players are beginning to feel more and more disenfranchised with what little reward they get for playing GW PvE. Only those who play the market and continuously farm can afford to get their hands on the best bling.
And yet quest rewards have actually gotten worse.
Where you used to receive skills for completing quests, now you just receive a piffling amount of money, some XP and maybe something you can trade for a key or superior salvage / ID kit.
There is no reward for completing a hard quest line, just a "Well done, have some pocket change" from the quest giver.
So...
Make max armour free as and when you find the crafter and do his quest.
Do the same for weapons.
Make all dyes free, and I'm sure you'll see a LOT more variety in characters.
Make "Bling" armour and weapons a reward for completing a quest.
Unlock armour and weapon mods for completing quests, then let the players apply them to their armours at will in outposts in much the same way as the PvP gear window works.

Cons:
You would lose player-to-player trade, resulting in a loss of social interaction.
Drops would become non-existant. There would be no point after all, and even I must admit to a little pleasure when something cool drops off of a monster.

Pros:
People could not exploit and scam others.
Local chat would clear up miraculously, allowing people to use the channel for socialising.
The eBay market would disappear.
You could use someone's appearance in game to judge their competence to some degree at least.
With more options more widely available, there would be greater individuality.
Players would be able to better advise others on builds knowing that everyone would have access to the best gear, improving player knowledge overall.

Let the flames begin...

lord_shar · Nov 20, 2006, 09:10 AM // 09:10

No flames, but if the current GW games does away with the PvE gradual economic progression and reward system in favor of "get it quick, get it now!", then there's nothing for players to earn and strive for. Without allowing characters to gradually evolve, re-playability dies out very FAST.

Nexus Icon · Nov 20, 2006, 09:19 AM // 09:19

Hence the quest rewards.
Make the most prized stuff hard to get by making players do a series of quests in a chain, and for the really good stuff, make each one of those quests "Master" in difficulty.
This whole idea relies on the developers constantly adding new stuff to the game, in the shape of quests, gear, whatever.
THERE'S your replayability problems solved.

Thom Bangalter · Nov 20, 2006, 09:28 AM // 09:28

That would require anet to consistently update content, which goes against their business model.

Xtroll · Nov 20, 2006, 09:38 AM // 09:38

Quote:

Kill the economy.
Destroy it, dispatch of it, remove the need for it.

You are kidding right?, well ok the economy might seem to be a bit off in GW, but basicly because it's thons of pll out there following way overpriced forum lists, you can usaly get the best items for 1/3 of guide prices If you spend some time serching the marked.

Quote:

Make max armour free as and when you find the crafter and do his quest.
Do the same for weapons.

Wouldent that result in a lot of pll constantly nagging their guild for a droknar run "for free as there is no economy", and a bunch of pll running around with identical wepons, and probably wery identical builds to suport the wepon?

Quote:

Make all dyes free, and I'm sure you'll see a LOT more variety in characters.

Yeah right???? I think you would find whole towns full of black armors, the dye economy actualy makes the variety, as the prices go up and down pll will buy different colors. If you think about the dye mixing part, I realy think it's way to many out there loving black.

Combine that with your free armor of choice, now you got a lot of black pll with identical armors (as the more expencive ones do look cooler) identical wepons and identical builds running around wondering what to do after they finished the storymode in PvE.....

ok ok, im putting it way on the edge here, but removing the economy?

garethporlest18 · Nov 20, 2006, 09:41 AM // 09:41

I'd lose interest in the game. I like making money to buy things, I like taking that time to make that money, I don't want things handed to me and I don't want things hard. I think that would take away a lot of the fun with the game.

Nickhimself · Nov 20, 2006, 10:15 AM // 10:15

Unfortunately, the cons far out-weigh the pros here.

Reasons behind economy in games:
Create a basis of "Good items" vs "crappy items". This is a very easy way for newer players to realize what is worth finding compared to what is crappy even though it sounds good at first.

Gives people a reason to play the game, when not questing. If there were no economy, you would quest to the end of the game, then probably quit. There would be no need to talk to anyone in town, since most of the time (just go to the temple of balth) it turns into a raunchy internet chat room thanks to one dick joke.

Makes finding items worth the trouble / Gives you a reason to spend the money you've aquired. If you just collect money, as is the case in single-player RPG's, you end up saying "what the hell can I spend my money on? 9,999,999 Phoenix Downs?". When there is a market for items, you can make money / spend money depending on your current financial situation.

Those are just a couple reasons as to why an economy is worth playing games for.

On the other hand:

Inflated prices thanks to shady businessmen causes a lot of frustration when you really just need a weapon but collector's weapons are just crappy / never have the right combination of mods you seem to be looking for.

example: Ghial's Staff. It's widely advertised as "the best MM staff in the game." This is false. It's not an MM staff, or it would have corpse exploitation benefit in some way. It's a Death Magic staff. Just because it's Death Magic doesn't mean it's only usable by MM spec's. If anything, The Nightbringer is a better MM staff if only for it's 40% faster casting speed. Getting that Flesh Golem out faster than the Ghial's wielder makes that "omg uber" staff worthless.

Greedy players will, instead of doing what you should do with in-game items: sell them / use them in-game, will turn to Ebay to sell these farmed items for real life money. First of all, I want to meet the people that buy green's from Ebay, so I can get them to buy me stuff since they obviously have a very disposable income. Secondly, what kind of person even thinks to sell something they found in the game on a website designed for REAL items?

Scandalous. That's really all there is to that.

Basically, without an economy, we might as well be playing Solitaire with a chat room.

lord_shar · Nov 20, 2006, 10:27 AM // 10:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nexus Icon

Hence the quest rewards.
Make the most prized stuff hard to get by making players do a series of quests in a chain, and for the really good stuff, make each one of those quests "Master" in difficulty.
This whole idea relies on the developers constantly adding new stuff to the game, in the shape of quests, gear, whatever.
THERE'S your replayability problems solved.

The problem with proposal is that it requires more overhead manpower than what the game's non-subscription model can handle. Also, quests are generally good for only 1 run per character before it loses general player interest (no more surprise factor).

The replayability problem hasn't been solved if manual intervention is required to keep players interested.

Games like Diablo1 + 2, and consequently GW, have proven random treasure drop system that appeal to the general masses. Randomness = surprise factor = sustainable living, interactive economy. Get rid of this random drop system, and you lose the popular player base.

Sli Ander · Nov 20, 2006, 10:35 AM // 10:35

Let me start off by saying I don't do much trading. Only when I get something really good dropped do I attempt to do other than merch it. I also don't farm much. I have one area I go to if I'm low on cash, but I try to keep a good nest egg. I don't spend much, so I don't farm much. That being said:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nexus Icon

Where you used to receive skills for completing quests, now you just receive a piffling amount of money, some XP and maybe something you can trade for a key or superior salvage / ID kit.

While I agree on the money, I actually like getting an id or salvage kit. It saves me money since I was doing the quests anyway.

Quote:

There is no reward for completing a hard quest line, just a "Well done, have some pocket change" from the quest giver.
So...
Make max armour free as and when you find the crafter and do his quest.
Do the same for weapons.
Make all dyes free, and I'm sure you'll see a LOT more variety in characters.

If you make things free you do take away the fun of getting them, as someone already stated. There is a great satisfaction in earning something you want.

Quote:

Make "Bling" armour and weapons a reward for completing a quest.

"Bling" Armor is a reward for a quest. Its called Obsidian Armor.

Quote:

Unlock armour and weapon mods for completing quests, then let the players apply them to their armours at will in outposts in much the same way as the PvP gear window works.

Here,again, I like things the way they are. I can see the upside of having weapon mods always accessible(it would certainly help put together a weapon to go with your build) but definitely not for armor. I, too, enjoy seeing that gold drop come off. I don't pvp, but I do keep track of the mods I unlock. I am most proud of the progress I've made on certain superior runes.

Quote:

The eBay market would disappear.

On one side yes, but the other side is that 'uber' accounts would still be sold. People would also simply start paying to have quests done for them.

Quote:

You could use someone's appearance in game to judge their competence to some degree at least.

Just as some people can be seen to be competent through their FOW armor? Appearance shouldn't be used to judge competence(same with titles), and won't show the difference between a competent character that doesn't want to bother with fancy gear, and an Ebayer that does.

Quote:

With more options more widely available, there would be greater individuality.
Players would be able to better advise others on builds knowing that everyone would have access to the best gear, improving player knowledge overall.

True to a certain degree. There are several factors in why people show individuality: they want a certain item for prestige, or its all they could afford. If anybody could get anything through a simple quest(not even like FOw which has a high cost), then desiribilty goes down and you'll see a lot of people simply stop caring. They'll end up making the same choices for different reasons, and 'individuality' of appearance will not change.

But the biggest factor in my disagreement with making items questable, with no gold involved, no materials involved, is that I want a challenge. I want a purpose in the game that my character can go for as I write his story. I want a goal for him, whether it be to get GMC title or simply to be able to switch to an armor I like better. If you start making things easier, people will start getting bored.

But that's just my two cents

*Darcy* · Nov 20, 2006, 11:41 AM // 11:41

I don't even know the rough percentage of ebayers playing GW, but even if they make up 50%, why should the rest of us have the gameplay ruined in an attempt to get rid of them.

So far, the only armor for which I have spent time collecting materials, is my warrior's 1.5k Kurzick. But now I like the looks of the Vabbian for my mesmer, so I have a new goal outside finishing the game. This keeps your interest in the game and gives you a sense of accomplishment when the goal is reached.

So, your suggestion would take away that pleasure from my type of player just to punish ebayers. Who would just quit GW and move to a more exploitable game, leaving the rest of us with nothing to work towards.

Nexus Icon · Nov 20, 2006, 11:41 AM // 11:41

When I see FoW armour in game, the cynical side of me automatically thinks "They eBayed the gold to get that". I know that there's a lot of players out there who don't do this, but come on, all FoW armour is about is cash. The quest to get the armour itself is trivial.

As for the devs having to add quests, I'm not saying add more areas or even add more monsters. Quests themselves seem to be very easy to put together thanks to GW's robust instanced world and the way it can change depending on the player's quest log. A quest is basically an NPC quest giver, a page of text with a "Yes / No" response and some monsters placed somewhere in an existing map.
Come on, that's not equivalent to writing a whole new chapter.
I'm just surprised we haven't seen MORE of these quests added. But ANet seems intent on pumping out special weekend after special weekend, adversely affecting the economy by creating over-farming for a short period of time.
If they put half the work into providing weekly simple quest updates that they put into, say, the Dragon Festival, we'd have hours and hours of new quest material on a weekly basis.
Players couldn't rush through a quest chain that was updated weekly, and could work towards a reward at the end. There's your sense of achievement and reward rolled into one.
Focussing purely on financial rewards distorts the world and enforces this ridiculous economy GW has.

It also makes completely the WRONG thing more valuable than others.
For example, the tried and trusted 15^50 weapon mod.
For PvE, there are a LOT better mods out there if you think about your build for more than 2 seconds (+15% in stance, +15% -5e, +15% -10AL etc.), but the majority of players never even consider these due to how inflated the price on 15^50 gear has become. Players are being misinformed by market trends.
Another perfect example is sundering weapons.
Generally considered utter junk by the more experienced players, sundering commands ridiculously high prices and has become so ridiculously popular that the majority of greens in Nightfall now have this, quite frankly, junk mod.

If people had free access to weapons with a wide range of modifications, they would be able to better choose a weapon based on the circumstances they find themselves in. Better informed players makes for better grouping due to people knowing their stuff.
As it stands, we end up with thousands of players forking over ridiculous amounts of their hard-earned (or ebayed) gold for substandard junk because it has mods that the market has made seem attractive due to restrictive pricing.

It's positively laughable.
I look at my gear, and whilst not being the height of bling, it's the best damn gear I can get (as far as I'm concerned). I have weapons for every circumstance I can imagine, a set of each of the best armours with alternate helmets and gloves depending on build, and the best part? It was all dirt cheap, or even free thanks to collectors.

Now the pain in the arse is this gear is taking up ridiculous amounts of storage, something that is only needed if you have an economy.
If I were able to change my gear in the same way PvP players could, I wouldn't NEED storage. I could pick and choose equipment depending on what I'd unlocked. In fact, given that ANet has always been big on trying to integrate PvE and PvP, I can't understand why such a model isn't ALREADY implemented.

So make that another argument for ditching the economy: No more storage.
This means players won't be able to horde stuff and falsely inflate or deflate prices based on how much stuff they release into the economy.

Other examples of expanding replayability?
Look at the impact titles have had on the PvE game.
People LOVE them. They love the idea of being able to pimp their achievements under their names and other players aspire to some of the titles they see on others. I recently made another suggestion regarding Kill Counts and monster bestiaries, both things that are probably incredibly easy to implement for the devs. These things could also be linked to titles, as suggested in that thread.
Suddenly there's a whole plethora of things to pursue instead of just more money, all of which require minimal effort on behalf of the devs.
Hell, they've already linked salvage chance percentages to one of the titles, so let's take this even further: you can only get certain skins if you've achieved a certain rank in a title...

With a little imagination, there really is no need at all for an in-game economy.

MithranArkanere · Nov 20, 2006, 11:50 AM // 11:50

I like to make some crafting NPC a quest rewards, but... if you want instant stuff.. go to PvP.

The only thing we should get rid of is any transaction over 100k. That maimum is there for something.

DIH49 · Nov 20, 2006, 11:59 AM // 11:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nexus Icon

Now this one will get a LOT of people riled, but I'll pre-empt that by stating that those who hate this idea the most will be those who play GW purely for the economy.

Starting off an argument with a character attack on the opposition is very poor form. It's also a fallacy which you can read more about here.

Quote:

I also in no way, shape or form expect this to be implemented, even though one of the benefits to ANet would be killing off the eBay gold market.

I question whether that is actually a benefit, but let's leave that issue aside for the moment.

Quote:

In a game, I see no need for a market that tries to emulate real-world economies.

Need? This is a game, there's no conception of necessity, only desire (aside from logican entailment based on desire of course). It is not a question of needing an economy, it is a question of wanting one. And the reason Anet wants one is because it allows for a good drop reward system. In multi-player games with no economy rewards are meaningless. You can have merely what everyone else does, since everyone is capable of doing the same quests and areas. Lack of variety is boring and unfun, and neither of those sell games.

The system you propose is effectively the one that currently exists for PvP characters. How much variety do you see there? Prevalence equals meaninglessness. If I have something and so does everyone else, what I have is worthless. Worthless things make for bad rewards. Further, and I see that you note this, you highly reduce the amount of player to player interaction in a game based around that very idea. This is a very, very bad thing. In any multi-player persistent game you want to do two major things. First, you want to maximize player interaction. How many times have you seen someone say they stuck around for the people? Player interaction is one of the, if not the largest, reason people play multi-player games. The second thing you want to do is make sticking around worth their time. If they love the people and hate the game, the group just goes elsewhere. I can play with my buddes at NWN2 just as easily as GW, and if NWN2 is a better game then why should GW see my money? You have to encourage people to stick around. No one does this better than WoW, and WoW works off of one single axiom: Always reward people. WoW understands that people want to compete with their peers. They want to show off and be "uber" and "1337" and whatever else these sort of people say. By constantly offering rewards you give people incentive to stick around and play it one level further. These sort of people then go on to buy WoW XPacks, or GW1.1 or whatever for the game they're on.

Quote:

There is no reward for completing a hard quest line, just a "Well done, have some pocket change" from the quest giver.

Excellent point, GW needs a better reward system. The problem with your position is you saw a bad reward system and said, "We can fix this by removing rewards altogether!" instead of "We better make an improved reward system." The former doesn't work, the latter does. It's just that simple.

electrofish · Nov 20, 2006, 12:05 PM // 12:05

/signed

liked the idea overall

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nexus Icon

Cons:
You would lose player-to-player trade, resulting in a loss of social interaction.
Drops would become non-existant. There would be no point after all, and even I must admit to a little pleasure when something cool drops off of a monster.

Example of social interaction in current trade:

A: WTS 1337 sword !!111!1!1!shift1
B: how much?
A: offer
B: 7k?
A: Noob!! "£$%^&*() it's worth at least 100K $%^&*

You bet I'll miss that kind of social interaction.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nexus Icon

Pros:
People could not exploit and scam others.
Local chat would clear up miraculously, allowing people to use the channel for socialising.
The eBay market would disappear.
You could use someone's appearance in game to judge their competence to some degree at least.
With more options more widely available, there would be greater individuality.
Players would be able to better advise others on builds knowing that everyone would have access to the best gear, improving player knowledge overall.

Let the flames begin...

Make it so that the *elite* armors can only be obtained by doing missions like urgoz or the deep, with free dyes there should be more than enough customization anyway.

Nexus Icon · Nov 20, 2006, 12:17 PM // 12:17

DIH49:
If you read my next post, I proposed very definite rewards that could exist WITHOUT an economy. Also, as far as social interaction goes, are you REALLY saying that "WTS" and "WTB" (but mostly "WTS") are valid forms of social intercourse?
Without the trade in local and hopefully a larger amount of quests to choose from with very definite rewards, local chat would hopefully consist more of people actually talking to eachother and discussing the difficulties associated with said quests.
I would hope that this would create a stronger community feel.

As for your argument regarding worth, it swings both ways. What value does anything have in the current economical system when anyone can go out and farm gold to buy the stuff they want?
You only have to look around to see how many people are having problems with Nightfall's difficulty, so not everybody could have something if you made the quests hard enough to do. Even better, if you had to work with others to achieve something, you're increasing social interaction again.

There's one fantastic example in the game at the moment of something that can't be bought and requires some dedication from the player to get: the UW Black Widow pet.
People form groups to go and get this pet, they spend time learning tactics from one another, and other people desire the pet and see it as something to aspire to. And there's no money involved at all (aside from the trivial UW entry fee).

soulkeepertdd · Nov 20, 2006, 12:18 PM // 12:18

I think the devs must know who uses ebay for gold.Or it must be easy to monitor.If a guy has 10k in his account then he gets 10 trades of 100k within 2 minutes from the same player i would be 90% sure he has not just sold items worth 1 mil.if that same person is found trading 1 mil again later on then anet must be able to be track it.If the game remembers every 0.1% of the map i have explored keeping track of high traders must be easy enough to do.

my old guild had a guy never rearly famed within 2 weeks he had fow armour for 2 of his chars.He might have had the greens of all greens but to be honest it does make you think he has got his gold from a gold site.

I do think its funny that people feel the need for status so badly they would spend £20-£40 just to wear armour,weapons in a game.

DIH49 · Nov 20, 2006, 01:16 PM // 13:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nexus Icon

DIH49:
If you read my next post, I proposed very definite rewards that could exist WITHOUT an economy. Also, as far as social interaction goes, are you REALLY saying that "WTS" and "WTB" (but mostly "WTS") are valid forms of social intercourse?

A fairly base and coarse form, but it is absolutely social interaction. But aside from this, regular trading occurs fairly commonly between all sorts of people. From the elovers trading each other presear flowers to my trading a sigil to my Guild Leader for a new hall. All of this would go away if you had an economy removal (as so long as trading exists economies will arise).

Quote:

I would hope that this would create a stronger community feel.

It wouldn't because you run into the issue of rarity again. So long as everyone has a thing, that thing is worthless. If you were to make all rewards quest based (like WoW) then the only way to make the rewards valuable is to make them rare. Like WoW, you may need to do the quest 30 times to get your Epic Carrot Top and another 30 to get your Epic Carrot Base. Of course, this does essentially the same thing we already have with weapons (though not armor). You go farm and rarely get a good drop that is then worth a whole bunch precisely due to its rarity. In your proposed system you don't want rarity. Since nothing is rare nothing is valuable, and since nothing is valuable no one goes after the things in the first place. And if they aren't going after the rewards then they certainly aren't making groups to get them (they'd just use heroes anyways, but that's a separate point).

Quote:

As for your argument regarding worth, it swings both ways. What value does anything have in the current economical system when anyone can go out and farm gold to buy the stuff they want?

Quite a bit thanks to the time function of money. Everyone knows that money = time, and pretty much everyone values their time to some degree ort another. So spending a certain amount of time at something confers a certain value corresponding with that time spent. This is the same way it works in Real Life. After all, one could argue that farming and getting a job are essentially the same thing. From your argument it would follow then that because I had a job that nothing in the economy was valuable. Absurd, wouldn't you agree?

Quote:

You only have to look around to see how many people are having problems with Nightfall's difficulty, so not everybody could have something if you made the quests hard enough to do. Even better, if you had to work with others to achieve something, you're increasing social interaction again.

A vague few have a difficulty with NF. The campaign is designed so that on average players can get through it while playing absolutely terrible builds. The vast majority of players would not have this difficulty, and therefore would achieve the reward you propose. Then we run into the problem of rarity again, which I mentioned in detail in my earlier post.

There's also an important point that you neglected to respond to. Namely, that people like playing the market game. People enjoy it, and a lot of people enjoy it. So many people in fact that calls for a better market system have been one of the largest, if not the largest, requests from the playerbase. When your customers really like something you do, the last thing you want to do is stop doing it. At least if you want those customers to stick around.

Amity and Truth · Nov 20, 2006, 02:15 PM // 14:15

People are just way to different for communism to work. It's the age old flaw of communism, equality looks nice on the paper but the base requirement isn't met. How can everyone be equal when they're clearly not?
It allready manifests itself in something as basic as love.
I love my girlfriend because she is different from the rest, not because she is one of the horde of clones. She is special to me.

Dark Helmet · Nov 20, 2006, 02:23 PM // 14:23

You need to quest to get the Elite Sunspear armourer available. You need to play through half the game (which includes a good number of quests) to get Vabbian armor, which requires rubies... and guess what, you can get those rubies by questing.

I get all my money from quest rewards, since I don't farm (and never have, not fun for me). Just playing the game through has gotten me enough for four 15k armor sets, and almost every skill.

Not A Fifty Five · Nov 20, 2006, 02:51 PM // 14:51

/signed
/no-way-in-hell-its-gonna-happen-tho

I chest run the end of game chests and make a lot of money very fast. I bought books when nightfall came out for 50k and sold the greens I got from them for 200k. So I'm very rich now

. And I would do away with it in a second to get rid of the economy and have people actually trying for the less econmically beneficial parts of the game like challenge missions, elite missions (yaya urgoz' bow, but do the math and the average gold rate you get is 20 times slower than solo farming).

Major quests/campaigns would be done for skill points instead of gold. You remember glint quests? and how they offered like 50k experience for the last one? and yet nobody did them anyways because they gave no gold? People would do them if it offered 50k GOLD tho. This is ridiculous and stupid.

Admittedly you would lose some people to the OMGWTFNOMOREGOLDANETDIESNOW people but you always get those. But no more eonomy would mean so much mroe fun in the entirely ignored areas of the game.

This, of course, will not happen tho. I know it.